Reel Nostalgia...

From the creative minds of Jaws and Lost...




Bad Robot phone home...


The first real trailer for J.J. Abram's "Super 8" is out...

And it looks totally like something you'd find coming from Amblin Entertainment in the Eighties, only it's out now from Bad Robot. Check out the Spielbergian trailer as well as this swanky, new poster for the film. I love both, but the poster is great for the fact that it's not just some head shot of a star and the films name. The art of the poster has disappeared over the last couple of decades as the need for stars to open a film has dominated the marketing of the project. I'm glad to see this as a turn in the opposite direction. Of course, it could be said that the stars of this film are Steven Spielberg and J.J. Abrams, which would explain their names being so prominent.

Looking forward to 8 being my number 4 in 11...

Insert Coins...

Greetings programs...



Twenty eight years ago I was sucked into another world. It was a world unlike anything anybody had seen before. It was a place that existed on the other side of the computer screen when video games dominated the cultural scene and arcades like Aladdin's Castle existed as places of enchanted amusement. Tron was my second Star Wars. Just five years after being taken away to a galaxy far, far, away, I was transported to an entirely different place not so far away, an electronic Wonderland, that would change my life forever. Star Wars had already changed cinema with its groundbreaking visual effects and set the benchmark by which blockbuster films would be produced but Tron would again alter the course of visual effects in cinema, albeit on a much less successful commercial level. While George Lucas was the undisputed master of the box office Force, lesser known visionary Steven Lisberger was the wizard of an electronic Oz. Tron was a film that was both technically as well as metaphorically ahead of its time by almost two decades as it narratively struggled to define itself in a relatively uncharted technical frontier and convey complicated themes, ideas and modern colloquialisms that hadn't yet existed. I vividly remember watching the film's opening day coverage that weekend on Entertainment Tonight where they interviewed audiences leaving the theater and most were left scratching their heads. Two teenage girls in particular were perplexed by their reactions such as "I just didn't get it," which seemed to sum up the the reasons why Tron had failed to resonate with mainstream audiences at the box office. Coincidentally, science fiction author William Gibson would be the first to coin the phrase "cyberspace" in his short story "Burning Chrome" which was published that same month in the July issue of Omni magazine while Blade Runner having been released just two weeks before it and whose initial reception was seen as both a critical and commercial failure, would go on to be regarded as one of the most influential films ever made.

Tron has a very unique place in cinematic history in that it is the first and only film of its kind to employ the complex techniques that were used to create its electronic world under the stewardship of Disney special effects supervisor Harrison Ellenshaw, commercial artist Peter Lloyd, and the conceptual designs of artists Jean Giraud a.k.a Moebius and Syd Mead whom had also worked on Blade Runner that same year. To render the film's ambitious computer graphics, several industrial computer animation companies such as Information International, Inc. were approached and a tediously complicated process of marrying the graphics to the film by blowing up the 65mm film negatives into "kodaliths" and matting or "rotoscoping" the elements into each individual frame of celluloid by hand. For this reason, Tron would be the first and last film of its kind to use these cumbersome methods to deliver special effects and as a result gives the film a stylistically unique look and quality that could not quite artificially be replicated per se in the digital filmaking world of today though many such processes have become simplified and streamlined by digital technology to the point that almost anyone can render similar looking visual effects on their home PC with relative ease. Ironically, several Disney animators refused to work on Tron out of fear that computer animation would inevitably replace them and render their jobs obsolete, a prophecy that would come to pass nearly 22 years later when Disney shut down its traditional ink-and-paint animation studios but would eventually be resurrected by Pixar's John Lasseter.

Tron was released on July 9, 1982 grossing $33 million on a $17 million dollar budget. While some might argue that the film was a commercial failure, and certainly not the blockbuster Disney had hoped it would be, it was still marginally profitable. On December 17, Disney will be rolling the dice again on its long-awaited sequel, Tron Legacy, which hopes to set another benchmark for computer visual effects and animation much like its predecessor. Let's all hope this time audiences and critics have caught up to Tron and this time will be much more receptive.

END OF LINE.

The Birth Of Flynn's Arcade...

Twenty-Eight years ago today, Walt Disney Productions released "TRON" on an unsuspecting (and unready) public...

And Decadent Dave would never be the same. The film went on to make a disappointing $33 million dollars with a 17 million dollar budget. The film was one of a collection of underwhelming box office performers greenlit by Ron Miller. This was another nail in the coffin of Miller's career as head of the studio/company. Less than two years later, Ron would be gone and a young executive from Paramount named Michael Eisner, that he had tried to recruit to run the film division would be in his place.

