Movies Centered Around Games or Being Lost in a Virtual World
Movies based on a video game IP = typically bad / Movies where virtual worlds are at the focal point = typically good or great
Drew is out this week not watching movies somewhere. In his absence the wonderful Katie Carter is kind enough to join us again! She is a veteran of the Do You Like Apples way of life at this point. With the video game inspired Free Guy opening this weekend we are focusing on movies that are centered around games or virtual reality. Let’s get lost (get it… like lost into a virtual game) into three recommendations that are all household names.
You can find Katie’s work at katieatthemovies.com and on Instagram @katieatthemovies.
Katie recommends…
Tron (streaming on Disney Plus)
“Tron” has long been considered a cult classic, although I’m not sure it entirely fits that term’s qualifications. When Walt Disney Productions released director Steven Lisberger’s film—inspired by early video games, in particular Pong—in 1982, it was both a critical and financial success, and Disney’s highest grossing live-action movie for the next five years.
But “Tron” can also be a challenging film to decipher, its plot too convoluted and technical for young viewers (or old ones—I’ll be real, I got more than a little confused on my rewatch), its visuals occasionally too cartoony to appeal to adults. The way “Tron” defies convention both on and off screen, however, makes it well worth seeking out. The story centers around Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges), a former programmer and game developer for a computer company called ENCOM, who spends his days at his arcade and attempting to hack into ENCOM’s mainframe. He’s doing this because he believes that ENCOM’s vice-president, Ed Dillinger (David Warner), plagiarized the games he designed so he could rise within the company’s ranks, and hopes to obtain the evidence he needs to prove it. With the assistance of ENCOM employees Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner) and Lora Baines (Cindy Morgan), Flynn uses ENCOM’s Master Control Program, or MCP, to enter the system mainframe, where programs appear in the guise of the humans (known as “users”) who created them. There, Flynn is forced to engage in a series of deadly games by the MCP and its second-in-command, Sark (also played by Warner), to prove his loyalty to the program over the users.
It doesn’t take long to notice that “Tron” prioritizes spectacle and technical jargon over heart and humanity, despite its tale of a creative underdog triumphing over big business, and a winning performance from the ever-charismatic Bridges. In fact, the entire cast pulls double duty, playing not only their human characters but also their digital counterparts, and seem to be having a good time doing it. But “Tron” is mostly famous for being one of the first movies to extensively use CGI, and while it would be easy to write off some of those effects (the light cycles, for instance) as looking rather clunky and dated today, I actually find them charming. CGI and backlit animation (used to film most of the scenes with live actors set in the computer world), along with a limited but bold color palette, clever sets and costumes, and an immersive soundscape, combine to create a uniquely dazzling film the likes of which hadn’t been seen before, and hasn’t really been seen since.
It’s true that the story of the making of “Tron” is more interesting than the movie itself: the drama with Disney animators who didn’t want to work with outside filmmakers; the romance that formed between computer scientist Alan Klay and Bonnie MacBird, who met while working on the movie together (and then the dispute as to how she would be credited after much of her script was rewritten); the gamble Disney, known for more light-hearted family fare, was taking on a more serious movie, using effects that had never been used before; and the fact that the Academy refused to nominate “Tron” for any special effects Oscars because, as Lisberger put it, they “thought we cheated by using computers.” Still, as far as video game movies go, “Tron” is not just one of the first, but one of the best, and its influence on the film industry continues to be felt today. I don’t know that I would call it a cult classic—I think it’s just a classic.
Billy Recommends…
The Matrix (streaming on HBO Max)
This classic is a movie that I missed the hype for. I was 8 when it came out and people kept raving about this movie that supposedly changed everything. Kids in my class and their parents could not stop talking about it. Despite the constant chattering I never got the chance to see it until I was 18 years old. At that point the cultural zeitgeist of this movie had worn off on me. All the tricks The Matrix had were created again and again, so I was not that impressed when I saw it finally. Don’t worry The Matrix fanboys. I am glad to inform you my views have changed. Understanding the context of this movie has made the couple of rewatches incredibly enjoyable.
Action movies before The Matrix were not like this revolutionary movie. They were vibrant, campy, and were often parodies of the prior movies that inspired them. The Matrix has its own inspirations for sure, but uses those ideas with a style of action filmmaking I don’t think we have seen before 1999. The Wachowski’s, Lilly and Lana, only had one movie before this called Bound. A noirish crime thriller that they used to “prove themselves” in the industry. Eventually getting the script they wanted to make approved and they had free reign for all the things on set.
This is something that is constant throughout the career for The Wachowski’s. At almost no point have they had to compromise their vision. The Matrix is the pinnacle of that freedom working. An iconic action film that pushed the technological limits to its peak while using that technology to form a story that is gripping from beginning to end. Surely most of our readers have seen this classic at this point, but use this opportunity to see it with a new lens. Try and appreciate the impact this movie left on the industry. The likes of which we may not see again from an original story.
Total Recall (streaming on Netflix)
*This is a repost from our Summer Blockbusters episode
The initial premise before the curtain is pulled back sounds like a dream that this whole world would be craving right now. A futuristic technology that makes travel so real that the user can’t tell the difference. Turns out that this technology is meant to mask a more massive conspiracy for planetary domination. A lot of people would probably take their chances no matter the sinister undertones.
Paul Verhoven’s sci-fi epic mixes a small, but powerful amount of skepticism of reality with a heavy dose of B-movie material. Total Recall says a lot in a few serious moments while driving this movie into cult classic territory with the always magnetic Arnold Schwarzenegger (Douglas Quaid) and his physical prowess. We have a superhero thrust into a plot that doesn’t need to set up a superhero subplot. The superhero aesthetic and leading man magnetism allows interesting directors, like Verhoven, to use world class visuals to enhance the thinly veiled themes he wants to bring into his movies.
Total Recall is an absolute trip and a quick 2 hours that is easy to come back to time and time again. This story works best when Quaid is struggling to make his reality clear and at a certain point things come into place a little too easily. Regardless, the ride is quick, Arnie can hardly do any wrong on screen. And there is a three-boobed woman. How neat is that?
Links
We have yet to see Wes Anderson’s move The French Dispatch, but the hype for his next movie continues to grow. First with snagging Tom Hank’s and now Margot Robbie.
Florence Pugh continues to zig and zag the performances she picks. If you were worried that Black Widow was going to saturate your love for this brilliant actress do not worry. She is going small once again. The first image of her performance in the movie The Wonder directed by Sebastián Lelio's has dropped.
The movie Venom: Let There Be Carnage that I am not excited for in the slightest has been pushed back because of the surge in covid cases. Please be safe out there everyone and get vaccinated so that I don’t have to eventually miss out on movies I actually want to see.