Were you a nerd in school, before it was cool and computers were a necessary part of everyday life? Are you a nerd in the making or have one in your home? Are you a Star Wars fan? If you thought R2D2 and 3CPO were cool, imagine being a teenager who makes real robots. How cool would that be? Pretty darn cool if you ask me. Better yet, “Bots High” doesn’t make robotics a boys club; it also focuses two teams that are all-girls.

The 2011 documentary “Bots High” is about high school geeks who are into constructing radio-controlled competitive robots–not as just a show and tell whistles and bell show of task-oriented robotics. These geeks construct robots for caged death fights. The documentary appropriately won a Best Documentary award at the Geek Film Festival, making it a film that geeks love without Spock, R2D2 or hobbits.

Joey Daoud was a fan of the reality shows “BattleBots” and “Robot Wars” and his enthusiasm clearly shows in his first feature length project. “BattleBots is a Vallejo-based California company that hosts robot competitions–mostly in the San Francisco area. Footage from the competitions were used in the 94-episode 5-season run of the reality TV show that ran from August 2000 until November 2002 on Comedy Central.

“Robot Wars”  was a British game show that ran from 1998 to 2003 with 120 original episodes and 33 episodes for an extreme series.

Being from Miami, Daoud looked around and found local teens and a few dedicated teachers. During the 2009-2010 year, Daoud followed three teams: Ransom-Everglades, My Mechanical Romance and Mechanical Misfits.

Robotics is about team work and strategy–working together to problem solve and consider just what other people might be making.  Under advisor Bob DuBard, Ransom-Everglades builds two robots, Fluffy and El Gran Rey Cholo.

My Mechanical Romance, a team from Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart (a Catholic high school for girls),  builds Teenager and Famous Last Words.

A large, all-girl team from Carrollton begin with task-oriented robots and move on to the combat robot they called Lil’ Kanye. No news about Taylor Swift.

As you can imagine, there’s teen angst and uncertainty combined with the kind of mechanical failures and fires that DIY electronics suggest. Daoud, who raised money on KickStarter, gives us interviews with the team members and ends by telling us where each is heading. I did wonder how the kids stood within the whole high school hierarchy, but that’s just a bit of nerd curiosity.

This documentary isn’t for everyone. Even Fluffy isn’t cuddly like R2D2 or humanoid cute like 3CPO. These are motorized machines for mechanized destruction. Think more of a crude Roomba with spinning destructive parts or sharp corners, something that your cat or dog would be justified in fearing.

“Bots High” is available on iTunes, YouTube, Vudu, XBox 360, CinemaNow and Amazon Instant.