Tron (1982), part 6

This is the final installment of my review of Tron.

Before I get into the impact Tron has had on pop culture in the decades since its release, let’s discuss how the movie itself stands up.

Video game-based movies are usually received with not much enthusiasm by most audiences. The recent Rampage, while not exactly a bomb, has reinforced the notion that movies based on video games are almost uniformly awful. The poster child for this perception is perhaps the 2003 film House of the Dead, based on the awesome zombie shoot-’em-up series of the same name. That movie is rightfully regarded as one of the worst ever made and pretty much established Uwe Boll’s reputation as a sucky director.

Hence, it pleases me to say that Tron is on the other end of that spectrum. The beautiful irony of this statement is that the film wasn’t based on a specific video game or series of games. It simply latched onto what was becoming a popular pastime and remains so to this day. This allowed director Steven Lisberger and company to let their creative juices flow free when crafting the story.

Because Jeff Bridges’s Flynn is the main character in the story, some may think that the film’s title is misleading. Since it takes a bit of time before we meet the title character, I can understand that stance, but I can’t exactly say that the film lies to us à la Bram Stoker’s Dracula. This is because we learn early in the film that once Flynn, Alan, and Lora are catching onto what Dillinger and the MCP are doing, Tron is essential to helping rectify things. After all, Flynn hacking into Encom, which leads to the MCP zapping him with the laser, was for the purpose of getting access to Tron. It’s also Tron’s disc that shuts down both the MCP and Sark in the end. So while Flynn is the main hero, you can’t necessarily say Tron himself is shortchanged either. Looking back now, I find this dynamic a bit like Han giving Luke a hand when it came to blowing up Tarkin and his Death Star, with Star Wars told more through Han’s point of view.

Despite the hiccups I mentioned earlier, Tron is exciting from beginning to end. Like the aforementioned Blade Runner, the film’s production values are eye-poppingly unique and immediately give it a classic look. The discs are every bit as awesome as lightsabers and the lightcycles are as cool as the speeder bikes in the following year’s Return of the Jedi. The fact that everything looks computerized makes the viewer feel like they’re in another world just like Flynn. Ironically, a number of movies made in the years since would actually be criticized for looking like they were whipped up on a computer.

The cast is another plus, with pretty much every actor playing two roles (even the movie itself acknowledges this). Heck, I just figured out not too long ago that Ram and the nebbish who asks Alan for popcorn are played by the same guy.

Bridges was already an established star by 1982, so it’s not surprising that he carries the film with his effortless charisma. But Boxleitner matches him by delivering the goods as Alan and Tron, and the actor would go on to dazzle audiences with his awesomeness in TV shows like Scarecrow and Mrs. King and Babylon 5 (which co-starred Peter Jurasik, who played Crom). Barnard Hughes is appropriately fatherly as both Walter and Dumont, and likewise, Cindy Morgan proves both her characters aren’t just the token love interests (her idea to chat with Flynn ends up setting the trio’s plan into motion). I’d say it’s the coolness that Bridges, Boxleitner, and Morgan bring to the film that’s almost certainly the reason why the Flynn-Lora/Yori-Alan/Tron triangle is surprisingly painless, which definitely can’t be said for other such love triangles in movies.

David Warner’s villainous turn here, along with his earlier ones in Time After Time and Time Bandits, pretty much made him synonymous with movie-moustache twirling villains, even overshadowing the fact that he also memorably played nicer guys in The Omen and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.

Like a number of its 1982 brethren, Tron was greeted with confusion by some upon its initial release. While computers and video games were both becoming more and more common by this point, they had yet to become second nature to many as they are in this day and age. As a result, the intricacies of the story and what the main characters do in it could have been seen by some as just so much tech talk (I won’t say technobabble, because Star Trek: Voyager is responsible for the headache-inducing overuse of that).

However, computer science itself would advance greatly in the years since Tron. Many computer experts today have said that Tron influenced them to make their mark in the field. I’d say if the movie were to be released today, the characters would actually be viewed as amateurs in regards to their computer expertise.

