Tron (film)
Encyclopedia
Tron is a 1982 American science fiction
film written and directed by Steven Lisberger
, and released by Walt Disney Pictures
. It stars Jeff Bridges
as the protagonist Kevin Flynn; Bruce Boxleitner
in a dual role as security program Tron and Tron's "User", computer programmer Alan Bradley; Cindy Morgan
in a dual role as program Yori and her "User", Dr. Lora Baines; Barnard Hughes
in a dual role as the tower guardian Dumont and his "User", Dr. Walter Gibbs; Tony Stefano in a dual role as Ed Dillinger's secretary Peter and Sark's otherwise-nameless Lieutenant; and Dan Shor
as Ram. David Warner
plays all three main antagonists: the program Sark, his "User", Ed Dillinger, and the voice of the artificially intelligent
Master Control Program. The film also features cameo roles by Jackson Bostwick
and Michael Dudikoff
(who makes his acting debut as a video game-conscript).
The film tells the story of Flynn as he attempts to hack into the ENCOM mainframe to prove that Dillinger has appropriated his work, but ends up being transported into the Digital World itself as a unique program/User. There, he teams up with Tron to defeat the Master Control Program, who has been controlling the Digital World.
Development of Tron began in 1976 when Lisberger became fascinated with Pong
. Along with producer Donald Kushner
, he set up an animation studio to develop Tron with the intention of making it an animated film. Lisberger decided to include live-action elements with the computer animation. Various film studios had rejected the storyboards for the film before the project was set up at Disney. There, backlighted animation was combined with the computer animation and live-action. Tron was released on July 9, 1982 in 1,091 theaters in the United States.
The film received positive reviews from critics. Critics praised the visuals and acting, but criticized the storyline. The film also was a box office success, grossing $33 million in the United States (approx. $74 million in 2010). Tron received nominations for Best Costume Design and Best Sound at the 55th Academy Awards
, and received the Academy Award for Technical Achievement
14 years later. Over time, Tron developed into a cult film
and eventually spawned into a franchise
, which consists of multiple video games, comic books and an animated television series. A sequel titled Tron: Legacy was directed by Joseph Kosinski
and was released on December 17, 2010; it also saw the return of Lisberger, Bridges, and Boxleitner to the franchise.
Tron was re-released in its original 70mm format in a number of cinemas across the USA and UK during 2011.
) is a software engineer
attempting to invade the mainframe
of his former employer, software company ENCOM, in order to find evidence that senior executive Ed Dillinger (David Warner
) plagiarised
several video games invented by Flynn. He is prevented by the Master Control Program (M.C.P.), an artificial intelligence
in the "ENCOM 511" supercomputer, that controls the ENCOM mainframe and seeks control over other mainframes as well.
When ENCOM's employees Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner
) and Lora Baines (Cindy Morgan
) tell Flynn that Dillinger has tightened security in response to Flynn's invasions, Flynn persuades them to admit him into ENCOM's buildings wherein to forge a higher security clearance for Bradley's program "Tron", which would monitor communications between the M.C.P. and the outside world. In ENCOM's laboratory, the M.C.P. uses a laser
developed for "quantum teleportation" to digitize Flynn into the ENCOM mainframe.
In the mainframe, computers' programs appear in the likeness of the human "users" who created them, and wield as their chief weapon an "identity disc" thrown at their enemies. Here, the M.C.P. and its assistant Sark (Warner
) seek complete control over input/output in the system. Programs resistant to their rule are forced to play in gladiatorial games in which the losers are destroyed. Imprisoned by Sark, Flynn meets Tron (Boxleitner
) and another program named 'Ram', with whom they escape into the mainframe during a Light Cycle match, and are later separated. In the attempt to reunite with Tron, Flynn discovers that, as a User, he is capable of manipulating the reality of the digital world. Shortly after learning of Flynn's "User" status, Ram is mortally wounded by Sark's minions and dissolves.
At an input/output junction, Tron communicates with Alan and receives instructions to destroy the M.C.P. Tron and another program named Yori (Morgan
) board a "solar sailer simulation" to reach the M.C.P.'s core. Flynn boards the sailer early in the journey, and later reveals his 'User' status to the others. Before they reach the M.C.P., Sark's command ship destroys the sailer, capturing Flynn and Yori. Sark leaves the command ship and orders its destruction; but Flynn keeps it intact while Sark reaches the M.C.P.'s core on a shuttle, carrying captured programs. Tron—thought killed in the sailer— confronts Sark outside the core while the M.C.P. attempts to consume the captives. Tron damages Sark and attacks the M.C.P. directly; whereupon the M.C.P. raises a shield around its core and re-empowers Sark against Tron. To destroy the M.C.P., Flynn leaps into it, distracting it long enough to reveal a gap in its shield, through which Tron destroys it. Thereafter input/output junctions are illuminated as programs begin to communicate with their users, and Flynn is reconstructed in the world outside. A nearby printer prints the evidence that Dillinger had plagiarized his code. Dillinger, entering his office, finds the proof broadcast and the M.C.P. inactive. Flynn takes his place as executive of ENCOM, while Alan and Lora remain his closest friends.
and saw Pong
for the first time. He was immediately fascinated by video games and wanted to do a film incorporating them. According to Lisberger, "I realized that there were these techniques that would be very suitable for bringing video games and computer visuals to the screen. And that was the moment that the whole concept flashed across my mind". "Everybody was doing backlit animation in the 70s, you know. It was that disco look. And we thought, what if we had this character that was a neon line, and that was our Tron warrior – Tron for electronic. And what happened was, I saw Pong, and I said, well, that's the arena for him. And at the same time I was interested in the early phases of computer generated animation, which I got into at MIT in Boston, and when I got into that I met a bunch of programmers who were into all that. And they really inspired me, by how much they believed in this new realm." He was frustrated by the clique-like nature of computers and video games and wanted to create a film that would open this world up to everyone. Lisberger and his business partner Donald Kushner
moved to the West Coast in 1977 and set up an animation studio to develop Tron. They borrowed against the anticipated profits of their 90-minute animated television special Animalympics
to develop storyboards for Tron with the notion of making an animated film.
The film was then conceived to be predominantly an animated film with live-action sequences acting as book ends. The rest would involve a combination of computer generated visuals and back-lit animation. Lisberger planned to finance the movie independently by approaching several computer companies but had little success. However, one company, Information International, Inc., was receptive. He met with Richard Taylor, a representative, and they began talking about using live-action photography with back-lit animation in such a way that it could be integrated with computer graphics. At this point, Lisberger already had a script written and the film entirely storyboard
ed with some computer animation tests completed. He had spent approximately $300,000 developing Tron and had also secured $4–5 million in private backing before reaching a standstill. Lisberger and Kushner took their storyboards and samples of computer-generated films to Warner Bros.
, MGM, and Columbia Pictures
– all of which turned them down.
