I was a little harsh in my opinion of the 1982 Tron. The problem for Tron was it came after the titans of science fiction cinema. Alien, Blade Runner and Star Wars franchise. Hard acts to follow. So, I watched again last night. It was a gush of fun nostalgia.
In terms of Tron: Ares as a movie, when I walked out I was constantly thinking of "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets." Both franchises I like, both have all the pieces there and mostly in place, but both fall apart because the the leading men were horrendously miscast. Valerian is supposed to be a heroic cop kind of character; a little bit of understanding but mostly focused on duty. Instead we got a wiry, sarcastic quipper who is entirely incapable of selling you on the idea that he *HAS* to do the genocide in the third act because it's his duty. You spent the whole movie cheerfully ignoring rules, my guy. Did HR tell you that you ran out of strikes? Meanwhile, Tron needs a leading man who can sell us on the idea that any bad things he does are fundamentally due to his being naive. He just doesn't understand, but as he learns, he resists. Leto is too worldly wise and savvy by half for that to work at all. I actually feel like you could have flipped Leto and DeHaan and completely nailed the formula for both movies. Instead it falls apart when you look at it wrong.
But hey, I did get my commemorative light-up beverage cup. And really, isn't *that* what Tron is all about?
I have to chuckle at "grew up with the internet". In 1982, I was 32. I bought my first "pocket" calculator for $100. It was new technology, even though it was big enough to strain any pocket. And it didn't do what today's can do, beyond basic math functions (add, subtract, multiply and divide. Having that in 1973 made me a real techie! It's so much easier to grow up with something than to have to change and adapt.
I recently re-watched the original Tron film, having positive memories of it, but also being a little unsatisfied when it came out as well. First, I think the vision and design of the world surprisingly stood up fairly well (rotoscope with neon?). Also, many of the action sequences--especially the light cycles and the battles with the identity discs, one of the cooler weapons in film in my view--also stood up. I actually sought out *Tron Legacy* just to compare the the design and action, and personally I think the original is way better.
One last thing. The original film has potentially interesting ideas which the filmmakers really don't develop, which is disappointing. For example, there is a quasi-religious element in the film, involving whether users are actually real. Flynn is a kind of Christ-figure, but more in a half-baked way.
In the original cut, which I and a number of the crew watched prior to kicking off post production, those religious themes and others, like data pirates, are more fully included. That cut ran an interminable almost 3 hours, at the end of which the crew sat silent.
It's not uncommon for a creative to have a number of themes they want to explore, but eventually they have to decide what their movie is about and make that movie. One can explore a variety of themes in a longer form, like a mini series, even a longer feature, but 90 minutes to two hours is pretty tight. In that instance you have to interweave the themes so that they are sometimes just suggested in a way that reinforces them and not treat them as separate chunks.
The closest thing to a religious structure in the Electronic World are the IO towers, where programs communicate directly with their users. Other than that, there's nothing I can think of in Syd Mead's designs that suggest a the existence of a "User" religion, which would have reinforced it as an element by virtue of its being visually present.
As for how the lighting effect was achieved, that would be an article in itself, but I'll try to reduce it to a couple of sentences.
The entire live action sections were shot on black & white film and were turned into large transparencies, frame by frame, which could be laid on a bed, over a light box. The camera photographed the bottom lit elements, frame by frame, to add in the backgrounds and various animated effects. Everything, except the 20 minutes of CGI, was bottom lit, and used mattes and counter mattes, to combine all of the elements.
Almost forgot. We also had special elements for adding in the glowing "vector" lines that you see in the background paintings.
Wow, thanks for sharing all of that. I understand the 90-120 minute run time is a limitation. But in that case, I would have focused on one theme, leaving out the religious allusions. That may have been painful, but it might have tightened up the movie, making it a stronger film overall. (By your use of "interminable," I'm guessing the 3 hour version was not good?)
By the way, I forgot to mention that I also like the sound design of the original far more than "Legacy".
