Though the visuals are alluring, the digital world conjured up is frankly not appealing. I wouldn’t even want to visit it. This world is dark, dangerous, and merciless. And talk about stilted dialogue. It’s almost as bad as the dialogue in Avatar. But of course the computer generation doesn’t much go to movies for dazzling dialogue— just give me the visual 3D effects. Jeff Bridges is o.k. in this film as the zen master creator of the world of Tron. Garrett Hedlund is the real star of the film and he is a little better, reminding one of the young man who played Kirk in the Star Trek reboot. The sound track sounds rebooted as well— can you say Jean Michel Jarre’s Oxygene. Maybe we were meant to think that this digital world is rather like the 80s when the original was made.
The movie plods along its 2 hours and 7 minutes, and honestly it would have been much better at about 90 minutes. This is a film where the director probably fell too much in love with the visuals and couldn’t cut things for the sake of the story. Not even a naughty Michael Sheen as Castor/Zeus can throw any thunderbolts into this film. Tron himself plays only a very minor role in this movie which is too bad. Clue, the computer generated Kevin Flynn alter ego gets to be the main bad guy.
But what exactly happens in this world in the grid—- contests involving throwing of lethal frisbees, riding of electron bikes that are modeled on Ducatis, some predictable Star Wars like flying battles at the end. And what exactly ties these few action scenes together? Not much. There is the nice idea of the isomorphic algorithm girl Quorra, but alas she has too small a role, and of course it is not explained how a digital female could ever escape the grid. Indeed, little is explained. Poor Jeff Bridges says the following—- ‘Perfection is standing right in front of you’ and ‘Perfection is unknowable’ and for good measure ‘Perfection is not what we are striving for’. O.K.—- which is it?
For those of us who saw the original ground-breaking Tron movie decades ago, this is mostly sad as a sequel. It needed more ideas, better dialogue, better action, more plot, and frankly better characters. The visuals alone stand out, and they are worth seeing, but they are not worth the 3D price tag. If I were Sam Flynn, I would ask for both my Dad back, and my quarter back.
posted December 21, 2010 at 11:43 am
Tron, like theology, is very much a human intellectual construct. And the ‘legacy’ of both are the limitations of natural reason. But the presumption that perfection is unknowable only reflects both our human limitations and ignorance as a species. And those limitations, particularly moral limitations, are what the incarnation was intended to rectify. But once again that possibility exists. For what both science and religion thought impossible has now happened. History has it’s first fully demonstrable Christian proof for faith. A proof founded upon a perfect moral conception on the nature of Love and created by God. An this is not the product of theology!
As in the beginning, it teaches a single moral Law, a single moral principle, a single test of faith, and delivers on the Promise of its own proof; one in which the reality and will of God responds directly to an act of perfect faith with a demonstration of his omnipotence, an individual intervention into the natural world, ‘raising’ up the man, correcting human nature by a change in natural law, altering biology, consciousness and human ethical perception beyond all natural evolutionary boundaries. Intended to be understood metaphorically, where ‘death’ and darkness are ignorance and ‘Life’ and light are knowledge, this personal experience of omnipotent transcendent power and moral purpose is our ‘Resurrection’, and justification for faith. From here, on a perfectly objective foundation of moral principle, conduct and virtue, true morality and ‘Life’ begins.
Revolutionary for those able to get both head and heart around it? More info at http://www.energon.org.uk
posted December 21, 2010 at 2:11 pm
Unfortunately Rokbeck, this interpretation, if it refers to the language of the New Testament, does no justice what those original author’s meant by things like resurrection (something that happens to a corpse), or incarnation, (the actual coming of the Son of God to earth involving the assumption of human flesh). Theologizing is simply a reflection on historical events, not a conjuring up of a mental philosophy of life, nor is a transvaluation of the vocabulary of the New Testament warranted. For we are talking at the end of the day about a person, not a principle, a Lover not a law, and a Word from God, not a human intellectual construct.
Merry Christmas, BW3
posted December 28, 2010 at 1:16 pm
Hi Ben,
I really enjoyed the movie. My 9 and 6 year old sons did as well. I think the soundtrack is much more worthy than what you describe. You can listen to the full score here…
http://www.listenbeforeyoubuy.net/listen/listendownload-daft-punks-tron-legacy-soundtrack/
I actually stumbled across your review while searching for “Tron Legacy quotes “perfection is unknowable” on google. I thought that was a very perceptive part of the script. Today we know in part, but some day we will know in full, what perfection is. And, it will swallow us whole as we become part of God’s eternal “grid”, his kingdom. It will be the sumation of all logic (John 1:1). There, reason, love, purity, and rest, will be our perfect system.
I feel like the movie is very worth-while, especially for those who remember the first Tron. Even if I did get my quarter back, I’d still be $40 in the hole after buying 3 tickets. For me, the price of admission to the IMAX 3D version was well worth it.
posted June 2, 2011 at 8:25 am
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