The thread about optimistic predictions in sci-fi made me think of this. How many movies showed existing (at the time they were made) computer technology with exaggerated capabilities?
A lot of these showed up when hacking became widely known to the public.
War Games, for example. Matthew Broderick, using a home PC with a 300-baud acoustic coupler and probably a whopping 16k of RAM, downloads complex software instantly and plays a complex real-time simulation with a computer that probably doesn't even run on the same operating system.
Weird Science, being a comedy, can be cut a little more slack. However, the graphical depiction of navigating through the military computer is interesting, to say the least. Actually, the ease of dialling up any military or corporate computer in any movie is very interesting.
Midnight Madness had a computer, installed in a van no less, that could be fed a riddle and instantly determine exactly which location in Los Angeles it refers to. Can you imagine the vast database and complex software that would require? Not to mention the ability to sort through metaphors, turns of phrase, literary references and abstract ideas. Even more interesting, this computer was purchased and ready to go within hours of being needed. Had somebody already developed this software?
Of course, these were written before a lot of the writers or the viewing public were really computer literate. Still, that doesn't explain Independence Day, in which Jeff Goldblum accesses an alien computer with a Mac Powerbook and installs a virus, written in C++, that cripples their network.
Any other examples?
One of my favorites has allways been the computer controlled catering van from "Wheels On Meals"! The computer looks rediculous! It's bassically a plastic box with a screen!! You gotta love those goofy 80's style computers!
Interesting point you bring there,Andy,which brings to myself this brief question...
I know that the original triolgy was made in the computer-less early days,but the current "Star Wars" trilogy has computers everywhere in this old school galaxy(pre-Luke Skywalker Jedi era),on Amidala's ship,and in the Jedi library(amongst other places).
Seems that the Empire didn't like computer technology(as does our current government adminstration),and completely did away with it,altogether,
leaving Han Solo and Chewbacca with no Internet porn to cruise through and explore,nor any public computer centers displaying information about the Empire(ala the jedi library),since the Empire seemed to yearn to keep everyone in the galaxy as poor as the citizens on Tattooie.
Which also explains why the nightclub life(as depicted in "Episode 2")was also banished as well(expect for Tattooie,which Han found the only good place to relax and get a drink).
Shoot, what was the name of that movie (the Forbin Project, or Colossus? nevermind, it is Colossus: The Forbin Project, thanks IBDB) about the supercomputer designed for artificial intelligence and took over all nuclear weapons. It was basically a honking big IBM mainframe, circa 1969 (and probably dumber than one of today's cellphones). Anyway, AI is still a long way off, even with vastly better computers now.
It's not just computers. look at the gadgets that people use today and then compare them to what was on TV and in the movies about twenty years ago. At lunch today, I was thinking about the TV show Knight Rider and how outdated the technology of that car is today.
I can't wait for 3D holographic interface systems with heads up displays and "touch in the air" buttons like in FF: the Spirits Within.
Sounds like the Enterprise. There, everything worked (Except the friggin Holodeck), untill they realy needed it. Never saw a computer repair bay, or the like. Even if they work along black box tech, they'd have to be busy as horny Vulcans to keep those computers up! Navy techs are always busy, why not StarFleet?
How about in Star Trek III when Bones goes into a bar and we see some people playing a weird WWII combat ace video game with wireframe graphics barely rivaling the original Tempest?
And it even happens today when modern technology is depicted. Almost every time someone's playing a video game in a movie we hear the familiar blips and bloops, when in fact most game's sound and music are just as good as any film's.
>War Games, for example. Matthew Broderick, using a home PC with a 300-baud
>acoustic coupler and probably a whopping 16k of RAM, downloads complex
>software instantly and plays a complex real-time simulation with a computer that
>probably doesn't even run on the same operating system.
What always got me was that his computer was autodialing using an accoustic modem. How did it hang up the phone? Not to mention that it would check each number in less than 5 seconds. Also, why does the computer's voice at the war room sound exactly the same as the little speech unit he had in his bedroom?
>How many movies showed existing (at the time they were made) computer
>technology with exaggerated capabilities?
Many, many movies!
Of course one of the biggest offenders is the movie Hackers, where absolutely nothing had any connection to reality.
Here are some of my favorites;
Secrets of the Ice Cave - Kid in a South American country sees criminals using a computer to store a map to some kind of treasure. He steals it and of course it works prefectly on his computer. Later, he and a girl are traveling across the countryside, they stop in a small village, the kid repairs the tribe's only TV, then he sticks the disk in a black, featureless box on top of the TV and the map comes up. Of course the disk wouldn't work at all after all the times he crammed it into his backpack, bending it.
Flipper - One of the modern syndicated shows had the police using a computer that spoke and could be asked plain english questions!
Wiz Kids - The star had a super computer that could break into systems, & talk.
Of course then you have the typical stupidity that many movies and shows include, like all the printing being in 2 inch high letters, being able to understand plain english questions and being able to enhance a photo to the point where it turns a black speck into a perfect image of a person's face.
I hate, hate, hate, hate those movies where computers can do anything and they never fail. "Hackers" is absolutely a mount of trash in that sense (well, in all of them, actually). But my personal demons in this type of films are either...
1) Talking computers. Look, if they are used in teen movies they are rather annoying, but if you put them in suposedely serious movies, any sequence they appear goes to hell. Examples: Assassins, The Jackal (Bruce Willis version).
Note: I don't know if they had "voice" in the original versions, but in the spanish dubbed version computers in these movies have horrible voices. About the Jackal, I just love to see Willis having a nice chat with a computer that can understand him and deliver him inmediately what he asks for with no mistakes.
2) Inmediate copy process. Always, always, when somebody has to copy something on a CD, it works almost instantly. One of my personal fantasies is a movie where the hero has to wait the standard 5-15 minutes to have his CD burned, only to get a Windows error nearly at the end of it. At least that would be realistic.
Movies also tend to show e-mail and operating tasks in unrealistic ways, even in our "information age" when pretty much everyone has used these programs, Hollywood seems to insist on showing nonexistant animations, consoles and other things. Case in point: The Net, Copycat, Disclosure, etc. A big offender is Swordfish. Has anyone seen CPUs or consoles that look and operate even remotely like the ones there? And I agree, Neville, more realistic computers would be a breath of fresh air. Imagine: Our hero hacks into an evil corporation's mainframe, but every time he tries to do something he finds a window that says, "WARNING: Explorer Cannot Open This Folder." He ctrl.alt.deletes this, sees it again and gets rid of it fourteen or fifteen times, then sees, "Want To See Hot, Barely Legal Nymphos?", then decides it's not worth it and opens a game of Minesweeper.
That would certainly make more sense than navigating a VR cityscape, looking for information.