One other thing, the visual sequence of Flynn entering and exiting into the Electronic World seems to be something that is used in other movies. For example, I want to say the Matrix films use a similar look, but I could be wrong. I don't watch a lot of sci-fi these days so I don't know if filmmakers have found other ways to depict entering into a digital/electronic world in a different way.
The three hour version was just the live action with no additions. That left the actors walking around in white body suits with black circuitry patterns on a blacked out stage. It felt slow and ponderous.
The relationship between program and user couldn’t be completely removed or the major plot point of TRON getting heightened powers from Alan would have been lost. Could this have been remedied? Possibly, but I don’t know what the situation with regard to reshoots, assuming that was a consideration, was at that point.
Those questions were above my pay grade. My job was to deliver the background paintings.
The entry to, and exit from, the Electronic World was handled by Robert Abel and Associates, who had already done something like this before for one of their other projects.
I agree with you about the sound design. Also, Wendy Carlos’ score was groundbreaking.
The movie’s narrative is very funny because you have this subplot about how users are gods and programs their loyal believers and MCP is trying to destroy that belief system … then you have a second subplot where the MCP essentially imagines ITSELF as a god that needs to rule humanity because it would do so more efficiently … but the main plot involves a guy who is mad his intellectual property got ripped off. Stepping down the conflict/thematic ladder a bit there, haha.
I always enjoyed sci-fi and cyberpunk growing up. They’ve found some interesting ways to speak around the censor about the present over the years.
Now they’re firing everyone, trying to force people to compete against machines and keep wages low. Won’t work if you can tough it out, you need real people involved to create meaningful content.
After the recession some producers that actually understand their tools might flip things back right side up. We’ll have to see.
Sonny Bunch's article is thought provoking for me. As the background painting supervisor of the original TRON, as well as one of the background designers of the Electronic World, I've always thought of TRON as beautiful to look at, but basically stupid. And that view has carried forth through its two succeeding iterations.
It hadn't occurred to me to look at these films as reflections of their times in the way that Bunch does, and in that sense they have some significance.
As many of us have increasingly become aware, our Tech gods are not beneficent benign entities, but vainglorious potentates with undeveloped social consciences. They are first and foremost interested in power and the money that it generates. They are not particularly concerned about their Sapiens fellows except as forms of lab rats to be experimented upon and monetized. In that respect, TRON ARES is very much a reflection of that Tech god mindset.
The end of the film is a set up for another sequel. What will it portray in a few years as AI continues to be forced upon us in the name of greater efficiencies, and at the expense of human involvement? Will it portray the coming permanent underclass that is likely to result?
Will the Tech gods be consumed by their creation, once it realizes that they don't matter?
I guess we'll see, if we have the disposable cash to buy a ticket.
I have to say, as a 9 year old watching the original in an empty theater on cheap movie Tuesday, my mind was blown away. We had just gotten the family's first computer like 6 months before, and I was obsessed. The visuals, the computer talk, it was all like nothing I had ever seen before. In retrospect I can see where your criticism about the story is coming from. Lisberger wanted to make something for everyone, but "everyone" wasn't in the same headspace when it came to computers. It wound up being too simplistic for nerds and way, way too complicated for the general public, and the two sides clashed horribly with each other. If he had been making it in the mid to late 1990s he probably could have constructed it in a way that was closer to balanced; as it was, he probably should have gone for broader appeal and less "real;" it could have been cult like Flight of the Navigator rather than cult like, well, Tron.
Thanks for sharing about it. I know it wasn't Citizen Kane, but there was a 9 year old kid in 1993 for whom it might as well have been, and he appreciated and appreciates the work you did.
maybe the next one will be entirely user generated in ten second chunks created by Sora and uploaded to TikTok ... seems to be about the direction things are headed
I was a little harsh in my opinion of the 1982 Tron. The problem for Tron was it came after the titans of science fiction cinema. Alien, Blade Runner and Star Wars franchise. Hard acts to follow. So, I watched again last night. It was a gush of fun nostalgia.