Likewise, while the only video arcades around today are basically ones with a restaurant attached (like Dave & Buster’s), video games themselves are more prominent than ever. Within just a few short years of Tron‘s release, Nintendo would dethrone Atari as the go-to video game system for the home. Nintendo itself is still going strong thanks to its Wii system, while Sony and Microsoft are still making money with their PlayStation and X-Box systems, respectively.

Even the film’s production would go on to be viewed as the beginning of great strides in Disney’s animation department. While some of the effects were done in the more traditional manner (for instance, the glow on the characters’ armor was added in post-production in a lab in South Korea), the computerized animation methods used would continue to be developed by Disney in some of its later features such as The Rescuers Down Under and Beauty and the Beast. This work, in many ways, would culminate 13 years after Tron‘s release when Disney in collaboration with Pixar put out its classic movie Toy Story. Not surprisingly, Disney would end up purchasing Pixar 11 years later. Also, nearly every animated film since Toy Story has been animated in the same computerized manner.

Ironically, Tron wasn’t even nominated for the Visual Effects Oscar for 1982, although it did receive nominations for both Sound Design and Costume Design. Lisberger would later state that the Academy felt the movie was cheating, as its effects were done with computers rather than the old-fashioned way. This is another irony, in that we have this movie to thank for how special effects in movies are basically done now.

Appropriately, while the movie didn’t initially rake in the cash, it quickly gained a following thanks in large part to the arcade games that were adapted from the movie. The first, simply called Tron, has four stages. One of these, not surprisingly, is one in which the player must drive a lightcycle while avoiding the walls that opponent cycles generate. Interestingly, the player’s cycle is blue, while the bad guys have yellow ones. In another stage, the player is piloting a tank and must shoot adversaries three times each in order to win (although only one shot from them kills you, which is a bit unfair). A third stage requires shooting at the MCP in order to make an opening to enter the cone on top of it. The fourth stage involves shooting at grid bugs in order to enter a flashing circle (and, yes, you are timed).

The second video game, Discs of Tron, was seen in arcades a year later. In that game, the idea is to beat Sark by reenacting the disc match between him and Tron. Here, though, the player is given three discs to use.

Tron had other merchandising too, including action figures and naturally, video games for Atari. One of my favorite Tron toys was the lightcycle, made by Tomy, which could go pretty fast by inserting and then pulling out a cord from its rear wheel.

Add to this the growing video market, which saw most homes having at least one VCR by the end of the 1980s, and its not surprising that Tron would be embraced as a classic movie. This, in turn, would eventually lead to a sequel Tron: Legacy, released in 2010.

While it was a treat seeing Bridges and Boxleitner playing their roles again, the movie itself, like many sequels, didn’t provoke the awe of its predecessor. I also disliked that we didn’t see Lora/Yori in the film.

When Disney put out its classic movie Fantasia in 1940, it was hailed for the unique way in which it combined animation and music. When its sequel, Fantasia 2000, came out six decades later, that originality was lost because such a combination had basically become the norm. I’d say there’s a similar flaw to Tron: Legacy: the computer artistry that defined its predecessor’s place in film history had become so commonplace that a followup just seemed like it was repeating things and nothing more.

Despite this, the sequel made money, although there are currently no plans for a third Tron movie.

But Tron itself is seen today as a film that in many ways predicted the world we live in now. Not only do most people (including yours truly) use computers on a daily basis, but the internet itself can be seen as a virtual reality of sorts that people place themselves into (for good and for bad). I doubt even Lisberger could’ve predicted how prophetic his work would turn out to be. As a result, greenlighting Tron turned out to be one of the most important decisions in Disney’s long history.

Tron (1982), part 5

This is part five of my Tron review.

Previously on Tron: Flynn, Tron, and Ram escaped the Game Grid, but were later separated when Sark’s tanks blew up their lightcycles, which eventually killed Ram. But Tron pressed onward with his girlfriend Yori, while Flynn tried to do the same with vehicles that ended up crashing before a skirmish caused him to camouflage himself as one of the bad guys.

Tron and Yori are making their way to the I/O Tower. They deal with several guards before having to climb up skyscraper-height poles to get to a secret entrance. A Recognizer is patrolling the area like a helicopter. Yori decides to use the secret entrance first, prompting Tron to briefly express concern before she slides down into the tower. Tron follows, although the Recognizer briefly catches him in the act.

