Tron Legacy

I saw "Tron Legacy" for Daft Punk.  And it had tons of Daft Punk.  They did the entire soundtrack, and what a soundtrack have they made.  There is an Oscar for best musical score and if Daft Punk doesn't get up that on stage in their funny little racing helmets to accept it, then I will eternally hate the Academy Awards.  This is techno at its most awesome, just incredible.  "Tron Legacy" might just have the best soundtrack for any movie ever, it fits so perfectly.  Its such a good soundtrack, that I almost forgot how stupid the rest of the movie was.

The original "Tron" was released in 1982, twenty-eight years ago.  That was back in the days when computers were just taking off, when most businesses still did work on paper.  The PC was still new technology, forget about visual interfaces, or mouses.  It was before Google, before Windows, before the Nintendo, before the Macintosh, before the World Wide Web, and if you're reading this blog, probably before you were born.  Computing was still a very wild frontier of seemingly limitless opportunities for a very small niche society of programmers and technicians.  "Tron" was made for such a different world.  If you follow Moore's Law, since 1982 the amount of transistors that can be fit on an integrated circuit has increased by 16,384 fold.  My old dusty Nintendo 64 is massively more powerful than the most cutting edge computer from the early 80s, and realize that the 64 itself is a dinosaur compared with the machine you're probably reading these words on.  The very concept of graphical interfaces was still in development.  This meant that for the audiences viewing "Tron", it really was the first visualization of the computer world.

"Tron Legacy" just does not share that spirit, sadly.  There doesn't seem to be any real interest in capturing the magic of the idea of "Tron" by updating it to the modern world.  Instead they just made an action movie, a good action movie, but just an action movie.  The original "Tron" wasn't very good, but at least it was trying to do something that movies had never done before:  CG effects, cyberpunk storyline, and acknowledging video games as a major cultural force.  The new one...  its shiny.  I like shiny, though.  "Tron Legacy" is a good movie for what its doing.  And that's to be fun.  This is a great fun movie.

I've always associated computers with my father working at home on the PC when I was just a child.   My dad was some kind of master wizard being able to control this amazing machine in order to program things for AT&T.  When you're four years old looking at C++ code, its more impossible to understand than the raining numbers from "The Matrix".  I remember being a little kid and for the first time seeing a computer panel.  The first thing I saw in it was a city, with each chip being a building. each little metallic bit a car.  It was some incredible fantasy world where tiny people lived.  "Tron" always will have a place in my heart, perhaps not for actually being a good movie, but because it imagined the same things I did when I saw that computer panel:  computers are home to a living world.

But that's not what "Tron Legacy" is about.  Computers are not important to this movie.  When you get right down to it, it isn't even really cyberpunk.  The digital world of the Grid is just an excuse to have kung-fu fights and chase scenes.  Something has been lost.  Not to mention that this movie really has next to nothing to do with the original "Tron" anyway, sharing only two characters - one of which is barely more than a cameo.  I don't think this is really is much of a proper sequel at all.  But still a fun movie.

The plotline this time revolves around Sam Flynn, the son of Jeff Bridges' character, Kevin, who was the protagonist of the first movie.  Kevin Flynn will from now be known as "The Dude" in this post for reasons that I shouldn't have to explain.  The Dude has disappeared off the face of the Earth since 1989, leaving Sam all alone to become, for whatever reason, Batman.  And the Dude's own company has fallen into the hands of super greedy corporate dudes*.  Sam doesn't actually dress in a cape and cowl, but he does sneak into his own company (which he doesn't control... somehow) and release their top secret stuff on the Internet.  So the movie starts with him driving his motorcycle really fast, parachuting off skyscrapers, surfing on the tops of taxis, breaking into a secure area:  he's Batman.  So when he finally goes to the Grid, he is able to kick ass instinctively, I suppose.  This doesn't really make any sense at all, I'm afraid, but who cares about the real world?  Let's get into the computer!

Later, Sam is visited by his dad's partner from the first movie, Alan (who's avatar was the eponymous Tron inside the computer world), who tells him that he got a message from The Dude.  Sam investigates and gets sucked into the computer world and suddenly has to fight another evil group of programs who, in the spirit of "Tron" are trying to escape to the real world and conquer us.  The lead villain is Clu, the idiotically named program who looks exactly like the Dude, so for the rest of this review will be called "the Evil Dude".  Evil Dude launched a coup against the Good Dude and now rules computer land with his entourage of a sniveling bald minister and Vanitas from "Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep".  The real Dude is living in a secret mountain base with Thirteen from "House" hiding with a Plot Coupon that could let the Evil Dude take over, and be able to escape the computer... or something.  Its very muddled, and the villain's plan actually doesn't make any sense.  Also Sam has to escape the computer world in eight hours or else he'll be locked in like his dad.  And then Thirteen (her real name is "Cora", but we'll just call her "Thirteen") is some kind of "biodigital jazz" lifeform that sort of appeared on their own in computer land without the Dude creating them.  I don't really see how that makes them special, since all the programs are already full-fledge people with emotions and personalities, so why do we care about these ones?  Evil Dude doesn't like Thirteen's kind, and goes off to kill them all.

Okay, this movie doesn't actually make a whole lot of sense, and the plot is a complete mess.  But that's not really important, since the whole point is just to give some kind of reference for the action.  Here's all you need to know:  Evil Dude is bad, Sam is good, Thirteen is only here to look pretty, the Good Dude is seriously acting like the title character from "The Big Lebowski" which is hilarious, and there are Light Cycle battles.

