Light My Flyer

Tron: Legacy (2010)

Starring: Willie Nelson, Boy Sting, Olivia DeHavilland, Jr. Directed by: Krzysztof Kieslowski Rating: PG Genre: SciFi Fiction

Review Fifty years ago a Palo Alto, California engineer named Hewlett J. Packard shrunk himself to the size of an engorged tick and "uploaded" his midget brain into the first IBM computer. Though Packard was later to achieve fame for inventing the concept of the expensive printer cartridge, those in the know are convinced that his time navigating the memory gates of that first electronic behemoth formed the basis of the original "Tron." How true this is, I do not know, but it's hardly surprising to insiders that the great Polish director Kieslowski would choose a remake of this original story as his comeback venture. Kieslowski, best known in Poland as the inventor of the color film, has always sought to recover the humanity that the Polish people felt was lost when they gave up the double-entry bookkeeping system shortly after World War II. And, truly, what better way than to team with the "FX" wizards at Disneyland and leave nothing but a immense plain of scorched eyeballs in their wake? But does it work? Until that wonderful rascal Willie Nelson burst fullblown like a chaw-cheeked Venus upon the screen, I had my doubts. But the moment Nelson (as Packard-like engineer "Wink" Winkerbean) "dismounts" from his "light cycle" and grins at the camera we know we're like babies snugly and securely pinched between his huge, dope-stained fingers.  There seems to be no line that Nelson cannot improve by his growly, stentorian delivery (e.g. "I did not know. I DID NOT KNOW!!!"). Somewhat more perplexing was the choice of newcomer Boy Sting as his son "Dingo." Mr. Sting, who rose to prominence largely due to a YouTube video in which he is seen ejecting pickles from his bottom while "beatboxing" to  Cee-Lo's "Forget you", is not (to put it kindly) a "natural" actor. Every line he delivers sounds like a cat force-fed helium and slowly strangled with a string of stale red vines. And if I'm not mistaken, there happens to be another performer with the same surname, whose dignity cannot be impugned by this turdlet of a talent (as a fan of Sting lute music can attest, the man has nothing more to prove and can retire to his chateau to finish the sonnet cycle on the Vedic bards we all await with bated breath). But even the guinea-pig like squealings of the lesser Sting cannot detract from the sheer ferocious intelligence of Mr. Kieslowski's script. And those of us who have already installed track-lighting are well on our way. Tally Ho!