Rating: Summary: Tron Review Review: Excellent Sci-fi movie, was way before it's time. A must see film!
Rating: Summary: Pioneered CGI Review: Tron was the first movie to use CGI in such a bold way as to make a whole city from computer animated pixels. To create a world of computer animation in the days of 386 processers and less then 2 Megabytes of RAM must have been painstaking. Thankfully, the movie today is still sharp. The creators were smart enough to make sure the movie remained timeless in it's look and execution. The storyline is original (it had to be to get a premises for the entire movie), a computer whiz, played by Jeff Bridges, gets sucked into the computer world as he tries to find evidence that his programs were stolen. What ensues is an adventure that no one has duplicated today, although it would be much easier with today's technology. They should consider a sequel, or a remake because the actions scenes seem a little slim in places, as if they just couldn't squeeze anymore images out of the computer. But suffice to say, Tron is a groundbreaking movie, making way for movies like Last Starfighter and computer animated special effects. Definitly worth the DVD version for the special effects and sound quality.
Rating: Summary: This ain't your father's Tron! Review: As a film, Tron is part adventure story, part special-effects bonanza and part allegorical statement on the personal computer revolution. In 1982, the only exposure most people had to computers was through the new-fangled video game arcades. Techies in those days were special because they were the insiders, speaking a language all their own and having insights into a strange, new world that everyone else could only imagine. So, it's no suprise that Tron is a cult favorite among this generation of programmers and computer users because it recaptures the magic of those early days. But that's not what's really cool.And while it's true that the 20th Anniversary Edition of Tron offers a ton of extras on its second disc, such as deleted scenes, a "making of" video, photo gallery and deleted soundtrack music, that's not what's really cool, either. What's really cool is that this version is finally in anamorphic widescreen format--enhanced for 16x9! The previous (1998) DVD release was letterbox. On larger screens and/or enhanced televisions, the improvement in visual quality should be startling. So even if you own the 1998 version, you might want to consider upgrading! -- Scott Loban
Rating: Summary: Uh . . . Review: I actually saw this in the theater when it came out a hundred or so years ago. I guess if "The Matrix" represents the current state of the art in movies influenced directly by video games, this would be like "Pong: The Motion Picture." Why bother? It looked like . . . 20 years ago. And the story would be a vacuous bore no matter what you did with it visually. Actually, the only movie I ever really enjoyed that was modeled on video games was "Battle Royale" (available on region-free English subbed Hong Kong DVD, all you sports fans), probably for it's unapologetic anti-social streak. Oh, there's a thin veneer of moral sentiment - but with a body count of 50 high-schoolers it's a movie that teenagers and people who hate teenagers can enjoy equally. Then again, I had no interest in video games at all until my brother showed me "Grand Theft Auto 3" recently. I became instantly hooked on hearing the digitized little pedestrians scream as I tried to see how many of them I could mow down with the ambulance I had stolen. I am a decent law-abiding (mostly) citizen, but I guess if one is going to get involved in such a frankly dehumanized medium it's best to dispense with all that good vs. eeeville malarkey and go straight for the guilt-free criminal thrills. After all, what good are virtual worlds if you can't rob, murder, rape, push The Button and generally give your Id an amoral workout? Where's the harm? Does anyone really want to BE Jeff Bridges in this movie or Keanu in that other thing? Where's the thrill?
Rating: Summary: Special Edition extras revealed Review: For the record, ...this 20th Anniversary Tron 2-disc set DOES have plenty of extras, in fact, it sounds like a port of the Masterpiece Edition laser disc set with even more goodies. Here is what is known as of Oct 1, 2001: * A new 75-minute documentary called, "The Making of Tron" * Deleted scenes with all- new introductions by writer / director Steven Lisberger and visual effects supervisor Harrison Ellenshaw * Production photo gallery with new photos from the Disney photo archives * Audio commentary by director Steven Lisberger, producer Donald Kushner and visual effects supervisors Harrison Ellenshaw and Richard Taylor * Storyboard to film comparisons * Extensive still frame galleries * Pre- production animation tests * Original Wendy Carlos soundtrack music deleted from the film * Inspirational designs by design artists Syd Mead, Peter Lloyd and Jean "Moebius" Giraud * Computer animation design and demo reels * Original publicity materials * Original theatrical trailer
Rating: Summary: "Fights for the User" / TRON instruction on PDP-10 Review: The first movie aimed at the programmers heart. The classic battle of a "progammer/user" verses the main frame "system administration". Users were always told by sys admin, "You must use the system the way I tell you. Bow down to my greatness!" The users manules were edited to remove any attemp to truly use the sysem. I have meet people like Sark that hid behind their big desk. I fought that battle personally with the Ga Tech Computer Center back in the early 70's. I got off mainframes and onto mincomputers to get around all that. I loved the movie. I read the book. That same culture battle is being now waged between network users and network administrators. When you get your own personal computer complex with a T1 to the network, you are finally free! The PDP-10 (previous PDP-6 and later DEC system 20) has a TRON instrucition "Test Right half word for One and skip if non-masked bits are Not zero". It was an opcode of 666 base 8. The TRON from Basic interperter. See ....information
Rating: Summary: Finally! Review: At last, Tron is getting decent treatment in DVD. The previous Tron DVD had no extras on it, which really made no sense considering that a Laser Disc edition was released a few years ago with plenty of goodies on it that they could have just recycled. The "Edition Details" ... are misleading. Below is a short list of features in this edition: - Deleted scenes with new intros by the writer/director and visual effects supervisor. - A new 75 minutes documentary called "The Making of Tron" - Audio commentary - Original soundtrack music deleted from the film - Lots of other items that give insight into the design effort that went into making Tron All in all, two discs worth of stuff. Sounds pretty sweet to me.
Rating: Summary: What a great movie!! Review: I am pre-ordering TODAY!! I remember watching TRON when I was little (about 8 if I remember). And watched it almost every year after that. I must have rented the same tape quite a few times!! What a joy to find out it is going to be released in a DVD anniversary edition!! The special effects were marvelous for the time! The neo-fantastic colors and graphics were well made for a movie before its time! It was so weird (and now that I look back, philosophical) to have each "program" given a human body. Makes you think what AI will "really" think about us when/if we ever perfect it. And, more importantly the story line. When it all comes down to it, the basic's of the movie is man against machine (and we all know who wins that battle). The music is the icing on the cake. The synthesizer back-tech sounds will amaze you. (for the time of the movie) Popcorn and soda in front of the TV (with your kids if you have any), and see the movie that you will not forget.
Rating: Summary: Tron Review: "Tron", as you aleready may know, stands for "Trace ON" a computer instruction used by software developers to "Debug" or get rid programming errors.
Rating: Summary: Excellent movie, a new DVD Special Edition is coming! Review: I watched E! news this morning featuring an interview with Jeff Bridges and it looks like in fact, Tron is being rereleased on DVD as a Special Edition towards the end of this year, possibly beginning of next year. I would imagine the DVD will probably be released in time for the Christmas holidays. Those of you who still love this movie will find this is quite possibly one of the greatest technical achievements for computer generated visuals for a film ever produced from the 80's! Like the technical achievements seen in this years "Final Fantasy," it opened so many doors for computer generated special effects in film and launched a whole new way of looking at movies. Let's just hope Disney doesn't follow Warner Bros. in releasing this movie in full screen format like they've done with "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory-GAG!"
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