'80s Roulette: WARGAMES

We tackle one of the decade's smartest blockbusters

I have (almost) every single movie released in theaters in the ‘80s in the United States on a hard drive, and once a week, I’m going to hit shuffle and review whatever film comes up first.

Welcome to ‘80s Roulette!

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JUNE 3, 1983

WarGames
Matthew Broderick, Dabney Coleman, John Wood, Ally Sheedy, Barry Corbin, Juanin Clay, Kent Williams, Dennis Lipscomb, Joe Dorsey, Irving Metzman, Michael Ensign, William Bogert, Susan Davis, James Tolkan, David Clover, Drew Snyder, John Garber, Duncan Wilmore, Billy Ray Sharkey, John Spencer, Michael Madsen, James Lemp, Gary Bisig, Gary Sexton, Jason Bernard, Frankie Hill, Jesse D. Goins, Alan Blumenfeld, Len Lawson, Maury Chaykin, Eddie Deezen, Stephen Lee, Stack Pierce, Art LaFleur, Brad David, Martha Shaw, Howie Allen, Michael Adams, James Ackerman, Jim Harriott, Tom Lawrence, Frances E. Nealy, Charles Atkins, Glenn Standifer, Edward Jahnke, Paul V. Picerni Jr.
cinematography by William A. Fraker
music by Arthur B. Rubinstein
screenplay by Lawrence Lasker and Walter F. Parkes
produced by Harold Schneider
directed by John Badham
Rated PG
1 hr 54 mins

When a teenager breaks into a national security server thinking he’s playing video games, he accidentally triggers what may well be the end of the world.

Hollywood loves to use advances in technology as an engine for storytelling, and for the most part, they get the technology incredibly wrong when they do so. Think of the ‘90s, when they had people doing things that can best be described as magic when they put on VR goggles or logged onto the internet. Part of that is a game of “What if?” that storytellers are playing, and that can certainly be fun. What if we could bring back dinosaurs with cloning and DNA samples? You can wring endless juice from these things if you’re willing to make the jump past what is possible, and it can often be a game of mere degrees as to what makes a great movie and what makes a ridiculous film.