Rated PG for sequences of sci-fi action violence and brief mild language
Cast: Garrett Hedlund, Jeff Bridges, Beau Garrett, Bruce Boxleitner, Olivia Wilde, Michael Sheen
Director: Joseph Kosinski
"Tron: Legacy" is a loud, thundering, visually stunning special effects experience with a plot that exists for no other purpose than to support a loud, thundering, visually stunning special effects experience. That's not really a bad thing. Movies like this needn't be deep; just entertaining. This is entertaining, if only for its visual style.
The original film was released back in 1982 and to be honest, I have not viewed the movie since that year. I didn't revisit it before watching the sequel, but I don't think my reaction would have varied all that much. The selling points here are the visuals, and the movie doesn't disappoint in that regard.
One fateful night Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges), CEO of software giant Encom, mysteriously disappears without word, leaving his seven-year-old son behind. Cut to twenty years later. Sam (Garrett Hedlund) has elected not to take over his father's company, opting instead to be an idealistic thorn in the side of its board of directors. One night, Sam's trusted confidant on the board Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner) approaches him with news that he's received a mysterious page from Kevin Flynn himself. Sam is skeptical, though he returns to his father's arcade to investigate. He fights the dust, navigates through the array of 80s arcade games, flips the power on, and immediately Journey's "Separate Ways: Worlds Apart" blasts from the jukebox speakers. (A little too obvious foreshadowing.) With more investigative work, Sam discovers his father's secret office behind the Tron game. Soon Sam finds himself unwittingly zapped into "The Grid." I won't reveal much of what he discovers in The Grid, except for the obvious fact that he soon finds his father, and with the help of a jaw-droppingly cute computer program (never thought I'd use that term) named Quorra (Olivia Wilde), Sam must help his father escape through the soon-to-be-forever-closed portal.
The director is Joseph Kosinski, who I know practically nothing about other than he seems to be a visual effects wizard with a Disney contract. (His next project is a "re-imagining" of the 1979 science-fiction flick "The Black Hole".) The movie looks sensational. The production design is quite complex, though both the fight scenes as well as the chase scenes are choreographed in a manner that makes them refreshingly easy to follow. Too many action movies nowadays use a "Bourne"-style shaking camera effect that grows nauseating. I appreciated the fact that I could follow the action scenes here. Observe the strategy of the participants. Actually comprehend the outcome for a change.
Special effects are also put to good use in "de-aging" Bridges for his role as Clu, Flynn's nefarious alter-ego who, in an effort to create a perfect "world" engages in a bizarre form of cyber-genocide. He does look a bit like the younger Jeff Bridges. It's obviously CG. (Common sense prevents us from foolishly thinking otherwise.) But the end result is passable enough.
The screenplay by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz does incorporate a significant amount of exposition and a couple quieter scenes involving Sam and his father. Those scenes more or less work, although they do slow the story's pace considerably. I did, however, appreciate the screenplay's observation that perfection seems at first to be a noble pursuit, until the realization sets in that perfection can never be fully understood.
What can you say about the acting here? Bridges has the most fun, playing the elder Flynn with a combination of Kenobi-like paternalistic instincts crossed with a new age hopefulness. (At one point, he chastises his son by saying "You're killing my Zen thing here, Sam!") Garrett Hedlund chooses to play Sam with a kind of Keanu Reeves "non-acting" acting style... which is fine. (What other technique is he going to use for this kind of story?) I don't know what sort of preparation one would need to portray a computer program, but Olivia Wilde does as good a job as any, I suppose. She has a wide-eyed eagerness that is quite endearing. Although that observation seems moot, as she was obviously cast not because of her ability to play a program, but because she looks sexy as hell in a skin-tight bodysuit. I'm not complaining.
I opted to watch the movie in 3D. (Although a healthy early chunk of the story was shot in 2D, the 3D footage held off until Sam enters The Grid.) The movie has been heavily hyped that it's the kind of flick meant for 3D. Here's the thing about 3D for me... even in good 3D movies, there comes a point in the story where I forget I'm watching the added dimensional effect, and am just pulled along with the narrative. Yes, the movie looks great. But it would look great in 2D as well. Let me put it this way: if I had watched the movie in regular 2D, the only difference in the review would be that you would have saved yourself the last minute reading this final paragraph. I doubt I'll ever be convinced that it's worth the additional cost of watching a movie in 3D. Take that as you will.
* * * out of * * * * stars
