Plot: For twenty years, Sam Flynn (Garrett Hedlund) has been haunted by the mysterious disappearance of his father Kevin (Jeff Bridges), an innovative software programmer and former CEO of ENCOM International. During a board of directors’s meeting before the launch of the 12th version of ENCOM’s operating system, Sam breaks in to the company’s headquarters and leaks the OS to the public for free while simultaneously uploading a malicious program into ENCOM’s mainframe. He is arrested and later released by the police. An executive consultant for ENCOM and friend of Kevin, Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner), propositions Sam into investigating a mysterious page originating from the long-abandoned Flynn’s Arcade. While exploring his father’s old stomping grounds, Sam discovers a hidden bunker beneath the arcade, and as he attempts to find information by hacking into his father’s computer, accidentally activates a digitizing laser which transports him to The Grid, a world existing inside the computer.
Review: You ever have the most profound question, wanting endlessly to know that answer to that question, only to find out that the answer ended up being a simple yes or no. Or rather just something underwhelming altogether. Actually better yet, you remember the Matrix? Do you remember the first time you watched the Matrix and asked what the Matrix was? Then you got this awesome answer. It’s like comparing it to that. Except in Tron Legacy you don’t get the awesome answer and aren’t blown away, it somehow from a plot perspective manages to become awesomely mediocre.
There is this build up throughout the entire movie, where you wait for the real story to begin but over the course of the movie you begin to realize, ok this is the movie. Parts become predictable and you can tell where it’s heading yet moments glimmer and it gives you a bit of hope that something might surprise you. I’m speaking purely from a plot perspective because that’s what the story is for this movie. It’s average but almost approachable in the sense that movie was made for a wide audience, like a family movie. It’s odd too because the substance deals with heavy material such as creationism, philosophical details of god and man and perfectionism, yet it’s like you’re given the abbreviated short answer in jot notes, complete in bullet form. It’s a quick summary over 2 hrs and 6 min. That’s a lot of time to give an exposition of what is going on and not get a lot out of it story wise. I left with more questions based on the outcome, yet in some strange obscure way I enjoyed the movie enough to say I enjoyed it and yeah would want to watch it again.
The world of Tron reminded me exactly of my drive home from the movie after dropping off my cousin. The streets were empty and I hear nothing but the sound of my engine as I cruised along. In some ways you don’t want a set destination, you just want to keep driving and exploring what is out there, to something you don’t know and hope to find. It’s a bizarre type of emptiness, yet it’s serene and calming. In that sense, if you can appreciate that type of atmosphere, that is Tron Legacy. This is probably the first film where my review is based on how I feel and not the critical nature of this and that in the film. I guess I left the movie with something I didn’t expect and I’m sure there might be others out there that might thing my opinion a tad nuts and crazy. There is this zen motif in the film and it’s carried brilliantly with the vastness of the production design. There isn’t much to say about the setting other than it is out of this world.
If you wondered about the 3D, it’s mandatory for this film. It doesn’t use the same type of depth of field or immersion Avatar used, Tron Legacy does something different with us looking through a looking glass into another world. It achieves that same type of sensation that Avatar did in respect to trying to get the audience to engage with the world’s surroundings. It’s not a gimmick to have something pop out of the screen, but the 3D is used to set mood, tone and presence. Watching the movie with 3D glasses was like walking at night with your sunglasses but everywhere you looked was bright neon lights illuminating architecture, figures, vehicles and life itself. The glasses themselves help mute the lights just enough for you to engage with the visuals and I think it works. It’s a curious technical achievement I think.
I wish the characters would’ve been better utilized and I think this is where-in the plot loses a lot of it’s substance. There is grand opportunities here but it’s almost like it being a Disney film, they needed to Disney the film. To Disney’s credit, the marketing I was familiar with never promised anything more than what was presented. You just kind of hope you get something you don’t expect, but know better than to get your hopes up. Watching films is a mystery, undeniably. The film had a lot of CGI and it’s more so the vehicles, the production design which benefit from it. It’s surprising how one of the main characters require photo-realism but how poorly it was done. There are moments where it’s the uncanny valley, sometimes it looks real, most times it did not. It was detracting from the film and there is a disconnect here. Avatar had more looks/feels real, than looks/feels fake. Tron Legacy suffers from this unfortunately and given the high stakes of the digital world, it’s like they had a budget on CGI characters, especially when it mattered most. It’s like having Gollum look crappy when you know you’re going to see him on screen 40-60% of the movie. You just can’t have that happen.
The soundtrack was provided by Daft Punk and let me tell you, aside from the visuals, production, art, creative direction being really fantastic. The music and soundtrack in this film is downright amazing. It’s a weird thing, how you can score A+ in these areas, but have a C grade for story. It just shows how unbalanced Tron Legacy is. One of my friends worked on the movie and he said you don’t need to see the first film to watch the second. As curious as I am to see/listen to the perspective of a person who had not seen the first movie, I think that that statement is a lie. The first movie carried substance and brought about the world of Tron. Here you see the world of Tron manifest itself and can similarly appreciate the purposeful nostalgia of the film itself. This might just be a personal opinion though. I really do think you need to have seen the first movie to be qualified to watch the second in this case. The real complaint of the film is the story, plot holes, deux es machina, contrived predictability, more questions than answers. Are these just things we have to learn to accept with films today? I can’t go much into spoilers but I did enjoy the movie. Generally because it was my type of film, technically intellectual, slightly philosophical and did have a bonafide presence with how it was presented. In the end however, it misses that umph to push it over. I think the fault lies in the story’s utilization of the characters. They are great, interesting characters who I think are acted well and it could’ve served to been written better. You know what it was. It was like watching a video game and you got the video game plot. It just depends what is enough for you to say you liked the movie. For me it was characters, the production design, the soundtrack, a bit of nostalgia, the usage of 3D at a technical level and the strange emotional feeling I left with watching the film. It had a presence, I just wish the story could’ve been told better.
