It's not hard to understand why some people think it's terrible, but I've always adored this movie. I think it was maybe my first experience with anything “cyberpunk.”
Looking forward to watching this black and white version. (Note: available on Amazon for anyone else looking for it.)
I remember watching it in the theatre as a kid and was blown away by it. I find it interesting that it had Cronenberg's editor working on it as well. Aside from stuff like Robocop and a couple of other things this was a cyberpunk movie I really got into. Ice T, Keanu and a dolphin all in one movie. I can wait for it to get released internationally so I can see it in my region in black and white.
The scene where you witness the protagonist's conversion into a robot from his point of view could be straight out of Ghost in the Shell. Actually, I don't think GITS is nearly so cynical; Robocop is nearly as cyber but even more punk. OCP and the government turn him into a machine with a callous disregard for his rights and wellbeing.
From Wikipedia: "Cyberpunk is a subgenre of science fiction in a dystopian futuristic setting that tends to focus on a "combination of lowlife and high tech"". I think the film makes an excellent work of portraying that dystopian future.
Strange Days is fantastic. It worked particularly well at just that moment in time, with the LA riots fresh in mind and the millennium coming up. It's one of the best cyberpunk movies I know of, and horribly underrated.
I stand by my assessment. It's underrated in that few people are aware of it or see it as a good movie. In the sense that it is well regarded by most who has seen it (it has 7.1 of ~72K votes on IMDB), it can also be reasonable to not describe it as underrated, so fair enough.
But I choose to go by the former - far fewer people are aware of it or would list it as an important sci-fi/cyberpunk movie than it deserves.
I agree that, for a national release, it is relatively obscure.
I think my aversion to it is due to Ralph Fiennes' and Juliet Lewis' character portrayals. I would consider myself a fan of both, and I'm not saying they didn't act well. I am saying these characters should never have been created, as one is disturbingly nervous, the other disturbingly nasty.
It's one of the very few movies I chose to sit down and watch but had to stop after just a few minutes.
The others would be The Departed — I loved the original Hong Kong movie Infernal Affairs, but I couldn't bear to watch more than a few minutes of The Departed. And the David Lynch Dune.
Usually I tough it out, L.A. Confidential, for example, I thought was awful, but saw it through to the end. I couldn't believe that the same director (Curtis Hanson) could have made such an awful (though, stangely, lauded) film and also the absolutely amazing Wonder Boys (and the servicable The Hand That Rocks the Cradle).
Not sure if this is still the case, but -- this film wasn't available anywhere to stream. I ended up buying a DVD player and the DVD version just to watch it.
It was one of those sci-fi movies that was just too different for mainstream audiences and critics. It also didn't help that the marketing of it sucked for likely the same reason.
I remember seeing it in 96 or maybe 97. It blew my mind and it was my first experience with cyberpunk and a "sci-fi" movie that really clicked with me. It was the first that modeled the future the way I was seeing it from my corner of the planet. I was annoyed and angry at all the happy-go-lucky variants that were presented almost all the time, I was tired of this oppressive optimism regarding technology and this was a breath of fresh air to my young mind.
A lot of things from it made their way to The Matrix for me visually and thematically and I was so sad that the movie never got the recognition it deserved. It felt the closest it would get to something that had that negative feeling and vibe that I get whenever I watch Ghost in the Shell again. Anyway, I'm really looking forward to this black and white edition!
I first saw it around 1998 I think, in my early teens, and it made the same impression on me. So many of the ideas were amazing! It was also around this time I saw Terminator 2, RoboCop and The Fifth Element for the first time also. And then another few years later when my english teacher in secondary school had us watch the Matrix on VHS. It wasn't until I watched it in my own time I appreciated it. So many good films, rose tinted glasses!
I grew up with the Johnny Mnemonic name being familiar, only to watch it a few years ago, but I discovered Strange Days, which I've hard never heard of, just a bit later. Strange Days has its flaws, but is much much more modern and reflects the cyberpunk literature much more accurately.