In 1980, they decided to take the idea to Disney, which was interested in producing more daring productions at the time. However, Disney executives were uncertain about giving $10–12 million to a first-time producer and director using techniques which, in most cases, had never been attempted. The studio agreed to finance a test reel which involved a flying disc champion throwing a rough prototype of the discs used in the film. It was a chance to mix live-action footage with back-lit animation and computer generated visuals. It impressed the executives at Disney and they agreed to back the film. The script was subsequently re-written and re-storyboarded with the studio's input. At the time, Disney rarely hired outsiders to make films for them and Kushner found that he and his group were given a less than warm welcome because "we tackled the nerve center – the animation department. They saw us as the germ from outside. We tried to enlist several Disney animators but none came. Disney is a closed group...."
decided in 1981 to film Tron completely in 65-mm Super Panavision (except for the computer-generated layers, which were shot in Vistavison and some scenes in the "real" world which were filmed in anamorphic 35mm and "blown up" to 65mm). Three designers were brought in to create the look of the computer world. Renowned French
comic book artist Jean Giraud
(aka Moebius) was the main set and costume designer for the movie. Most of the vehicle designs (including Sark's aircraft carrier, the light cycles, the tank, and the solar sailer) were created by industrial designer Syd Mead
, of Blade Runner
fame. Peter Lloyd
, a high-tech commercial artist, designed the environments. Nevertheless, these jobs often overlapped, leaving Giraud working on the solar sailer and Mead designing terrain, sets and the film's logo. The original 'Program' character design was inspired by Lisberger Studios' logo
of a glowing body-builder hurling two disc
s.
To create the computer animation sequences of Tron, Disney turned to the four leading computer graphics firms of the day: Information International Inc. of Culver City, California
, who owned the Super Foonly F-1 (the fastest PDP-10
ever made and the only one of its kind); MAGI of Elmsford, New York
; Robert Abel and Associates
of California; and Digital Effects
of New York City
. Bill Kovacs
worked on this movie while working for Robert Abel before going on to found Wavefront Technologies
. The work was not a collaboration, resulting in very different styles used by the firms.
Tron was one of the first movies to make extensive use of any form of computer animation
, and is celebrated as a milestone in the industry; but only fifteen to twenty minutes of such animation were used, mostly scenes that show digital "terrain" or patterns or include vehicles such as light-cycles, tanks and ships. Because the technology to combine computer animation and live action did not exist at the time, these sequences were interspersed with the filmed characters. The computer used had only 2MB of memory, with a disc that had no more than 330MB of storage. This put a limit on detail of background; and at a certain distance, they had a procedure of mixing in black to fade things out, a process called "depth cueing". The movie's Computer Effects Supervisor Richard Taylor told them "When in doubt, black it out!", which became their motto.
Most of the scenes, backgrounds, and visual effects in the film were created using more traditional techniques and a unique process known as "backlit animation". In this process, live-action scenes inside the computer world were filmed in black-and-white
on an entirely black set, printed on large format
Kodalith high-contrast film, then colored with photographic and rotoscopic techniques to give them a "technological" appearance. With multiple layers of high-contrast, large format positives and negatives, this process required truckloads of sheet film
and a workload even greater than that of a conventional cel-animated feature. The Kodalith was specially produced as large sheets by Kodak for the film and came in numbered boxes so that each batch of the film could be used in order of manufacture for a consistent image; but this was not understood by the filmmakers, and as a result glowing outlines and circuit traces occasionally flicker as the film speed varied between batches. After the reason was discovered, this was no longer a problem as the batches were used in order and "zinger" sounds were used during the flickering parts to represent the computer world malfunctioning as Lisberger described it. Lisberger later had these flickers and sounds digitally corrected for the 2011 DVD and Blu-ray release as they were not included in his original vision of the film. Due to its difficulty and cost, this process was not repeated for another feature film.
Sound design and creation for the film was assigned to Frank Serafine, who was responsible for the sound design on Star Trek: The Motion Picture in 1979. Tron was a 1983 Academy Awards
nominee for Best Sound.
At one point in the film a small entity called "Bit" advises Flynn with only the words "yes" and "no" created by a Votrax
speech synthesizer.
More than 500 people were involved in the post-production work, including 200 inker and hand-painters in Taiwan's Cuckoo's Nest Studio
(unusual for an English-language production, in the end credits the personnel are listed with their names written in Chinese characters).
This film features parts of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
; the multi-story ENCOM laser bay was the target area for the SHIVA
solid-state multi-beamed laser. Also, the stairway that Alan, Lora, and Flynn use to reach Alan's office is the stairway in Building 451 near the entrance to the main machine room. The cubicle scenes were shot in another room of the lab. Tron is the only movie to have scenes filmed inside this lab.
The original script called for "good" programs to be colored yellow and "evil" programs (those loyal to Sark and the MCP) to be colored blue. Partway into production, this coloring scheme was changed to blue for good and red for evil, but some scenes were produced using the original coloring scheme: Clu, who drives a tank, has yellow circuit lines, and all of Sark's tank commanders are blue (but appear green in some presentations). Also, the light-cycle sequence shows the heroes driving yellow (Flynn), orange (Tron) and red (Ram) cycles, while Sark's troops drive blue cycles; similarly, Clu's tank is red, while tanks driven by crews loyal to Sark are blue.
Budgeting the production was difficult by reason of breaking new ground in response to additional challenges, including an impending Directors Guild of America
strike and a fixed release date. Disney predicted at least $400 million in domestic sales of merchandise, including an arcade game by Bally Midway and three Mattel
Intellivision
home video games.
The producers also added Easter eggs
: during the scene where Tron and Ram escape from the Light Cycle arena into the system, Pac-Man
can be seen behind Sark; whereas a "Hidden Mickey
" outline can be seen below the solar sailer during the protagonists' journey.
, who is best known for her album Switched-On Bach
and for the soundtracks to many films, including A Clockwork Orange
and The Shining
. The music, which was the first collaboration between Carlos and her partner Annemarie Franklin, featured a mix of an analog Moog synthesizer
and Crumar
's GDS digital synthesizer (complex additive
and phase modulation synthesis), along with non-electronic pieces performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra
(hired at the insistence of Disney, which was concerned that Carlos might not be able to complete her score on time). Two additional musical tracks were provided by the band Journey
after British band Supertramp
pulled out of the project.
of the Chicago Sun-Times
gave the film four out of four stars and described the film as "a dazzling movie from Walt Disney in which computers have been used to make themselves romantic and glamorous. Here's a technological sound-and-light show that is sensational and brainy, stylish, and fun". However, near the end of his review, he noted (in a positive tone), "This is an almost wholly technological movie. Although it's populated by actors who are engaging (Bridges, Cindy Morgan) or sinister (Warner), it is not really a movie about human nature. Like [the last two Star Wars
films], but much more so, this movie is a machine to dazzle and delight us". Ebert was so convinced that this film had not been given its due credit by both critics and audiences that he decided to close his first annual Overlooked Film Festival with a showing of Tron. Perhaps unsurprisingly, InfoWorld's Deborah Wise was impressed, writing that "it is hard to believe the characters acted out the scenes on a darkened soundstage... We see characters throwing illuminated Frisbee
s, driving 'lightcycles' on a video-game grid, playing a dangerous version of jai alai
and zapping numerous fluorescent tanks in arcade-game-type mazes. It's exciting, it's fun, and it's just what video-game fans and anyone with a spirit of adventure will love—despite plot weaknesses."
