Tron (1982), part 3

This is part three of my Tron review.

Previously on Tron: The Dude was trying to hack into his former employer’s computer system to prove he was screwed over. But he ended up getting punked in the most electronic way possible. The good news is that there’s no Ashton Kutcher around, so what happens next won’t be all that bad.

After the MCP digitizes Flynn down into tiny little electronic pieces, it sucks Flynn into the laser. We then see what’s pretty much a computerized version of the star tunnel from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Flynn is then rematerialized inside the computer world, now outfitted with the cool armor we see the other imprisoned programs wearing. He understandably bugs his eyes out at what’s transpired, but he doesn’t have time to take it all in, because Sark’s guards quickly appear and tell him to move his ass. One even jabs Flynn with his stick, prompting him to make a smartass remark about parking tickets.

Aboard his command center, Sark goes into his Vader chamber, where the MCP informs him that there’s a new prisoner who Sark will find quite the challenge, so long as he gets the same treatment as the other captives. Sark is pleased with this until the MCP informs him that Flynn is not a program but a “user”. This gives Sark pause, and he reminds the MCP that users are the reason everyone in this world, including the MCP, exists. The MCP basically says fuck ’em all, but when Sark presses the issue, the MCP begins to painfully draw power from him. Sark relents, as the MCP tells him to get his ass going on this.

Flynn is led into the same cell block we saw Crom led into earlier in the film. There he meets Ram, as well as Tron (also played by Bruce Boxleitner). Thirty-three minutes into the movie, and we’re finally meeting the title character. I’ll have more to say about this later, but Ram and Tron lament that Flynn is the latest in the long line of captured programs. But Tron is hoping the users will still come through. Flynn attempts to get within conversational distance of his new roommates, but the force fields stop him. He asks Ram where the hell he is, but Ram just answers that he’s a guest of the MCP.

This brings up an interesting (although, within the framework of the finished film, irrelevant) question: What do the residents of this computer world call their home, anyway? We never find out, so for all Flynn knows, he could be in Pleasantville. Ram also informs Flynn of the video games the MCP will have him play. Flynn is delighted to hear about this, given his expertise with them, obviously expecting that the worst that can happen is that he loses a few quarters.

The guards, standing on the glass ceilings that cover his prison, break up the male bonding, and order Flynn to go one way and Tron the other.

Flynn is led to what looks like a chasm, along with other recently captured programs. Sark’s ship appears, with its captain personally addressing them. He says that the MCP wishes to test what they can do on the game grid. Sark also pooh-poohs the idea of the users, and informs the captives that they will each be given a special disc, upon which their actions and experiences will be imprinted. He concludes his speech by saying that if they lose their discs or don’t do as they’re told, then their asses are grass.

As Flynn and the others are led back to their cells, he catches sight of Tron engaged in a game. This game has Tron going it alone against four of Sark’s lackeys. All four are duking it out with their discs, which instantly vaporize opponents on contact. While it may have taken some time before we met this film’s title character, we quickly see how bad-ass he is as he takes out all four of his opponents. I especially love the “I’m screwed!” face his final opponent gives before Tron vaporizes him.

Back in their cell, Flynn and Ram shoot the breeze and get to know each other a bit. Ram tells him that he was previously a program for an insurance company. Flynn tells him that he doesn’t remember much about what he was before he was taken prisoner. Sark’s guards suddenly appear again to take Flynn to play a video game, with Ram wishing him luck. En route, Sark tells his men to pit Flynn against another captured program.

As it turns out, that opponent turns out to be Crom. They enter the gaming arena, with jai alai-looking cups attached to their right hands. Flynn has a shit-eating grin on his face, while Crom looks pissed off. The two go to opposite ends of the room. Once they stop, a rod emerges from above them and drops a ball of light that Crom catches. He laughs at the notion of Flynn easily taking him out. Before Flynn can reply, Crom begins the game by tossing the ball at him. Flynn misses it and nearly falls over his platform, beneath which is another bottomless chasm.

