#steven lisberger

[atomic-chronoscaph]

Tron production photographs (1982)

[mikyapixie]

🩵Yori By Mike Maihack🩵

[creepynostalgy]

Cindy Morgan in Tron (1982)

[coupleofdays]

The TRON first script draft

Last year, the wonderful @greetingsprogram1982 managed to acquire a copy of the first script draft for the film TRON, scanned it, an uploaded the pages as jpgs here on Tumblr. I have now taken the liberty to convert these scanned pages into a pdf file and upload it to The Internet Archive, in order to hopefully preserve this important historical artifact a little better (many of you are probably aware that Tumblr isn't exactly the ideal place to archive things long-term for various reasons):

I can highly recommend that any fan of the original TRON movie check out this script draft, if you haven't already done so. It's a fascinating read, containing scenes and concepts that didn't make it into the final film (and missing some parts that would be added later), and versions of the movie characters who are very different from what they eventually ended up being.

Again, huge thanks to @greetingsprogram1982 for scanning the script in the first place!

[haveyouseenthismovie-poll]

[menthealoh-shots]

Tron (1982)

[movie-titlecards]

Slipstream (1989)

My rating: 5/10

One of those movies that, for whatever reason, seemed rather impressive when I watched them as a kid, but don't hold up terribly well. Don't get me wrong, it's far from terrible, but it does drag on a bit and pretty much everything in it has been done better elsewhere.

[ulrichgebert]

In Computern leben Programme, die wie die Menschen draussen aussehen, nur mit schwarzweißen Gesichtern und farbenfrohen raumanzugsähnlichen Rüstungen (ein bisschen wie die Leute in Morodors nachcoloriertem Metropolis). Das besonders fesche Sicherheitsprogramm Tron unterstützt den jungen Computerspielprogrammierer Jeff Bridges darin, den üblen Machenschaften des trotz richtungsweisender* innovativer Computerbilderzeugung wie gewohnt den Schurken spielenden David Warner ein Ende zu setzen, so da�� -obwohl ich nicht ganz verstanden habe, warum- am Ende wieder Ordnung und Gerechtigkeit einkehren. Es ist Disney.

* Wir sind manchmal nicht total glücklich mit der Richtung, in die es wies, erfreuen uns aber am Score der legendären Switched-on-Bach-Synthezizer-Pionierin Wendy Carlos.

[80smovies]

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | Tron (Lisberger, 1982)

On the last day before my Disney+ subscription expired, I decided to revisit what is likely my favourite live action film that Disney proper ever produced. The genius of this movie is that it understands that realism was never in reach for its state of the art for 1982 special effects, so instead it embraces their limitations wholeheartedly. The set pieces have a purified linear sense of movement. The cyberscapes in which most of this movie is set are abstracted into lines, colours, shapes. The visuals here feel as inspired by the avant garde as they do by the primitive graphics of early video games. Like the Star Wars movies, this is a case where the inspirations of the original are unexpected and idiosyncratic, while the inspiration of the legacy sequel is just the original. I don’t mind the 2010 film, but I find its Alienware PC aesthetic less interesting than the experimental one here. There is no shortage of real visual beauty. 

And matching this style is the narrative, which has the protagonists distilled into digitized abstraction, acting out the outlines of an action adventure plot. There is something poignant here, the characters having their personalities stripped down yet having their innate humanity come through. These classic Disney live action movies have an interesting tension between the their commercial confines and their willingness to colour within the lines. In that respect, Jeff Bridges is a perfect lead, as he brings an irreverence that creates friction with the deliberate limitations of his role. And the warm electronica of Wendy Carlos’ score complements this all quite nicely. 

But there is also a sinister aura, one that extends to real life. The unfriendly glow of the computer and arcade screens casting the protagonist’s obsession into relief. The neon highlights of a black helicopter ominously lighting up the sky above a cityscape that resembles a circuit board. Seas of cubicles extending to the horizon. A board room that looks like the Death Star. Only when the heroes have triumphed, the frontier spirit of early Silicon Valley overcoming the evils of corporate technofascism, creators reclaiming their creations from the suits, does the movie really present us with natural light. 

Anyway, I did laugh both at the sight of Bridges being the oldest guy at the arcade, and at one of his games being named Vice Squad, presumably after the Wings Hauser movie. I wonder if Hauser ever starred in a Disney movie?

