SOLO (film)

SOLO. Norberta Barba, dir. USA/Mexico: Triumph (release), 1996. John Flock, Joseph N. Cohen, prod. Mario Van Peebles, star. William Sadler, featured villain. Based on Robert Mason's Solo diptych, q.v. under Fiction.

Van Peeble's Solo, a killer cyborg assassin, develops a conscience in conflict with his programming and goes AWOL. He finds refuge in a South American village and is hunted by Sadler's Col. Madden who leads a high-tech. military unit. Van Peeble's describes his character as "very fluid, not like a Robocop kind of guy. He could damn near pass for human[,] but he's still got certain qualities—something different about him." Described in prod. by Sean Strebin and Steve Biodrowski, Cinefantastique 28.2 (Sept. 1996): 38-39, source for this citation, and quoted. See also IMDb citation[1] and Wikipedia entry for the film, which has the source novel Mason's Weapon.[2]

In her "Review of Valerie Estelle Frankel's Star Wars Meets the Eras of Feminism, SFRA Review 51.3 (Summer 2021),[3] Kara Kennedy says that "Frankel suggests that the droid L3-37 represents a stand-out character as 'a delightful voice for empowerment' who, though cast as humorous, reminds the audience of the rights some characters must still fight for (318)."[4] We'll note that this female-gendered robot[5] is in a long tradition going back to Maria in METROPOLIS and deserves attention.

Not to be confused with the 2018 SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY.

RDE, early; and finishing 23Nov21