Back To The Motherboard In Tron: Legacy

via wired.com



With Comic-Con came more information and more visuals from the highly anticipated Disney movie Tron: Legacy. It’s the sequel to the 1982 movie Tron, an anthropomorphic view of what life would be like inside a computer if softwear were people-like and not just electronic bits.

The original movie had a message, but perhaps best known for its exciting (in 1982) sci-fi visual effects and images. The sequel had to live up to having an up-to-date, 2010 version of the best in distinctive electronic imagery, and so far it looks like it may have succeeded.

The 1982 film had a story that was concerned with warning about computers knowing too much about us and controlling our lives. Now we accept that as just the way it is, so the new movie had too look for modern concerns for its storyline. About the new message, the writer/director said, “Technology is all about bringing people together, supposedly, and now there’s this sense that technology may have a dark side that keeps us from connecting with each other, and I think this film examines that problem.”

The first movie used scenes of video game action within the computer as a showcase for the imagery. In the new movie, combatants once again fight it out in the virtual world, hurling discs and riding light cycles. They also still wear suits that have the movie’s trademark glow, expect in the modern version. costumes shine more brightly, due to electroluminescent lamps woven into the casts’ tight-fitting suits. Before “action!” was said on set for each scene, there would be a call to “light ‘em up!” To make the new movie even more visually stunning, it was filmed in 3-D rather than having it added post-production.

Actor Jeff Bridges stars in Tron: Legacy, reprising the role of videogame designer Kevin Flynn. Between the time of the first and second films, it is revealed that the character has been lost in the network for many years. His son, played by Garrett Hedlund, enters cyberspace to look for him. There are again life-and-death battles between the inner world characters, played out in the dark, foreboding, but shiny environment that most of the movie takes place in.

The original movie grossed only $33 million in the United States in 1982. Expect the sequel to do much better.

Ryan Reynolds’ Green Lantern Suit Is Painted On

via movies.yahoo.com

To me, most movies based on comic book superheroes are a major miss. They focus on a lot of special effect shots and spend little on the character development and plot that might make the films interesting.

Sometimes the actors can make all the difference as to whether the movie is worth seeing or not. For example, Brandon Routh as Superman and Chris Evans as the Human Torch made their films worth spending the money to rent them.

The upcoming movie about Green Lantern might be worth seeing for the sake of the star, Ryan Reynolds. I’ve liked him going back to when he was on Two Guys, A Girl, And A Pizza Place. He’s got the talent to turn even a farce like Van Wilder into an entertaining movie.

It’s been revealed that the suit he “wears” in Green Lantern is actually digitally painted on, using a motion capture suit (covered with computer sensors) and CGI to add the GL suit later. It’s said that the suit “hugs his every muscular ripple. Little is left to the imagination.” This might make the movie something to see just for this reason, as Reynolds is known to be well-developed.

Because it’s a special effect, the muscle definition will probably be digitally enhanced, covering the real Ryan. It would have been better to paint him all over with liquid latex. I’d pay the theater ticket price just to see that on a big screen (especially if it were 3-D!).