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John Badham explains why it was difficult to make 'Wargames' (1983): "At the time, nobody wanted to make 'WarGames' (1983). Leonard [Goldberg] managed to get it set up with United Artists…. It was tough to make, and the attitude of the studios was, “It’s about some kid with a... show more
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My dad took me to see WarGames, I'm convinced he never learned to navigate a PC because he was worried that if hit the wrong sequence of keys he could start WW III.
haha, i wouldn't blame him for that... 🤣
When this movie came out, I was a high school kid working as a computer programmer at NASA. The NASA engineers were passing the WarGames script around, and it was the first movie script I ever read. Great script, great film.
Wow, that is incredible...
This movie is what ended up scaring people enough that they sent Kevin Mitnick (RIP) to prison. The insane thing is that Mitnick hacked NORAD by coincidence while the movie was being filmed.
wow, that is really interesting... I read they changed laws relating to the internet after this film...
Badham is the guy who tried his best to ruin Saturday Night Fever, until John Travolta told him after viewing the lousy rough cut, "FFS stop using close ups of my face and use wide shots when I am dancing."
that is real funny... the movie is still on my watchlist..
It's not a great film (Karen Lynn Gorney is cosmically bad IMO), but Travolta is great in it. If you can, try to find the original R rated cut. They kinda butchered it to make it PG after it premiered and kids were dying to pay but could not get in.
One of my favorite parts of the movie is the vintage 7-11.
This movie made me become a developer and later an IT manager. My 12 year old brain loved the exiting world of computers. That I just ended up developing software for calculating salaries, implementing the most boring laws, regulations, tariffs and calculations didn’t cross my mind until I was deep into my career. But I did meet my wife on the job and am still happily married to her, so it got me something. The money wasn’t bad too.
I am so happy to hear this!!! 😃😃
I remember seeing that movie at the Cine Real in 1984, in the mall in Lima, the same one that had a store where you could program BASIC on a Tandy TRS-80. In the Andes, Sendero Luminoso was escalating terror, and a nuclear war between the USSR and the USA still seemed plausible.
yea, it all felt too real...
The concept is pretty dry but the dialogue and performances made this film so much fun.
first hour of the movie is very engaging, imo.
John Hughs vibe?
Just imagine the kind of cultural shift that will take place once the first movie with woke villains becomes a hit.
An absolutely terrific film that still holds up to this day.
A movie that, whenever I see it's on TV, I will drop everything and watch.
Ally Sheedy was so hot in this movie
"We're in." … I just now got this reference in The Matrix. Doh!
As a kid with a Commodore 64, Wargames was one of the most influential/inspirational movies of my childhood.
TV-series copying the theme from 1984.
I saw WarGames upon release in a packed theater at Scott AFB. Could have heard a pin drop in there lol
‘80s boys: I don’t really care what the movies are about, just put any of the following in it and I’ll go see it. Ally Sheedy Demi Moore Jennifer Connelly Phoebe Cates Elisabeth Shue Miss Piggy Lea Thompson* * even Howard the Duck
Shall we play a game?
War Games was very forward thinking
Computers in 80s movies were essentially magic, I remember seeing a film where two dudes made a supermodel using a Commodore 64 or one where a guy went and lived in an Atari, and people just believed it
Kids with computers is perfectly plausible. The idea that the Pentagon’s actual nuclear war computer is sitting there on a regular dial-up modem with a weak backdoor password, that’s the real stretch.
I saw this movie for the first time two or three years ago. I was surprised at how good and entertaining it is; even after more than 40 years, it seems more authentic than 99% of today's action films.
“The only way to win is not to play” truest life lesson
Such an incredible movie. The precociousness of early personal computing vibe. The old equipment. The ASMR of the clickety clack of the keyboards. The nerd gettin' in with that young, ripe cooz Ally Sheedy. 10 out of 10.
I didn’t know at the time how much this movie was going to influence the rest of my life
One of the first films I ever saw. Great fun. I remember it well.
War is an unwinnable game
Except that Wargames was loosely based on a real life event which makes it more believable. Great movie. 🍿 👇
Tom cruise paid a nice homage to it in edge of tomorrow. Also the movie is a remake. The original is called fail safe and general baringer pays homage to that when he says “get our bombers back to fail safe” towards the end. Top 80s flick!
matthew broderick could do anything with a computer back then.
