7 Movies that Feature Hilariously Outdated Technology

Certain genres of film require a level of timeliness, a sense that the world of the film is very much like your own.  Stephen King has noted that he scatters common brand names throughout his stories to lend a sense of familiarity and reality, thereby making the horror all the more horrific.  Indeed, it seems like thrillers and adventure stories are the main culprits in the practice of integrating conspicuous and soon-to-be-obsolete techology into their ridiculous plotlines.  But I’m glad when it happens, because there’s nothing funnier than an up-to-date, tech-savvy blockbuster ten years later…

1. War Games (1983)

Ah, remember the good old days?  When you could connect your phone to your computer, unwittingly inventing the internet but being too modest to know it, and dial into every bank in town, not to mention the Pentagon?  It’s a shame some people had to go and ruin it for all those hackers next door who were just trying to have a little fun, forcing major companies to adopt newfangled “security systems.”  Matthew Broderick’s wide-eyed performance saves this otherwise preposterous movie, as does the oddly philosophical ending, which has a HAL-type supercomputer ruminate on the fact that nobody can win a little game called…war.  It’s heartwarming, really.

2. The Wizard (1989)

The technology in this case is of the Nintendo variety, which makes it all the more laughable.  As anyone who was of movie-going age in 1989 remembers, it was a big-ass deal when this movie offered a tantalizing sneak preview of the yet-to-be-released (and much anticipated) third installment in the venerable Mario trilogy.  Some believe Mario 3 to be the apex of the video game era.  I would have to agree with them.  For those who are unconvinced that Mario 3 alone (and its dead-serious treatment as the BEST GAME EVER) makes this a film worth watching or re-watching, I have two words for you: Power Glove.

3. Batman (1966)

The Bat Computer is probably the best representation of a computer in television and movie history.  It looks nothing like a real machine, features large, probably hand-written labels pointing out the functions of its various components, and seems to serve no other function than to house a series of Christmas lights.  It fits the style of the show perfectly, of course, but you have to wonder how much of their set design and decoration was on purpose, and how much was due to the immense amount of drugs the crew was doing.

4. The Net (1995)

The Net, Sandra Bullock’s career apotheosis,  is one of the only movies that was on during my family’s free month of HBO back in high school.  The shrewd businesswoman that I am, I recorded all the movies that were on and went on to watch them over and over, as I didn’t have very many videos.  Therefore, I got to know this movie pretty well.  One result was that I now never want to watch Dennis Miller in anything ever again.  Another was that when I finally got the internet and discovered that it was nothing like what I’d seen in The Net, I thought, what the hell?  What weird kind of chat program was she using?  It certainly ain’t no AOL.  Since computers form pretty much the entirety of the subject matter of this film, we get to see a lot of them.  Give it another ten years and it’ll be even funnier.

5. You’ve Got Mail (1998)

It’s like someone said, what title can we give our film that will both disgust the common man and also age really really badly?  Even back when everyone used AOL, when chatting as soon as you turned on the internet was the norm, and when chatting up strangers and then meeting them happened outside of To Catch a Predator, this movie was already outdated.  It was outdated the moment Nora Ephron first put pen to paper.  Shudder.

6. Jurassic Park (1993)

This movie is a veritable treasure chest of made-up computer programs that look neither real nor practical.  When Lexie is trying to operate the system to lock the door with the dinosaur trying to get into it, it takes like twenty fucking minutes just to navigate through the menus.  You’d think they could find a simpler way to go about it.  Plus, any movie that has someone (again, Lexie, when they start the ill-fated jeep tour) squealing “An interactive CD-ROM!” is just asking for trouble.

7. All the James Bond movies (1962-      )

‘Nuff said.