The Running Man arrived this week, again, and without any dents, cracks, or scratches this time.
Let’s jump right in shall we?
The Running Man (1987)
Oh man, where do I start? I suppose at the risk of beating a dead horse, I can say that the movie was at least better than Trucks. And actually, I suppose if I was just watching the movie and had nothing to go off of, it might have been a little more enjoyable. Maybe. But as far as saying that this movie is loosely based on the book, loose would be a definite understatement.
I suppose rather than try to list everything that was different; I should just start with listing the things that were the same.
They idea of the dystopian future America where the economy is ruined is the same. The main character’s name (Ben Richards) is the same. The name of the show he winds up on, The Running Man, is the same. And that is pretty much where the similarities stop.
While I won’t list every difference, there are some major ones I should point out. First of all, Ben Richards is not a down on his luck everyman in this movie. He is actually an ex-police officer who has just broken out of jail. Richards was put in jail because he would not follow orders and fire on an unarmed crowed of protesters. Ironically, upon his escape, he is listed on the news as a fugitive who was in jail for shamelessly gunning down an innocent unarmed group of protestors….
The other major notable difference is with The Running Man show itself. In the book it involved running away from the “hunters” and the contestants were free to travel all over the world. Basically, they were set loose, given a head start, and then had to see how long they could survive in the world (with the deck stacked against them of course). In the movie, the show involved placing the contestants inside an arena (a very large arena, but still a limited space) where they had to get through each of 4 different quadrants within 3 hours while being chased by the “stalkers”. Quite the different premise indeed.
Now that I’ve discussed the differences that bear mentioning, I’d like to just talk about the movie for a little bit on its own.
The movie was…. Ok. It was your typical 80s action flick set in a tattered futuristic America movie. And by that I mean it was full of lackluster acting, cheesy puns and one-liners, and of course, 80s attire. As my wife pointed out, it’s always interesting watching movies from the 80s that are supposed to be set “in the future” because the feeling you get from them is never a “futuristic” feel, but always a “yep, this is an 80s movie” feel. Although, I’m sure 20 years from now they will say the same thing about today’s movies. Although, there seems to just be something about the 80s that is just so…… 80s… that I don’t think any other era really captures quite the same.
As far as the acting goes, as much as I love Arnold Schwarzenegger (who plays Ben Richards), he was definitely not chosen for his acting ability (as is typically the case with Schwarzenegger films from this period). It seems that at the time period, Arnold was typically cast for his body, and his ability to deliver those cheesy one-liners in his thick Austrian accent. The rest of the acting in the movie was also pretty mediocre. Actually, the best performance, I felt, came from the TV show host, Killian, who was played by Richard Dawson. Dawson, if you don’t know, was the original host of Family Feud, so he was very much in his element as the host of The Running Man. He even got in a few of his Feud trademark sayings during the movie. Even outside of hosting the show, I enjoyed Dawson’s portrayal of Killian very much. Speaking of trademarks… I definitely had to hold my hand to my head and sigh when at one point Richards turned to Killian and said “Killian, I’ll be back”. Yep…. They went there….
I was also disappointed we didn’t get to see more of the other shows that were mentioned in the book. In fact, we didn’t get to see any of the ones mentioned in the book, and we only got the briefest glimpse of one other show. We got to see a brief shot of Climbing for Cash (or Bucks, or something like that). The show involved a guy climbing a rope with packets of money stuck to it, as he reached the money he had to stick it in his shirt, or to his body somehow, all the while he has a pack of Dobermans nipping at his heels. I think there was a big missed opportunity to not explore any other type of shows. In fact, until the point we saw the blurb of Climbing for Cash, I had the feeling that the only show in the movie version of this world was The Running Man. So, in that light, I’m glad they at least at one other one that was mentioned, but I would have like to see more.
Overall I would say I was mostly disappointed with The Running Man. I felt that the book itself would have made for a very interesting movie. Unfortunately this was not that movie. I would love to see someone today try to make a movie that follows the book better, as I think it would be a very exciting movie.
One last fact. At the time this movie was made, it still wasn’t known that King was Bachman. So the opening credits say “Based on the novel by Richard Bachman”, and none of the producers or directors knew that the book was really written by Stephen King.
And that’s all I have for you. I’m making decent progress though The Gunslinger, so I should be back fairly soon with my review of that.
As always, thank you for reading.
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