On the other hand, Variety
disliked the film and said in its review, "Tron is loaded with visual delights but falls way short of the mark in story and viewer involvement. Screenwriter-director Steven Lisberger has adequately marshalled a huge force of technicians to deliver the dazzle, but even kids (and specifically computer game geeks) will have a difficult time getting hooked on the situations". In her review for The New York Times
, Janet Maslin
criticized the film's visual effects: "They're loud, bright and empty, and they're all this movie has to offer". The Washington Posts Gary Arnold wrote, "Fascinating as they are as discrete sequences, the computer-animated episodes don't build dramatically. They remain a miscellaneous form of abstract spectacle". In his review for the Globe and Mail, Jay Scott
wrote, "It's got momentum and it's got marvels, but it's without heart; it's a visionary technological achievement without vision".
In the year it was released, the Motion Picture Academy refused to nominate Tron for a special-effects award because, according to director Steven Lisberger, "The Academy thought we cheated by using computers". The film did, however, earn Oscar nominations in the categories of Best Costume Design and Best Sound (Michael Minkler
, Bob Minkler
, Lee Minkler
and James LaRue
). In 1997, Ken Perlin
of the Mathematical Applications Group, Inc.
won an Academy Award for Technical Achievement
for his invention of Perlin noise
for Tron.
In 2008, Tron was nominated for AFI's Top 10 Science Fiction Films list.
. It included eight pages of color photographs from the movie. Also that year, Disney Senior Staff Publicist Michael Bonifer authored a book entitled The Art of Tron which covered aspects of the pre-production and post-production aspects of Tron.
, head of Pixar
and Disney's animation group, described how the film helped him see the potential of computer-generated imagery in the production of animated films stating "without Tron there would be no Toy Story". The two members of the French house
group Daft Punk
, who scores the sequel, have held a joint, life-long fascination with the film. Tron developed into a cult film
and was ranked as 13th in a 2010 list of the top 20 cult films published by The Boston Globe.
negotiated to develop and direct "TR2N", described as "the next chapter" of the 1982 film and based on a preliminary teaser trailer shown at that year's San Diego Comic-Con, with Lisberger co-producing. Filming began in Vancouver
, British Columbia
in April 2009. During the 2009 Comic-Con, the title of the sequel was revealed to be changed to Tron: Legacy. The second trailer (also with the "Tron: Legacy" logo) was released in 3D with Alice In Wonderland
. A third trailer premiered at Comic-Con 2010 on July 22. At Disney's D23 Expo September 10–13, 2009 they also debuted teaser trailers for Tron: Legacy as well as having light cycle and other props from the movie there. The film was released on December 17, 2010.
in 2000 with no special features. In 2002, the film received a 20th Anniversary Collector's Edition re-release in a 2-Disc DVD set.
To tie in with Trons sequel, Tron: Legacy, the movie was re-released by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on Special Edition DVD and for the first time on Blu-ray Combo on April 5, 2011, with the subtitle "Original Classic" to distinguish it from its sequel. Tron was also featured in a 5-Disc Blu-ray Combo with the 3D copy of Tron: Legacy. The film was re-released on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK on June 27, 2011.
Science fiction film
Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic...
film written and directed by Steven Lisberger
Steven Lisberger
Steven M. Lisberger is an American film director, producer and writer famous for directing Tron in 1982.Lisberger was born in 1951 in New York City and grew up in Hazelton, Pennsylvania. He is a 1974 graduate of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts...
, and released by Walt Disney Pictures
Walt Disney Pictures
Walt Disney Pictures is an American film studio owned by The Walt Disney Company. Walt Disney Pictures and Television, a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Studios and the main production company for live-action feature films within the Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group, based at the Walt Disney...
. It stars Jeff Bridges
Jeff Bridges
Jeffrey Leon "Jeff" Bridges is an American actor and musician. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Otis "Bad" Blake in the 2009 film Crazy Heart....
as the protagonist Kevin Flynn; Bruce Boxleitner
Bruce Boxleitner
Bruce William Boxleitner is an American actor, and science fiction and suspense writer. He is known for his leading roles in the television series How the West Was Won, Bring 'Em Back Alive, Scarecrow and Mrs. King , and Babylon 5...
in a dual role as security program Tron and Tron's "User", computer programmer Alan Bradley; Cindy Morgan
Cindy Morgan
Cindy Morgan is an American actress best known for her appearances as Lora/Yori in Tron and Lacey Underall in Caddyshack.-Biography:...
in a dual role as program Yori and her "User", Dr. Lora Baines; Barnard Hughes
Barnard Hughes
Bernard Aloysius Kiernan “Barnard” Hughes was an American actor of theater and film. Hughes became famous for a variety of roles; his most notable roles came after middle age, and he was often cast as a dithering authority figure or grandfatherly elder.-Personal life:Hughes was born in Bedford...
in a dual role as the tower guardian Dumont and his "User", Dr. Walter Gibbs; Tony Stefano in a dual role as Ed Dillinger's secretary Peter and Sark's otherwise-nameless Lieutenant; and Dan Shor
Dan Shor
Daniel Shor is an American veteran actor, director, writer and teacher with a career spanning over 30 years.- Early life :Shor was born and raised in New York City. Attended McBurney school from 6th thru 8th grade...
as Ram. David Warner
David Warner (actor)
David Warner is an English actor who is known for playing both romantic leads and sinister or villainous characters, both in film and animation...
plays all three main antagonists: the program Sark, his "User", Ed Dillinger, and the voice of the artificially intelligent
Artificial intelligence in fiction
Artificial intelligence is a common topic in science fiction, whether it is in literature, film, television or theatre. Science fiction sometimes focuses on the dangers of artificial intelligence, and sometimes on its positive potential.- Myths :...
Master Control Program. The film also features cameo roles by Jackson Bostwick
Jackson Bostwick
Jackson Bostwick is an American actor best known for playing Captain Marvel in the first season of the Shazam! television series of the mid-1970s.Bostwick is an expert in Jeet-Kune-Do and Wing-Chun Kung-Fu...
and Michael Dudikoff
Michael Dudikoff
Michael Joseph Dudikoff II is an American actor who has been in numerous films, including the American Ninja series , Tron , Bachelor Party , Platoon Leader , River of Death , Soldier Boyz , Ringmaster , and The Silencer , to name a few...
(who makes his acting debut as a video game-conscript).
The film tells the story of Flynn as he attempts to hack into the ENCOM mainframe to prove that Dillinger has appropriated his work, but ends up being transported into the Digital World itself as a unique program/User. There, he teams up with Tron to defeat the Master Control Program, who has been controlling the Digital World.
Development of Tron began in 1976 when Lisberger became fascinated with Pong
Pong
Pong is one of the earliest arcade video games, and is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. While other arcade video games such as Computer Space came before it, Pong was one of the first video games to reach mainstream popularity...
. Along with producer Donald Kushner
Donald Kushner
Donald Kushner is an American producer who has worked with animation, live-action and theater productions.He attended high school in Providence, received an undergraduate degree from Syracuse University in 1971 and a Boston University law degree in 1973...
, he set up an animation studio to develop Tron with the intention of making it an animated film. Lisberger decided to include live-action elements with the computer animation. Various film studios had rejected the storyboards for the film before the project was set up at Disney. There, backlighted animation was combined with the computer animation and live-action. Tron was released on July 9, 1982 in 1,091 theaters in the United States.
The film received positive reviews from critics. Critics praised the visuals and acting, but criticized the storyline. The film also was a box office success, grossing $33 million in the United States (approx. $74 million in 2010). Tron received nominations for Best Costume Design and Best Sound at the 55th Academy Awards
55th Academy Awards
The 55th Academy Awards were presented April 11, 1983 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. The ceremonies were presided over by Liza Minnelli, Dudley Moore, Richard Pryor, and Walter Matthau.Louis Gossett, Jr...