As Crom laughs at this, Ram and Tron are in their cell chatting about Flynn. Ram points out that there’s something unique about him.

Flynn quickly begins to match Crom’s skill at the game they’re playing. Before long, Flynn tosses a shot which leads to Crom dangling precariously over his platform. Flynn stops playing, with a look of concern about what’s happening. Seeing this, Sark pushes his aides aside and angrily tells Flynn to finish Crom off. Flynn replies by angrily telling Sark to go screw himself.

But Sark renders the discussion moot when he pushes a button that causes Crom’s platform to vanish. Crom cries out as he falls and disintegrates. Flynn is apparently bracing himself for the same fate. This bring me back to that Santa Claus reference from earlier as Sark looks at another button, which will presumably kill Flynn. But he’s stopped short when he hears the MCP reminding him that he wants Flynn to die playing, just like the other captured programs. So I guess just like Santa, the MCP knows when you’re being good or bad.

With option number 1 taken off the table by the electronic Kris Kringle, Sark angrily goes for option number 2. This involves pushing a different button, which causes two of his guards to magically appear to take Flynn away. The game room itself quickly dissolves as they leave.

However, Flynn isn’t brought back to his cell. Rather, he’s about to embark on another game. This time he has Ram and Tron alongside him, and Ram expresses happiness that Flynn survived the last game. Flynn, though, is shocked upon apparently seeing his friend Alan in this world. However, Tron (in a rather angry tone, I should say) tells Flynn that he’s not Alan, and Alan is actually his user. He asks how Flynn knows Alan, and Flynn lies that his user knows Alan. Flynn also adds that he’s starting to remember more about himself, adding that his user wants him to stop the MCP. Tron says that Alan wants him to do the same. They give each other suspicious glances again after Flynn tells Tron that he knows that.

Another shot of the video game terrain brings us to Flynn, Tron, and Ram materializing on another grid. From his office, Sark presses a button with a lightcycle on it. Glowing rods then rise up in front of our heroes. As they take hold of them, the rods turn into cycles (Flynn’s cycle is gold, Tron’s is orange, and Ram’s is red), while on the other end of the grid, three of Sark’s lackeys are seen doing the same, and they all, like Sark earlier in the movie, have blue cycles.

Tron (who calls himself Gold 1) instructs Ram (Gold 2) and Flynn (Gold 3) to each take on one of the opposing cycles. Copy, Red Leader! (Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)

One blue cycle goes up against Tron, which leads to the schmuck smashing himself into the wall. Seeing this, Flynn goes through the maze that the cycles’ trails have already made. The blue cycle beside him acts like an idiot as the guy doesn’t take advantage of the chance to smash Flynn with his cycle walls. Rather, he just smashes himself into a nearby one. Flynn then contacts Tron and Ram, telling them that he’s escaping through the hole in the wall and that they’re welcome to join him. They take him up on the offer after smashing the remaining cycle with their own cycle walls.

Outside the grid, Flynn says, “Greetings, programs,” as our trio quickly speeds away. We also hear a female voice, not unlike the computer counting down the seconds to self-destruct on Dark Helmet’s ship in Spaceballs, informing them that they must return to the game grid. Despite asking nicely, our heroes fail to comply and quickly evade two Recognizers.

Sark sees this on his monitor and angrily orders the trio caught, even if it means sending out every tank available. And I kid you not, on Sark’s screen, we see Pac-Man. What the character represents here, I don’t know, but this (intentionally or not) makes me chuckle. But best of all is that Sark drives home his resolve by bringing his nameless lieutenant (Stephano) to the ground with his fist. The chump’s fall is even accompanied by the famous sound of Pac-Man dying.

Next up: We’ll see where our trio is headed, although sadly, there will be no more cameos from other famous video game characters.

Tron (1982), part 2

This is the second part of my review of Tron.

