THX 1138 (1971)

George Lucas' THX 1138 is about a futuristic society living in an enclosed town. In the film there's a guy, named THX 1138, who decides he's tired of the way things go and stops taking his mandatory emotion-eliminating drugs. At this point he falls in love with someone and they decide to escape the city. That doesn't work quite as expected as she does not make it, but he decides to escape anyways. I found this plot to be rather dull. I also thought the ending was a little unexciting. To spoil it, THX 1138 does escape but the viewer doesn't know what lies outside the enclosed city. People do not live there so it's unclear whether he will survive. Birds are seen flying by so life is possible, but being the only person outside the city seems like it wouldn't exactly work.

The only thing interesting about this film is its visuals. The majority of the film consisted of characters dressed in white on all white backgrounds which was kind of strange to look at. The effects were pretty impressive at times, but I don't know which of these effects are from 1971 and which ones are more recent. As is typical of George Lucas, he has re-edited this film to death and the original version is rarely screened. Due to this, I can't award any points for special effects, because they aren't groundbreaking for today - just for 1971.

Overall, I thought this was pretty bad. The idea of a futuristic society where someone is watching over everyone isn't exactly an original idea. I'm sure Lucas was inspired heavily by Nineteen Eighty-Four so I would recommend that book or either film based on it over this even though I'm not familiar with any of those works. While I did not expect this film to be anywhere near as good as Star Wars, I expected a lot more from this film and it did not deliver at all.

33/100
F

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