, and received the Academy Award for Technical Achievement
Academy Award for Technical Achievement
The Technical Achievement Award is a kind of Scientific and Technical Award given by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to those whose particular technical accomplishments have contributed to the progress of the motion picture industry and who are given a certificate, which describes...
14 years later. Over time, Tron developed into a cult film
Cult film
A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...
and eventually spawned into a franchise
Tron (franchise)
The Tron franchise began in 1982 with the Walt Disney Pictures film Tron. It was followed by various film tie-ins, a comic series and the 2010 sequel Tron: Legacy...
, which consists of multiple video games, comic books and an animated television series. A sequel titled Tron: Legacy was directed by Joseph Kosinski
Joseph Kosinski
Joseph Kosinski is an American television commercial and feature film director best known for his computer graphics and computer generated imagery work. He made his big-screen directorial debut with the Disney Digital 3-D science fiction film Tron: Legacy, the sequel to the 1982 film Tron...
and was released on December 17, 2010; it also saw the return of Lisberger, Bridges, and Boxleitner to the franchise.
Tron was re-released in its original 70mm format in a number of cinemas across the USA and UK during 2011.
Plot
Kevin Flynn (Jeff BridgesJeff Bridges
Jeffrey Leon "Jeff" Bridges is an American actor and musician. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Otis "Bad" Blake in the 2009 film Crazy Heart....
) is a software engineer
Software engineer
A software engineer is an engineer who applies the principles of software engineering to the design, development, testing, and evaluation of the software and systems that make computers or anything containing software, such as computer chips, work.- Overview :...
attempting to invade the mainframe
Mainframe computer
Mainframes are powerful computers used primarily by corporate and governmental organizations for critical applications, bulk data processing such as census, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise resource planning, and financial transaction processing.The term originally referred to the...
of his former employer, software company ENCOM, in order to find evidence that senior executive Ed Dillinger (David Warner
David Warner (actor)
David Warner is an English actor who is known for playing both romantic leads and sinister or villainous characters, both in film and animation...
) plagiarised
Plagiarism
Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as the "wrongful appropriation," "close imitation," or "purloining and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions," and the representation of them as one's own original work, but the notion remains problematic with nebulous...
several video games invented by Flynn. He is prevented by the Master Control Program (M.C.P.), an artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence
Artificial intelligence is the intelligence of machines and the branch of computer science that aims to create it. AI textbooks define the field as "the study and design of intelligent agents" where an intelligent agent is a system that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its...
in the "ENCOM 511" supercomputer, that controls the ENCOM mainframe and seeks control over other mainframes as well.
When ENCOM's employees Alan Bradley (Bruce Boxleitner
Bruce Boxleitner
Bruce William Boxleitner is an American actor, and science fiction and suspense writer. He is known for his leading roles in the television series How the West Was Won, Bring 'Em Back Alive, Scarecrow and Mrs. King , and Babylon 5...
) and Lora Baines (Cindy Morgan
Cindy Morgan
Cindy Morgan is an American actress best known for her appearances as Lora/Yori in Tron and Lacey Underall in Caddyshack.-Biography:...
) tell Flynn that Dillinger has tightened security in response to Flynn's invasions, Flynn persuades them to admit him into ENCOM's buildings wherein to forge a higher security clearance for Bradley's program "Tron", which would monitor communications between the M.C.P. and the outside world. In ENCOM's laboratory, the M.C.P. uses a laser
Laser
A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of photons. The term "laser" originated as an acronym for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation...
developed for "quantum teleportation" to digitize Flynn into the ENCOM mainframe.
In the mainframe, computers' programs appear in the likeness of the human "users" who created them, and wield as their chief weapon an "identity disc" thrown at their enemies. Here, the M.C.P. and its assistant Sark (Warner
David Warner (actor)
David Warner is an English actor who is known for playing both romantic leads and sinister or villainous characters, both in film and animation...
) seek complete control over input/output in the system. Programs resistant to their rule are forced to play in gladiatorial games in which the losers are destroyed. Imprisoned by Sark, Flynn meets Tron (Boxleitner
Bruce Boxleitner
Bruce William Boxleitner is an American actor, and science fiction and suspense writer. He is known for his leading roles in the television series How the West Was Won, Bring 'Em Back Alive, Scarecrow and Mrs. King , and Babylon 5...
) and another program named 'Ram', with whom they escape into the mainframe during a Light Cycle match, and are later separated. In the attempt to reunite with Tron, Flynn discovers that, as a User, he is capable of manipulating the reality of the digital world. Shortly after learning of Flynn's "User" status, Ram is mortally wounded by Sark's minions and dissolves.
At an input/output junction, Tron communicates with Alan and receives instructions to destroy the M.C.P. Tron and another program named Yori (Morgan
Cindy Morgan
Cindy Morgan is an American actress best known for her appearances as Lora/Yori in Tron and Lacey Underall in Caddyshack.-Biography:...
) board a "solar sailer simulation" to reach the M.C.P.'s core. Flynn boards the sailer early in the journey, and later reveals his 'User' status to the others. Before they reach the M.C.P., Sark's command ship destroys the sailer, capturing Flynn and Yori. Sark leaves the command ship and orders its destruction; but Flynn keeps it intact while Sark reaches the M.C.P.'s core on a shuttle, carrying captured programs. Tron—thought killed in the sailer— confronts Sark outside the core while the M.C.P. attempts to consume the captives. Tron damages Sark and attacks the M.C.P. directly; whereupon the M.C.P. raises a shield around its core and re-empowers Sark against Tron. To destroy the M.C.P., Flynn leaps into it, distracting it long enough to reveal a gap in its shield, through which Tron destroys it. Thereafter input/output junctions are illuminated as programs begin to communicate with their users, and Flynn is reconstructed in the world outside. A nearby printer prints the evidence that Dillinger had plagiarized his code. Dillinger, entering his office, finds the proof broadcast and the M.C.P. inactive. Flynn takes his place as executive of ENCOM, while Alan and Lora remain his closest friends.
Cast
- Jeff BridgesJeff BridgesJeffrey Leon "Jeff" Bridges is an American actor and musician. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Otis "Bad" Blake in the 2009 film Crazy Heart....
as Kevin Flynn. Bridges also portrays Clu (Codified Likeness Utility), a hacking program intended to find evidence of Dillinger's plagiarism in the mainframe. - Bruce BoxleitnerBruce BoxleitnerBruce William Boxleitner is an American actor, and science fiction and suspense writer. He is known for his leading roles in the television series How the West Was Won, Bring 'Em Back Alive, Scarecrow and Mrs. King , and Babylon 5...
as Alan Bradley, a friend of Kevin Flynn and employee of ENCOM. Boxleitner also plays Tron, a security program developed by Bradley. - David WarnerDavid Warner (actor)David Warner is an English actor who is known for playing both romantic leads and sinister or villainous characters, both in film and animation...
as Ed Dillinger. Warner also plays Sark, a command program, and provides (uncredited) the voice of the Master Control Program, an artificial intelligence created by Dr. Walter Gibbs and expanded by Dillinger. - Cindy MorganCindy MorganCindy Morgan is an American actress best known for her appearances as Lora/Yori in Tron and Lacey Underall in Caddyshack.-Biography:...
