Beyond the Marquee was recently on hand in the heart of Hollywood for the 30th Anniversary Celebration for the iconic 1982 Disney film TRON. Original crew and die-hard fans showed up to the historic Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood to rejoice in the film that 3 decades ago was heralded as groundbreaking digital technology. In case your Light-cycle was in the shop or your Recognizer ran out of gas on the way to tinsel-town, don’t worry, now is your chance to live vicariously thru us! Host Kat Sheridan took to the GRID Carpet to chat it up with all the guests and find out why the movie has endured for so long. She even caught up with TRON himself, Bruce Boxleitner, as he shares his memories of the film as well. Click ahead to see the full UNCUT interview with Bruce as well. 

It’s hard to believe thirty years has passed since Disney’s TRON debuted in theaters in 1982 to wide-eyed audiences who followed the adventures of a video game programmer who get’s digitized into a computer. Even back then, as ground-breaking as the film was, it was greatly under-appreciated for the leaps and bounds in digital effects that it brought to cinema. Unlike films in the past, the combination of old-fashioned filmmaking and cutting edge (for the early 80’s) computer technology gave birth to a movie unlike any the world had seen before, a world within a video game, where computer programs were not just 1’s and 0’s but were realistic characters with personalities and conflicts of their own. It was an eye-opening breath of fresh air that tackled complex challenges of backlit compositing, old-fashioned visual effects imagery, minimal budgets, computer animation, rotoscoping and the use of multiple formats of media. While jaw-dropping for it’s time, some of the film’s visual effects may look crude and dated today in comparison to the smooth and polished advancements of CGI technology, there is a great appreciation for this film by fans and filmmakers alike. For what the film achieved then and the elements within that have stood solid all these years later, it is a great testament to . PIXAR’s own founder John Lasseter has said on numerous occasions that it was TRON who inspired his career in digital animation and legions of others in the entertainment industry owe their careers to the pixel power of a film that braved a brand new frontier in motion pictures. With a recently successful sequel (Tron Legacy), a current hit animated TV series (Tron Uprising) and from the excitement at the recent 30th Anniversary Event in Hollywood,  it doesn’t seem like the nostalgia and sheer awesomeness of TRON is going away anytime soon!

Beyond the Marquee – UNCUT: (Bruce Boxleitner)

TRON 30TH Anniversary Celebration Event poster

BTM Host Kat Sheridan chats with Bruce Boxleitner (aka TRON) on the GRID Carpet outside of Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood for the 30th Anniversary TRON Celebration Event

Light-Cycles race across the digital game grid in the 1982 film TRON

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The Beyond the Marquee team on the Grid Carpet GRID Carpet outside of Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood for the 30th Anniversary TRON Celebration Event (L-R) Steve Czarnecki, Derek Easley and Kat Sheridan

(L-R) Jeff Bridges (Flynn), Cindy Morgan (Yori) and Bruce Boxleitner (TRON)

(L-R) Kat Sheridan, Harrison Ellenshaw and Steve Czarnecki