Tron
First posted 1/28/02
What is there to be said about Tron that hasn’t already been said?
Um, quite a bit, actually.
Ah, the eighties. Back when things like cell phones and motorized scooters could only be found in the dreams of madmen, back when it was possible to buy a movie ticket without mortgaging one’s house, back when Michael Jackson was still considered “eccentric.” And yes, back when personal computers were an innovative, fresh new invention that some fools were suggesting would revolutionize the future.
It’s hard for me to believe now, but as young as I am, I am old enough to have seen the entire PC-Internet evolution, from bulletin boards run by my neighbors, to an on-line community full of freaks just like myself- it’s scary how fast things have changed. When I was a kid, running “Where in the USA is Carmen Sandiego?” on an Apple II/c with no hard drive was the coolest thing around. That or “Math Munchers.” These days you need an advanced degree in physics to play a basic shoot ‘em up. Sigh. No wonder I’m happiest loading up “Final Fantasy Legend” on my Game Boy these days. Or “Bionic Commando.” Man, I loved that game on the old NES. Never owned it myself, had to borrow it from a friend, but-
Where was I? Oh, right, ‘80’s, computers, Tron. The cover of the recently released double-disc presentation of the movie heralds it as a “Milestone in the history of Computer Animation.” Okay, sure. Then the back describes it as a “Masterpiece of CGI ingenuity”- huh? Are we supposed to forget that the film didn’t do very well at all at the box office when it opened? That critics en masse labeled it as a disappointment, and audiences followed suit? Citizen Kane, The Wizard of Oz, ”It’s a Wonderful Life”- they can pull this sort of revisionist crap, because they truly are great films. Tron, fun as it is, gorgeous as it can be, ain’t.
Okay, first a basic plot summary for those of you not familiar with the story: there are two worlds, the world outside the computer and the world inside. The movie begins and ends in the first, but it’s the second that makes the impression; if it weren’t for Circuit-land, we’d have nothing more on our hands here but an obscure piece of flotsam for Jeff Bridges fans.
Mr. Bridges plays lead here, the arrogant, goofy, socially inept programmer who will serve as our link between the two realms. At the start of the film, we find Flynn running an extremely popular arcade in downtown- um- somewhere. He splits his time between breaking world records on video games and trying in vain to hack into the computer system of the company he used to work for. An ex-girlfriend, Laura (Cindy Morgan) and her current beau Alan (Bruce Boxleitner) still work for the company, and Alan’s having some problems of his own.
He’s designed a new program called Tron to rein in the increasingly powerful Master Control Program, which essentially runs the company through help of its original programmer, Ed Dillinger (David Warner), current CEO. Unfortunately, the MCP has caught wind of Flynn’s attempts to hack in, and cuts off all “Group Seven Access,” in an attempt to block him from the system. This also shuts out Alan, who complains to Ed. Ed feeds him some company double-speak and essentially told to mind his own damn business.
Alan goes to find his girlfriend, who is currently working with mentor/father figure Dr. Walter Gibbs (Barnard Hughes) on some sort of matter transference engine- which I’m sure we all know will become very important in about ten minutes. Alan whines to Laura, who decides they should go hunt down Flynn, because he has “Group Seven Access” or “Group Six Access” or some access of some group that is apparently special. (Allowing Alan to spout the immortal line: “He also had access to you.” Wow, talk about your subtle exposition…) One wonders why neither of our two clean-cut heroes consider that, since Flynn was fired, he probably doesn’t have “access” these days to anything more impressive than the stuff growing in his fridge- but if it gets Jeff Bridges into the main plot line faster, fine by me.
They find Flynn. Flynn tells ‘em the reason he keeps hacking into the system is because back when he worked for the company, Ed stole a number of games Flynn had been working on, sold them to the company, and used the money and prestige that gave him to worm his way to the top. Flynn spends his time trying to get into the mainframe in order to bring back proof that Dillinger screwed him. Laura and Alan convince that he can use a main terminal at the company in order to hack more directly into the system, and give Alan an opportunity to get his Tron program access to the MCP.
