Writer-director Michael Crichton and star Tom Selleck perhaps felt silly when “Runaway” (1984) came out on the heels of “The Terminator” and immediately felt dated. It’s not because the predictions about the future are wrong – they’re wrong in “The Terminator” and plenty of other SF classics too – it’s because it’s cheesy rather than cool.
Selleck and his co-starring mustache do professional work in acting like this is a gritty police procedural, except with robots. In the near future (imagine an alternate late-Eighties), robots are common in society, but they break down a lot, and police are in charge of dealing with the malfunctions.
Rage of the machines
It initially struck me as bizarre that the film opens with Jack Ramsay (Selleck) and partner Karen Thompson (Cynthia Rhodes) responding to a call where they are tasked with flipping the off switch on a piece of farm equipment. But the more I think about it, Crichton is commenting on how societies can shift into new normal behaviors that seem bizarre to an outside viewer.
“Runaway” (1984)
Director: Michael Crichton
Writer: Michael Crichton
Stars: Tom Selleck, Cynthia Rhodes, Gene Simmons
A real world example: People from before the age of police would be shocked to find out that crimes are “a police matter.” Before police, citizens took action if they witnessed a crime. In “Runaway,” malfunctioning machines have become a police matter.
Too much of “Runaway” plays as cheesy. The direction and action aren’t dynamic enough to be exciting, but not bad enough to be unintentionally funny – at least not consistently. I did chuckle at the robot driver, which is a mannequin – a little too close to the “automatic pilot” from “Airplane!”
Sometimes the killer robots look silly: A long standoff in a suburban house ends with Ramsay encountering a squat little box wielding a gun; not exactly a great payoff. But later, the little spider bots that insert victims with needles border on being creepy.
Crichton the futurist
Disconnecting myself from “Runaway’s” goofiness, I recognize interesting – and sometimes accurate – predictions from Crichton. As we know now, the idea that robots would be major lifestyle elements didn’t come to fruition.
But in 1984, it wasn’t a dumb idea; robots were on everyone’s mind (even “Rocky IV” had a robot butler) and were assumed to be right around the corner. As it played out, people leaned toward improved appliances rather than robots (such as Ramsay’s all-purpose Lois, which looks like a moving stack of stereo equipment) that work those appliances.
But on the other hand, Crichton predicts drones (called “floaters” here) and Roombas, although the Roombas here are fast and deadly, carrying bombs and zipping under cars along highways. The designs are on-point with what we have today.
“Runaway” is aware of the coming of cellphones. Luther (Gene Simmons, who very much has a villain’s face) tells Ramsay that his call can’t be traced because he’s using a mobile phone. But, like so many other science fiction films, “Runaway” didn’t imagine that cellphones would become so affordable, popular, palm-sized and ubiquitous.
We only live in one reality, so we only see one progression of technology and gadgets, but that doesn’t mean it’s the only outcome that was ever possible. So it’s amusing to watch “Runaway” to see how things might have gone differently.
Struggling on celluloid
The fact that “Runaway” isn’t very good is a separate issue. The robots aren’t menacing enough, Luther’s scheme is goofy (he already owns lots of mean machines, but his goal is to acquire more via industrial espionage), and everything else is predictable, such as Ramsay’s fear of heights coming into play in the conclusion.
Having Kirstie Alley on hand as a sex symbol does provide Eighties nostalgia, and there’s some synthesizer music, but the film isn’t dripping with the vibe of the era.
Crichton’s novels are gripping and propulsive, but he struggles to translate his skills to film, which can be strained and flat. Still, there’s enough smart (if sometimes wrong) futurism in play here that a Crichton completist or Eighties B-movie fan might get something out of “Runaway.”