SomeDreamsShouldBeThrownBack

Just got done watching this movie, and came straight here to suggest it. This thread must be bumped because this movie is perfect for HDTGM -- a well-known star, decent enough acting, and a barely coherent time travel plot. And the editing choices are nuts. The first 5 minutes sets up a fast-paced sci-fi action movie, and then somehow the next 40(?) minutes goes into the life story of apparently a totally different character. By the time it all ties together, you're already ahead of the big reveal, and all you can see are the problems. This movie can literally go fuck itself.

The show clearly has cameras in there, because right after he's killed we cut to the audience watching his burning body. But I'm sure they knew not to broadcast the part where he tells everyone who the dead bodies were. It's all perfectly crafted. It wouldn't matter anyway, because all the rebels show in their pirate broadcast are close ups of some mummies that they tell the home audience are whoever, Price and Haddad.

That was a pretty standard line on game shows back then -- winners would get "the home version" of Jeopardy, Family Feud, etc. The joke being, what the hell would the home version of this game even be? The movie is definitely in on that joke. So many omissions! This is one of those movies with that amazing mix of "future-tech" where the filmmakers tried to be forward-thinking about what might exist in 2019, but not very consistently. So in the 32-year distant future, we have exploding head collars, keypad doors, and home automation where Maria Conchito Alonzo can just say "coffee," but the coffee is still brewed in a shitty old Mr. Coffee, and she still has an answering machine. And in the legal contract Arnie signs before jamming the pen in the lawyer's back (I can't believe no one mentioned that poor guy!) he is signing away his rights to "video tapes, bubble chips, and all other forms of recordings known or unknown." They went straight from video tapes to bubble chips? And how the fuck is a bubble chip even a recording medium? But it is funny. Maria Conchito Alonzo's name is way too long. And if you say her initials, you get M.C. A. How did Jason miss that one? To continue: M.C. A took over the apartment from Arnold's brother, but she never changed the door code? Especially with that shitty password 4 4 5 5 6 6, which I only know because there is this deliberate insert shot of Arnold slowly keying it in. I guess it was important for us to see that? I'd also like to know more about the WWF connections to this movie. Everybody is a wrestler. And if you go to Dynamo's IMDB page, it turns out that dude really was both an opera singer AND a wrestler! And sadly, he died in 1987, the same year this movie came out. It's too bad he never got to reap the benefits of his screen work as a flamboyant murdered and would-be rapist. Which brings me to this simple fact: Electricity does not work that way. I'm no scientist, but unless you're Palpatine, you can't just run around shooting lightning bolts at people. The electricity would just go straight into the earth, or whatever the closest grounded surface is. I remember seeing this movie as a kid and this part really bothered a friend of mine. I didn't care back then, but on rewatch it looks totally ridiculous. Almost as ridiculous as the idea that the same people who are into the bloodsport of The Running Man would be into opera. Finally -- I had to rewind the beginning a few times to confirm that Arnold really says the following line to the resistance when they're taking off his explosive collar: "I've seen too much? All I've seen is a bunch of low foreheads who think they can change the world with dreams and talk." At first I thought I had the cleaned-up TV version, though I couldn't figure out what curse word even sounds like "low foreheads." But then after all the cursing later, I realized no, that's actually the line. Is "low foreheads" a really bad insult in Austria? Maybe the only thing worse than being called a "low forehead" is being called a "plain zero."

Awesome episode. On a side note, I saw this turd in the theater years ago, and it was only halfway through rewatching it for this episode that I realized "Holy crap, Frank Lapides is the Lawnmower Man!!!" Not exactly an omission, but one detail I'd have loved to hear you guys talk about was the way the VR "learning interface" thing worked, when Larry Brosnan hooked up Jobe at the institute. I could maybe get on board with the idea that Jobe has to go into VR to experience this super-learning-whatever machine, and that somehow Kabbalistic symbols and other arcane "knowledge-stuff" flying at his face is entering his brain and making him smarter. Suspension of disbelief, sure. But here's the thing -- why did Larry Brosnan have to be in VR too? And in his VR world, he has this image in front of him of Jobe's brain, and he uses his VR hand to grab -- what, some kind of VR stuff? -- and he just starts chucking it at Jobe's CGI brain, like he's throwing Pokeballs or something. Setting aside the total nonsense that is, why does he have to be floating around in VR to do that? Couldn't he have just been at one of the regular computer terminals in the room?

I registered an account days ago, and only got approved moments ago, to say exactly this! For fucks sake! Sure, maybe you have demonstrated to me that you can read my mind, and you've convinced me to go against my blue boy boss of however many years to take you on a drive through a blizzard to god knows where. That does NOT mean I am going to instantly buy into you carrying on a conversation on a fucking gun as if it's a fucking telephone. And on top of that, Thomas Jane's delivery during the gunphone conversation does not sound like someone on a phone call. He sounds exactly like someone pretending to be a crazy person, talking exaggeratedly on a pretend phone. "Hello?!?! JONESY?!?! Jesus Christ, I KNEW it was you!" Well, yeah, you knew it was him! Because who the fuck else would be calling you on your pretend gun phone? Alien telemarketers? And Sizemore is completely OK with this, he just needs his gun back. And doesn't blink an eye when Jane starts babbling some crap about Duddits and Mr. Grey, all of which is completely new information to Sizemore. So goddamn ridiculous, and not in a good way.