Tuesday, October 19, 2010

TRON Legacy

In 1989, Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges), the innovative software engineer and the CEO of ENCOM International, disappears. Twenty years later, his son, Sam (Garrett Hedlund), now ENCOM's controlling shareholder, takes little interest in the company besides an annual practical joke on the board of directors. Sam is visited by his father's friend, ENCOM executive Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner), urging Sam to investigate a mysterious page originating from Flynn's abandoned arcade. There, Sam discovers a concealed computer laboratory and unintentionally teleports himself to the Grid, a virtual reality created by his father.














On the Grid, Sam is captured and sent to compete against a masked program called Rinzler. Realizing that Sam is a User, Rinzler takes him to CLU, the world's ruler, who is physically identical to a younger Kevin Flynn. CLU nearly kills Sam in a Light Cycle match; but Sam is rescued by Quorra (Olivia Wilde), an apprentice of his father's, who conveys him to his father outside CLU's territory. There, Flynn reveals to Sam that he had been working on a new, "perfect" system and had appointed CLU and Tron, a security program created by Alan Bradley, as its co-creators. After much work, Flynn discovered a new series of sentient "isomorphic algorithms" (ISOs), self-produced Programs that spontaneously evolved in the system, which carried the potential to resolve various mysteries in science, religion, and medicine; but CLU, considering these an aberration, betrayed Flynn, captured Tron, and destroyed most of the ISOs, with the sole exception of Quorra. Meanwhile, the "portal" permitting travel between the two worlds has closed, leaving Flynn a captive; wherefore CLU sent the page that originated from the arcade, hoping to summon an individual to draw Flynn out of hiding and re-open the portal.










Against his father's wishes, Sam returns to the Grid to find Zuse, a program promised to provide safe passage to the portal. The End of Line Club owner, Castor (Michael Sheen), reveals himself to be Zuse and betrays him to CLU's guards. In the resulting fight, Flynn appears to rescue his son, Quorra is injured, and Zuse gains possession of Flynn's 'identity disc'. Knowing the disc works as a master key to the Grid, Zuse attempts to use it to bargain with CLU; but CLU simply takes it and destroys the club. Flynn and Sam save the injured Quorra and stow away aboard a freighter heading towards the portal, where Flynn restores Quorra and reveals her to be the last surviving ISO.









The three unexpectedly arrive at a station aboard a massive warship and encounter Rinzler. As Quorra attempts to distract him, Flynn recognizes Rinzler as Tron, reprogrammed by CLU to serve him. Meanwhile, CLU announces his desire to enter the real world to his massive army as his warship heads towards the portal. Sam saves Quorra from Rinzler and reclaims Flynn's disc. The trio use an aerial shuttle and flee, but CLU, Rinzler, and several guards pursue them in Light Jets. After making eye contact with Flynn, Rinzler remembers his original identity and collides with CLU's Light Jet. CLU uses Tron's Light Jet to escape while Tron falls into the Sea of Simulation, where his armor converts from red to blue.











Sam, Flynn and Quorra eventually reach the portal, only to find CLU blocking their path. After attempting to reason with CLU, Flynn sacrifices himself by merging with CLU, while Sam and Quorra use Flynn's disc to travel through the portal back to the real world. Flynn and CLU's merge causes a massive explosion that destroys them both, as well as CLU's army and his warship.

Back in the basement of Flynn's arcade, Sam backs up the system onto his flash drive and powers it off. He then meets Alan and tells him that he will start working at ENCOM, and, as the controlling interest shareholder, he will name Alan chairman of the board. Quorra meets Sam outside, and the two take off on his motorcycle. The movie ends with Sam showing Quorra the sunrise she has longed to see.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Gulliver's Travels

Lemuel Gulliver (Jack Black) is the boss of newcomer Dan (T. J. Miller) in the mail room of a New York City newspaper, but soon, Dan is promoted to a boss. Deeply depressed at his dead-end job, Gulliver decides to talk to journalist Darcy Silverman (Amanda Peet). He convinces her he could write a report about his (false) extensive world "travels" saying his dream is to become a writer. After suffering writer's block and thinking that Darcy will not want to hang out with a "guy from the mailroom", he plagiarises a report from other publications on the Internet. The next day, Darcy, impressed by his writing, presents Gulliver with a new task – to travel to the Bermuda Triangle and write an article confirming that the legend of ships mysteriously disappearing in the area being caused by extraterrestrials is not true.