Almost three decades later, Eisner is now gone and a sequel to the film Miller thought would help bring Disney back in touch with the modern youth (that abandoned Mickey in the mid-70's/early-80's) would be coming out in theaters. I wonder if this December, Ron will sit down in front of a silver screen to watch this and have a slight smile on his face.

Karma...

80's Reunion...

It seems that Hollywood's fascination with the Eighties is continuing...

But now it has moved beyond just remakes of 80's films to the culture. Particularly video games. I'm sure many of you saw the announcement that the classic arcade hit "Space Invaders" was being turned into a film. This follows on the news that a game based on "Missle Command" is being adapted. And we all know that "Tron Legacy" will be coming out late this year based on the 80's film about video games, which actually spawned an arcade game. This got me wondering what other games from that time period would be great or at least captivating enough for adapting into a film. Here's an incomplete list of films that Suits could/probably are going after.




Donkey Kong - The classic game that brought us Mario which has him rescuing the heroine from a giant gorilla. I'm sure Peter Jackson is salivating at doing this one.




Dig Dug - A little tunnel digger that is digging through caverns beneath the earth destroying little red monsters (Tomatoes) and fire breathing dragons (Fygars). I sense something Darren Aronofski would just love turning into a compelling story. Heck, he's already planned on "Robocop."




Joust - This tale of knights riding giant bird creatures among floating rocks brings to mind images of "Avatar" when thinking of the possibilities. But since Cameron is busy, how about Andrew Stanton once he finishes "John Carter of Mars?"




Robotron - Ironically, Disney sued Williams Electronics for the "Tron" part of the name. Apparently the Mouse's lawyers didn't know that tron was used before the 1982 by scientist and the world alike to discover things like, oh, electrons and such. How about Neill Blomkamp for this project?




Pac Man - Who can ever forget this lovable little guy? Imagine a bizarre film featuring this fellow running around a glowing room looking for food. Only one man should direct this. Terry Gilliam, your future awaits you.




Dragon's Lair - And bringing it back home to Disney territory, former Disney animator Don Bluth created this sensation about a knight named Dirk the Daring, who attempted to rescue a beautiful princess, Daphne, from the evil dragon Singe, who has locked Daphne in a ancient wizard's castle. Who else to direct this, but Don Bluth of course.




Defender - A lone fighter must protect his planets inhabitants while destroying an alien horde bent on control and domination. Steven Spielberg, call your agent. I think he has some news for you.




Asteroids - Out in an asteroid belt, a small spacecraft plots a course for its survival all while having to avoid hostile alien forces. Could this be any better a project for George Lucas? Oh wait, yes I forgot about that. Go back to the Ranch, George. We'll get someone like James McTeigue as a substitute.





Zaxxon - Another space fighter game where you're trying to move through behind enemy lines and destroy their bases. I sense another opportunity for Tom Cruise and J.J. Abrams to work together!




Centipede - A distant traveler on a strange and exotic planet encounters strange and horrific insect like creatures that he/she has to destroy in order to survive. How about we get Rob Zombie to direct this one? It can't be as bad as his Halloween remakes can it? Can it?




Galaga - A space warship encounters an alien armada heading toward his home and has to destroy it all by himself. Could this be "The Last Starfighter" game adaptation? No, but it sounds like it. Let's call up Ronald Moore and have him work on this. He did an impressive adaption of "Battlestar Galactica" so why not this?




Castlevania - Simon Belmont, a descendant of the Belmont clan of vampire hunters, travels to the dark and foreboding fortress of Dracula, Castlevania. There he fights all the evils until he meets the famous vampire in a battle that apparently Von Helsing couldn't finish. Kind of like "Bram Stoker's Dracula" meets "Indiana Jones." Francis Ford Coppola could come out of his semi-retirement and do this one with his eyes closed.





Tempest - A bizarre world where you have to survive a gauntlet of creatures that come at you from strange dimensions. This seems opportune for a director such as David Lynch to pull off.




Pitfall! - Ok, this one didn't start out as an arcade game but it did become one later when Sega licensed it from Activision. It was a fun game when it came out in the 80's for the Atari and could prove to be a great film. If you're going to rip off Indy, then Pitfall Harry is the one you should do it with. Now, who is in between projects right now that could handle this? Steven Sommers perhaps?




