Tron: Legacy

City Paper Grade: B-

by Drew Lazor

[ City Paper Grade B- ]

On paper, there are few things more dated than 1982's Tron, the special-FX blockbuster that threw wisecracking hacker Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) into a digital world ruled by polygonal airships and dueling Day-Glo jumpsuit warriors armed with hypercolor Frisbees. But it's maintained its luster, fervent fanbase aside, for one reason: Personal technology is so soulless, we're all starved for any conceit involving glimmers of humanity fastened behind the circuitry.

Picking up years after Flynn's abrupt disappearance, Tron: Legacy focuses on his sullen son Sam (Garrett Hedlund), loner adrenaline junkie/majority shareholder of his Microsoft-like tech giant. Sam repeatedly rejects requests from his sole ally, Alan (returnee Bruce Boxleitner), to wrest control of the company from the board's greedy paws (they're anti-open source — not cool, dude!). Then, just like pops, Sam gets zapped by a teleportation laser and finds himself on "The Grid," which, with its sprawling 3-D environments and Daft Punk-backed mêlées, is a touch more Matrix sexy than its predecessor's graph-paper landscape.

Flynn, it turns out, has been trapped inside the damn computer this entire time, betrayed by the CLU program he wrote to create a digital utopia. (Thanks to painstaking CGI, CLU is portrayed as wrinkle-free Jeff Bridges '82, with few cheese-bot shortcuts.) Exiled after discovering a strain of beautifully flawed programs that hold untold power for mankind ("Bio-digital jazz, man!"), Flynn's suspended in iLimbo, meditating in garb from the Steven Seagal Kimono Collection with platonic house guest Quorra (Olivia Wilde). Sam, hellbent on busting out, relies on his unpredictable "User" advantages to combat CLU and his battery-powered goons.

The visual power of Tron: Legacy is undeniable — director Joseph Kosinski's multi-dimensional treatment of the franchise's iconic disc battles and light-cycle races will draw squeals on infinite loop — but remember, this is a Disney flick, one with muddled storytelling and puddle-deep characters. Bridges' vintage Flynn is as satisfying as a nostalgic Atari session, but Hedlund and Wilde are mostly concerned with being pretty, and Michael Sheen's hammy turn as a lascivious club owner is just a half-assed impression of the emcee from Cabaret.