Hugh Jackman will star in Steven Spielberg’s new DreamWorks robot tale, ‘Real Steel.’ Variety says the story revolves around Jackman as a former fighter who is forced to reinvent himself as a boxing promoter when human fighters are replaced by robots. Jackman struggles until he discovers a discarded robot that always seems to win, while at the same time, he learns of a young son he never knew he had. A father/son bonding tale ensues as the robot brawls its way up the ranks.

‘Night at the Museum’ director Shawn Levy will direct. Levy describes the film as a “rousing sports movie” with Jackman’s character “a former boxer who can no longer do the only job he’s good at, and one particular robot that may be his return to grace.”

Based on a short story by ‘I am Legend’ author Richard Matheson, Variety says ‘Real Steel’ was one of 17 projects taken in DreamWorks’ split from Paramount last year. The film will be the studio’s first film since raising $875 million from J.P. Morgan Securities, Reliance Big Pictures and Disney. ‘Real Steel’ has a budget of $80 million.

If the plot sounds a little ‘Terminator’ or ‘Transformers,’ Levy assured Sci Fi Wire the movie is “more ‘Rocky’ than ‘Transformers.’”

The story, he says is “very much about a down-on-his-luck, slightly desperate journeyman who works in this robot boxing sport and who is desperately needing redemption and one last shot.”

The robots are “most definitely not Transformers, not Terminators, definitely not WALL-Es, either,” Levy said. “Unlike a lot of these others, these are human-built, human-scale fighting machines. They are built for human spectacle. People in this movie have gotten bored with human carnage and human violence. So in the quest for more, more, more, this sport has evolved to this.”

Production starts in June.

(Photo by PR Photos)

Story provided by the Dish Information Corporation