Once inside, the duo is halted by the tower’s guardian Dumont (also played by Barnard Hughes), who looks like he’s in some sort of compressed box, with only his face and hands visible (and wearing quite unflattering head gear, I must add). Tron explains that they wish to communicate with Alan. But Dumont turns out to be a bit rough around the edges compared to Walter, as he states that he’s surprised that the MCP and Sark haven’t just closed the tower down. But Tron explains that Alan could help change the whole system for the better, allowing the tower to be used more. Dumont remains skeptical until Yori pleads with him, just as Sark’s guards spot them inside. Dumont concedes, shutting out the guards with a force-field.

Dumont asks Tron the name of his user. Tron replies, “Alan One.” I thought his last name was Bradley, but, I must admit, Alan One does have a nice, distinctive ring to it. Dumont says this before allowing Tron to pass:

Dumont: All that is visible must grow beyond itself and extend into the realm of the invisible.

I guess that’s a fortune cookie fortune, only without the cookie? Not that it matters, since Tron is free to proceed.

Outside the tower, Sark arrives and brings in what he calls the “logic probe” to break down the tower’s wall. This thing is really impressive, which is saying a lot considering the other gadgets we already know Sark has at his disposal.

Tron walks to the platform where he can talk to Alan. He whips out his disc and stands on the platform, holding it above his head. He slowly releases the disc and it shoots upward, causing the red light from the tower to turn blue. We hear Alan informing him that he’s souping up Tron’s disc so that Tron can use it to destroy the MCP. Also, the disc must be thrown at the MCP’s base in order to have the desired effect. Curiously, Alan doesn’t ask Tron if Flynn is there, but I guess souping up these discs requires one to pull an all-nighter.

I must also note the irony (no doubt intentional) that the only reason Tron has this disc at all is because Sark issued it to him.

Tron gets his souped-up disc and quickly thanks Dumont before he and Yori bolt. Sark and his men enter, along with Flynn, who can still act incognito thanks to his red armor. Dumont pleads ignorance when Sark asks where Tron is. In response, Sark angrily tells his men to take Dumont into custody, but I’m guessing it’s only because Sark hates Dumont’s hat as much as I do.

Yori and Tron head for the craft we saw being put together earlier. And this film has had its share of gaffes up to this point, but it’s here that we come to the mistake that’s always stuck out for me. As Tron and Yori ascend into the craft, we see that she’s now wearing a helmet similar to Tron, as opposed to the cap we previously saw her wearing. Yori explains that the craft should be able to take them to the MCP.

While she’s prepping the ship, more guards show up. Tron dispatches them, and in all the confusion, Flynn gets knocked down and is left hanging on the side of the craft. This skirmish ends on an amusing note as a guard basically saves Tron the trouble by tossing himself overboard.

Yori soon gets the craft going, with Sark’s vessel slowly in pursuit. As the MCP takes Sark to task for allowing Tron and Yori to steal the craft, Tron encounters Flynn. Delighted that Flynn is still alive, he manages to pull Flynn aboard the ship before he can fall, which returns Flynn’s armor to its blue color. The two do the decent thing and briefly mourn Ram before they meet up with Yori.

As when he first met Tron, Flynn is now astonished at how much Yori resembles Lora. This leads to Tron literally coming between them before Flynn can snap out of it. He then informs both of them that he’s a User, and they continue their journey.

While two Recognizers tail our heroes, we see Dumont being tortured by Sark with waves of energy. Yori’s voice then states that “grid bugs” on the terrain below should be avoided, although that seems easy enough, as these things don’t seem to be able to leap up to catch their sailing ship.

However, the craft is halted by a power surge from the MCP. Their only hope is to move the craft to another beam, but the only one in sight isn’t close enough. Flynn races to the front of the ship and uses himself as a conduit to briefly lift the ship, causing the surge to go past them and take out the Recognizers.