Double Dragon - Billy Lee and his twin brother Jimmy (known as Hammer and Spike), fight through the gangland of the Black Warriors gang to rescue their mutual love interest Marian. Now this film screams of cheesy, 80's kung fu/karate films. Who better than Sam Firstenberg to direct and Golan-Globus to produce. Perfection. I wouldn't even know it was a new film.




Pole Position - A racing game? With fast, Formula One race cars and add in some hot girls and slick shiny action? Is there anyone out there besides me that can't imagine Michael Bay directing this? The film he was born to do!

Well, that's my list. And time to fess up. Of course some of these films would make great adaptions, while others would be a desecration at least and a challenge at best. I'll let you guess which ones are deserving of an actual good film and which ones would simply be giant hole through which money is dumped. Now that might make an interesting arcade game.

But just think how many quarters you'd have to drop in...

Tron Hacked...

A virus/review of the script for "Tron 2" has finally arrived...

It's from Cin City 2000 and it's an early draft so we know that things have changed since this one, but for those that are interested in finding out some of the details of the sequel to the 80's cult film, delve right in.

"CLICK ME"

Don't worry, I don't think it's a virus/trojan horse/worm or something else, but be warned that spoilers are ahead...

Hat Tip to Latino Review.

The Turn...

THX-1138 posted that little walk down my childhood's memory lane the other day and happened to mention "The Turn" that I keep talking about. He's right... I have tended to mention it a few times, so I guess it was time I explained it.

Now first off, a little disclaimer. For those of you that think I don't like George Lucas, that I hate on him, that I'm entirely too negative toward him and Star Wars...

You're wrong.

I have the utmost respect for Lucas and for Star Wars. Just as I love Disney and am critical of some things that they do, I do so out of my love for what has been created and those that did the creating. I have been hard on Lucas the last few years, ok... since "The Phantom Menace," but even before that the signs were there. But I am critical, not because I wish any ill will toward GL, but because I see a man that is responsible for a good deal of my childhood making turns that I believe are wrong. Not just for him but Lucasfilm and the fans as well. Now, will he listen to me? Nope, he has no idea I even exist I'm sure. Although he did speak(along with Steven Spielberg) at my commencement at USC some years ago. My best friend met him and Spielberg and totally dissed Lucas without intending to, but that's another story.

It's my firm belief that no matter what George does, good or bad, Star Wars is just too big and has grown so large that he really can't control it anymore. Not like he used to. And it's taken on a life of it's own. Like that "A Long Time Ago" post I did earlier in the year, I feel that there is a future for the Star Wars Universe that doesn't involve Lucas. That too, is another story for another day. But I digress...

As the posters in THX's post showed, George Lucas has had an amazing list of film accomplishments throughout his life, but that collection of posters showed you a powerful group of films that most film makers only dream of coming close to. From his opening film, "THX-1138" to "Body Heat" there was no question about the depth and breath of scope as to what his creative hand touched. He was a golden boy along with the wunderkind that was Spielberg. His contributions to the movie going experience will be forever remembered. His instrumental place in the creation of the Avid, his development of a superior sound system known as THX, even his creation of a little computer division that he eventually sold off during his divorce to Steve Jobs will be part of the tapestry of film for eternity.

And then the first tarnish appeared. When "Return of the Jedi" landed in theaters we got our first sign that the man who could do no wrong, could finally do wrong. It wasn't a horrible film... not at all. There is much in it to like. But the beginnings of what fans would start to see creep into other films and stories appeared here. But it was the first we saw of it and it was minor. After all, look at all that came before? We may have gotten the Ewoks, but there was that great battle between Luke and Vader, right? We may have had to suffer through a horrible dance number, but we saw a much more epic space battle than we did before? Right? We may have had to have the first films story rehashed with another Death Star, but we got to see the Emperor in all his evil splendor, Right?

