Tron: Legacy (2010 review)

4 out of 5

Generally, movies that are considered failures don’t get sequels almost 30 years afterwards.  Yet such is the legacy of Tron, which came out in 1982, gained a fanatical cult following, and now there’s the 200 million dollar Tron: Legacy.   Like the original, it has stunning FX for its time.  Probably also like its predecessor in about three decades it’ll seem positively quaint. But in its native digital 3D format Tron: Legacy looks really, really cool.  There is a hint of substance but mostly a hell of a lot of style.

Decades ago, Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) disappeared, leaving behind his son, Sam (Garrett Hedlund) as the heir to the ENCOM Company.  Bitter, Sam engages in acts of vandalism against the company until Kevin’s old partner, Alan (Bruce Boxleitner) ,tells him he has received a message from Sam’s missing father.  This leads to Sam being sucked into a digital world known as The Grid where sentient programs fight for their digital lives in gladiator games. Like in the original movie, the younger Flynn seems to be remarkably underwhelmed by the revelation that inside of computers is an entire society of sentient beings, but whatever. The Grid is ruled by the brutal Clu 2.0 (also Bridges) who is searching for old man Kevin, his creator.  Sam joins forces with his father and Kevin’s partner, Quorra (Olivia Wilde) to escape the Grid and failure may mean the end of the world as we know it.

Supposedly Sam is the main character of the film but as the movie goes on you realize he’s really not. This is fine because Hedlund is saddled with a generic hero that bounces around the movie and not much else. But when the credits roll the only actor to pop up before the title, star billing position, is Jeff Bridges. There’s something inherently wacky about building a tentpole FX picture around a 60 year old actor.  Bridges provides suffer dude zen, enlivening what could have been a dull part. 

The real treat is the character of Clu who is fairly mind-boggling to see.  There are various portions of the movie where we see young Kevin Flynn, old Kevin Flynn and Clu. The stuff in the “real world” with digitally de-aged Bridges looks a bit wonky, but Clu fares much better because it’s a CGI element in a CGI world. There are a few shots where Clu looks a bit more like a special effect than a person, but mostly it’s pretty convincing.  Clu’s motivations boils down to daddy abandonment issues but the movie takes it’s time to reveal them.  One of the film’s best beats is a flashback to when Clu turned against his creator, and the moment is a combination of evil computer logic and a kid trying to get his father’s approval.  This crazy stuff can only happen in sci-fi.  Oddly, with the two abandoned sons the theme turns out to be, “Flynn is a really bad dad.” 

The rest of the characters aren’t as memorable.  Wilde is endearing as the child-like yet combative Quorra.  Michael Sheen is fairly annoying as a hammy bar owner but his screen-time is mercifully brief.  Pulling double-duty like Bridges, Boxleitner plays old Alan and the young title character of Tron.  Tron, however, is barely in the movie.  Frankly, unless you’ve seen the first flick you’ll have no idea who Tron is and how he fits into this story. 

There are a few subtle nods and flat-out steals from the original.  Legacy starts off almost like a remake.  Like his father, Sam infiltrates ENCOM and is soon sucked into the digital world and forced to fight with light discs and light cycles in almost the same order as the original.  When Sam escapes the movie spins off in its own direction and not exactly for the better.  There’s a brief backstory about Clu committing digital genocide that’s never expanded on.  It has as much weight as if Clu was mean to a dog.

But Legacy is not about plot and deep characters, it’s about the visual style and eyeball popping FX.  This is how 3D should be done: digital cameras, 3D adding immersion to the world, and steady editing and camera movements. First time feature Director Joseph Kosinski has a solid command of the frame and the action is fast paced with lots of cool technological toys.  Light cycle races and disc battles are awesome in any decade.  One thing Legacy improves immensely over the original is in its pacing.  The first film is a bit draggy and a minimal musical score makes some action scenes lifeless but this flick is much faster. The music in Legacy is absolutely fantastic.  Provided by Daft Punk, it bridges the ‘80s Casio sound with modern flourishes combined with a sweeping classical orchestral score for one the best soundtracks of 2010. 

If you’re looking for a big budget holiday FX movies, Tron: Legacy is a decent option.  There are movies out now like Black Swan if you want a solid filmmaking, but if you want spectacle, this is it.  Legacy sometimes it gets so self-involved in its own mythology, but as soon as the light cycles start speeding around all of its flaws are, to put it in Tron parlance, “derezzed.”