Review of The Running Man (1987) by Katrina L — 08 Aug 2009

The Running Man is vintage Schwarzennegger, and I don't mean that as a compliment. Everything you expect is here. Like The Terminator, it's about a brutal future world where humanity is in chaos. Like Total Recall, Schwarzennegger is an unassuming man caught up in it, trying to right the wrongs of an evil corporation. And like Batman & Robin, he quips himself silly while doing it. At least it's trying to make some kind of satirical point about TV, but it's been made before (and since) by better movies. This dumb actioner mushes together cliches from Escape From New York, Rollerball and others, and it might work if it wasn't so brazenly guilty of the same crimes its antagonists commit. Give me The Truman Show any day.

In the film's opening five-minute infodump, we're told the world economy is in ruins, the government has gone crazy with power, an underground resistance exists to defeat them, etc., etc. (It may have been easier just to show the title of the movie above the words "Standard Dystopia Scenario".) Meanwhile Ben Richards (Schwarzennegger) refuses to follow his orders and kill a bunch of unarmed rioters. He is made to look like the bad guy, sent to prison, escapes, and is then recaptured. This takes half an hour. He's soon picked up for The Running Man, a sadistic TV show where popular "stalkers" track down criminals in a ruined city. The audience cheer and whoop for their favourites. It's The Gong Show, or some version of the Got Talent franchise, but with blood everywhere. Somehow, the audience overlooks the cruelty of what they're watching. Presumably, given the harsh times they live in, they just don't care. They're glad for somebody to boo and hiss at, and the government are glad it isn't them. Never mind all the nasty TV execs, cruel police officers and gunned-down innocents: the apathetic audience is the film's most successful satirical point.

But we've seen this kind of future world before, to put it lightly. Escape From New York is probably my favourite. A dark and horrible prediction of escalating crime rates, no money and law enforcement gone awry, it threw an antihero into the mix and gave him a mission he didn't want to accomplish, and not long to do it in - or to live. The Running Man does pretty much the same thing, but with added TV cameras, murderous Gladiators and an audience. However, Schwarzennegger is no Kurt Russell. This is Arnie in full smirking action hero mode, all shit-eating half grins and impossible biceps. He ploughs through baddies easily enough, dispatching them with witless one-liner kiss-offs and looking pleased with himself as he stands over their corpses. You're supposed to be concerned for the hero's safety, yet he's no more in danger from what's going on than you are. This is probably why he's better off playing homicidal killing machines instead of good guys. As for carrying out some kind of mission, The Running Man morphs at the last minute from Schwarzennegger playing the game to Schwarzennegger bringing down the bad guys, and does he want to do it? Who knows? Ben Richards has no particular emotions one way or the other. As the tiresomely-named baddie, Damon Killyan (Richard Dawson) notes: he looks pissed. That's about it for motivation.

The sad thing is, The Running Man isn't clever enough to really point the finger at its wicked TV moguls, because it's no better than they are. It presents us not with people being tragically wronged, but with Schwarzennegger, everybody's favourite action hero, blowing up bad guys. Everything in it from the tag-line ("The Running Man is a deadly game no one has ever survived... but Schwarzennegger has yet to play!") to the dialogue (Arnie delivers the time-honoured "I'll be back" without an ounce of embarrassment) capitalises on the mindless Planet Hollywood star quality of its hero. We're not meant to agonise about the injustice of the dystopia we're looking at, because the all the "real people" are either enjoying The Running Man (and thus making things worse) or loitering in sewers and ruins, where all Standard Dystopia Survivors reside. We're meant to go "Ooh" and "Aah" as Ben Richards saws Buzzsaw in half ("He had to split!"), sets Fireball alight ("Hey, need a light?") and fires Killyan into a Coke billboard at high speed ("That hit the spot!"). You'll laugh, you'll groan, and you'll roll your eyes when Richards gets the girl at the end, a half-assed resolution to a non-existent romance thrown in there because these kinds of movies have a quota to meet. You almost wish The Running Man would just embrace its mindlessness and focus on the excitement. But no, it had to go and be a satire...

If you're young enough and have yet to see the many movies that do this sort of thing better - or failing that, if you're drunk - maybe you'll get a kick out of The Running Man. It's got just enough wanton violence to please Arnold's fans, and although he comes across as even more of a heartless muscle-bag than the T-800, the chances are you'd still rather side with him than the weasly Killyan. But you never get the feeling that the movie really abhors this sort of thing, rendering it about as sharp as Schwarzennegger's enunciation.

Maybe it's cleverer than it seems. Perhaps the passive audience cheering guys like Buzzsaw on are a neat reflection of you and me, passively enjoying something that's plainly horrific. But somehow, I doubt it. Arnie's enjoying himself too much. The moral of the story, then? TV sucks and murder is wrong, but hey, don't change that channel! He's about to kill a guy!