Previously on Tron: We learned that the computer world is becoming more and more advanced. A certain program that calls itself the Master Control Program pretty much dominates it. However, after it gets rid of a program that looks like Jeff Bridges, the MCP sends for someone called Dillinger, who isn’t the gangster.

We see Ed Dillinger (Warner) being taken to Encom, the computer corporation of which he’s the CEO. The cool glow in the dark helicopter where we first see him reminds us of the perks that come with being a CEO. Dillinger enters his office, and being a cultured villain, politely tells his secretary Peter (Tony Stephano) to leave after he greets his boss.

Once alone, Dillinger pushes some buttons on his desk, which is also a computer that still looks cool today. After logging in, we hear the MCP thanking Dillinger for returning to the office on such short notice. We also see the text of the MCP’s words on the computer/desk. How nice; this is an artificial intelligence that may be bent on world domination, but it can still take the time to abide the hearing-impaired. Even HAL wasn’t this considerate.

The MCP informs Dillinger that Flynn has attempted to hack into their systems again. Dillinger is assured that the info Flynn is looking for is still safely hidden away. Despite this reassurance, Dillinger decides to keep everyone with Group 7 access (the same kind of access Flynn has) out of the system for the time being.

“There’s a 68.71 percent chance you’re right!” the MCP replies. Does this mean their chances here are better than getting through an asteroid field (which is, of course, 3,720 to one)?

As it turns out, one person who has the same kind of access as Flynn is his former colleague Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner). Somewhere in a cubicle farm, he’s attempting to access his program Tron, but his screen tells him his access is suspended and he has to talk to Dillinger about it.

Alan quickly goes to Dillinger’s office after telling the nebbish in the cubicle next to him that he can help himself to the popcorn he was snacking on. Dillinger sees Alan approaching via the cameras that are part of his desk/computer and promptly shuts the MCP interface off before Alan enters. Dillinger informs Alan that he’s been briefly cut off for security reasons, as someone with Alan’s kind of access has been tampering with the system. But he assures Alan that he doesn’t suspect him, and asks him about what he’s currently working on. Alan says it’s a security program called Tron, which monitors the contacts between systems. He also informs Dillinger that Tron is a program that runs independently of the MCP. Dillinger gives a polite smile and assures Alan that everything will be back on track before long.

After Alan leaves (giving his boss a not-quite-enthusiastic thank you), the MCP begins to bitch to Dillinger about a program that’s independent and is potentially monitoring him. While this is never directly expressed, a program such as Tron could make Alan as much a thorn in the MCP’s and Dillinger’s sides as Flynn has become.

At the moment, however, Alan’s frustration with machinery is continuing as he almost puts his fist into the elevator doors that are taking too long to open (I know the feeling). Once inside, he hits the button that will take him to Laser Bay 2.

Inside this bay, Alan’s colleague/sweetheart Lora Baines (Cindy Morgan) is working on an experimental laser with her colleague Dr. Walter Gibbs (Barnard Hughes, who would later be the grandpa on Blossom). The two engage in cute banter while making the final preparations. Soon, they put on safety goggles and see the computer image of an orange, which is their laser’s test subject. The laser activates, causing the fruit to vanish until it reappears mere seconds later. Lora and Walter congratulate each other as Alan cheers them on while descending a nearby staircase to join them (I guess Alan doesn’t need those same goggles).

Walter explains the laser to Alan, who subsequently asks if it can send him to Hawaii. Lora (tongue-in-cheek, I’m guessing) says it can, but he’d have to “purchase your program 30 days in advance.” It’s just that simple, huh?

Alan then vents his frustration that Dillinger has cut him and everyone else with his access level out of the system. Walter consoles him with the fact that computers and programs can’t think, although Alan says that at the rate everything’s going, some may begin to do that. Walter laughs, saying that soon the programs will be doing all the thinking rather than the people. Putting aside any real-life echoes some may hear in Walter’s statement, I can’t help but wonder if James Cameron took that throwaway line and ran with it when he made a certain classic science fiction film which came out two years after Tron.

