Character: Ben Richards
Year: 1987
There's a lot of predictions made about the future in Schwarzenegger's movies.
A nuclear wasteland run by machines in the year 2029 was the basis of The Terminator. The Judgement Day that occurred on August 29, 1997 in that movie's sequel and even the amended date of July 24, 2004 in the Rise of the Machines. Throw in the colonization of Mars by 2084 in Total Recall and human cloning by 2015 in The 6th Day, and Arnold is practically the Nostradamus of 80's action heroes.
That said, of all those aforementioned, science fiction, visions of the future, who would have thought that The Running Man would end up being the most likely to actually happen in real life. No, not a United-States-turned-police-state, run by a single dictatorship under martial law, but rather the idea of a reality television show where prisoners are hunted for sport and entertainment. I mean, sure, we haven't gotten that extreme yet, but back in 1987 when the movie came out, there wasn't even such a thing as reality television. So who knows, by the time we get to 2019 (the films alleged date) we could be seeing such a thing.
Ok, maybe not. But the reality television prediction was pretty spot-on, you have to admit.
Anyways, I'm not sure what more needs to be said. The Running Man was one of the first Arnold movies that I ever saw, and it's always remained one of my favourites. Besides, Richard Dawson, as a villainous game show host? The only way that could have been better is if they got Bob Barker.
Ok, it has been suggested to me that I look like a real idiot for having stated that The Running Man takes place in 2019, when the trailer opens with the voice over telling us that it was in fact 2017. So I have come to the comments section to defend my decision.
ReplyDeleteYes, the trailer, and indeed, even the movie itself opens with the line 'In the year 2017...' BUT, only the first five minutes of the movie actually take place in 2017. Once Arnold is convicted (spoiler alert) of a crime he didn't commit, the screen flashes a big '18 Months Later' before we get into the meat of the story. And, while I don't have a calculator handy, my gut instinct is telling me that 18 months after 2017 would in fact be... (drum roll) yes, that's right: 2019.
Both Wikipedia and the IMDB both refer the movie being set in 2019, and more importantly the movie poster itself (go ahead, click on it at the top of this entry...) as well as on VHS, DVD and especially the new Blu-Ray jacket covers, all feature 2019 quite prominently.
So, perhaps it is not I that should be made fun of, but rather the fools that wrote and recorded the voice over for the trailer. Or the even bigger fool that called me out for my alleged 'mistake'.
Thank you, and good day.