It doesn't help that there's been little to no advertising. I venture to guess there are still loads of people who don't know this movie actually exists.
Tron: Ares
- Thread starter WarpFactorZ
- Start date
I mean, you could describe T1 that way, but I'd say that "Kyle and Sarah meet up, clash, and gradually learn to trust each other" is just as important a broad stroke of that movie in terms of both plot and runtime. Whereas "Find Sam’s Dad. Than try to Escape" really does convey the essence of Tron: Legacy. Even the introduction of Quorra doesn't really affect the the plot; it just adds "with Sam's new born sexy yesterday girlfriend" to the "try to escape" part.
Just because one can sum up Hamlet with "The ghost of Hamlet's dad tells him to kill his stepfather. He then does that" doesn't mean one is making a particularly useful observation about the play. Calling Tron: Legacy a two-act story, however, cuts to the quick of its narrative shortcomings, and thus is a useful observation.
It's two-act because you're making it that way by ignoring story points to make the film sound simpler than it is, just as I did with The Terminator.
Besides all that, I personally don't buy into the implication that a film having two acts is some kind of damning criticism. Even if Tron Legacy was undeniably a two-act film, that means nothing in terms of the story, it's characters, or it's plotting. Is a five-act play somehow superior to a two-act play regardless of all other factors?
Edit: For the record, I'm not arguing that Legacy is some masterwork. Or that it doesn't have deficiencies. Only that "it's a story told in two acts" only says one thing about it. It's not an insightful criticism on any level.
Besides all that, I personally don't buy into the implication that a film having two acts is some kind of damning criticism. Even if Tron Legacy was undeniably a two-act film, that means nothing in terms of the story, it's characters, or it's plotting. Is a five-act play somehow superior to a two-act play regardless of all other factors?
Yeah. "Kyle and Sarah meet up, clash, and gradually learn to trust each other" would be the first act, and "Kyle and Sarah escape from the Terminator multiple times before finally destroying it" would be the second act.
Edit: For the record, I'm not arguing that Legacy is some masterwork. Or that it doesn't have deficiencies. Only that "it's a story told in two acts" only says one thing about it. It's not an insightful criticism on any level.
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Nah, in terms of two-hour mainstream sci-fi action movies, the plot of Tron: Legacy really is that simple. The movie is about the same length as, say, The 6th Day, but in plot terms, The 6th Day is a lot more eventful and complex.
That doesn't mean The 6th Day is necessarily better overall. But it's definitely more eventful and complex.
It's not, but it is a useful observation in that it invites a frank discussion about how thin T:L's story is. No one, not even an ardent admirer of the movie, could credibly argue that the movie has anything like a complex and eventful story in sci-fi action movie terms.
If the term "story act" has any meaning whatsoever, then that meaning must be "significant story development." So, yeah, a two-act story should be understood as having fewer developments as a five-act story. If you're not willing to recognize that basic math, there's no use in you using the term "act" at all.
If we're not willing to abide by a fundamental spirit of fairness, there's no point in having movie criticism discussions at all, because all we could say would be "Me like thing" or "Me not like thing."
No. Just for giggles, I checked: Sarah and John meet at minute 37 of a 103-minute movie (not counting end credits) - in other words, when the movie is 35%, or pretty much exactly one-third, over. Ergo, it's not remotely honest, in storytelling discussion terms, to say that Kyle and Sarah meet in the first act of T1. In the context of two-hour sci-fi action movie storytelling, their meeting is about as classic an endpoint to Act One as they come.
The only reason to say that John and Sarah meet in T1's first act is to make a dishonest argument, in the sense that one is actively flouting basic fairness.
Obviously, no one-sentence observation can be "insightful" in the sense of "it's argued at length," because "at length" inherently means "across multiple paragraphs." Therefore, calling the observation "not insightful on any level" is not a productive argument on any level. The meaningful question, rather, is whether said one-sentence observation is useful - and, again, I argue that it is, for the reason stated above.
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You yourself said "Kyle and Sarah meet up, clash, and gradually learn to trust each other" so checking the time when they first meet does not cover the events as you described. Sarah isn't really on Reese's 'side' until an hour in.
If we're to check times, in Tron Legacy the characters are not in a position to actually escape the Grid until an hour forty-two into a two hour movie. Prior to that we have Kevin simply not wanting to leave, and then after that his disc is in the possession of others for about a half hour.
I did not say that a five act story does not have more developments than a two act story. I asked if a five act play was somehow superior to a two-act play regardless of all other factors. Does it have more acts? Yes. Does that mean anything in regards to the quality of the writing, acting, staging, etc? No.
"Showing a clear understanding of a person or situation".
A one-sentence observation can be insightful.
My brain isn't well suited to arguing that Tron Legacy isn't necessarily two-act and that if it is it doesn't matter.
I said that "Kyle and Sarah meet up, clash, and gradually learn to trust each other" is an act, which it absolutely is. It's absolutely the movie's second act, as the time details confirm.
You said it "would be the first act," as in, it could rationally be considered the first act.
It couldn't.
I did not say that a five act story does not have more developments than a two act story. I asked if a five act play was somehow superior to a two-act play regardless of all other factors.
False. You wrote "Even if Tron Legacy was undeniably a two-act film, that means nothing in terms of the story, it's characters, or it's plotting." You could have written "that means nothing in terms of the movie's overall artistic quality," but you didn't. Instead, by using two terms fundamentally linked with narrative acts - "story" and "plotting" - your statement very clearly indicated a belief that "a five act story does not [necessarily] have more developments than a two act story."
If your wording didn't accurately convey your intended argument, that's on you.
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You're right. So I shall pretend I wrote "Even if Tron Legacy was undeniably a two-act film, that means nothing in terms of the quality of its story, it's characters, or it's plotting." like it was in my head.