I really enjoyed the book, actually all of William Gibson's work from that era. I didn't think that the movie was great but reading this interview, it really does seem like the things I didn't like about it were the result of studio interference. So I look forward to finding this new version on a platform I have access to.
I absolutely hate monochrome. The trend of removing colour from something and calling it an improvement. In photography, in film, everywhere.
Is it just me? Is there something different with my visual perception that makes me prefer colour over monochrome after we worked so hard to evolve the right photoreceptors in our eyes and the colour in photography, film and computer screens? Or is it just my general low tolerance of pretentious bullshit?
Depends. I can't tell you why you don't like monochrome :).
For me it's situational (and I would never call it "automatic improvement").
Both as consumer and occasional photographer, there are times when B&W feels right and great - it showcases shapes and contrast, and eliminates distraction of colour.
E.g. Recently I dressed my kids for a fun old-school photoshoot at abandoned old gas station I found, and my wife thought I was crazy because nothing matched but went along with me because she loves me :D. Then she saw them finished in 1920's B&W style and they were great - stripes and blocks were obvious, random colours weren't distracting.
I think Ansel Adams is still great. Some street/city photography is great in bw. And some portraiture is awesome in bw. And there are so many decisions and choices and and ways one can turn colour photo into bw! There are a dozen radically different mono shots in a single colour photo. Decisions of contrast and brightness and colour blend can make completely different results, so both the original subject matter and the choice/process have massive impact on result. Which at the end will always be subject to personal preference and impact.
At the same time, I can see a photo on Instagram and it's obvious it's a photo of somebody's breakfast that they pushed the filter button thinking it'll make it more interesting. There's a usage of bw that's clearly with thought of making it "more artsy! More artsy! Dial up the artsy!", always, regardless of nature of photo, possibly with little regard on how to make it bw. I probably have very very similar reaction to it as you do. But I still think some bw stuff is great - e.g. Sin City, when it comes to movies:).
Black and white can be great. For instance, in The Wizard of Oz, it serves as a differentiation between reality and fantasy worlds. Pleasantville uses it as well. There is a large volume of pretentious monochrome. There are some actual good works though. I prefer good art. Good art exists in both color and monochrome.
I had similar thoughts to yours until I read, "So, I got the hi-res footage from the studio, and we graded it into black-and-white. I worked with Cyrus Stowe, who was the colorist on this version. Basically, we went through it scene-by-scene, and he was really great."
They didn't just put a feather in their cap and call it macaroni. They spent the time to get each scene contrasted correctly.
I'm a photography hobbyist, definitely prefer monochrome to color.
Nope, won't call it an improvement.
And obviously we naturally see in color, so monochrome means deliberately deleting some informations.
But that's how I usually take photographs. I don't care about color, only some very basic elements like light, shadow, shapes, texture, patterns etc. In some (if not a lot) cases, monochrome amplifies those elements. Personally, it actually simplifies my workflow. As long as there's sufficient light and shadows, I can start taking pictures without thinking if the color pallete of the scene is overall interesting or boring. It's rarely my intention to capture the scene as objectively accurate as it is.
You may prefer to "see" in color. That's perfectly fine.
If you think film as an art; it’s being colour or monochrome is become just a medium of choice and not improvement.
IMHO It’s even better now since RAW image information gives freedom to translate it in a monochromatic in a way director likes. Each monochromatic films has it’s rendition and contrast different, and you must use filters while filming if you want some different rendition than that (photographic) film intended.
Aside from that, I don’t know many examples films shot in colour film and reverted to monochromatic (schindler list maybe?). Instead saw more film shot in digital but converted into monochromatic (Eva, great polish film comes into my mind). Color grading has its effects so monochromatic conversion as well imho.
I don't mind monochrome; I haven't watched much that was filmed and color and converted to monochrome but watching old black and white movies doesn't bother me at all.
But what really does bother me is when modern movies have all the colors shifted to make everything look drab, or blue, or green. The blue-shifting is the worst. I've even seen it done to re-releases of old movies that didn't look like that originally, presumably to make it "feel HD" or something.
