The Colony

Welcome to the Colony. It's very sleek, effete, modern and totally upper middle classish. Externally it's a well constructed paradise replete with its own efficient private security enforcing the C&R, the fine print covenant and restrictions which govern life, but what lies behind the pleasantries and the security screens?

Colony featured excellent performances by Hal Linden as the evil genius who created the colony and John Ritter the neophyte who allowed to enter the circuit walls engirding the Colony is drawn into discovery of the hidden secret.

I never liked John Ritter's personal philosophy of endemic liberalism but it is strange to watch this 1980s made for TV movie and witness its eerie prophesy for life in a nearly paranoid state.

In this mid-90s TV movie John Ritter plays Rick Knowlton who has designed a security system. He is also a family man with a wife Leslie (Mary Page Keller) and two kids (Alexandra Picatto and Cody Dorkin). While feelings the effects of living in a big city of L.A. and having their car stolen Rick is looking for a new and fresh place to live without the stresses and fears that city life creates. A super-rich tycoon Philip Denig (Hal Linden) wants to buy this security system and move the Knowlton family to his community. Rick is ecstatic, but soon finds out that this community isn't as great as he first thought.

Unfortunately this flick doesn't make the cut in my eyes. Not scary enough or spooky enough and the messages that are delivered could have been done in different ways to be much more effective. I do believe they needed to amp things up for it to strike any real chords with me. Might work better for those who have not seen this type of movie before. Sad though, because I think Ritter was perfectly cast for his role, but needs more meat on the bone for me to become more concerned for their well-being. Also starring Frank Bonner from WKRP IN CINCINNATI.

This made for TV suspense thriller had lots of potential but just seemed to fall flat. John Ritter stars as a security expert of the high tech scale who moves his family into THE COLONY an ultra exclusive community that appears on the surface to be perfect in every way.

Shortly after moving in they soon find all is not what it appears. An elaborate set of rules and regulations abound that at first seem to be ridiculous but in reality are taken seriously by those who run The Colony. The family encounters staff members, who come into their home to do various environmental checks, remove outdoor plants that are deemed inappropriate for The Colony and perform surgery on their pet dog. Security guards shows up at the home of another family when the man of the house decides to paint his dwelling with a color that The Colony does not approve of. Slowly this utopian community begins to show it's dark and sinister side as Ritters family begins to catch on.

The film attempts to have a Stepford Wives type plot to it but too many topics are touched on and compressed to allow the film to have a build up for a suspenseful ending which also falls somewhat flat. The characters seemed to be miscast which hurts the picture. Hal Linden as the BMOC (Big Man On Community) who runs the Colony and wants everyone to love, respect and fear him at the same time just doesn't seem believable as a sinister individual. John Ritter who is fine in comedy roles also just doesn't seem to click in this picture.

The story is there and if redone with good casting and directing would make for a suspenseful film along the same lines as The Firm. If you've never seen it it's still worth viewing.

Starring the fantastic late great John Ritter The Colony is a made for television thriller with a concept alone that it deserves credit for.

It tells the story of a family who move into an exclusive gated community but begin to have concerns about the overwhelming number of rules they must live by and the strange behaviour of their fellow residents.

It's all very 90's (If that makes any sense) but despite the usual gliches it's quite an entertaining little venture. There are a couple of plot holes but thankfully nothing too major and Ritter is excellent as always.

A harmless way of killing 90 minutes.

The Good:

John Ritter

Some interesting ideas

The Bad:

Cliched

Ending could have been better

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

I would happily sacrifice some freedoms for that quality of life

The Colony stars the eternally likeable John Ritter(dead); he really does elevate this movie, it is not too hard to feel sorry for this families plight because he is so easy to like. If you don't know where to watch this, it is viewable on youtube for free, as maqny other old TV movies are. The themes in this film, of safety versus freedom, especially during this 2020 the Corona Virus Panic, are even more relevant than they were in 1995. When I watched this in early April, I couldn't help think to myself, as people talk about how great it is to give up freedoms for safety in this film, about how much people have been chided for wanting their constitutional freedoms among the mostly fabricated Corona Virus scare, and the totalitarian methods many governor's and some police who enforce those unconstitutional orders.

Yes, some of the story line is ridiculous, and uses a common trope that has been borrowed from Jurassic Park ad nauseum, of a young teenage girl being a tech wiz, though at least here, she's not as overly adept as in some films, and doesn't instantaneously whip up a solution. Another trope not too uncommon of the time it was made John Ritter's brother just happens to be a detective within The Colony's jurisdiction, and was really an unnecessary addition. The ending is overblown to the extreme, and would have been better with a much more subtle, ideally downbeat(or partially downbeat) ending. Those are the two biggest weaknesses here. The other silly aspects are easily forgiven as this is clearly a bit of a satire, but it doesn't necessarily tread that line between the dramatic and satire well, hence why the overblown conclusion is not so great and diminishes the amazing tension built up in the first 2/3's of the film.

The script is overall well-written up to the final 1/3 when it becomes a bit of a hot mess. It is filmed as well as one can hope for a TV film, and acted better than most TV films of it's time, or before or after. One could complain about character development, but that's really not the point here is it? No.

Despite all of this, 25yrs after it's made, can we say a lot of the surveillance techniques here are unrealistic? I think we can conclude they are not. With government threatening to chip or put bracelets on those with Covid 19, or the use of drones in LA and Detroit to attempt to monitor and keep people in their houses, this film becomes even more chilling, despite it's silly aspects. We may laugh at some of the absurd laws that the Colony implements, but I think we can agree they are not so far fetched when people have been fined for parking their cars instead of going straight home, or like in Colorado, required to have a "permit" to even travel to work, verifying that they are essential.

Flawed as it is, I still really do recommend this film, again it is viewable on youtube for free, and I hope it will scare the tar out of some people into stop thinking that the government is here to protect us, they are not. They are, in the US, supposed to protect our constitutional freedoms not us(although certainly the military may be deployed to protect the country, they are not meant to provide total safety), and this film illustrates that beautifully, allegorically, despite it's flaws and silly aspects.

God Bless ~Amy