After Walter bids the lovebirds a good evening, Alan and Lora walk down a corridor. She asks if Dillinger gave any reason for shutting out the Group 7 people, and Alan says that someone’s been tampering with the system. She tells him that Flynn has been thinking of breaking into Encom since Dillinger fired him, and that he has the same access as Alan.

“Flynn had access to you, too,” he grimly notes, referring to the fact that Flynn and Lora were once romantically involved. Despite his tone, Lora convinces him to come with her to Flynn’s arcade to bring him up to speed on what Dillinger’s been doing. Alan reluctantly agrees, wondering what Lora ever saw in him. She replies that she loved him for his brain (a brain that can create video games like nobody’s business, so I guess I can see his appeal).

Lora and Alan walk through the busy arcade until they spot Flynn playing the game he created, Space Paranoids. The screen is the same one that Clu was on earlier when he was shooting down Recognizers. Unlike Clu, though, Flynn doesn’t have to worry about any debris from them knocking him off course. He gets thunderous cheers from the crowd gathered around him after he breaks the game’s record.

He greets Alan and Lora, and after the latter says they need to talk, he escorts them to a room on the upper level of the building. As Flynn changes clothes, Lora cuts to the chase and asks if he’s been trying to break into Encom. Flynn chuckles at how blunt she is before asking Alan if she still has a tendency to leave her clothes on the floor. Alan says no, and then Lora tells both of them to cut it out, as this is just the kind of banter a girl wants to hear when she gets both her former and current boyfriends in the same room.

To his credit, however, Flynn does admit that he’s been trying to hack into Encom. When Alan asks him for details, Flynn says that it all began three years prior when he was working with Encom as a software engineer. His work there led to his inventing the aforementioned Space Paranoids, among other games. At the same time, Dillinger was in the same department as Flynn and managed to confiscate those games. Three months later, Dillinger presented those games as his own, eventually getting him into the comfy position he now holds with the company. Since then, Flynn has made ends meet by running the arcade.

When Alan asks what Flynn has to gain by going through all the trouble of breaking into Encom, Flynn forcefully states that proof of Dillinger’s theft must be in there somewhere. That when Lora informs him that Dillinger has blocked out the kind of access that Flynn has, and is thus closing in on him. Flynn chuckles, and seems to just toss his hands up at this tidbit, but Alan states that things could potentially turn around if he had access to Tron. This gives Flynn the realization that he could make that possible if he could get to a terminal at Encom. With that, Lora whips out her car keys and asks, “Shall we dance?” And our heroic trio is off.

As they arrive at Encom, Walter is following Alan’s lead and directly going to Dillinger to ask WTF is going on. Dillinger replies to his complaints of people not being able to access their programs with the MCP, saying something is amiss. Walter points out that the MCP itself is part of the issue, but Dillinger says things are much better with the MCP around, and that user requests should be secondary.

Walter: "User requests are what computers are for!"

Dillinger: "Doing our business is what computers are for!"

Okay, I’m not a software expert and the closest I’ve ever come to being a programmer is when I set up my blog. I’m also not a business executive, let alone a ruthless one. But as Encom itself is a computer company, I would think user requests and their business are one and the same.

The two argue a bit more until Dillinger tells Walter he’s fired, although if I were Walter, I’d be more saddened about my granddaughter dating Sheldon Cooper.

At the same time, Alan and Lora are having trouble getting in until Flynn whips out a homemade key card that does the job. Alan rolls his eyes, saying Flynn is like Santa Claus (a name drop we’ll get back to later).

The MCP informs Dillinger that it wants to now try frying bigger fish than mere corporations, beginning with the Pentagon, saying that the IQ of humans would make it and the Kremlin easy pickings. Dillinger reminds the MCP of who’s responsible for its existence, and then the MCP threatens to expose Dillinger’s illegal acts.