Yeah, absolutely hated the Ozark (TV Series) look. Heavily desaturated, brightness turned down and shifted heavily into blue. Ruined what looks like pretty scenery in the background on photos.
Compare that to Outlander, a cheesy romance show I mostly just kept watching because of the beautiful (saturated) landscape shots.
I agree in general, but there is one exception and that exception applies here: film noir. Johnny Mnemonic and cyberpunk in general derive a lot of its inspiration from film noir and film noir in color just isn't the same.
Noir: my favorite genre. Here's some color noirs I don't think have lost anything for not being in B&W: Leave Her to Heaven; Black Widow (1954); Blood Simple; Le Samouraï; Chinatown; Body Heat; Femme Fatale (2002); The Last Seduction; Thief (1981); Basic Instinct; After Dark, My Sweet.
My favorite noir however is indeed B&W: Detour (1945). To me it is the quintessential noir film.
A lot of bad photos in color can be improved just by tone-mapping colors to shades of gray. RGB noise turns into grain (e.g.)
Also a lot of "Black and White" television would be better called, "Grey and White" since the television would wash out the true deep blacks, and reduce the total image contrast.
As an aside, a similar effect happened in theaters for a long time where the theater owners would drop the brightness of the projector bulb to get more life out of it. But details in the dark would be lost. It may still happen today, I just don't go to the theaters anymore.
A proper screening of Citizen Kane would be fun to see in a dark theater with a bright DLP projector.
Black and white movies have a number of advantages over color. You immediately know you are in an artificial story, like introducing your film saying "Once upon a time…" :)
Similarly, why do animation? Why take away all the detail of reality? Again, animation highlights the artificiality of the story, which can be a huge advantage. Samurai Jack is incredibly beautiful, and unapologetically make strange choices to heighten the viewer's experience. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iBU_D36-AA
I like monochrome film and photography, but removing color from an already shot movie is troubling. Generally both mediums have their merit, but black and white scenes aren't usually shot in the same way as color ones. For example, go look for color photos by Ansel Adams, who was typically a B&W photographer - he often even used the same subjects and angles, but it's clear that he was shooting for a much more dramatic lighting for his monochrome works. He'd pick the weather and time of day to add as much shadows, contrast and texture, but would avoid all of that for his color scenes.
Well its you in that you have a preference for colour and that's fine.
Colour has an emotional response of its own - which is why set design, lighting temperatures and colourists are a thing. Colour theory is of course the basis of this. Monochrome takes away that response and values shape, form and light to invoke a visual response.
Different ways of telling a story. Just taking a colour film/video/photograph and removing colour may not work. Shooting in monochrome has deliberate intent.
When I evaluate one of my "arty" photos, I ask myself if the color adds anything to the composition, if not, make it B&W. Color is additional information and art is more elegant when extraneous elements are stripped out.
I feel exactly the same way. We had a joke in my country 20 - 30 years ago which was something like "why are you using black-white [film], don't you have enough money for color?".
I must be more jaded than all of you, I see it as a simple money grab at no cost that could be done by anyone applying a B&W filter to previous releases. Even if they really changed the colour sliders for each scene as they claim there have been more ambitious fan edits than this.
Also, of all the problems with the film, the colour palette was not very high on the list.
The entertainment industry is now about finding your most devout + hardcore fans and extracting what you can from their pocket with bonus editions/features/DLC/power ups.
I feel like the time is so right for a true-to-the-material film or series adaptation of Gibson’s works. I would pay so much money to see Neuromancer or Bridge trilogy adapted for the screen.
Amazon is working on an adaptation of The Peripheral, but don't seem to have announced a release date. Hopefully they'll pick up the rest of the Jackpot trilogy as well.
In the late-90s, in a grad student seminar class at the MIT Media Lab, one of the wearable computing students brought in a clip from Johnny Mnemonic, as part of conveying how jarring they thought the experience of switching on biologically-interfaced intelligence augmentation might be.