As the ship resumes its journey, Tron takes the dazed Flynn to the other end of the ship to recuperate. As Flynn recovers (in Yori’s arms, no less), Tron asks how Flynn accomplished what he did with the beam. The latter simply states it was elementary physics (well, it’s better than the ones we see in Superman IV, I’ll grant them that). The ship continues onward, passing some interesting looking canyons as well as a city. Eventually though, Sark’s ship catches up with them and breaks the ship apart before sucking it and its occupants inside.

Yori (wearing her cap again) and Flynn are brought to the same cell as Dumont (who’s now wearing a cap himself, rather than the stupid hat seen earlier). Yori sadly informs Dumont that Tron is dead, and that Flynn is a User who came to help. But Dumont begins to doubt that even the Users can help now. Sark comes in, pleased as punch that Tron is dead. But his grin quickly turns upside down when he sees Flynn alive and well. After they exchange some brief “fuck you”s, Sark orders Dumont taken to the holding pit, with his armor glowing to emphasize the point. Yori and Flynn are knocked down when they try to intervene. Sark informs them that Dumont and other guardians are being taken to the MCP, and that the two of them are to remain on board, as the ship will soon “de-rez”, which is program-speak for “they are screwed”.

But to no one’s surprise, Tron is actually alive and stealthily crawling across the exterior of Sark’s vessel. He manages to cling to the capsule that Sark, some of his men, and the guardian programs are now on. The capsule detaches from the ship and makes its way to the MCP.

As Flynn realizes that the cell that he and Yori are in is beginning to lose power, we see the MCP in all its glory as it seems to spin non-stop. But Yori begins to give up and actually comes within inches of disintegrating herself (due to a broken heart, I guess), before Flynn revives her with his magic User touch. It also seems that he was right about their prison wall, because in the next shot we see it’s vanished, allowing both of them to leave. They make their way to the ship’s control panel as it begins to slowly disintegrate, layer by layer.

As the guardians are forcibly pinned to the wall, the MCP stops spinning, no doubt because it’s as dizzy as we are watching it, and informs Sark that it senses a disturbance in the Force. Er, I mean it senses a nearby presence.

Sure enough, Sark goes to the nearby mesa and meets up with Tron, who had previously dispatched Sark’s lieutenant with his disc. In true western style, the two proceed to fight it out with their discs. In the meantime, the MCP informs the guardians that they’re all screwed.

Tron, once again, shows off his badassery, even flat out telling Sark that he’s better than him. As if to emphasize this point, Tron’s next throw creates a clean slice through Sark’s disc, while smacking Sark square in the head, causing him to begin disintegrating. Damn, Tron’s disc is as bad-ass as he is!

Sensing this, the MCP inexplicably transfers all its power to Sark, reviving him and making him grow to King Kong size. The MCP then uses its shields to block Tron’s disc throws until Sark appears, although Tron’s disc doesn’t have any luck against him now.

Flynn tells Yori to bring them to the beam that the MCP is generating. He tells her that he’s going to throw himself into the MCP in order to distract it. Yori objects, but Flynn reassures her with a tender kiss.

He dives in, causing the MCP to briefly go crazy before giving Tron another opening into its core, which he takes advantage of. The impact tosses Flynn out of the MCP, which is reduced to what looks like a small stone with the face of a man using a typewriter. The face quickly vanishes and causes Sark to disintegrate.

As Tron and the guardians make a break for it, the capsule the MCP was housed in breaks apart, causing everything in the system to truly light up. Tron reunites with Yori just as Sark’s ship vanishes. She kisses him again before telling him what Flynn did. Dumont appears and shows the happy couple how things are looking better now, and I’m sure Blossom, Joey, and Six will think it’s so cool.

We go through the computerized 2001 tunnel once more back to real world, where Flynn is conveniently restored to his normal self sitting at that same terminal. To add to this good fortune, the printer next to his terminal prints out info which confirms Dillinger’s crimes. Flynn happily darts off with this hard copy.

The next morning sees Dillinger arriving at the office. He attempts to access the MCP, only to see the same info we saw printed earlier. This leads to Dillinger dropping down into his chair in defeat.