Inside Encom, after breezing past a lone security guard, Lora says she’ll set Flynn up at her station in the laser bay before meeting up with Alan in his office. She also notes the convenience of Dillinger never knowing they’re in the building if they don’t go to the top floor.

Flynn playfully follows Lora while Alan sets things up on his end. Lora’s terminal turns out to be conveniently located at the target area of the laser seen earlier. After she departs, Flynn goes to work, only to have the MCP chat with him on the terminal. Flynn chuckles as he dicks around with the MCP, prompting the program to clandestinely turn on the laser behind Flynn. The laser activates and carefully but quickly digitizes Flynn before sucking his form into the laser.

Next up: Where does Flynn go? We’ll find out next time, but as a famous movie character once said, I don’t think he’s in Kansas anymore.

Tron (1982)

This is the first part of a six-part review of this classic from 1982.

I’ve written articles about films where I’ve made a point to note other movies that were released in the same year. To me, this has been relevant because the 1980s was a pretty great decade when it came to science fiction, fantasy, and even horror movies.

Many critics have stated that the apex of that illustrious decade was 1982. That was the year that gave us E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, which became the year’s (and for a time, history’s) biggest moneymaker. But the year also produced equally classic works such as Blade Runner, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, The Thing, Poltergeist, The Dark Crystal, The Secret of NIMH, Creepshow, Beastmaster, Conan the Barbarian, and our current subject, Tron. Not all of these films made money at the box office, but all of them have become classics that have stood the test of time. I suppose one reason for this is that each of these films was interested in trying something different, either visually or dramatically (or in some cases, both). It could be said that these different approaches are sorely lacking in movies made in the decades since.

The idea of Tron itself was unique: a man trapped inside a computer world. By the start of the ’80s, computers were becoming a bit more common. I say “a bit”, because the place one could most likely find one was in an office building, as most people couldn’t afford them for their homes at that point. At the same time, the popularity of video games was increasing. Atari was riding high with its 2600 and 7800 systems, and video arcades themselves were becoming more and more common. Keep in mind this was over a decade before the internet entered the vernacular, let alone blogs and email.

Indeed, it was a certain video game, Pong, which gave writer-director Steven Lisberger the idea for Tron in 1976. He would later say in an interview:

"Everybody was doing backlit animation in the ’70s, you know. It was that disco look. And we thought, what if we had this character that was a neon line, and that was our Tron warrior – Tron for electronic. And what happened was, I saw Pong, and I said, well, that’s the arena for him. And at the same time I was interested in the early phases of computer generated animation, which I got into at MIT in Boston, and when I got into that I met a bunch of programmers who were into all that. And they really inspired me, by how much they believed in this new realm."

Lisberger’s initial intention was to make an animated movie out of the idea. To that end, he filmed a 30-second animated clip in order to promote not only Lisberger Studios, which he and producer Donald Kushner set up to make Tron, but also several rock radio stations. Later on, the duo decided to mix live action in with the animation.

After being rejected by other studios, Disney agreed to finance and distribute the film. However, they did have a hand in reworking the script, because while the studio liked the unique ideas Lisberger and Kushner were presenting, they weren’t quite enthusiastic about putting up the cash for a project helmed by a relatively new producer and director.

Anyone who’s seen the film knows that the title character and numerous others in the computer world are encased in blue colored armor while others are colored red. But the initial idea was for Tron to have a more yellowish color, and also a closer resemblance to the Centurions from Battlestar Galactica. The film would end up being shot in black and white (indeed, the costumes the actors wore during filming were black and white) with the colors added in post production.

Given the nature of the film, it’s no surprise that it begins with some cool animated graphics which come together to form a person encased in unique armor before the title pops up.

We next see the outside of a video arcade called Flynn’s. A customer puts a quarter into a game called Lightcycles. This game requires the player to outmaneuver another lightcycle driver without crashing into the walls that both cycles produce as they move.