The most amusing (for me) thing about JM is what it was based on really short story (~40Kb) which I discovered years later after the film.
The film itself left almost nothing in my mind (well, 20 years passed), except a couple of scenes (the tv column, war hacker dolphin, some minor shots, yakuza with the monowire) and as I looked at the shorts from it on Youtube.. yeah, I really thought of it way better than it deserved. Though I wouldn't mind a re-watch with a couple of beers and some friends, for shits and giggles. Probably along with '12 monkeys'. Not sure if I would prefer coloured or black-and-white version, though. For sure I wouldn't try to watch them both, that would an overkill *grin*
I loved the start of this film; it's an onslaught of super advanced wetware technology, cybernetics, comic book weaponry, corporate dystopia and (frankly) a little bit too much violence lol. I agree with the others comments: it might not live up to my mid 90s memory of it.
He did voice work for the game Cyberpunk 2077 which has somewhat similar plot device around information lodged in a neural implant proving fatal, maybe he was thinking of Johnny when he signed on for that
I suppose that he is rather visiting the large pots of money that they have sitting besides them. Not sure if Johnny Mnemonic is going to have something so enticing for him.
regardless of the posthumous negative judgment on the film, when jhonny came out our brains melted: before then we had only seen "the matrix" on TRON and the Lawnmower
the flight scene in hyperreality was mindfuck on the same level as the wormhole in Stargate, absolutely a must-see for a nerdy 90s kid
I was just the right age for that to be a mind-blowing movie. Have me a lot of enthusiasm for our technological future, which I primarily squandered on gaming...
I last saw Lawnmower Man in the 90s and rewatched it recently with my partner who hadn’t seen it.
It seems in 2017 a new director’s cut was made which seems to be the default version you get on Amazon Prime at least. As a result of the re-added footage it makes more sense and feels more cohesive, especially Jobe’s story and holds up fairly well IMO.
I am pretty sure I already watched the movie a long time ago. I can't say whether it is good or bad because I forgot the story. Maybe I 'll watch it again because I really like Keanu Reeve. But I don't think I will watch this black and white version.
Also I don't understand why it seems to be such a feat to have removed the colors from this movie ? I am not a computer graphic expert I just do some coding for fun and play with image editing software (I dabbled in the demoscene) and I don't think it is that hard to turn a picture into grayscale or is it ?
>The black-and-white knocks several million dollars off of the price tag.
Yes I bet it does ! But I genuinely don't understand why would people will watched a degraded version of a movie ?
The article didn't go into too many details about why it worked better, but these excerpts gesture at why:
"dialing up Gibson’s cyberpunk paranoia"
"the three computer graphic sections become quite coherent in black-and-white"
"it has this kind of a dreamy, 16mm feel to it. It reminds me of Tetsuo and Eraserhead, and all these great, kind of dreamy, black-and-white movies."
"the color graphics now look all pretty retro, but in black-and-white, it has its own quality to it for sure."
"I take inspiration from films like Alphaville, La Jetée, things like that"
My impression is that the color version sets an expectations that Longo never meant. It was always intended as a B&W art film, and not as a summer block-buster. The colors and expense were a distraction.
So, if you haven't yet, check out the movies mentioned. Ironman: Tetsuo, Eraserhead, Alphaville and La Jetée. They are definitely not Hollywood blockbusters.
I'm not sure that Eraserhead has any overlap with Johnny Mnemonic in anything other than this mention of dreamy colours (military-bleak is how I'd describe Eraserheads palette).
I can't speak for the others in your list, but Eraserhead is an art experience that requires some... endurance of the horrific, depending on how much one invests themselves into what's going on on screen.
If you take a clip and run it through a desaturation filter it will look aweful. To properly turn an image or a clip into black-and-white, it needs to be done by hand.
Now you have to do this manually for the whole movie. Every scene has to be done separately. But also, it has to be done in a way that is self consistent throughout the movie.