[atomic-chronoscaph]

Mark Hamill - Slipstream (1989)

[byneddiedingo]

Tron (Steven Lisberger, 1982)

Cast: Jeff Bridges, Bruce Boxleitner, David Warner, Cindy Morgan, Barnard Hughes, Dan Shor, Peter Jurasik. Screenplay: Steven Lisberger, Bonnie McBird, Charles S. Haas. Cinematography: Bruce Logan. Production design: Dean Edward Mitzner. Film editing: Jeff Gourson. Music: Wendy Carlos.

Epochal, visionary, pioneering, confusing, migraine-inducing, and occasionally inept. Tron is all those things and more. It would be almost 20 years before movies like The Matrix (Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski, 1999) would begin to make full cinematic sense of some of Tron's key ideas about the relationship between humans and computers, and we are just now beginning to get seriously antsy about the promise and threat of artificial intelligence. At the time of its release, Tron was mostly discussed as an artifact of the Atari age: the growing popularity of computer games. Not many of us owned personal computers, and the internet was something only techies (and the military) knew anything about. So Steven Lisberger, the creative force behind the movie, has to be hailed as something of a prophet. And Disney has to be praised for a taking a risk (and suffering a loss when the film underperformed at the box office) on a movie as odd as Tron. Even Lisberger wasn't entirely sure that the visual effects he was playing with would work in a feature-length movie. Lisberger also has to be commended for not over-explaining in his film just what he's up to; instead, he plunged his audiences right into the strange world he created. That said, Tron is still sometimes a movie with one foot in chaos, and a lot of it seems to be just the filmmakers "trying stuff out." The acting is sometimes wooden, as if the performers, especially Bruce Boxleitner and Cindy Morgan, weren't sure what they were doing. The exceptions are David Warner, who could draw on a long career of playing villains on stage and screen, and Jeff Bridges, who seems incapable of giving a bad performance. As for the visuals, not everything works or even makes sense. There are moments of weird beauty, but too often what's meant to be dazzling is merely garish, and a lack of reference points sometimes makes the action incomprehensible. Boxleitner and Bridges have much the same build, so when they're suited up as Tron and Clu it's sometimes hard to tell which is which. (Lisberger originally planned to have them be distinctly different body types, but was unable to follow through in the casting.) Still, time has been kind to Tron, allowing its prophetic essence to prevail over its flaws.

[gameofthunder66]

-watched 6/22/2024- 3 stars- on Plex (free)

43% Rotten Tomatoes

Trailer - Slipstream (1989)

In this film the robot has a dream. :-)

[coupleofdays]

It's funny to think that Lisberger Studios not only (intentionally) pioneered CG special effects with Tron, but a few years earlier, they (unintentionally) created what is apparently a foundational piece of media for the furry fandom with Animalympics. The world has so much to thank them for.

I'm no furry myself, but after having finally watched Animalympics today, I can definitely see how it might be... appealing to some people. Tatyana Tushenko is just the top of the iceberg.

Though personally my favorite part was the "Ingmar Birdman" gag:

[bearpillowmonster]

Tron 3 starts in a cabin in the woods "My name is Sam Flynn." and we'll see him and his new beard looking out the window drinking his tea. It'll show how he's distanced himself from technology using analog stuff. The one thing he still keeps is his dad's disc in the shape of that harddrive at the end of Legacy. OFF THE GRID. This is 15 years from Legacy.

He created an executor program codenamed Ares that became a sort of virus too smart for his own good. Maybe all Sam has to do is log back into a computer and Ares will be right there, just needs the access code.

I imagine Quorra would either be right there with him or the complete opposite and working at Encom.

After some hesitation and convincing, Sam goes through with it, trying to use the drive to bring his dad back because "he'd know what to do." but with his disc came the special ability to move gates. Ares can bring himself to the real world, hoping to bring his army with him and conquer.

Ares arrives with a few stragglers but soon realizes that he doesn't want to control this world and becomes a secondary protagonist, turning against his own kind. Sam will be Blue (which is really a white but he's still more aligned with blue). Ares will be Red. But both will be on the same team fighting the ones passing through the gate. So who's the main next villain? Not a program, but a human. This would be where the Quorra side kicks in and the meaning of ISO actually starts to mean something.