But then came "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" the following year. Sure it also had a great deal of cool stuff in it. The fight in Shanghai at the Club Obi Wan was something. The darker tone was nice, interesting, but Short Round? Ok, I can tolerate him. He was kind of amusing. I'd rather have had more Sallah, but it was ok. But Kate Capshaw? With all respect to Spielberg, she ain't no Karen Allen. I loved that Indy had this connection to a strong woman with a good deal of spunk. She could take care of her own. Capshaw's character was a whinny annoying pain in the rear that I could see no way for Indy to fall in love with. And yet he did. I enjoyed the film, but it wasn't near the beauty that was Raiders. It's darker tone is something that Spielberg had argued against and I understand his reasons. I don't mind the tone, but I believe the tone came from the darker elements that were happening in George Lucas' life at the time. His marriage was falling apart and he was having to build his Skywalker Ranch while working on these films. It was probably a lot. Add to that the weight of all this fame and fortune on a very shy man and somehow it's going to take a toll. Part of that toll showed up in "Return" with the way the characters were. They didn't seem exactly like they were in the first two films. There was a human vulnerability that was missing. It was like they were caricatures of the original characters. They were super-heroes that you knew could not be harmed. The little touches that took place in the first two films seemed to have been brushed aside. And broad attempts at forced humor and plot regurgitation had taken the place of what we had seen before. Lucas seemed to be going into unknown territory with the characters and seemed unsure. The film seemed directionless in search of a finale where everyone was happy and the bad guys were gone.

After these films, we would get others of disappointment as well. The watered down, Lord of the Rings-lite that was Willow. The Nevana animated television shows, "Droids" and "Ewoks." There were others, but nothing was the hit that Star Wars or Indy was. Everything was a letdown. Let's face it... "Howard the Duck?" I didn't know what to think after watching that. It seemed somewhere between 1980 and 1981 it was all down hill. Nothing he made looked like anything he had made before. A pale imitation of what had come before and what we expected from the future...

And yet we waited for a future.

One in which Star Wars was. We waited for that day when a new Star Wars film would come out. Would it be Chapter 7 and the further adventures of Luke? Or would it be the telling of the Republic and how the Empire came to be? Some waited maybe for a continuation of our childhood, others for something to make up for the ending of the last trilogy. I mean, it can't be as bad as Return. Can it? Really, could Lucas create anything as annoying as the Ewoks? I doubt it... or so I did. We all did. And we all were wrong...

The first warning should have been the "Special Editions." He remade classics. They may have had flaws, but they were masterworks. Did we really need to see Jabba running around talking to Han? It seemed to slow the story down to me. I know he didn't have access to this kind of technology back in the 70's, but that was a good thing. It made him be creative. It made him make decisions about what he could choose and what he couldn't. Even creative genius must be restrained sometimes so that it is focused. I remember in an art class one time the teacher talked about a law that was put in place in France. It was to forbid an artist from messing with their work after it was sold to another. This was done because a certain artist would go into the galleries and start painting on works that he had sold because he just didn't feel they were done. We needed a law like this for Lucas... But we didn't have it and the "new, improved" versions of our childhood were created. Only this time they weren't as idealized. They weren't as good. And so we waited for the prequels...

I remember hearing all the negative buzz. But my friends and I were too excited. George couldn't have made a bad film. This Jar Jar couldn't be as bad as the Ewoks, could he? Watching the screen craw come across that screen was truly a mind numbing moment. Then it began and you were seeing a young Obi-Wan. But the moment they ran into Jar Jar, the train wreck began. With each scene. Each embarrassingly awkward, bad scene. Instead of a roaring adventure pulled from the pulp inspired 30's Flash Gordon, like Star Wars was, we got long, boring passages of atrocious dialog that sounded like lessons in metaphysical healing. We saw Anakin Skywalker as a really bad child actor. We got the cute nickname "Anni..." That's what I always wanted to hear right? We got the Force explained to us in the most boring way possible. We saw him violate the original films even. Did he not rewatch them before sitting down with a pencil and notepade? Obi-Wan meet Anakin as a pilot NOT as a boy, Yoda trained Obi-Wan NOT Qui-Gon Jinn, ect. Sometimes less is more. Sometimes you want to be kept in the dark... when it's all revealed it can only turn into a letdown. The X-Files was good at this. You had to know we were never really gonna find the truth. It couldn't measure up. George Lucas forgot this...

Having kids might have changed him as well. Perhaps they're the reason he wanted Anakin to be a small boy? Maybe he saw that when he looked into the eyes of his son? I'm not sure, but his focus on the first film wasn't on the first film. And he wasn't helped by all the Yes Men around him. Lucas had gotten so big by this time he was no longer a film maker, he was an industry. And in this case, the film maker lost out. Where is Gary Kurtz when you need him?

Then the sequel, "Attack of the Clones" came out. It was better than the first. I've told friends that if Lucas would have started with this it would've been easier to forgive him. This one had much more of what the fans expected. But it also had more of what they feared. Those romance scenes between Anakin and Padme have dialog that a greeting card company would fire people over. Again, less would have been more appropriate. All he had to do was show them falling in love. We didn't have to hear all those painfully awkward words. The images would have told the story.