The film ends with Alan and Lora on the roof of the Encom building as an Encom chopper, which Alan says has their boss on board, arrives. That boss turns out to be Flynn, who says “Greetings, programs!” as he happily embraces his friends/subordinates. So Flynn is now the head of Encom. Awesome! I hope this means Walter got his job back. I also hope it means Flynn kept his arcade, because how cool is a CEO who owns an arcade?

Next up: I wrap things up with a look at Tron‘s legacy (and I’m not just talking about the sequel Tron: Legacy).

Tron (1982), part 4

This is part four of my Tron review.

Previously on Tron: Flynn discovered that he’d arrived at a place that is, essentially, Ready Player One before the Ernest Cline book (or the subsequent Spielberg film). He finally met the movie’s title character who, along with another program, helped Flynn kick some ass playing video games where you only get one try.

Flynn, Tron, and Ram escape the game grid in their lightcycles, which lose their trails as they make their way through a crack in the wall. It’s a good thing, too, as our heroes would’ve instantly smashed each other up, making this a very short movie.

As our heroes haul ass as far from Sark as they can, Flynn expresses regret about creating all those programs with tanks, such as the one Clu was driving earlier. Sure enough, tanks seem to emerge from the walls and began chasing our trio. The gunner in the lead tank fires but misses, which makes him curse (don’t let this guy play Donkey Kong if he’s getting this pissed off at missing one measly shot).

The cycles scramble and head in another direction. The pursuing tank stops at the edge of another cliff (if there’s one thing this world has plenty of, it’s cliffs), and in the grand tradition of police cars in wacky comedies, the following tank comes too close to the first, knocking it over the cliff where it literally goes boom. The driver of the other tank reports that they’ve lost one of their number, but doesn’t mention that it was because he himself fucked up.

The chase goes on a bit longer until the three cycles find refuge and stop. The cycles disappear, leaving our heroes standing erect again, with the sticks they grabbed vanishing. I don’t know if the drivers did this themselves or if the cycles did, but after Flynn remarks at how playing a video game in this manner is harder than in his arcade, wee see that our heroes have arrived at some sort of fancy cavern. Looking at this place, there doesn’t seem to be any room for the cycles to maneuver, so I’m guessing Flynn, Tron, and Ram decided to park here.

Elsewhere, Sark is bitching as the search for the trio continues. He says to his lieutenant, “I’ll be lucky if the MCP doesn’t blast me into a dead zone!” I don’t know what the hell Sark means by this. I would call this name-dropping, but the Cronenberg film of the same name was still a year away. So I guess he read the 1979 book it was adapted from.

In the cavern, Tron leads Flynn and Ram up a hill. Once they’re at the top, they see a tower, which Tron identifies as an Input-Output, or I/O Tower. Flynn asks when they’ll take on the MCP, prompting Ram to chuckle and say that the three of them have no chance against the MCP and Sark’s army. Tron states that the next step in stopping the MCP is to get to the tower so he can contact Alan.

Our heroes climb down and see what looks like a lake. Tron takes a drink, which causes his armor to glow. Flynn and Ram quickly follow suit, happy at the chance to regenerate (after all, Mario already ate all the mushrooms that turn you into a giant and the flowers that give you the ability to throw fireballs).

As Sark’s troops continue searching, Tron (I guess) feels a disturbance in the Force. When Flynn and Ram ask what’s up, Tron simply answers, “Alan One.” I guess this refers to Alan, and I’ll actually return to this. Tron then announces he’s ready to head out. Flynn and Ram follow after a few more gulps.

The next shot finds our trio in the cycles again, with Tron leading the way. I guess they can just wish up those sticks whenever they want to go for a drive. Hey, George Jetson had a car that could fit into his briefcase, so why not?

Alas, Sark’s tanks turn up not far behind them. The first tank takes aim at Tron, although the shot instead takes out Flynn and Ram. Tron quickly outruns the subsequent shots, although he’s clearly pissed off when it seems that Flynn and Ram have been destroyed. But among the wreckage, Flynn awakens and drags the unconscious Ram away from the debris before the tanks comb through it and report back to Sark that both men are dead.