In the twenty-eight years since "Tron", the world of the computers has become far more sleek and solid. When before the world was very bright harsh colors and blocky cartoony ships, the new "Tron Legacy" world is dark, stylish, and very realistic.  The difference between the Light Cycle bikes basically amounts to the difference between a Model T and a Bugati Veyron.  The whole world has the shine of a new model car, its incredible stuff.  Perhaps not artistically superior, but definitely amazing effects with very cool action sequences.  The fight scenes are what make this movie, along with Daft Punk of course.  Just have fast shiny objects fly around to Daft Punk and not even Michael Bay** couldn't ruin it.  ...Actually Michael Bay could still ruin it, but it would be a lot more watchable.  What I'm saying here is that the movie looks cool, sounds cool, and is just fun enough that you can forgive its horrible plot flaws, weak characterization, and complete waste of its best character.

However, the effects are not all good.  To make a young Jeff Bridges for the Evil Dude character, they decided to try to digitally animate his face, thus giving an illusion of a younger character.  This, in short, does not work.  Evil Dude, and the young Jeff Bridges that shows up in a flashback look horrible.   I'll admit, its better than the young Patrick Stewart from "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" which looked like a bloated mannequin monster from your most awful nightmares.  But still, "Tron Legacy"'s young Jeff Bridges effect looks like they stepped this thing off the set of "Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within".   Its rubbery, it doesn't move right, when it opens its mouth it just falls apart.  The best advise I can give is to just look away from Evil Dude's face, and then you'll be convinced.  But then weirdly, as the movie goes  on, the effect winds up looking worse.  How could they have thought that this worked?  I can't believe this is the best they could have done.

The best character in this movie is without a doubt, Zeus, played by David Bowie in Ziggy Stardust make-up who is actually being played by Michael Sheen.  This guy is the crazy owner of the End of Line (Endl;) Club where Daft Punk has a cameo as basically Daft Punk.  He jumps around in a wildly over-the-top performance dancing with his glass cane that shoots lasers.  Some people might find him ridiculous and incredibly effeminate, I found his ridiculousness to be hilarious.  How come they couldn't get the real David Bowie for this movie?  The guy has acted before, he was perfect in "The Prestige", why not?  Too busy with the spiders from mars? Sadly this character gets double-crossed by the Evil Dude and dies way too quickly.  My favorite characters always die... its tragic really.

Oddly enough, I found myself rather liking Thirteen in this film.  In "House", I've always considered her to be the inferior replacement to Dr. Cameron and basically only existing because of how sexy Olivia Wilde is.  Here her main purpose is again just to be eye candy***.  The original "Tron"'s eye candy, Yori, has completely disappeared without explanation.  But Wilde is able to bring a sort of charming energy and innocence to her character.  Also, I liked the haircut, very Japanese.  Unfortunately, Thirteen has very little to do in this movie other than being the love interest for Sam in rather boring "tell me about your world" scenes.  Sam on the other hand just barely passes as the protagonist.

The character Tron actually is in this movie, but again he's wasted.  There's a whole plotline for him but its all kinda forced into the background, and he really could have used more screentime.  However, by far the most awesome point was the moment where Tron attacks Clu and proudly declares:  "I fight for the users!"  And then Tron is gone from the rest of the film, just when I want to see him the most.

One more thing:  remember the teaser trailer?  Nothing that happens in that trailer even remotely has anything to do with anything in this movie.  There aren't even green programs!

By the time I was done seeing "Tron Legacy" I was hugely entertained, indeed, I rather loved it.  But just a minute or two of thought really tore the whole plotline down, and the movie just isn't "Tron".  There's a whole massive world of digital wonders out there, and the best this movie could do was have very shiny action scenes?  I can't help but feel they were aiming too low.  Oh well, I still recommend it.  Its an awesome action film, if nothing else.  Its worth seeing just for the spectacle.  In fact, I might actually want to see this movie again.  And I'd see another sequel in this style.  And if that's not the sign of a successful movie, I don't know what is.  Can't wait for this movie to be a stage in a "Kingdom Hearts" game.

--------------------------------------------------
* One of which is played by Cillian Murphy, who also is the son of the villain from the original "Tron", Ed Dillinger, played by David Warner.  Ed Dillinger's computer avatar, Sark was the real big bad for most of that film.  Tragically, David Warner isn't in this movie and Cillian Murphy says a total of four lines altogether in an abandoned plotline of some kind.  Maybe they're setting up a sequel, I don't know. If you have Cillian Murphy in your movie, USE HIM.

** I saw the trailer for "Transformers 3:  Dark of the Moon".  Just the fact that a Transformers movie's subtitle is one word away from a Pink Floyd album is offensive to me.  Its comforting to know I can already predict what 2011's worst movie will be, and the year hasn't even started.

*** By the way, the Dude in this movie has been locked away for twenty years inside the computer land with nobody to talk to but Thirteen.  As far as I can tell, he never made a move.  Come on!  I know the Dude has become some kind of Zen Jedi whatever but still, its Olivia Wilde!  If he hasn't had sex with her at least once, the sexual frustration of that man must be up to a million.  How did he go all this time without digging out his fingernails and growing black swan wings?