The camera zooms into the game itself to reveal that the yellow-colored cycle is being driven by someone wearing similar armor to what we saw in the title sequence, and who looks scared shitless. We then see that there’s a good reason for that, as the blue-colored cycle is being driven by Sark, played by the always intimidating David Warner. We see a few moments of the cycles moving around before the anonymous yellow-cycle driver slams into a wall, disintegrating. As the arcade customer curses his bad luck, the blue cycle drives off and the movie cuts to Sark in some sort of control room entering what looks like a smaller version of Darth Vader’s meditation chamber from The Empire Strikes Back, only with lights encasing him rather than those heavy black metal doors.

We then hear the Master Control Program (voiced by Warner), praising Sark on his increasing ruthlessness. The MCP informs Sark that they now have military programs in custody, specifically those from the Strategic Air Command. Sark is asked if he’s interested in testing his mantle on them. As this is the same person who would, a decade later, mercilessly torture a certain Starfleet captain to within an inch of his sanity, Sark is all for the idea, as it would be a nice break from wiping the floor with “those accounting cream puffs you keep sending me.” Yeah, I can see how going into death matches against accountants may not exactly get the blood pumping. At least the one played by Charles Martin Smith in The Untouchables was a federal agent to begin with.

The next scene actually shows us what the MCP described as taking programs into custody. As Crom (Peter Jurasik) is taken by two staff-wielding guards to his cell, he protests that he’s just a “compound interest” program for a bank. He then says that if he’s imprisoned, his “User” will be angry. But the guards’s only reply is a forceful push into the cell. Inside is another program, Ram (Dan Shor), who asks Crom if he believes in the Users, who we soon learn are human beings, or rather those with the know-how to create computer programs. Crom says he does, because how else could he exist? In reply, Ram says that the MCP is snatching up programs who believe in the Users. If the MCP finds a program particularly useful, said program gets absorbed into the MCP to make it bigger. Programs that don’t meet the criteria, like Ram and Crom, are sent to what’s called the “game grid”, to play games until they die. When Ram asks how things are outside their cell, Crom informs him that the other sectors of their computer world have it as shitty as they do, thanks to the MCP.

Meanwhile in the real world (we know this, because there’s a caption that actually says as much), a programmer named Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) is attempting to access his program Clu (also played by Bridges). Flynn reminds Clu that there’s a file they must find ASAP. Clu, who’s driving a cool looking computerized tank, takes a sip of whatever beverage is being rotated into reach as he scouts the area via Flynn’s instructions.

The tank stops as Clu sees what looks like several rays all shooting in one direction. Clu states this is a memory, and asks the small floating device he calls Bit (which can only say “yes” or “no”) if they can merge with it in order to get on with their task. Bit says yes, and they go through it with no problem. But Clu is soon detected and being chased by Recognizers, which are aircraft with long legs and heads that resemble the robot Maximilian from The Black Hole, which Disney put out three years before Tron.

Clu uses the tank’s weapons to blast the Recognizers, but the debris of one causes him to lose control of his tank and crash into a wall. Clu gets out and tells Bit to get the hell out of here, which it does. After the Bit heads off for parts unknown, more Recognizers show up, one of which combines its two legs and, for a moment, we wonder if it smashes Clu and the tank.

Flynn gets a message on his computer that Clu has been “detached” from the system. Cursing another failed attempt on his part, Flynn attempts to access Clu again. Alas, Clu has been taken directly to the MCP. A guard says that Clu was caught trying to raid the memory, and before Clu can say much, the MCP uses the Force (or something like that) to slam Clu into a nearby wall. Clu then cries out in extreme pain as the MCP tortures him. The MCP then asks Clu who his User is, but he just tells him to fuck off. Not surprisingly, this leads to the MCP torturing him to death. As Clu’s body disintegrates, the MCP says, “Get me Dillinger!”

Next up: Those who have yet to see this film may be asking, Who’s Dillinger? You’ll find out next time, but I’ll give you a hint: It’s not the infamous gangster.