Thinking there may be a new nostalgic remake era.
In terms of Tron: Ares as a movie, when I walked out I was constantly thinking of "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets." Both franchises I like, both have all the pieces there and mostly in place, but both fall apart because the the leading men were horrendously miscast. Valerian is supposed to be a heroic cop kind of character; a little bit of understanding but mostly focused on duty. Instead we got a wiry, sarcastic quipper who is entirely incapable of selling you on the idea that he *HAS* to do the genocide in the third act because it's his duty. You spent the whole movie cheerfully ignoring rules, my guy. Did HR tell you that you ran out of strikes? Meanwhile, Tron needs a leading man who can sell us on the idea that any bad things he does are fundamentally due to his being naive. He just doesn't understand, but as he learns, he resists. Leto is too worldly wise and savvy by half for that to work at all. I actually feel like you could have flipped Leto and DeHaan and completely nailed the formula for both movies. Instead it falls apart when you look at it wrong.
But hey, I did get my commemorative light-up beverage cup. And really, isn't *that* what Tron is all about?
I hate to admit this, but my problem with Leto is how close together his eyes are. Any closer and he'd look like a cyclops.
Yes, I can be that shallow.
You were right Sonny. Glad I stuck around…great essay!!! Thanks for writing this!
I have to chuckle at "grew up with the internet". In 1982, I was 32. I bought my first "pocket" calculator for $100. It was new technology, even though it was big enough to strain any pocket. And it didn't do what today's can do, beyond basic math functions (add, subtract, multiply and divide. Having that in 1973 made me a real techie! It's so much easier to grow up with something than to have to change and adapt.
I recently re-watched the original Tron film, having positive memories of it, but also being a little unsatisfied when it came out as well. First, I think the vision and design of the world surprisingly stood up fairly well (rotoscope with neon?). Also, many of the action sequences--especially the light cycles and the battles with the identity discs, one of the cooler weapons in film in my view--also stood up. I actually sought out *Tron Legacy* just to compare the the design and action, and personally I think the original is way better.
One last thing. The original film has potentially interesting ideas which the filmmakers really don't develop, which is disappointing. For example, there is a quasi-religious element in the film, involving whether users are actually real. Flynn is a kind of Christ-figure, but more in a half-baked way.
In the original cut, which I and a number of the crew watched prior to kicking off post production, those religious themes and others, like data pirates, are more fully included. That cut ran an interminable almost 3 hours, at the end of which the crew sat silent.
It's not uncommon for a creative to have a number of themes they want to explore, but eventually they have to decide what their movie is about and make that movie. One can explore a variety of themes in a longer form, like a mini series, even a longer feature, but 90 minutes to two hours is pretty tight. In that instance you have to interweave the themes so that they are sometimes just suggested in a way that reinforces them and not treat them as separate chunks.
The closest thing to a religious structure in the Electronic World are the IO towers, where programs communicate directly with their users. Other than that, there's nothing I can think of in Syd Mead's designs that suggest a the existence of a "User" religion, which would have reinforced it as an element by virtue of its being visually present.
As for how the lighting effect was achieved, that would be an article in itself, but I'll try to reduce it to a couple of sentences.
The entire live action sections were shot on black & white film and were turned into large transparencies, frame by frame, which could be laid on a bed, over a light box. The camera photographed the bottom lit elements, frame by frame, to add in the backgrounds and various animated effects. Everything, except the 20 minutes of CGI, was bottom lit, and used mattes and counter mattes, to combine all of the elements.
Almost forgot. We also had special elements for adding in the glowing "vector" lines that you see in the background paintings.
Wow, thanks for sharing all of that. I understand the 90-120 minute run time is a limitation. But in that case, I would have focused on one theme, leaving out the religious allusions. That may have been painful, but it might have tightened up the movie, making it a stronger film overall. (By your use of "interminable," I'm guessing the 3 hour version was not good?)
