Ridiculous 80s action wrapped around a surprisingly sharp dystopian idea.
Nerdy Up North Podcast
The setup
Ben Richards is framed for a massacre and eventually forced onto The Running Man, the government's hugely popular television show where prisoners are hunted and killed by colourful celebrity assassins.
The Running Man is peak 80s Schwarzenegger.
It is loud, ridiculous, full of stupid one liners and completely over the top, but underneath all of that there is actually a really clever dystopian story going on.
Arnie plays Ben Richards, a man who ends up forced onto a deadly TV game show where convicted criminals are hunted down in front of a live audience by a group of colourful killers called Stalkers. It is basically reality TV taken to the most insane possible level, and somehow watching it now it feels even more relevant than it probably did when it came out.
The film is constantly playing with the idea of the media controlling what people see, editing footage to change the truth and turning violence into entertainment. Everyone watching the show just accepts what they are being told because it is presented to them on a screen. For a movie filled with men in ridiculous costumes trying to murder Arnold Schwarzenegger, it has a surprising amount to say.
Arnie is just Arnie in this. He is not disappearing into the role, but that is exactly what the movie needs. He throws people around, delivers one liners after killing them and spends most of the film looking like he could punch through a wall if the script asked him to.
The Stalkers are also a huge part of the fun. Every one of them looks like someone was given an unlimited 80s budget and told to come up with the most ridiculous wrestling character possible. You have Buzzsaw, Dynamo, Fireball, Subzero and Captain Freedom, and they all fit perfectly into this completely mental world.
Richard Dawson is brilliant as Damon Killian as well. He is probably one of the best parts of the film because he is so charming while being an absolutely horrible person. He understands television, he understands the audience and he knows exactly how to manipulate everyone around him. That makes him much more interesting than just having another big action villain for Arnie to punch.
The action is ridiculous, the effects are dated, the costumes are insane and the whole thing is dripping with 80s cheese, but that is exactly why it works. It never feels embarrassed about what it is, and it never slows down long enough for you to question how stupid some of it is. You just go with it.
What I like most about The Running Man though is that you can watch it in two completely different ways. You can enjoy it as a stupid Schwarzenegger action movie full of fights and one-liners, or you can look underneath that and see a film about media manipulation, reality television and people being entertained by misery.
It is one of Arnie’s most entertaining films and one of those movies that somehow feels more relevant now than it did nearly forty years ago.
Verdict
The Running Man is big, stupid fun until you actually think about what it is saying. Then it becomes big, stupid fun with a disturbingly believable dystopian streak running through it.