as Dr. Lora Baines, Alan's co-worker at ENCOM and assistant to Dr. Walter Gibbs. Implied to have later married Alan. Morgan also plays Yori, a program created by Baines and a confidante of Tron. - Barnard HughesBarnard HughesBernard Aloysius Kiernan “Barnard” Hughes was an American actor of theater and film. Hughes became famous for a variety of roles; his most notable roles came after middle age, and he was often cast as a dithering authority figure or grandfatherly elder.-Personal life:Hughes was born in Bedford...
as Dr. Walter Gibbs, a founder and employee of ENCOM. Hughes also plays Dumont, a guardian program protecting input/output junctions. - Dan ShorDan ShorDaniel Shor is an American veteran actor, director, writer and teacher with a career spanning over 30 years.- Early life :Shor was born and raised in New York City. Attended McBurney school from 6th thru 8th grade...
as Ram, an actuarial program for an unnamed insurance company and close friend of Tron and Crom in the mainframe. - Peter JurasikPeter JurasikPeter Jurasik is an American actor known for his television roles as Londo Mollari in the 1990s science fiction series Babylon 5 and Sid the Snitch on the 1980s series Hill Street Blues and its short-lived spinoff Beverly Hills Buntz.-Career:Among Jurasik's guest appearances are an entomologist in...
as Crom, an accounting program.
Origins
The inspiration for Tron occurred in 1976 when Steven Lisberger, then an animator of drawings with his own studio, looked at a sample reel from a computer firm called MAGIMathematical Applications Group, Inc.
Mathematical Applications Group, Inc. was an early computer technology company founded in 1966 by Dr. Philip Mittelman, it was located in Elmsford, New York. It was one of four companies hired to create the CGI animation for the film Tron...
and saw Pong
Pong
Pong is one of the earliest arcade video games, and is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. While other arcade video games such as Computer Space came before it, Pong was one of the first video games to reach mainstream popularity...
for the first time. He was immediately fascinated by video games and wanted to do a film incorporating them. According to Lisberger, "I realized that there were these techniques that would be very suitable for bringing video games and computer visuals to the screen. And that was the moment that the whole concept flashed across my mind". "Everybody was doing backlit animation in the 70s, you know. It was that disco look. And we thought, what if we had this character that was a neon line, and that was our Tron warrior – Tron for electronic. And what happened was, I saw Pong, and I said, well, that's the arena for him. And at the same time I was interested in the early phases of computer generated animation, which I got into at MIT in Boston, and when I got into that I met a bunch of programmers who were into all that. And they really inspired me, by how much they believed in this new realm." He was frustrated by the clique-like nature of computers and video games and wanted to create a film that would open this world up to everyone. Lisberger and his business partner Donald Kushner
Donald Kushner
Donald Kushner is an American producer who has worked with animation, live-action and theater productions.He attended high school in Providence, received an undergraduate degree from Syracuse University in 1971 and a Boston University law degree in 1973...
moved to the West Coast in 1977 and set up an animation studio to develop Tron. They borrowed against the anticipated profits of their 90-minute animated television special Animalympics
Animalympics
Animalympics is a 1980 animated film produced by Lisberger Studios and released by Warner Bros.. Originally commissioned by the NBC network as two separate specials, it spoofs the Summer and Winter Olympic Games, and features the voices of Billy Crystal, Gilda Radner, Harry Shearer and Michael...
to develop storyboards for Tron with the notion of making an animated film.
The film was then conceived to be predominantly an animated film with live-action sequences acting as book ends. The rest would involve a combination of computer generated visuals and back-lit animation. Lisberger planned to finance the movie independently by approaching several computer companies but had little success. However, one company, Information International, Inc., was receptive. He met with Richard Taylor, a representative, and they began talking about using live-action photography with back-lit animation in such a way that it could be integrated with computer graphics. At this point, Lisberger already had a script written and the film entirely storyboard
Storyboard
Storyboards are graphic organizers in the form of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence....
ed with some computer animation tests completed. He had spent approximately $300,000 developing Tron and had also secured $4–5 million in private backing before reaching a standstill. Lisberger and Kushner took their storyboards and samples of computer-generated films to Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
, MGM, and Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
– all of which turned them down.
In 1980, they decided to take the idea to Disney, which was interested in producing more daring productions at the time. However, Disney executives were uncertain about giving $10–12 million to a first-time producer and director using techniques which, in most cases, had never been attempted. The studio agreed to finance a test reel which involved a flying disc champion throwing a rough prototype of the discs used in the film. It was a chance to mix live-action footage with back-lit animation and computer generated visuals. It impressed the executives at Disney and they agreed to back the film. The script was subsequently re-written and re-storyboarded with the studio's input. At the time, Disney rarely hired outsiders to make films for them and Kushner found that he and his group were given a less than warm welcome because "we tackled the nerve center – the animation department. They saw us as the germ from outside. We tried to enlist several Disney animators but none came. Disney is a closed group...."
Pre-production
Because of the many special effects, Walt Disney PicturesWalt Disney Pictures
Walt Disney Pictures is an American film studio owned by The Walt Disney Company. Walt Disney Pictures and Television, a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Studios and the main production company for live-action feature films within the Walt Disney Motion Pictures Group, based at the Walt Disney...
decided in 1981 to film Tron completely in 65-mm Super Panavision (except for the computer-generated layers, which were shot in Vistavison and some scenes in the "real" world which were filmed in anamorphic 35mm and "blown up" to 65mm). Three designers were brought in to create the look of the computer world. Renowned French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
comic book artist Jean Giraud
Jean Giraud
Jean Henri Gaston Giraud is a French comics artist. Giraud has earned worldwide fame, not only under his own name but also under the pseudonym Moebius, and to a lesser extent Gir, the latter appearing mostly in the form of a boxed signature at the bottom of the artist's paintings, for instance the...
(aka Moebius) was the main set and costume designer for the movie. Most of the vehicle designs (including Sark's aircraft carrier, the light cycles, the tank, and the solar sailer) were created by industrial designer Syd Mead
Syd Mead
Sydney Jay Mead, commonly Syd Mead, is a "visual futurist" and concept artist. He is best known for his designs for science-fiction films such as Blade Runner, Aliens and Tron...
, of Blade Runner
Blade Runner
Blade Runner is a 1982 American science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, and Sean Young. The screenplay, written by Hampton Fancher and David Peoples, is loosely based on the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K...
fame. Peter Lloyd
Peter Lloyd (illustrator)
Peter Lloyd is a freelance illustrator specializing in advertising and digital artwork. Lloyd was born in England in 1944, but moved to the United States in 1959, where he was the youngest student to graduate from the Art Center College of Design with a master's degree.Lloyd provided art to...
, a high-tech commercial artist, designed the environments. Nevertheless, these jobs often overlapped, leaving Giraud working on the solar sailer and Mead designing terrain, sets and the film's logo. The original 'Program' character design was inspired by Lisberger Studios' logo
Logo
A logo is a graphic mark or emblem commonly used by commercial enterprises, organizations and even individuals to aid and promote instant public recognition...
of a glowing body-builder hurling two disc
Disc
- Data storage :* Disk storage, a general category of data storage mechanisms** Magnetic disk*** Floppy disk, a magnetic data storage device using a flexible disc*** Hard disk drive, a non-volatile magnetic data storage device...
s.