Sark orders his men to keep after Tron, while Flynn carries Ram until they reach a pile of debris. He finds a place roomy enough to set Ram down before lying down himself and taking a nap. Not that this matters, but it’s unclear how long Flynn’s nap was, as he’s awakened when he rolls over and hits a button that causes the machinery he and Ram are inside of to suddenly light up. Flynn gets to his feet, while Ram is astonished at how Flynn is apparently bringing this dead machine to life. The pieces around them form into a nearly complete Recognizer, and Ram is further astonished when Flynn notices the controls of the vehicle and instantly sets the Recognizer into motion.

But Flynn stops the Recognizer when the weakening Ram calls him over. They hold hands for a brief time, which prompted my wife to ask if they were going to kiss (not that such an act would’ve been objectionable, just out of place in this instance). Ram is fading fast and asks Flynn if he’s really a user. Flynn nods, prompting Ram to smile, presumably thinking that there’s hope in their situation. Flynn nods again when Ram asks him to help Tron. Ram’s eyes close and he slowly disintegrates as Flynn sadly looks on.

Elsewhere, Tron is continuing his journey on foot. He realizes that he still has a ways to go before he reaches the tower, but his focus changes to Sark’s ship, which Tron notes is nearby. Flynn is also headed toward the tower, but is having trouble with the Recognizer, as it only seems to be able to go in a straight line.

Inside Sark’s ship, we see another vessel being created. This ends up somewhat resembling the ones used by the respective villains in Star Trek: Insurrection and Attack of the Clones. Thankfully, we’re seeing this type of ship in a good movie this time.

Inside the control room overseeing this ship, a female program (also played by Cindy Morgan) informs a guard of its status. As she walks off, Tron snatches her from behind a corner and identifies her as Yori. After she simply repeats what she just told the guard, Tron puts some kind of magic touch on her, which makes her recognize and subsequently embrace him. Yes, these two are sweethearts, like their flesh and blood doppelgangers. Some may roll their eyes at this, but honestly, why not? If the Replicants in Blade Runner can be romantic with each other, why not the residents of this place?

Tron asks Yori where they can go to plan their strategy, and she quickly leads them out of the control room.

Back to Flynn, who suddenly realizes that he’s not alone in the Recognizer. It turns out that Clu’s Bit from earlier has been tagging along, and Flynn recognizes it by its limited vocabulary. He also just shrugs his shoulders when the Bit says Flynn is his program. This actually makes sense, as the program Bit was with earlier in the film looked just like Flynn.

Tron and Yori are continuing their trek on foot, encountering bizarre looking programs on the way. Flynn, on the other hand, is still having trouble with the Recognizer. But the damn thing starts really acting up, even taking out a bridge, dooming the tank that was crossing it. It soon goes down, yep, another cliff. Flynn pushes every button he can but nothing is helping, and the Bit constantly saying “No” is no doubt adding to his frustration. Eventually, the Recognizer, despite Flynn’s efforts, takes itself apart a piece at a time, until the top section containing the control center that Flynn and Bit are currently in just crashes, tossing Flynn out. Bit gets the hell out of there again (thanks for sticking around, twerp).

Flynn is a bit dizzy, but assures the unfazed crowd around him that he’s fine. I guess the people here must be on painkillers or something, because they don’t seemed to have noticed a massive vehicle crash in their immediate facility. Flynn even states that there are some live ones in this area before taking notice of what I’m guessing is a call girl program (hey, Daryl Hannah’s Replicant was referred to as a “pleasure model”, too).

But Flynn doesn’t let the sight of her stop him from continuing on. He reaches the tower, but can’t find Tron. Suddenly, Flynn hears the sound of approaching footsteps, prompting him to hide. The footsteps’ owners turn out to be Sark and his posse. Flynn is watching from above and leaps down to take out the slacker who’s lagging behind the others. After punching him out, Flynn grabs him to presumably get info out of him. But this physical contact causes Flynn’s armor to turn red. Understandably, this freaks him out a bit and prompts him to move away from the guy, who promptly disintegrates. Flynn darts off after muttering, “I don’t believe this!” You and me both, pal.

Next up: We’ll see if Tron and Yori reach the I/O Tower, and if Flynn gets his blue mojo back.

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.