Lastly, "Revenge of the Sith" came out and we finally got the Star Wars film we wanted originally. Was it perfect? Nooooo. But it had what most of the others lacked. True heart. An action story that flowed and didn't get bogged down by clunky, romantic dialogue. Sure, Anakin turns too quickly and Lucas still forced those bad Harlequin Romance card packed scenes between our two doomed lovers, but it mostly worked.

We've suffered through A horrid CG "Clone Wars" film earlier in the year that only added to the pile of disappointment, but the series has actually turned out good for the most part. Some of it quite good actually... But clearly the damage is done. Lucas is in the process of getting out all his ideas that he's talked about filming over the last twenty years. Sort of like cleaning house and getting rid of what you don't want anymore. He says when he's through with all these things in about a year or so he's going to go back to making esoteric films like he did in college. I'll believe it when I see it. He's become more of a businessman than a film maker over the past two decades it seems. More concerned with toys and product lines and running the machine that is Lucasfilm than creating more of the mythic creations he gave us in his youth. When he does go back to these films, when he returns to being a true film maker, I hope he hands Lucasfilm and Star Wars and Indy off to someone with some perspective. Perhaps he will sell it to Fox or Disney or someone else. Perhaps he'll license them. I think he's spent too much time with these characters. It's best that they each go their separate ways and maybe, just maybe they'll find themselves again.

Now that would be a welcomed turn...

When George Lucas Could Do No Wrong...

I Remember that time growing up when George Lucas was a god. He was this mythic film maker. He dove into my mind and pulled out the most wondrous things and then put them on the screen. This was before "Return of the Jedi" or even "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom." This was the edgy, Avant-garde man whose name was golden. This was before I knew he was human. Before you could see his faults. Before "The Turn" that Honor talks about.

This is a short journey down that road. Into a past I still remember, from a present I wish to forget. Before he gave plaid a bad name.



THX-1138: Writer, Director, Producer.



American Graffiti: Director, Producer.



Star Wars: Writer, Producer, Director.



More American Graffitti: Story, Producer.



The Empire Strikes Back: Story, Producer, Executive Producer.



Kagemusha: Executive Producer.



Raiders of the Lost Ark: Story, Producer, Executive Producer.



Body Heat: Producer(uncredited)

Not to mention several other blockbusters which touched his influence in the late 70's and early 80's. But that was a different time. A different place than where we find ourselves today.

Tron. Two. Point. Oh?

BACK ON THE GAME GRID.

Greetings Programs!

Last week at Comic Con International, Disney unveiled test footage for the sequel to their revolutionary 1982 sci-fi computer animation film Tron ending years of speculation and rumors of an eventual follow-up marking the 26th anniversary of the original release. No, I’m not talking about the low-rent video game sequel Tron 2.0 released in 2003.

It is with great pride that I say that Tron is one of my favorite films ever. No matter how old I get, I am always in awe each time I watch it by its unique visual style and artistic design conceptualized by artists Syd Mead (who designed Blade Runner the same year) and Heavy Metal magazine’s evocative futurist illustrator Jean Giraud “Moebius”. No film before or after Tron can ever compare to it, mostly because of the laborious film techniques and limitations of the computer technology available at the time which gave the film its hyper-surreal atmosphere of a sort of Kubrickian abstract. The computer animation sequences under the supervision of Harrison Ellenshaw who worked previously on Disney’s The Black Hole, were rendered on antiquated computers the size of refrigerators by three different commercial animation companies which took months to render out seconds of shots and married to the film using a tedious process of rotoscoping them with 65mm monochrome live-action sequences and backlit animation plates which were painstakingly done frame-by-frame onto blown-up film cells called Kodaliths by hand in order to achieve advanced optical image compositing, something that can be done digitally today on any home computer with relative ease. Tron had achieved a distinct landmark visual style as visually groundbreaking as Fritz Lang’s Metropolis 60 years before it and would revolutionize the special effects and computer animation industry forever (for better AND for worse) the way that Star Wars did to traditional visual effects a mere 5 years before it. A couple years later, Universal’s The Last Starfighter about a high-scoring video game player who is recruited by the Star League and whisked away to fight an interstellar alien war, followed Tron’s precedent by showcasing live-action and computer animation sequences. It would be the end of the decade, however, until James Cameron’s The Abyss in 1989 and T2 in 1991 before the film industry would fully embrace computer animation and begin to abandon practical stop-motion and scaled model visual effects and would be retired into obsolescence a decade following Tron with the groundbreaking photo-realism of Jurassic Park. But Tron remained a major inspiration to Disney animator John Lasseter who would go on to make commercially successful computer animation films at Pixar with Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

