Disney released a new trailer for TRON LEGACY today to coincide with their presentation at Comic-Con. I suppose this is the big movie news of the day. And I have to admit that I am really looking forward to seeing this movie. I was a huge fan of the original, but this trailer is leaving me cold.
Check it out for yourself.
“I’m not your father, Sam.”
Boy, that line made me cringe. So did “Here they come!” You just can’t say those things in a post-Star Wars sci-fi movie anymore. You can’t make it sound good.
No, I’m not an angry fanboy pining for the perfect (read flawed memories of…) cinematic past of my youth. I’m just saying the trailer was kind of flat. The effects were cool. The stuff was cool. It was neat seeing the bikes and the recognizers, and delightfully creepy seeing Jeff Bridges look like he’s 30. But I couldn’t get past the dialog and the stilted acting. It was like the Star Wars prequels to me. All posing and pacing. Hit the mark, say the line.
“Cut! Again… But with more intensity.” You know?
Also, the Tron world looked too pretty for me. I liked the dreamlike feeling of the original. The fakeyness of it actually helped the atmosphere back in the 80′s. But with today’s technology, we can make everything perfect. And that’s a problem. It was perfect… and that bugged me.
Just because you can make something perfect, doesn’t mean you should.
Okay, I know. It’s just a trailer. I should wait until the actual movie comes out before I go on a rant. I’ll shut up now.
But I would really like to know what you guys think.
I believe we have a lot to talk about.
Due in theaters December 17, 2010, TRON LEGACY stars Jeff Bridges (CRAZY HEART, THE BIG LEBOWSKI), Garrett Hedlund (FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS), Olivia Wilde (HOUSE M.D., ALPHA DOG) and Michael Sheen (THE QUEEN, FROST/NIXON)
Director, Joseph Kosinski, remarkably has no previous director credits on the IMDb, but he has directed a couple of notable CGI video game commercials. You can see them below.
Gears of War: “Mad World”
Halo, “Starry Night”
Is this a risky move on Disney’s part? Or is it inspired?
Time will tell.
By the way, my deepest apologies for the dreadful Yahoo commercial at the end of the trailer. They are truly awful and the volume is turned way up on them and you can’t pause it. As soon as I can find a reliable version not on Yahoo, I’ll change the feed. Until then, thank you for not screaming and closing the page.
UPDATE:
I’ve included a couple of trailers for the original.
TRON (1982), Official trailer
And the fan made TRON MODERN TRAILER, by DrewboiX. Better quality footage that really showcases the phenomonal design plan of the original.
By the way, my deepest apologies for the dreadful Yahoo commercial at the end of the trailer. They are truly awful and the volume is turned way up on them and you can’t pause it. As soon as I can find a reliable version not on Yahoo, I’ll change the feed. Until then, thank you for not screaming and closing the page.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
You’re absolutely right, John! I vaguely remember watching the original…back in 1982 such extensive use of computer graphics was new & exciting – it looked a bit fake & tacky, but it didn’t matter because it was so original for its time.
Nowadays computer graphics – improved over the intervening decades – are the norm, rather than a unique selling point. If you’re planning a modern sequel to an old film whose principal selling point was its pioneering use of computerised animation, then, at a time when computerised animation is no longer considered avant-garde, you need to have some other reason for people to watch your film.
I think the producers of ‘Legacy’ might have missed a trick by going for ‘perfect’ graphics rather than staying with the retro-tackiness of the original, which gave it so much of its character.
@PaulG
Exactly, PaulG. Even in 1982, Tron was retro-tacky. It was a very early synthesis of past and future, which has become so common today. But it may have started here.
After mulling it over for a few hours, I was able to figure out exactly what was bothering me about the design execution.
In the original, the look and feel of “the grid” was largely B&W with an explosion of artificial color and light. It also appeared that a lot of that footage may have been shot on grainy stock, giving it an old film noir look. The original Tron definitely had a hard-boiled edge to it in both story and style. Like film-noir, but futuristic. Also, there were elements of Casablanca, Double Indemnity and The Maltese Falcon in the story.
This was very similar in concept to Blade Runner, which came out the same year (a week earlier), but completely different in execution. Blade Runner gets most of the credit for creating “Cyber Noir,” but Tron’s contribution can’t be underestimated.
The new grid looks as though they put very little thought into it. Just make it look cool. I think that’s what I was missing. The thought. The purpose. The meaning beyond what I’m seeing on the screen.
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