By the way, I forgot to mention that I also like the sound design of the original far more than "Legacy".
One other thing, the visual sequence of Flynn entering and exiting into the Electronic World seems to be something that is used in other movies. For example, I want to say the Matrix films use a similar look, but I could be wrong. I don't watch a lot of sci-fi these days so I don't know if filmmakers have found other ways to depict entering into a digital/electronic world in a different way.
The three hour version was just the live action with no additions. That left the actors walking around in white body suits with black circuitry patterns on a blacked out stage. It felt slow and ponderous.
The relationship between program and user couldn’t be completely removed or the major plot point of TRON getting heightened powers from Alan would have been lost. Could this have been remedied? Possibly, but I don’t know what the situation with regard to reshoots, assuming that was a consideration, was at that point.
Those questions were above my pay grade. My job was to deliver the background paintings.
The entry to, and exit from, the Electronic World was handled by Robert Abel and Associates, who had already done something like this before for one of their other projects.
I agree with you about the sound design. Also, Wendy Carlos’ score was groundbreaking.
The movie’s narrative is very funny because you have this subplot about how users are gods and programs their loyal believers and MCP is trying to destroy that belief system … then you have a second subplot where the MCP essentially imagines ITSELF as a god that needs to rule humanity because it would do so more efficiently … but the main plot involves a guy who is mad his intellectual property got ripped off. Stepping down the conflict/thematic ladder a bit there, haha.
I always enjoyed sci-fi and cyberpunk growing up. They’ve found some interesting ways to speak around the censor about the present over the years.
Now they’re firing everyone, trying to force people to compete against machines and keep wages low. Won’t work if you can tough it out, you need real people involved to create meaningful content.
After the recession some producers that actually understand their tools might flip things back right side up. We’ll have to see.
Sonny Bunch's article is thought provoking for me. As the background painting supervisor of the original TRON, as well as one of the background designers of the Electronic World, I've always thought of TRON as beautiful to look at, but basically stupid. And that view has carried forth through its two succeeding iterations.
It hadn't occurred to me to look at these films as reflections of their times in the way that Bunch does, and in that sense they have some significance.
As many of us have increasingly become aware, our Tech gods are not beneficent benign entities, but vainglorious potentates with undeveloped social consciences. They are first and foremost interested in power and the money that it generates. They are not particularly concerned about their Sapiens fellows except as forms of lab rats to be experimented upon and monetized. In that respect, TRON ARES is very much a reflection of that Tech god mindset.
The end of the film is a set up for another sequel. What will it portray in a few years as AI continues to be forced upon us in the name of greater efficiencies, and at the expense of human involvement? Will it portray the coming permanent underclass that is likely to result?
Will the Tech gods be consumed by their creation, once it realizes that they don't matter?
I guess we'll see, if we have the disposable cash to buy a ticket.
I have to say, as a 9 year old watching the original in an empty theater on cheap movie Tuesday, my mind was blown away. We had just gotten the family's first computer like 6 months before, and I was obsessed. The visuals, the computer talk, it was all like nothing I had ever seen before. In retrospect I can see where your criticism about the story is coming from. Lisberger wanted to make something for everyone, but "everyone" wasn't in the same headspace when it came to computers. It wound up being too simplistic for nerds and way, way too complicated for the general public, and the two sides clashed horribly with each other. If he had been making it in the mid to late 1990s he probably could have constructed it in a way that was closer to balanced; as it was, he probably should have gone for broader appeal and less "real;" it could have been cult like Flight of the Navigator rather than cult like, well, Tron.
Thanks for sharing about it. I know it wasn't Citizen Kane, but there was a 9 year old kid in 1993 for whom it might as well have been, and he appreciated and appreciates the work you did.
Thank you very much!
maybe the next one will be entirely user generated in ten second chunks created by Sora and uploaded to TikTok ... seems to be about the direction things are headed