Review of The Running Man (1987) by Bill S — 29 Mar 2015

Arnold is back in yet another futuristic nightmare. The Running Man is about Ben Richards, a man who is framed for killing hundreds of innocent people and is taken to jail. He is then put on the show The Running Man where they take criminals and put them against stalkers.

The premise of the movie itself was fun and had a good cast of people. Arnold you can almost guarantee will be fun and throw out some awesome one liners ("what a hot head"). He always brings his admirable charisma to these films and never fails to entertain.

The announcer in the film also has a lot to like. For one he was a really good villain. He did play a bit too much like a typical bad guy in an action movie but nevertheless he was a good character. The acting was alright I guess, Arnold is fun to watch but he's not the best actor.

Richard Dawson was good as Damon but like I said, he falls into typical villain category. The story never failed to be entertaining though that's for sure. It was nonstop action from beginning to end and was fun.

To bring out the worst in this movie is that there is some really cheesy acting from the stalkers and it gets too dumb for my taste. The dialogue isn't the most clever thing in the world that's for sure.

The romance between Ben and Amber wasn't very believable and barely had anytime to bond together. The scene were they broadcast the reality behind Ben and show the Damon is a liar doesn't make any sense either.

There's some footage they got that is impossible to get unless the characters had hidden cameras in which case they didn't. The overall outcome of the Running Man was a fun action film that had a cool story and atmosphere.

There were a lot of problems I had with it but it's a dumb fun action movie. C.