Many may have forgotten (or never knew), but 1993's The Lawnmower Man (or, originally, Stephen King's The Lawnmower Man) was kind of a big deal back in the days. And it actually still has a significant place in movie history as one of the first movies after Terminator 2: Judgment Day that tackled and used CGI extensively.
I'm not going to talk about the movie, its history or post-history, but I'll just extremely briefly refresh everyone's mind: The Lawnmower Man was a scifi horror based extremely loosely on Stephen King's short story. The movie was already in development under the title Cybergod but they added some elements from King's novel so they can use the title and King's name. It's about a secret project on advancing intelligence through drugs and VR (yes, virtual reality) treatment. When Dr Angelo, played by Pierce Brosnan decided to start the treatment on a mentally challenged gardener, it gets out of control: Jobe, raised and abused by a Priest who holds him in a shed behind the Church, not only get's superintelligent, but develops telekinetic abilities. He soon gets out of control, murders everyone who wronged him one by one, and plans to transfer his consciousness into cyberspace and then spread to the internet to achieve a newfound form of godhood - to be an immortal being spread worldwide. Recognizing that Jobe became a dangerous and powerful being, Dr Angelo tries to stop him before he achieves his goal.
Sounds like a pretty good story, huh? Well, in a lot of ways it is, but there are few things that bring the movie down, and while there are only few of those things, they do bring the movie down by a lot.
First of all, this movie is a very unique take on a "religious" possession horror type: it does involve a lot of reference to religion and a lot of catholic elements. For one, Jobe is named after a biblical person and was raised by a abusive priest. After transforming into a superintelligent human with telekinetic powers, Jobe keeps talking about seeing god and wanting to be one. Before he gets killed, the priest tells him that Devil has possessed him, and Jobe answers with a spine chilling, monster-like dual voiced scream.
He is indeed confused and not himself due to the experimental drugs used for the treatment, so he kind of IS possessed and IS trying to be (and eventually succeeds) a god. So that's a very interesting take/interpretation of the entire concept. The music is not an action or sci-fi score at all: the movie is scored as if it's indeed a possesion horror, with lots of ominous and choir-like cues, and there's some nice horror imagery in it.
The cinematography was done but Russel Carpenter himself, an Oscar Winning cinematographer who would go on and work with James Cameron on a lot of his movies
The ending is "great" too: Dr Angelo and others think they succeeded in stopping Jobe from accessing the then-fictional internet (called DataNet) by blowing up the scientific facility (in which Jobe already killed everyone upon his arrival) seemingly before he ( his consciousness already transferred into cyberspace) could escape the facilities mainframe. Suddenly, Angelo's phone starts to ring; and then we cut to a shot of couple of major cities, which reveals that every phone in the world starts ringing - a sign which Jobe said will be heard around the world as a celebration of him taking over. The movie ends.
So what are the things that bring it down then? Well, the CGI, which is used to show the then-fictional VR games and Jobe's kills is very outdated now to the point of being silly in places. The decision to show Jobe's kills having a video game elements to it also ruins those scenes: like for one example, the Priest is burning alive but in a video game fire. Him burning in an actual fire wouldn't take us out from the moment and would have been as horrific as intended.
And the worst of all, the scene with security guards, which are killed by video game bees. While other things can possibly be forgiven, given the context of the story (and they do make sense: Jobe is projecting what he knows from VR world that he frequents so much into our real world), that scene alone is so silly because of the graphics that it brings the movie down from "recommended" to either "it's not for everyone" or "recommended but there's this one scene..."
