VIRTUOSITY

VIRTUOSITY. Brett Leonard, dir. USA: Paramount, 1995. Eric Bernt, script. Denzel Washington, Kelly Lynch. Russell Crowe, stars.

In Los Angeles in 1999, an ex-cop (Washington) hunts Sid 6.7 (Crowe): a computer-composite of serial killers, who manages to get out of the computer-generated VR into a nano-technology produced android body, and into everyday LA reality. See for imagery of superimposition of mechanical and cybernetic devices upon the human and the injection into Washington's character of a small tracking device. Pre-release coverage in Cinefantastique 26.6/27.1 (Oct. 1995): 96-97. Cf. and contrast Terminator movies and Leonard's Lawnmower Man (cited this section) for "mechanized" villains. Cf. and contrast VIRTUAL COMBAT for VR. Also cf. and contrast motif of human beings entering computer-space: see in this Categoryt TRON (1982) and, under Fiction, J. Sladek's The Müller-Fokker Effect. Following the Disney rule of "The Plausible Impossible": If everyday humans can move across some sort of portal into cyberspace, denizens of cyberspace can cross the barrier into our space. Look for mixed world possibilities, as we see with "Toons" in WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT? (1988).