To create the computer animation sequences of Tron, Disney turned to the four leading computer graphics firms of the day: Information International Inc. of Culver City, California
Culver City, California
Culver City is a city in western Los Angeles County, California. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 38,883, up from 38,816 at the 2000 census. It is mostly surrounded by the city of Los Angeles, but also shares a border with unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County. Culver...
, who owned the Super Foonly F-1 (the fastest PDP-10
PDP-10
The PDP-10 was a mainframe computer family manufactured by Digital Equipment Corporation from the late 1960s on; the name stands for "Programmed Data Processor model 10". The first model was delivered in 1966...
ever made and the only one of its kind); MAGI of Elmsford, New York
Elmsford, New York
Elmsford is a village in Westchester County, New York, United States. Roughly one mile square, the village is fully contained within the borders of the town of Greenburgh...
; Robert Abel and Associates
Robert Abel and Associates
Robert Abel and Associates was a pioneering production company specializing in TV commercials made with computer graphics. Robert Abel's company, RA&A was especially known for their art direction and won many Clio Awards....
of California; and Digital Effects
Digital Effects
Digital Effects Inc. was an early and innovative computer animation studio at 321 West 44th street in New York City. It was the first computer graphics house in New York City when it opened in 1978, and operated until 1986. It was founded by Judson Rosebush, Jeff Kleiser, Don Leich, David Cox,...
of New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. Bill Kovacs
Bill Kovacs
Bill Kovacs was a pioneer of commercial computer animation technology.-Early career:Kovacs received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Carnegie Mellon University in 1971. He worked for Skidmore, Owings and Merrill while getting a Masters of Environmental Design from Yale University...
worked on this movie while working for Robert Abel before going on to found Wavefront Technologies
Wavefront Technologies
Wavefront Technologies was a computer graphics company that developed and sold animation software used in Hollywood motion pictures and other industries. It was founded in 1984, in Santa Barbara, California, by Bill Kovacs, Larry Barels, Mark Sylvester...
. The work was not a collaboration, resulting in very different styles used by the firms.
Tron was one of the first movies to make extensive use of any form of computer animation
Computer animation
Computer animation is the process used for generating animated images by using computer graphics. The more general term computer generated imagery encompasses both static scenes and dynamic images, while computer animation only refers to moving images....
, and is celebrated as a milestone in the industry; but only fifteen to twenty minutes of such animation were used, mostly scenes that show digital "terrain" or patterns or include vehicles such as light-cycles, tanks and ships. Because the technology to combine computer animation and live action did not exist at the time, these sequences were interspersed with the filmed characters. The computer used had only 2MB of memory, with a disc that had no more than 330MB of storage. This put a limit on detail of background; and at a certain distance, they had a procedure of mixing in black to fade things out, a process called "depth cueing". The movie's Computer Effects Supervisor Richard Taylor told them "When in doubt, black it out!", which became their motto.
Most of the scenes, backgrounds, and visual effects in the film were created using more traditional techniques and a unique process known as "backlit animation". In this process, live-action scenes inside the computer world were filmed in black-and-white
Black-and-white
Black-and-white, often abbreviated B/W or B&W, is a term referring to a number of monochrome forms in visual arts.Black-and-white as a description is also something of a misnomer, for in addition to black and white, most of these media included varying shades of gray...
on an entirely black set, printed on large format
Large format
Large format refers to any imaging format of 4×5 inches or larger. Large format is larger than "medium format", the 6×6 cm or 6×9 cm size of Hasselblad, Rollei, Kowa, Pentax etc cameras , and much larger than the 24×36 mm frame of 35 mm format.The main advantage...
Kodalith high-contrast film, then colored with photographic and rotoscopic techniques to give them a "technological" appearance. With multiple layers of high-contrast, large format positives and negatives, this process required truckloads of sheet film
Sheet film
Sheet film is large format and medium format photographic film supplied on individual sheets of acetate or polyester film base rather than rolls. Sheet film was initially supplied as an alternative to glass plates...
and a workload even greater than that of a conventional cel-animated feature. The Kodalith was specially produced as large sheets by Kodak for the film and came in numbered boxes so that each batch of the film could be used in order of manufacture for a consistent image; but this was not understood by the filmmakers, and as a result glowing outlines and circuit traces occasionally flicker as the film speed varied between batches. After the reason was discovered, this was no longer a problem as the batches were used in order and "zinger" sounds were used during the flickering parts to represent the computer world malfunctioning as Lisberger described it. Lisberger later had these flickers and sounds digitally corrected for the 2011 DVD and Blu-ray release as they were not included in his original vision of the film. Due to its difficulty and cost, this process was not repeated for another feature film.
Sound design and creation for the film was assigned to Frank Serafine, who was responsible for the sound design on Star Trek: The Motion Picture in 1979. Tron was a 1983 Academy Awards
55th Academy Awards
The 55th Academy Awards were presented April 11, 1983 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles. The ceremonies were presided over by Liza Minnelli, Dudley Moore, Richard Pryor, and Walter Matthau.Louis Gossett, Jr...
nominee for Best Sound.
At one point in the film a small entity called "Bit" advises Flynn with only the words "yes" and "no" created by a Votrax
Votrax
Votrax International, Inc. , or just Votrax, was a speech synthesis company located in the Detroit, Michigan area from 1971 to about 1996 It began as a division of Federal Screw Works from 1971 to 1973...
speech synthesizer.
More than 500 people were involved in the post-production work, including 200 inker and hand-painters in Taiwan's Cuckoo's Nest Studio
Cuckoo's Nest Studio
Cuckoo's Nest Studio is an animation studio based in Taiwan. The company is famous for their work on the Hanna-Barbera series, movies and specials of the 1980s, as well as overseas production for Nelvana's Care Bears franchise, Film Roman's Garfield and friends, DiC Entertainment's Inspector...
(unusual for an English-language production, in the end credits the personnel are listed with their names written in Chinese characters).
This film features parts of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory , just outside Livermore, California, is a Federally Funded Research and Development Center founded by the University of California in 1952...
; the multi-story ENCOM laser bay was the target area for the SHIVA
Shiva laser
The Shiva laser was a powerful 20-beam infrared neodymium glass laser built at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in 1977 for the study of inertial confinement fusion and long-scale-length laser-plasma interactions. The device was named after the multi-armed form of the Hindu god Shiva, due...
solid-state multi-beamed laser. Also, the stairway that Alan, Lora, and Flynn use to reach Alan's office is the stairway in Building 451 near the entrance to the main machine room. The cubicle scenes were shot in another room of the lab. Tron is the only movie to have scenes filmed inside this lab.
The original script called for "good" programs to be colored yellow and "evil" programs (those loyal to Sark and the MCP) to be colored blue. Partway into production, this coloring scheme was changed to blue for good and red for evil, but some scenes were produced using the original coloring scheme: Clu, who drives a tank, has yellow circuit lines, and all of Sark's tank commanders are blue (but appear green in some presentations). Also, the light-cycle sequence shows the heroes driving yellow (Flynn), orange (Tron) and red (Ram) cycles, while Sark's troops drive blue cycles; similarly, Clu's tank is red, while tanks driven by crews loyal to Sark are blue.
