Featuring A Live Performance by The Great Octopus!
Synopsis
Teenage hackers befriend the new kid with excellent computer prowess and pit him against one of their own in a friendly and flirtatious competition. During their play, they stumble onto a corporate corruption that has financial and environmental ramifications only they can stop.
Details
There was a time in the 90s where technology was growing rapidly and entering the common household. Hollywood saw an opportunity to tap into our paranoia by portraying the Internet as a hellscape that only the deeply nerdy or most mysterious underground misfits could navigate. People who interacted with it preyed on the innocent or had their identities destroyed by their curious nature. From The Net to Strange Days to Hackers, 1995 carved out its own genre which Mac expert Andy Ihnatko coined “hacksploitation” and a corner of cinema was forever changed. Hackers is as much about vibes as it is about hacking. Its focus on the alternative, adopting the energy of electronic music and a mix of thrift and high fashion costuming, leaning into newly branded extreme sports skateboarding and inline skating, created a culture that became a blueprint for films like The Matrix. What better way to translate this to the public than having the main characters played by a youthful edgy and gorgeous cast on the verge of stardom: the likes of Angelina Jolie, Jonny Lee Miller, and Matthew Lillard. If that’s not ahead of its time and deserving of a cult status I don’t know what it is. Come and see for yourself. (VANYA GARRAWAY)