Upon arrival in Bermuda, Gulliver rents a boat and travels into the triangle. After falling asleep at the helm of his ship, he's caught in a freak storm and the boat is overwhelmed by a waterspout. He washes up unconscious on the shore of Lilliput, where he is immediately confirmed as a "beast" by the town's tiny people. He is captured and imprisoned in a cave, citizens claiming him to be dangerous because of his huge size. Here, he meets another prisoner named Horatio (Jason Segel) who was jailed by General Edward (Chris O'Dowd) because he likes Princess Mary of Lilliput (Emily Blunt), whereas Edward wants her for himself. After the island across from Lilliput, Blefuscu, infiltrates commandos to kidnap Princess Mary, Gulliver manages to break free of the plough-machine he is forced to work and then rescues the princess from being kidnapped. Gulliver also saves her father, King Benjamin (Billy Connolly) from a fire by urinating on it.










Gulliver is declared a hero by Lilliput's citizens and makes up a deal of lies saying he is the President of the United States, says Yoda is his Vice-President and a living legend in his homeland. Edward, however, becomes enraged due to the luxurious accommodations that have been built for him, and even being presented as an honorary general of the Lilliputian Army complete with uniform. When the townspeople find Gulliver's boat and his things, Gulliver gets angry voice mail messages from Darcy, angrily saying she has to take his place and travel to Bermuda now, and also found out about his plagiarism and she no longer wishes to be friends with him. The next day, chaos ensues as the Blefuscian Navy lay siege on the city when Edward shuts down its defense system as an act of revenge for Gulliver's treatment. Gulliver defeats the armada, invulnerable to the cannonballs being fired at him (although he receives numerous welts on his stomach). Embarrassed once more, and with Mary no longer wanting to do anything with him, Edward defects to the Blefuscians and brings with him blueprints of a robot coming from one of Gulliver's sci-fi magazines. The Blefuscians secretly build the robot based on Gulliver's magazine, with Edward as the pilot.











The Blefuscians invade Liliput and the robot-wielding Edward makes Gulliver admit to the people that he is "just the guy from the mail-room" and nothing more. Edward banishes Gulliver on the shores of Brobdingnag ("the island where we dare not go"), where he is captured by Glumdalclitch, a giant girl who is to Gulliver as Gulliver is to the people of Lilliput, and forced to become her doll complete with wig and dress. Darcy is then imprisoned by the Blefuscians when she is lost in the Bermuda Triangle in the same manner as Gulliver. Horatio, who has gone to Brobdingnag after being spurned by Mary, reveals to Gulliver that Darcy is imprisoned. Gulliver narrowly escapes with him, using a parachute that he took from a dead U.S. Air Force pilot sitting in the dollhouse (a crashed F-104 Starfighter is seen in the girl's yard).

















Once again accepting a duel from Edward, this time not only for Lilliput's freedom but for its fate as well -as Edward threatens to destroy it should Gulliver fail- Gulliver ultimately defeats him with the assistance of Horatio, who disables the machine's electrocuting weapon. Horatio is hailed a hero and gets King Benjamin's permission to court the princess. Edward, reaching the point of insanity, threatens to kill the princess, but the princess, finally having enough of Edward, knocks the traitor down in frustration. Gulliver then helps to make peace between the rival island-nations by reciting Edwin Starr's "War" and he, along with Darcy, return to New York on their repaired boat. The film ends with Darcy and Gulliver holding hands walking away from the screen.