USA Today recently posted an article about television and movies, and how completely ridiculous some of the “Tech problem solving” is.
The author, Kim Komando, mentioned current movies, as well as movies from way back… like “2001, A space Odyssey”, “War Games” (a personal favorite), “The Matrix”, “Swordfish”, “Independence day”(Another favorite) , and Terminator (Hey! Don’t mess with Arnold!) among many others. Here is a link to the article if you’d like to read it. It’s actually pretty good.
Everything she said is (probably) absolutely true. (I don’t know… I’m not a techie) But when I finished this article, I stopped and giggled. I was thinking. “So what if none of it makes sense. Who cares? It’s FUN!”
Now, really… honestly, do you watch a classic Schwarzenegger movie for the reality of the technical scenes? Of course not! You watch them because it is fun to watch him blow things up! “Yay Arnold! Go get ‘em!”
Now true, there are probably people who look at things like the security cameras that she mentions in this article and think this is actually possible to zoom in and clean up the picture— but honestly, is that hurting anybody? No. If anything, it will make them think twice before robbing a store.
I don’t care if Hugh Jackman can’t really hack his way into a computer system in three minutes while held at gunpoint. That is NOT THE POINT. The point is Drama. Action. Fun. It’s called suspended reality.
I don’t know about you, but I get enough of the real world every day just driving to work. If I read a book, or watch a movie, I’m not looking for realism. I want to be entertained.
Excuse me. I need to go watch Die Hard, now. OOoooooooo. How about an Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Marathon topped off by a little Bourne Identity! Then maybe I’ll pop on the First Transformers movie and then save the world with Independence Day. Oh yeah, for dessert, the all-time best movie ever made… True Lies!
Yay! Bring on the ridiculous technology plots and let’s watch some things explode!
Jennifer M Eaton 