I haven't seen it (I think).
Looking at its entry on Rotten Tomatoes, it appears to be one of those films where the newer reviews tend to be more positive.
Why would there be newish reviews anyway unless it's a film that's still attracting significant attention?
Some of the better sci-fi movies aren't received well initially and take time to pick up a following. If they're lucky they go on to be 'sleeper hits' or 'cult classics'. Sure, re-releases help but a lot of it is there's a small group of people, like those commenting here, who remember a film/series and sing their praises long after the critics and mass audiences have forgotten about them.
Also, there are people like myself who are always scouring recommendations lists to see what we've overlooked. I find some very interesting movies that way.
Thanks. I feel myself that l am too influenced by critics. Years ago I used to go to Blockbuster and come away with random movies based on blurb on the back of the dvd case. Nowadays I'm wary of watching a movie unless it has a great score and lots of reviews on rotten tomatoes. I feel like i'm probably missing out on a lot of hidden gems.
Both awful and great in equal measure. Exemplary of what society at large are just incapable of understanding about the (not-quite-so) new electronic frontier.
The chain of commentary above just perfectly describes Hackers as well.
So no changes have been made apart from being in black and white? I tried watching it a few months ago. It was awful (imo), I turned it off half way through.
I always loved the cyberspace sequence. I was like "hey wow, this is actually a really good and doable representation of what the metaverse could be like!"
"I've had it with them, I've had it with you, I've had it with ALL THIS - I want ROOM SERVICE! I want the club sandwich, I want the cold Mexican beer, I want a $10,000-a-night hooker!"
When you understand the relationship between directors, producers and studios it's not surprising at all.
Directors rarely see their version of the movie on the screen. Sometimes they don't even see the final product before it is on the screen.
It is easier afterwards to work on a directors cut/version since studios see that as an opportunity for an additional cash grab after the 1.0 is no longer generating money.
If you read the article and more about the backstory of the production, the director did not get to make the film he really wanted to make. From the very start the producers demanded he turn it into a summer blockbuster and changed all kinds of script and other sequences to be more cheesey action movie fluff.
It's actually pretty rare that a director has complete creative freedom on a film. Only huge names like Kubrick, Scorsese, Spielberg, etc. once they gained acclaim could put any damn thing they wanted on film and know that no one would question or change a thing
Why weird? Musicians change songs in subsequent albums and live versions (done with different arrangements etc, not just being slightly different) all the time.
And they don't have as heavy external influence as film-makers do, where tens or hundreds of millions are at stake, to the point that they're often denied certain decisions, frequently denied final cut, have different scriptwriters brought in by the producer, and so on. So they often end up with an end result that it's not what they'd wanted (and that's aside from technical and other issues).
So, I got the hi-res footage from the studio, and we graded it into black-and-white. I worked with Cyrus Stowe, who was the colorist on this version. Basically, we went through it scene-by-scene, and he was really great.
I understand there is more involved than running the whole movie through a black-and-white filter with the default settings.
Ok, so it was an afternoon's work. To fix studio butchery that deprived audiences of writer William Gibson and director Robert Longo’s ambitious vision.
Would you only be satisfied if a year's worth of work had been spent?
He discussed that he considered a number of different things he could have done but since the original plan was not to commercialize the result (but instead just put it out on youtube) there probably was not a lot of budget and time available.
That would be nice as a first approximation, but a bit more work went into it:
"So, I got the hi-res footage from the studio, and we graded it into black-and-white. I worked with Cyrus Stowe, who was the colorist on this version. Basically, we went through it scene-by-scene, and he was really great. He's really a very talented guy."
Sounds like it was a pet project of the director's and had a few small art-house film screenings. If we're lucky maybe they'll take it on the film festival circuit, drum up interest, and have a wider independent/art house film release. Who knows maybe it eventually gets out to more theaters, kind of like the Mad Max Fury Road chrome edition (black and white) some years back.
Looking forward to watching this black and white version. (Note: available on Amazon for anyone else looking for it.)