Short Circuit

★★★★☆

The comedy about a robot coming to life and the humans trying to catch him or help him escape holds up better than I expected! The human leads are as engaging as the robot, the jokes are (mostly) still funny, and the story holds up under internal logic (if not real-world logic). The villains are cardboard (the trigger-happy army division and the selfish jerk ex-boyfriend), but that’s just fine for this type of comedy.

The only real problem is Ben, the one-dimensional comic relief Indian programmer played by a white actor in brownface. At least he’s shown to be both intelligent and sympathetic (and in the sequel he’s actually written as a person).