While this is going on, we are privy to a conversation between Ed and the MCP where we learn that the MCP is growing more and more powerful. It plans on assimilating the networks of the Pentagon, and, eventually, taking over the world. When Dillinger attempts to take the MCP off-line, the MCP threatens to leak Dillinger’s theft to the press, leaving Dillinger able to do nothing more than frown uncomfortably.
Our intrepid heroes make their way into the building, and Flynn is left to do his magic at a work station in the lab where we saw Laura and Dr. Gibbs playing with lasers earlier. For some reason, the MCP is able to speak to him while he types, ordering him to desist, an order Flynn blithely ignores, unaware that he has picked a computer directly in the line of fire of the matter transference beam. (Toldja.) The beam is fired, Flynn disappears, and wakes up inside the computer.
Up until this point of the film, we’ve had occasional glimpses into the “other world,” but from here till the last five minutes or so, we’re at play in the fields of the Borg. Which means we see lots of nifty looking computer animation/black light effects, with the added bonus of a relatively non-nonsensical plot-line. As usual, my summaries are running longer than they need to, so I’ll hit the high points.
Inside the system, Flynn meets a number of “programs” who resemble their users in the outside world. He plays a couple of video games, helps Tron and friend Ram break free, gets separated from Tron watches Ram die, shows off semi-godlike powers, reunites with the good guys on their way to the MCP headquarters, learns the true meaning of Christmas, kisses the program who looks like Laura, bringing the idea of cyber-porn to a whole new level of possibilities, “sacrifices” himself by jumping into the MCP (which, admittedly, looks way friggin’ cool), allowing Tron to destroy the MCP for good, then gets transported back to the real world with a convenient computer printout of the proof he was searching for so desperately at the start of the movie. (I could get into the highly dubious worth of a printout as proof of foul play, but I won’t- I think I’ve already hit this movie with about as much sarcasm as it can take.)
That’s it.
So- overall thoughts. Watching Tron again when the new DVD came out, I couldn’t help but think how much better this movie would have been with a really solid screenwriter at the helm. Because visually, the film is still impressive; better than that, it remains unique, presenting a world that no one else has attempted to copy in the decades since its initial release. A number of the action sequences have a cool zing to them, like the light cycle bits and the concluding battle with MCP, and the acting, while not uniformly brilliant, is decent: Jeff Bridges and David Warner are both very good.
Also, there a enough moments of striking intelligence in the story-line to make me wish someone with more experience in plotting and dialogue could have taken a crack at this. The religious implications are, for the most part, intriguing rather than heavy handed, and every so often you’ll hit a pun on computer software that doesn’t make you roll your eyes and groan. I particularly liked the fact that the MCP started off as a simple chess program.
On the other hand, there are quite a few “roll your eyes and groan” moments, and it’s hard not to get the impression that the makers of the movie, while being big computer fans, just spent a weekend or two reading a few books on the science and not taking good notes. For instance, why is one of the programs called “RAM”? Forgive my probably inadequate knowledge here, but isn’t RAM (Random Access Memory- way to go, brain!) a part of the hard drive, and not a really a program? It’s not painfully bad, but it does get sloppy, especially the scenes involving Flynn trying to hack the system, where’s he just typing in simple commands which somehow circumnavigate the firewalls of the MCP. I mean, we’re all used to movies doing whatever the hell they want when showing people using computers, but with a movie supposedly focusing on them, one might hope for a bit more accuracy. (A bit- get it? Get it? No? Philistines.)
There’s also, and here I’m being really picky, a number of shots that were obviously inserted because they looked cool, even if they had nothing to do with the plot. My favorite is the minute animation of these neato spider thingies, which we never see interacting with the main characters.
I do have fondness for this movie, though, despite its silly and occasionally haphazard storytelling. Mainly because it’s fun, and, if not aware of its faults per se, it at least doesn’t pretend to be that much better than it actually is, current box artwork notwithstanding. I find something like this about a billion times preferable to recent special-effects hackwork, although that might just be the grumpy old coot in me. I would comment a bit more on the DVD, but I haven’t gotten around to checking out all the special features; suffice to say, it’s nice to be able to see a good print in widescreen for once. Recommended for Jeff Bridgeheads, ‘80’s nostalgists, and freaks like me.