Robot Dreams Made Me Want to Float Away - A Review

What does a robot dream about when it's all alone? 

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What does a robot dream about when it's all alone?  🤖

What does a robot dream about when it's all alone? 

Robot Dreams was a beautiful movie. I watched it yesterday and it made me laugh, cry, and feel so much my smile was beaming on the way out of the theater. It's an animated film with such a simple premise: An anthropomorphic dog and a robot become best friends. There are no words in this movie, and they don't need any. The character will do all the work for you. 

What is this weird Robot Dreams movie about? 

We start with a Dog living in New York City. This dog is chronically lonely. He gets up every day, heats up a mac and cheese meal and wastes his day on watching television. He looks at a Moose across the street being fed popcorn by his girlfriend. It makes Dog sad, but just as that happens he sees a commercial that asks if he's lonely. He gets excited and calls this company to get his very own Robot. 

This excites Dog. He thinks he's going to be very happy when Robot shows up, and he's right! He is. Once Robot gets put together, Dog and Robot hit the town the way best friends should. They eat hotdogs together. They invent a dance they do on roller skates together. They even go to the beach and use Robot's motorized paddle ability to explore the ocean. After that, they take a nap. This is where the problem comes in. 

Dog wakes up and finds that he can't lift Robot off the ground. Robot wakes up and watches but Dog just can't get him up. Dog needs to return home before coming back and trying again, but every time he makes it back, something bad happens. The beach is closed until July 1st. Dog says screw it and buys something to cut the lock with and gets arrested before as he makes his way to the beach. This is bad news. Dog is going to have to wait until the beach opens back up on June 1 to grab his new best friend. Unfortunately, it's not even Halloween yet. 

So, after being best friends for about a week, Dog and Robot will have to spend 10 months apart. They’ll go through rain, sleet, and snow without each other. Robot can't move. Dog can't get back to the beach. There's nothing they can do to be together, so Dog and Robot... dream. 

What Does The Robot Dreams About

Heeyyyy... I don't want to spoil the movie for you! 

I will tell you this though. They did such a great job rendering New York City and filling it with a variety of anthropomorphic animals. There are no humans here. Just a variety of beasts acting like we do. Animals were serving food, driving taxis, delivering mail, playing around at the beach, and looking for candy on All Hallows Eve. There's even a scene where two elephant kids are building a snowman. Their mother squeezes out of the building and pulls them inside by their floppy ears. It's funny for me to even think about it.

Since none of the characters talk like us, music is used as a way to get points across. Dog and Robot do their new dance to September by Earth Wind and Fire. The punk rock kids on the corner are bumping I Hate Hate by Reagan Youth while they hang out on the corner. The breakdancers are doing their moves to Breakdown by T La Rock. Happy by William Bell is playing when a character I call "Bookman from Good Times" runs across Robot around the movie’s end. 

Same guy down to the job and theme music! They may claim it was an accident, but we know better…

Robot Dreams is an excellent film made by a gang of Spanish speakers. The intro takes about 5 minutes showing you all the groups that teamed up to make it. That's probably why the characters gesture rather than speak. You could play this film anywhere in the world and spread a lot of joy as you travel. 

Should you see Robot Dreams?

Absolutely!

It's hard to explain how great it is and why without spoiling more of it. It explores loneliness in a way that makes you feel like you can change your destiny if you feel similarly. That’s who needs to see it most. If you’re feeling lonely or troublesome, I believe you can use Robot Dreams to gather hope for yourself. If you don’t feel that, you can still go out and enjoy the film.

So I'll leave you to go to wherever they're playing it and give it a look. It's a worthy watch and I hope you jump on the train and see for yourself.