Why do some people complain this movie is hard to follow?

I agree. I fail to see what's difficult to understand. I thought this movie was innovative and ahead of it's time as far back as the late 80s/early 90s (I'm not old enough to have thought all that when it came out).

I think people find it hard to follow because it is a shallow movie. There is no 'reading between the lines' like most films. If anyone who's confused about it is told that it's shallow, they'll know exactly what the movie was about. I'll admit it myself, I was waiting for something to happen, and it just didn't happen.


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I was totally unsure about the motivations for the characters and what was literally happening on screen half the time. Incredibly hard to follow, and I'm a Film Studies major.

I know a bit about computers but I am no genius. I think the main reason it is hard to follow is because it is somewhat of a slow and boring movie at first. I was lost most of the way through the movie trying to understand what the point of it all was. Obviously I understood he was sucked into a game and is forced to fight for his life with the help of some friendly programs written by their "users" but even still, the point of the movie is skewed. It seems more like an endless maze of the characters having no ultimate goal and just blindly following any path thrown to them. I would say that it is the writers faults.

On top of all that I saw the sequel first...so I had to grip the major differences between this film and that one. Correct me if I am wrong. Flyyn is somehow inspired by the events in this movie to make "The Grid" 7 years later with the same characters only instead of building a game, he builds a digital civilization which takes on a mind of its own.
I could see back in the 80's this being a spectacular film. But to standards today, it is very dull.
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I think people are just dumb though, that might be the issue.

I remember thinking it was hard to follow when I first saw it in 1982. I think a biggest reason is so many of the characters look basically the same except for the black and white image of their face. The inconsistent coloring mentioned in the trivia doesn't help that either. There was also a lot of poor transitions due to the limitations of the technology and some odd scenes like the gridbugs that didn't go anywhere. Watching it now it's not confusing, but that's because I already know the story.

That why I liked this movie, it's very easy for a kid to follow (good vs evil), and yet there is much more going on if you think about it (the program's religious belief in the users, people and programs deep down being alike in some ways, programs and users just wanting freedom and justice, the user has special powers over then programs).

I wouldn't say it's hard to follow unless the people watching it are more the partier types than that want to drink and talk more than watch (yes, I know a few people like that).

It's much easier to follow that the Matrix 2 and 3.

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