Also, the ending, in which Jobe enters VR world and tries to upload himself to the internet may not be everyone's cup of tea. I don't think it would work for a first time viewer nowadays; I don't think the viewer would retain the mood. It looks like PlayStation 1 graphics, but if you suspend your disbelief and explain to yourself that this was simply the computer graphics of that particular time so it makes sense within the story, it may work for you. This is partially why it still works for me and doesn't throw me out of the movie. I can still feel the dread and the danger of what might happen
As I was watching the evolution in movies with wide eyes at the time, the Lawnmower Man was naturally on my radar because it used Terminator 2's technology and the ending was basically people entering video game: as a kid, how can you not love that. it did blatantly copy a lot Terminator 2 imagery thought
It's not just the liquid metal characters. Jobe also uses extends/stretches out his fingers (in the VR world) to punctuate Dr. Angelo's mind and see what he's hiding
The fact it's R rated with strong R rated scenes and content didn't really phase me - by that Point I knew both Terminator movies, both RoboCop movies and Total Recall by memory. For me it's just the way scifi were (at the time at least) - an adult movie with awesome comic book imagery. My parents knew sci-fi is mostly in the adult area now, so they would simply watch it with me at night (which was cool because it created the mood!) serving as censors, making sure my eyes are covered during sex scenes or gore. That's how it used to work back in the days. And you know, since those movies were geared for adults, they were always into them too.
The movie rooted itself in pop culture for many years, and spawned quite a few video games since it was just a natural choice for them. The video games answered the question about what happened next
Of course, 1996's sequel, which is to this day called one of the worst movies ever made, should not even enter discussion but I have to mention it for those who heard about it. Lawnmower Man 2: Beyond the Cyberspace is as stupid as its name. It truly is one of the worst movie ever done, and its not even remotely "it's so bad it's good". The sequel is not a horror movie, it's a PG 13 rated, utterly ridiculous scifi adventure in a typical mid 1990s fashion - teenagers on skateboards with nonexistent gizmos, computers that have ridiculous abilities, genius computer hackers. No one involved in the first movie, other than child actor Austin O'Brien, is involved with the sequel. It's like Power Rangers movie: in a distant future with flying cars and all that stuff, there's a Virtual world everyone attends, and there's some super crystal that gives the power to everything and the good guys (teenagers and hippie scientist) and bad guys (evil corporation and Jobe) fight for it.
If you thought that Alien 3's beginning was a stretch to justify a sequel, it's nothing in comparison to this one. This sequel openly ignores the ending of the movie and cherry picks what it likes and what it'll ignore. For example, Jobe had transferred his consciousness into the cyberspace, and his body atrophied and died - we literally see his dried up corpse. But the sequel ignores all that, Jobe is alive and well (and played by a different actor) and roams in the new version of VR, which looks exactly like the real world, only you fly in it.
Of course, since it was ignored that he uploaded himself into computers, the fact that Jobe managed to win at the end of the first movie and spread himself everywhere is also ignored. Jobe is not only played by a different actor, but is a completely different person: he's upbeat, energetic, talkative and constantly joking and acting like Jim Carrey - he reminds me of Batman Forever's Riddler. He is as far away from the stoic murderer he was in the first movie it's insane.
And the entire world is all futuristic which makes no sense: the first movie clearly takes place in our times, everything is normal. Then few years later we have flying cars, videophones, supertrains etc
The movie ends with Jobe fighting with the hippie scientist in a sword fight over the crystal...yup. After the teenagers and the scientist defeat Jobe, they fly away....I think that's enough
I remember even as a young guy who couldn't wait to see a sequel to The Lawnmower Man that I was in disbelief at how bad it was. I used my own money to rent it and watch it after school by myself, and I forced myself to finish it. I regretted I wasted time on it and I was devastated that I spent my money on it it was that bad. I think this movie and RoboCop 3 were the biggest sequel disappointments of my formative years.
What do I think of the movie after a rewatch? I could not go past 10 minutes. I just couldn't. It's really so bad it's a hassle to sit through, with no redeeming qualities - cinematography, look, music, designs - nothing in there at all. It looks like a mid 1990's tv movie, certainly like a direct to video release, although it did get theatrical release and earned $2 million. It's the most bad mid 1990's movie can get
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