Budgeting the production was difficult by reason of breaking new ground in response to additional challenges, including an impending Directors Guild of America
Directors Guild of America
Directors Guild of America is an entertainment labor union which represents the interests of film and television directors in the United States motion picture industry...
strike and a fixed release date. Disney predicted at least $400 million in domestic sales of merchandise, including an arcade game by Bally Midway and three Mattel
Mattel
Mattel, Inc. is the world's largest toy company based on revenue. The products it produces include Fisher Price, Barbie dolls, Hot Wheels and Matchbox toys, Masters of the Universe, American Girl dolls, board games, and, in the early 1980s, video game consoles. The company's name is derived from...
Intellivision
Intellivision
The Intellivision is a video game console released by Mattel in 1979. Development of the console began in 1978, less than a year after the introduction of its main competitor, the Atari 2600. The word intellivision is a portmanteau of "intelligent television"...
home video games.
The producers also added Easter eggs
Easter egg (media)
Image:Carl Oswald Rostosky - Zwei Kaninchen und ein Igel 1861.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Example of Easter egg hidden within imagerect 467 383 539 434 desc none...
: during the scene where Tron and Ram escape from the Light Cycle arena into the system, Pac-Man
Pac-Man
is an arcade game developed by Namco and licensed for distribution in the United States by Midway, first released in Japan on May 22, 1980. Immensely popular from its original release to the present day, Pac-Man is considered one of the classics of the medium, virtually synonymous with video games,...
can be seen behind Sark; whereas a "Hidden Mickey
Hidden Mickey
A Hidden Mickey is a representation of Mickey Mouse that has been inserted subtly into the design of a ride, attraction, or other location in a Disney theme park or elsewhere on Disney properties...
" outline can be seen below the solar sailer during the protagonists' journey.
Music
The soundtrack for Tron was written by pioneer electronic musician Wendy CarlosWendy Carlos
Wendy Carlos is an American composer and electronic musician. Carlos first came to notice in the late 1960s with recordings made on the Moog synthesizer, then a relatively new and unknown instrument; most notable were LPs of synthesized Bach and the soundtrack for Stanley Kubrick's film A...
, who is best known for her album Switched-On Bach
Switched-On Bach
-Details:The album consists of pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach, performed on a Moog synthesizer, a modular synthesizer system, one of which can be seen at the back of the room on the album cover. "Switched-On Bach," or "S-OB" as Carlos referred to it, was recorded on a custom-built 8 track recorder...
and for the soundtracks to many films, including A Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange (film)
A Clockwork Orange is a 1971 film adaptation of Anthony Burgess's 1962 novel of the same name. It was written, directed and produced by Stanley Kubrick...
and The Shining
The Shining (film)
The Shining is a 1980 psychological horror film produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick, co-written with novelist Diane Johnson, and starring Jack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, and Danny Lloyd. The film is based on the novel of the same name by Stephen King. A writer, Jack Torrance, takes a job as an...
. The music, which was the first collaboration between Carlos and her partner Annemarie Franklin, featured a mix of an analog Moog synthesizer
Moog synthesizer
Moog synthesizer may refer to any number of analog synthesizers designed by Dr. Robert Moog or manufactured by Moog Music, and is commonly used as a generic term for older-generation analog music synthesizers. The Moog company pioneered the commercial manufacture of modular voltage-controlled...
and Crumar
Crumar
Crumar is an Italian company which manufactured synthesizers and keyboards in the 60's, 70s and 80s. Its name is taken from that of its founder, Mario Crucianelli...
's GDS digital synthesizer (complex additive
Additive synthesis
Additive synthesis is a technique of sound synthesis that creates musical timbre by explicitly adding sinusoidal overtones together.The timbre of an instrument is composed of multiple harmonic or inharmonic partials , of different frequencies and amplitudes, that change over time...
and phase modulation synthesis), along with non-electronic pieces performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra
London Philharmonic Orchestra
The London Philharmonic Orchestra , based in London, is one of the major orchestras of the United Kingdom, and is based in the Royal Festival Hall. In addition, the LPO is the main resident orchestra of the Glyndebourne Festival Opera...
(hired at the insistence of Disney, which was concerned that Carlos might not be able to complete her score on time). Two additional musical tracks were provided by the band Journey
Journey (band)
Journey is an American rock band formed in 1973 in San Francisco by former members of Santana. The band has gone through several phases; its strongest commercial success occurred between the 1978 and 1987, after which it temporarily disbanded...
after British band Supertramp
Supertramp
Supertramp are a British rock band formed in 1969 under the name Daddy before renaming to Supertramp in early 1970. Though their music was initially categorised as progressive rock, they have since incorporated a combination of traditional rock and art rock into their music...
pulled out of the project.
Box office
Tron was released on July 9, 1982, in 1,091 theaters grossing USD $4 million on its opening weekend. It went on to make $33 million in North America, moderately successful considering its $17-million budget.Critical reception
Critical reviews were mostly positive; Roger EbertRoger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
of the Chicago Sun-Times
Chicago Sun-Times
The Chicago Sun-Times is an American daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois. It is the flagship paper of the Sun-Times Media Group.-History:The Chicago Sun-Times is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the city...
gave the film four out of four stars and described the film as "a dazzling movie from Walt Disney in which computers have been used to make themselves romantic and glamorous. Here's a technological sound-and-light show that is sensational and brainy, stylish, and fun". However, near the end of his review, he noted (in a positive tone), "This is an almost wholly technological movie. Although it's populated by actors who are engaging (Bridges, Cindy Morgan) or sinister (Warner), it is not really a movie about human nature. Like [the last two Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
films], but much more so, this movie is a machine to dazzle and delight us". Ebert was so convinced that this film had not been given its due credit by both critics and audiences that he decided to close his first annual Overlooked Film Festival with a showing of Tron. Perhaps unsurprisingly, InfoWorld's Deborah Wise was impressed, writing that "it is hard to believe the characters acted out the scenes on a darkened soundstage... We see characters throwing illuminated Frisbee
Frisbee
A flying disc is a disc-shaped glider that is generally plastic and roughly in diameter, with a lip. The shape of the disc, an airfoil in cross-section, allows it to fly by generating lift as it moves through the air while rotating....
s, driving 'lightcycles' on a video-game grid, playing a dangerous version of jai alai
Jai alai
Jai alai is a sport involving a ball bounced off a walled space. It is a variety of Basque Pelota. The term, coined by Serafin Baroja in 1875, is also often loosely applied to the fronton where the sport is played...
and zapping numerous fluorescent tanks in arcade-game-type mazes. It's exciting, it's fun, and it's just what video-game fans and anyone with a spirit of adventure will love—despite plot weaknesses."
On the other hand, Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
disliked the film and said in its review, "Tron is loaded with visual delights but falls way short of the mark in story and viewer involvement. Screenwriter-director Steven Lisberger has adequately marshalled a huge force of technicians to deliver the dazzle, but even kids (and specifically computer game geeks) will have a difficult time getting hooked on the situations". In her review for The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, Janet Maslin
Janet Maslin
Janet Maslin is an American journalist, best known as a film and literary critic for The New York Times. She served as the Times film critic from 1977–1999.- Biography :...
criticized the film's visual effects: "They're loud, bright and empty, and they're all this movie has to offer". The Washington Posts Gary Arnold wrote, "Fascinating as they are as discrete sequences, the computer-animated episodes don't build dramatically. They remain a miscellaneous form of abstract spectacle". In his review for the Globe and Mail, Jay Scott
Jay Scott
Jay Scott was the pen name of Jeffrey Scott Beaven , a Canadian film critic.Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, Scott fled to Canada in 1969 as a draft dodger. He settled in Calgary, and began writing film reviews for the Calgary Albertan a few years later...
wrote, "It's got momentum and it's got marvels, but it's without heart; it's a visionary technological achievement without vision".
