It looks good. The soundtrack is spectacular. And it has Jeff Bridges in it. Who at one point delivers the line "You're messing with my zen thing, man." Reasons alone perhaps to recommend.
One of the marvelous things about the original was that it was all essentially an analogy for the computing process that Flynn sets out to achieve. That the entire film is the usual "hilariously graphical interface while hacking in films" bullshit taken to the absolute extreme. Legacy doesn't even try to do this. It throws us some vague philosphical jazz, then becomes an excuse to string set pieces together. We discover a whole new world, with deeply profound implications. Evidently the best thing to do is to run away from it a bit sharpish, giving it a kick on the way out.
I guess I should be used to this sort of thing by now. Intellectual properties with vast potential blinded by the appeal of impressive visual techniques. And they are impressive here. The bike chase is all one could ask for. Except maybe some depth to the whole affair. Like caring for the mooks who get totaled as they go. Ya'know, how the first one did it.
I have a number of minor quibbles that frustrate me about the whole affair, like the plot twist that starts waving at you from the start of the second act, but these pale into insignificance once I'd accepted that it's just not a very good film.
Shame, a damnable shame.
I really really liked it.
ReplyDeleteAnd I thought it did exactly what it set out to do - and with enough style and substance to create a good action movie with good effects.
It's nothing more than that.. because it's a sequel to a Disney movie that is nothing more than a good action movie with nice effects.
To expect a sequel to somehow exceed the originals univesr and make some grand intellectual statement or exspress some deep symbolic meaning is setting it up to fail.
The film is efficiently composed - gorgeous to look at.. and from the moment he goes into the machine you hold your breath until he gets back out.
Kudos for the reprisal of the role of Tron both as his business partner and the only guy that still 'believes' in the original creator as well as Olivia Wilde is extremely sexy.
There's nothing at all surprising in it. It's very straight forward 'by the numbers'. But I expected nothing more. It's a film that is a homage to a particular visual style that was as amazing in 1982 as it is now - but deserves a hell of a lot more respect than it ever did.
I think this film adds brilliantly onto the original and I cannot see how it could be improved.