enoch7 It's a fun little movie. Yeah, it's a dated product of it's time. For me that's a charm. The 'hacking' is dumb; but if you let go of that stuff it is an enjoyable movie.

mr-mcphee Soundtrack: 9 Pulsating, funky mix of post-punk electronica. Just killer.Costumes: 9 This isn't the way people actually dressed in the 90's, especially hackers, but who cares, the costumes just work.Characters: 8 Great characters with their own personalities, a lot of energy in the main characters, and even though some characters play on old tropes (stuffy FBI agent, cartoonishly evil villain), at their worst, they still don't feel too clichéd.Plot: 7 This movie manages to mix a few interesting plots into each other somewhat naturally. The main plot is a bit convoluted, and probably hard to understand to the average person, but actually makes sense, unlike what some critics said, and the competition between Crash and Burn is a great take on the love-hate relationship.Cinematography and effects: 10 Thankfully relies a lot on practical effects to provide a totally fictional, but totally creative and beautiful, depiction of computers. Projecting the screens onto the actors faces, the super computer as translucent forest of structures, morphing the New York skyline into a circuit board; all amazing and novel.In summary, not 100% true-to-life, but for the better. They simultaneously try to pay respect to real hacker culture at the time, while extrapolating it into a stylish and exciting universe. Unappreciated in its time, but a cult classic that still holds fans for a good reason.

Roedy Green Making a movie about computers is difficult. Even the latest equipment looks ridiculously antique within a few years of release. There is not really anything to see -- just people sitting at keyboards. You must interpret it poetically. There is not much action. The public has no idea what is really going on.The best attempts, like Tron, work at two levels, direct action for the kids, and subtle in-jokes and metaphors for the computer savvy.Hackers has lots of energy, but it is downright silly.For a start, the techno-babble is complete gibberish. The screenwriters did not even know the difference between a modem, a screen and RAM. I think they composed the dialogue by looking up computer jargon in a dictionary and throwing the words into a hat. They make zero attempt at plausibility.This incompetence quickly destroys the illusion we are viewing whiz kids capable of bringing down civilisation as we know if they so chose.Most of the dialogue is theme and variation on "I'm the king of the castle, and you're the dirty rascal". It sounds like something first graders would say. It is so juvenile, it is jarring.Another jarring thing. Dade and his mother stayed in a one-bedroom apartment where mom slept on the couch. Yet Dade had thousands of dollars to spend on clothes and hairstyling.There is a goony character called Cereal. He appears to be brain damaged, perhaps from too many drugs. Yet we are supposed to believe he took over all TV channels of earth.But the main problem with the movie was the lead Dade, played by Johnny Lee Miller. He was badly miscast. His hair was expensively bleached and each curl pressed into place. He wore a leather jacket costing thousands of dollars that Liberace might have coveted. His facial features were so sharp he could cut cheese with them, but he had no sizzle. He came across as soggy as yesterday's waffle, a sort of young Lawrence Welk. His voice was as flat as Houston astronaut ground control.Angelina Jolie did a great job with the atrocious dialogue they handed her. She was like a time bomb about to explode. It is too bad the movie was not written more around her acting skills.A touch I did like was the way the characters got around their city with dazzling speed on roller blades. It added some visual excitement and flash.Some of the CGI visuals to poetically represent hacking into computers were of course completely unrealistic, but at least interesting and metaphorically evocative.A movie is a team. The writers were incompetent though the basic plot was quite clever. Most of the actors were great. The visual effects people were ahead of their time (but of course dated now). A movie is as good as its weakest link.

residentevil6901 I have read most the reviews on here which there is a lot of good and bad people are saying. I can see where the bad reviews are coming from but I just don't get how some people just can't simply watch a movie and just appreciate it for what it is? Entertainment. . . . . I watch this movie at a minimum a few times per year and never get sick of it.It's great to watch some of the actors in their earlier roles, it almost has an 80's look to it with some of the clothes they wear, I connected with it when it came out due to I was similar in age. Maybe that's why I still like it today because I saw it when I was much younger. It is very silly and not accurate at times but I didn't watch it for it's authenticity of hacker / computer terms, I watched it because it looked like a fun movie and I was right.Matthew Lillard's character had me rolling a few times and when they mess with the secret service agent in charge of catching them was great. Reminded me of being young and messing with someone in similar ways. The soundtrack is excellent, it made the movie for me. I bought it and listen to it more then I watch the movie.I give any movie I watch a 10 if it ends up being a movie that I can watch over and over and can put it into the "if you were stranded on a desert island what movies would you want with you" category! This is definitely one of those movies for me, but I am easily entertained when I watch a movie. It has to be a boring slow movie like He Said, She Said for me to hate it! "It's leopard boy . . . . and the Decepticons!"