In the year it was released, the Motion Picture Academy refused to nominate Tron for a special-effects award because, according to director Steven Lisberger, "The Academy thought we cheated by using computers". The film did, however, earn Oscar nominations in the categories of Best Costume Design and Best Sound (Michael Minkler
Michael Minkler
Michael Minkler is a Motion Picture Sound Re-Recording Mixer. His Oscars are for the work done on Dreamgirls, Chicago and Black Hawk Down, but Minkler has a varied career that includes films like Inglourious Basterds, JFK and Star Wars, as well television programs like The Pacific and John Adams...
, Bob Minkler
Bob Minkler
Bob Minkler is an American sound engineer. He won an Academy Award for Best Sound and was nominated for another in the same category. He worked on over 50 films between 1957 and 1992.-Selected filmography:Won* Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope...
, Lee Minkler
Lee Minkler
Lee Minkler is an American sound engineer. He was nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Sound for the film Tron.-External links:...
and James LaRue
James LaRue (sound engineer)
James LaRue is an American sound engineer. He was nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Sound for the film Tron.-External links:...
). In 1997, Ken Perlin
Ken Perlin
Ken Perlin is a professor in the Department of Computer Science at New York University, founding director of the Media Research Lab at NYU, and the Director of the Games for Learning Institute. His research interests include graphics, animation, multimedia, and science education...
of the Mathematical Applications Group, Inc.
Mathematical Applications Group, Inc.
Mathematical Applications Group, Inc. was an early computer technology company founded in 1966 by Dr. Philip Mittelman, it was located in Elmsford, New York. It was one of four companies hired to create the CGI animation for the film Tron...
won an Academy Award for Technical Achievement
Academy Award for Technical Achievement
The Technical Achievement Award is a kind of Scientific and Technical Award given by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to those whose particular technical accomplishments have contributed to the progress of the motion picture industry and who are given a certificate, which describes...
for his invention of Perlin noise
Perlin noise
Perlin noise is a computer-generated visual effect developed by Ken Perlin, who won an Academy Award for its use in the motion picture Tron...
for Tron.
In 2008, Tron was nominated for AFI's Top 10 Science Fiction Films list.
Books
A novelization of Tron was released in 1982, written by American science fiction novelist Brian DaleyBrian Daley
Brian Daley was an American science fiction novelist. He also adapted for radio the Star Wars radio dramas and wrote all of its episodes.-Biography:...
. It included eight pages of color photographs from the movie. Also that year, Disney Senior Staff Publicist Michael Bonifer authored a book entitled The Art of Tron which covered aspects of the pre-production and post-production aspects of Tron.
Cultural impact
The film, considered groundbreaking, has inspired several individuals in numerous ways. John LasseterJohn Lasseter
John Alan Lasseter is an American animator, director and the chief creative officer at Pixar and Walt Disney Animation Studios. He is also currently the Principal Creative Advisor for Walt Disney Imagineering....
, head of Pixar
Pixar
Pixar Animation Studios, pronounced , is an American computer animation film studio based in Emeryville, California. The studio has earned 26 Academy Awards, seven Golden Globes, and three Grammy Awards, among many other awards and acknowledgments. Its films have made over $6.3 billion worldwide...
and Disney's animation group, described how the film helped him see the potential of computer-generated imagery in the production of animated films stating "without Tron there would be no Toy Story". The two members of the French house
House music
House music is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in Chicago, Illinois, United States in the early 1980s. It was initially popularized in mid-1980s discothèques catering to the African-American, Latino American, and gay communities; first in Chicago circa 1984, then in other...
group Daft Punk
Daft Punk
Daft Punk are an electronic music duo consisting of French musicians Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter . Daft Punk reached significant popularity in the late 1990s house movement in France and met with continued success in the years following, combining elements of house with synthpop...
, who scores the sequel, have held a joint, life-long fascination with the film. Tron developed into a cult film
Cult film
A cult film, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a highly devoted but specific group of fans. Often, cult movies have failed to achieve fame outside the small fanbases; however, there have been exceptions that have managed to gain fame among mainstream audiences...
and was ranked as 13th in a 2010 list of the top 20 cult films published by The Boston Globe.
Sequel
On January 12, 2005, Disney announced it had hired screenwriters Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal to write a sequel to Tron. In 2008, director Joseph KosinskiJoseph Kosinski
Joseph Kosinski is an American television commercial and feature film director best known for his computer graphics and computer generated imagery work. He made his big-screen directorial debut with the Disney Digital 3-D science fiction film Tron: Legacy, the sequel to the 1982 film Tron...
negotiated to develop and direct "TR2N", described as "the next chapter" of the 1982 film and based on a preliminary teaser trailer shown at that year's San Diego Comic-Con, with Lisberger co-producing. Filming began in Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
, British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...
in April 2009. During the 2009 Comic-Con, the title of the sequel was revealed to be changed to Tron: Legacy. The second trailer (also with the "Tron: Legacy" logo) was released in 3D with Alice In Wonderland
Alice in Wonderland (2010 film)
Alice in Wonderland is a 2010 American computer-animated/live action fantasy adventure film directed by Tim Burton, written by Linda Woolverton, and released by Walt Disney Pictures...
. A third trailer premiered at Comic-Con 2010 on July 22. At Disney's D23 Expo September 10–13, 2009 they also debuted teaser trailers for Tron: Legacy as well as having light cycle and other props from the movie there. The film was released on December 17, 2010.
Home media
Tron was first released on DVDDVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
in 2000 with no special features. In 2002, the film received a 20th Anniversary Collector's Edition re-release in a 2-Disc DVD set.
To tie in with Trons sequel, Tron: Legacy, the movie was re-released by Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment on Special Edition DVD and for the first time on Blu-ray Combo on April 5, 2011, with the subtitle "Original Classic" to distinguish it from its sequel. Tron was also featured in a 5-Disc Blu-ray Combo with the 3D copy of Tron: Legacy. The film was re-released on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK on June 27, 2011.
See also
- Tron (franchise)Tron (franchise)The Tron franchise began in 1982 with the Walt Disney Pictures film Tron. It was followed by various film tie-ins, a comic series and the 2010 sequel Tron: Legacy...
- TRON commandTRON commandTRON is a debugging command in the BASIC programming language. It is an abbreviation of TRace ON. It is used primarily for debugging line-numbered BASIC GOTO and GOSUB statements. In text-mode environments such as the TRS-80 or DOS, it would print the current line number which was being executed,...
in BASIC, a probable inspiration for the film title - Simulated realitySimulated realitySimulated reality is the proposition that reality could be simulated—perhaps by computer simulation—to a degree indistinguishable from "true" reality. It could contain conscious minds which may or may not be fully aware that they are living inside a simulation....
- AutomanAutomanAutoman is an American science fiction superhero television series produced by Glen A. Larson. It aired for only 12 episodes on ABC between 1983 and 1984.-Synopsis:...
, a 1983 TV series inspired by Tron.
External links
- Article about the CGI in Tron
- Tron Wiki – A wiki devoted to Tron
- Dorkosphere – An extensive review of Tron