It is then with some excitement, ambivalence and apprehension that I reflect upon the test footage for the sequel tentatively known as TR2N, for I have seen so many of my beloved film franchises ultimately tarnished by highly commercialized sequels, re-makes and reboots that have tried in vain to re-invent the wheel and ultimately missed the point of the original source material. The test footage showed an “upgraded” and elaborately more sophisticated and rendered version of the original lightcycle sequence which (by today’s standards) may look somewhat dated in comparison to advances in state-of-the-art computer graphics, yet somehow maintains the elegant simplicity and aesthetic of its predecessor. It’s relatively easy now to make a film like Tron on a few home PC’s and there’s nothing groundbreaking about it at all. However it would be impossible to go back and make the film using similar techniques employed in 1982 which pushed the envelope of crude computer animation and industrial photography of the time and is the fundamental reason why Tron will historically remain a uniquely distinctive visual film in that regard.

In 1982, Tron narratively struggled to define its ambiguous electronic world of “cyberspace” which, ironically, would be coined afterward by William Gibson in his groundbreaking cyberpunk novel Neuromancer and to which the enormously successful films of The Matrix all owe a debt of gratitude. And while Tron may have also struggled to find an audience that grappled to comprehend its complex technological rubric it managed to indelibly create an allegorical mythology of fantastical electronic cultural lore that was as prophetic as it was nearly two decades ahead of its time. Audiences and civilization have caught up to Tron and understand the nomenclature of its syntax of terminology like Users, Programs, and Digitizing which have since entered the cultural lexicon. Tron presented many complex idiosyncratic ideas of a pseudo-religious themes where programs profess a heretical believe in their real-world creators and wish to commune with them through input/output temples to help them liberate their captivity by an oppressive system of corporate e-commerce not (by Microsoft] but rather the Encom Corporation’s MCP – Master Control Program – who takes a perverse pleasure in watching such non-conformist subprograms systematically destroyed in gladiatorial video game arenas. Tron was definitely a product of the period of video game subculture of the late 70’s and early 80’s and the conjunction of Bally/Midway’s enormously successful Tron arcade game at its peak was the perfect complimentary promotional vehicle for the film, the first of its kind, which had incorporated a soundtrack of cues from Wendy Carlos’ appropriately synthesized electronic score that have since transcended the film to become more familiarly associated with the sounds of the game.

Jeff Bridges returns to reprise his role of Kevin Flynn, super-hacker and computer genius who last vindicated himself and became Encom’s CEO following the ousting of David Warner’s nefarious Ed Dillinger who fraudulently stole his proprietary video game designs to become Encom’s senior exec. In the footage, Bridges again plays a double role as his younger electronic counterpart program named Clu as well as his now much older and bearded self. This was achieved through a process of digitally mapping photorealistic images of the actor onto fully 3-D animated models, a process impossible to achieve for the original Tron but relatively common to video game designers nowadays. Lacking to appear in the demo is the title character of Tron himself who was played by Babylon 5’s Bruce Boxleitner and, like Bridges, would appear much older now. The question remains, if Tron himself would appear in the film and if the likeness of Boxleitner would be rendered to appear as he did in the original film using the same techniques that were given to Bridges’ Clu as demonstrated in the test footage or, as we have seen in the original film, some programs appear as mirror avatars of their aging real-world counterparts such as Barnard Hughes’ priestly electronic gatekeeper Dumont. Of all of the visual possibilities demonstrated by the footage, this seemed to resonate as the most fascinating of potential concepts for the direction of the new film under Joseph Kosinski who is well versed in directing photo-realistic computer graphics in commercials for companies such as Apple and Microsoft. Could TR2N continue to evolve the style and mythology established by its now-antiquated predecessor without looking like just another trumped-up computer effects spectacle that has plagued the blockbusters of today in lieu of an interesting story, especially one that was as narratively incoherent as the original Tron? For that we will have to wait and see but for animation fans and fans of the original Tron, this could be a very exciting time to see the state of computer visual effects pushed once again into groundbreaking new territory of the electronic frontier.

END OF LINE.

Retrography: The 80's...