MAID-DROID (2008)

From the creator of the insane Japanese zombie feature "Stacy" (2001), Naoyuki Tomomastu goes a step further with his erotically demented low- budget fantasy "Maidroid". In the not so distant future, Maria was an android that was programmed to take care of Ueno when he was a child. When he got a little older his parents died in an accident and he decided Maria would look after him. As he grew older, he became attached to her emotionally and was upset that the sexual function didn't compute because of her being a prototype. Still this being the case the love he shared for her lasted long after her battery power had died. This shows when he's an old man still talking to her and washing her, though there's no life in her anymore.While there's news reports of a series of serial rapes hitting the city, detective Yuri Akagi begins to suspect it's an android. Upon each night there seems to be an attack and Akagi might have to do something out-of- ordinary to get her suspect (and when she does it's quite a sight!?).The concept looks better on paper, than so on screen… as its rather patchwork with these two thin plot threads having no real connection, other than having something to say about society's approach to sex and love. Quite laughable with its observations of what men and women are after (especially the motivation for the serial rapist) and the sexual appetite that spurs them on (Love is eternal, nothing material about it and it's more than skin deep). Well the director does craft numerous eye-brow raising moments, both intentional and unintentional. Really it's like two different movies fused together, but have trouble gelling as the editing is a mess and it just doesn't feel right. Creative and unusual with the ideas, but the frenetic execution is ramshackle and clumsy. However there's no denying how jarring in nature it becomes; as the words lewd, sleazy and outrageous figure promptly. Soft-core sequences come from nowhere. The somewhat sweet and heartfelt romance of a man and his droid is broken up by chintzy and violent pockets of the serial rape investigation of very little groundwork. Still when they should be disturbing in detail, it's just goofy. The script is not always serious, as black humour shows up in those kinky scenes that come across like info-commercials for these maidroids. Second-rate entertainment.

Initially I had no idea what this movie was all about prior to buying it, so it was with no expectations or hopes for the movie that I sat down to watch it.The story is sort of interesting in an odd way. "Maid-Droid" tells two different stories, actually. The main story is about a young boy who gets a maid-droid to look after him, as his parents are working. Then during his teenage years, his parents dies, and he is left alone with the maid-droid. Coming into his teens, the boy discovers sexuality, but the prototype maid-droid is not able to update with a sex program. When the guy has turned old, the maid-droid is out of battery, leaving the tables turned, as the old man have to take care of the maid-droid as she had taken care of him when he was younger. "Maid-Droid" also tells the tale of a detective chasing after a robot that is raping victims in a quiet part of town.Be warned that "Maid-Droid" has a lot of nudity and adult situations, bordering on pornography. I was a bit surprised at this, as I had thought the movie to be either a romantic comedy or a comedy movie. This movie is not for everyone to see, and the adult contents should be taken into consideration before you sit down to watch it. And the movie also is dealing heavily on the Japanese fetish with lolita cosplay and maid costumes.The acting in "Maid-Droid" was adequate, although there was no real outstanding performances in particular. But for a movie of this type, I think the actors/actresses did well enough.The movie is fairly slow in its progress, but the story is still entertaining enough. Sure, at times it was cheesy and stupid, and the excessive adult situations didn't help that along, but the movie was still good enough entertainment. However, I doubt that I will make a second watching of it, because it just didn't have that much appeal.

I'm ashamed to admit that I even rented this. Obviously conceived as a combination of high science fiction and soft-core porn, it fails on both accounts. The actors do their best with bad material, especially the aged man in love with his maid droid. And in the tradition of the worst J-video schlock, it flushes any credibility down the toilet by dredging the same tired well of deviant sexuality and misogyny (get ready for that swirling simulated phallus as it menaces the poor victims). See - the women being raped are actually just horny and the rapist is satisfying them!?!!?!? The special effects are poor, the comedy is lowbrow (a malfunctioning sex-bot rips a guys junk off), and the ending is actually a repudiation of the message of the entire film to that point. Pure garbage. Do not bother with this unless you have a maid fetish or like robotic bestiality.

This seemed like the director didn't know which movie he was filming - a soft-core sci-fi porn about a robot serial rapist or a really sweet movie about a boy who grows up loving his maid robot. As it stands, either would be okay in it's own genre (soft-core vs sci-fi fantasy), but this movie just comes across as confused. There are several scenes that are hilarious if you're not easily offended by nudity and mimed sexual acts. The plot which the movie is named after is about a man, Ueno (possibly Hiroshi Fujita?), who gradually falls in love with his prototype maid-bot, Maria (played by the adorable Akiho Yoshizawa). She coaxes him to at least attempt to fall in love with a real woman and get married, but he can't stand how greedy and mean real women are in comparison to his submissive and ever-willing-to-please maid-bot. He spends almost his entire life with her even when her battery dies. In stark contrast from their love, we get to see an Otaku, a Japanese Fanboy, get berated by two single women on television for playing with dolls instead of cultivating real relationships. He finally has enough of their taunts and mean-spirited jabs and beats them up, claiming that real women want rich, handsome men and have no time for him so why should he bother trying to impress them when he can find comfort with a doll. We see him later in a hilarious scene where he tries out the newer version of maid-bot. Whereas Ueno loves Maria, the Otaku substitutes a real relationship for sex with the doll.While the Otaku samples Maid-Bot, the female detective tracking the serial rapist robot is in the next room talking to a ghost-in-the-shell puppet man who explains the difference between what men want in a partner versus what women want. The puppet also explains the drive to preserve one's life and how it applies to the rapist. The detective gets her answer and is able to solve the case.I gave this a four out of ten simply because it didn't seem like a really coherent story when meshed together. Sure, the two messages are opposite sides of the same coin, but the movie suffered from having to show both sides. I might have scored it higher if it had just focused on the old man trying to buy a new battery for his Maria.