Damnit! Now I want to plop down on the couch and watch the entire movie, curse you!
Sadly, I was never computer skilled enough to get Ally Sheedy in my room in the 80s. Myself or my Spectrum 48k - one of us let us both down.
![Francis Ford Coppola on how young children convinced him to make 'The Outsiders' (1983) & the reason why he loves the movie: "Interviewer: 'Rumble Fish' (1983) is so completely different a film from 'The Outsiders' (1983), not just in black and white and color, but in the tone. And everybody said, “Well, he’s off in Tulsa, making two films,” rather in a way that, once, people would go up to the desert and make two westerns at the same time. 'Rumble Fish' makes 'The Outsiders' seem an odder film than I thought it was when I first saw it. 'The Outsiders' almost felt like a film in which you weren't quite there all the time. Coppola: No, I don’t think so. 'The Outsiders' (1984) was the type of film that I personally liked, a melodrama with a romantic tone. I liked the book a lot when I read it; I thought it was sweet and youthful and had something in its little, simple theme that was of value, and I wanted to make the picture very much as the book was. Maybe that’s what you're interpreting as my not always being there, except that I did make the decision to make it exactly like the book. The key to 'The Outsiders' is the score; the fact that it’s this schmaltzy classical movie score indicates that I wanted a movie told in sumptuous terms, very honestly or carefully taken from the book without changing it a lot, with young actors—putting the emphasis more on that kind of 'Gone with the Wind' (1939) lyricism which was so important to the young girl [Susie Hinton] when she wrote it. I liked the film on that basis. It’s how I made it and why I made it. But if you think about my career, I’ve never made two films that were alike... maybe the two Godfathers. But every one of my films is very different from one another and I was feeling that I was in kind of a journeyman period of my life, approaching a future style of work as a more serious, older man which would be based on a tremendous amount of exploration while I had the chance to do that. To me it’s nothing to say, well, I’m going to make that film and it’s going to be that kind of film. Like 'The Outsiders'—it’s not that I couldn’t make that sixteen other ways. People suggested, “Well, are we really going to make this book like that?” “Well,” I said, “little kids wrote me a letter and wanted me to make it that way.” Of all the letters I get from movies, 'The Outsiders' is the one where all of these cute little fourteen- year-olds . . . so I’m in it for them. I feel I must have gained something, although it wasn’t as challenging, cinematically or even on the level of acting and other things as, say, the one that came afterwards. But I always had this idea that I wanted to make one film that was romantic and schmaltzy, like 'The Godfather' (1972), and one film that was more of an art film, more in the direction of 'Apocalypse Now' (1979)." (Francis Ford Coppola's interview with David Thomson & Lucy Gray, 1983)](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2010103103555600427/amplify_video_thumb/2009991376948342784/img/l_kRKFmpgrUZcjno.jpg)
![Nancy Allen on her favourite collaboration with Brian De Palma: "I guess I'd have to say "Blow Out' (1981) I love each one. "Home Movies" is a trifle. 'Carrie' (1976) was a kick because it was my first film. It was great. 'Dressed to Ki!!' (1980) I love for the reasons I told you. But 'Blow Out,' I think, for so many reasons. No. 1, it was such a great piece at that time. It really came together in terms of his style, content, all the actors, the performances... leading up to one of his best films ever, I think. What happened, of course, with "Blow Out" was I didn't like the character, it was never originally written for someone like myself or someone like John [Travolta]. It was really more of a small, dark, film noir piece, which I love, and the characters were a bit older than we were and really kind of past it. It was over for them, very cynical and dark. The guy's character was very cerebral, more like a John Heard or Jimmy Woods, this type of person. So, when John was cast, in a way, it was perfect. I didn't see it right away. That's not who this character is, but what John brought to the character, what wasn't there, was the heart and soul. So, I did not want to make another picture with Brian. I didn't like this character. John wanted to do it with me, and Brian said, "Well, wouldn't you like to work with John?" I said yes, of course I would. Yes, I love working with John. So I had to find a love of this person, which I did. I came to fall in love with her and give her things that I felt I could align with." (Nancy Allen's interview with Michael Calia, The Wall Street Journal, 2015) P.S: Happy 76th birthday, Nancy Allen!](https://image.24vids.com/tw-2069846772097188010/amplify_video_thumb/2069828402207731713/img/vnaHeU8QX0dv5POY.jpg)