To quote Homer Simpson, did anybody see the movie Tron? Okay, okay, Im sure quite a lot of people have actually seen Tron, and probably liked it. Wait, no, I dont mean the Tron with the Daft Punk soundtrack and Olivia Wilde lying on a sofa. Im talking about the original Tron. The Tron from 1982, with the light cycles and the funny graphics, and Jeff Bridges playing, well, Jeff Bridges. From a modern perspective, Tron just about holds up to our often critical gaze. Of course the computer animation appears very basic, the science fiction tale is riddled with clichés, and the overall feel of the film at times verges on comedic. But, despite all its flaws and narrative simplicity, Tron is fundamentally a strong film. Even at face value, it is a film worthy of praise for its innovative daring and way-ahead-of-its-time-ness; courtesy of the brains of creator Steven Lisberger, and the faith (and $17 million) of Disney. The computer generated images and animation prevalent in Tron were products of a complex and lengthy process of data management on a huge scale. The coupling of live action with computer graphics had never before been achieved with such a fluid synchronisation. And to create the style with such vivid neon colours, the majority of Tron was filmed in black and white, and the colours added in post-production by hand, frame by frame, on specially made Kodak film sheets.
But taking a step back from the technological ingenuity of Tron, we also have to acknowledge the plot of the film. The story itself focuses on the character of Kevin Flynn (played by Jeff Bridges) a youthful, enthusiastic computer programmer. He has produced a series of popular and successful video games, but the credit, and financial reward, has been taken by the antagonist Ed Dillinger (David Warner). Flynn essentially wishes to provide the evidence that Dillinger stole his ideas, and attempts to hack in to the mainframe of his former employer ENCOM. However, a magical laser beam (right? Im no scientician) transports him in to the system, and he has to fight his way through a series of obstacles to overthrow the Master Control Program, indict Dillinger on industrial plagiarism charges, and gain his freedom. The world he enters is a physical and humanised contrabulous fabtraption, where the various computer programs are presented as humans, and the video games which Flynn produced are the gladiatorial stages on which said programs are made to fight. Along the way, he runs across the programs of his friends, Tron (Bruce Boxleitner) and Yori (Cindy Morgan), whose characters in the real world, Alan and Lora, are assisting Flynn in his hacking exploits. Okay, so the story is a little wacky. And it can be argued that the plot is nothing special or even new; Lewis Carrolls Alices Adventures in Wonderland put its protagonist in a bizarre world of make believe in 1865. If you want, you can say that Jeff Bridges character merely disappeared down the proverbial rabbit hole (note to self: magical laser beam and proverbial rabbit hole may need to be re-phrased). To get to the point at last, if you think an Alice in Wonderland allegorical comparison was strange, how about five deeper ways of looking at Tron