Sneakers

There are a bunch of movies which might not be GREAT, but really good, and you can watch them over and over again. Rainy day movies. "Sneakers" is without a doubt such a movie.

It is a lightweight caper which gets into a higher division thanks to the acting: Redford is always good, as is Strathairn, Kingsley and McDonnell. The other actors do a really good job as well, but these four stand out in my opinion.

There are twists and turns in the script, Great San Francisco locations and lots of underplayed humor in this film, all contributing to that the movie can be seen several times.

Take it for what it is, and you'll have a really good time in front of the TV.

At a key point in the plot, the device that might be able to get past any computer encrypted password needs to be tested. Carl (River Phoenix) is asked what is the hardest computer to hack into, "give me the number for something impossible to access." He answers, "The Federal Reserve transfer node, Culpeper, Virginia." Mother (Dan Aykroyd) adds, "900 billion a day goes through there."

Between December 10, 1969 and July 1992, this same building in Culpeper housed four computers through which the majority of transactions of the 5,700 US banks were processed. It was also a bomb bunker that stored about four billion dollars cash. These cash reserves and computers could be used to keep business transactions going on throughout the eastern half of the United States in the event that Washington DC was bombed in a nuclear war making cash there radioactive and unusable. Interestingly this build was decommissioned in June of 1992 just months before the film "Sneakers" opened in September of 1992. Since 2007 this building has been home to the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center at the Packard Campus of the Library of Congress where over 6 million items of the nation's audio recordings, television and motion pictures are stored and preserved, including the copyright print of "Sneakers."

Sneakers is still fun to watch after 12 years and it was a great look at the time in which it was made. 12 years ago, the Cold War just ended and nobody was really sure how things were going to shape up geopolitically. Sneakers captured that mood perfectly and kept things tense with the soundtrack, locations and set work.

It's got the best balance of technical accuracy verses ease of viewing that I've ever seen on film. Not too many cartoon-like computer interfaces but no staring for minutes at a time at command line interfaces. Sneakers also gets points for being in the Bay Area and traveling among places that I visit every day (Hills Brother Coffee Building for the 'box drop' and the Dumbarton Bridge - for starters). Actors have fun with their roles although it's obvious that Sidney Poitier, Robert Redford, Ben Kingsley and James Earl Jones are not delivering their A-Game. It doesn't matter, it doesn't make it any less fun to watch. I like Phil Alden Robinson's camera movements; don't forget to look for the long, low slide across the Scrabble pieces right in a pivotal moment of the plot.

The movie still retains some relevance today. Ben Kingsley offers that gem " world war. And it's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see and hear, how we work, what we think... it's all about the information!" gains some credibility especially in the face of the post-9/11 news reporting on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News. Trash-diving is still a viable option to gain information on your opponent and social engineering will always work to help you gain some information.

Sneakers is still one of the best mainstream treatments on the subject of hacking. Watch, learn, enjoy.

A friend and I were discussing River Phoenix yesterday so last night I decided to watch this movie again for the first time in a while. Let me put this out there first. This isnt an Oscar movie but its really fun. Also for 1992 the technology they are showing didn't exist. There is a lot of "you couldnt do that in 1969/1992 on the internet". Those are my only criticisms. That being said a better cast cannot be found. Its got heavy hitters. The chemistry is great. The pacing is well done. I can watch this over and over. Whats disturbing is how well.it actually forecasts the role of data in our lives now. Theres actually dialog that gets very Edward Snowden-ish that I didn't catch in the 90's or early 2000s. But is so in your face in 2021. That being said I would so watch it again.

Given that this came out in 1992, the level of technology in it is amazing. I watched this twice, the latest in 1999, and still am amazed at some of the things they can do with computers. Of course, some hacking techniques are commonplace and outdated now, but it is still engrossing to see these acts in action.

Watching it a second time gives you a sense of perspective though. Back then, to think that a chip that can control the world was preposterous, but now, with almost everything microchip-controlled, and the ubiquity of the Internet, that thought is not too farfetched.

Talking in movie terms, this ranks as one of the better ones that center around computers. There is some solid acting, and though there are sub-plots within the main plot, they do not grow so much so as to overwhelm the main storyline, which is basically a group of men hired to find the chip-that-controls-everything.