(1995) What were the four most commonly used passwords of the mid-1990s? In director Iain Softley's film, those of us who do not belong to the world of computer hackers are introduced to "Conscience of a Hacker," the manifesto written by The Mentor (aka Lloyd Blankenship). According to wikipedia: "It is considered a cornerstone of hacker culture, and it gives some insight into the psychology of early hackers. It is said to have shaped the hacker community's view of itself and its motivations. The Manifesto states that hackers choose to hack because it is a way for them to learn, and because they are often frustrated and bored by the limitations of standard society. It also expresses the satori of a hacker realizing his potential in the realm of computers."

In Seattle in 1988, Dade Murphy (using the handle Zero Cool), an 11-year-old prodigy with a PC, was arrested after setting loose a virus that took down 1,507 financial network system in a single day, causing a seven-point drop on Wall Street; his punishment was being prohibited from using a computer until his 18th birthday. After his seven years of probation, having moved with his divorced mother (Alberta Watson) to New York City, where Dade (Jonny Lee Miller) becomes a senior in an unfamiliar high school, he celebrates his birthday by hacking into a television network and changing the programming. However, as Crash Override he discovers he's trespassed on another hacker's territory; Acid Burn terminates his time in The Outer Limits.

At school he meets Kate Libby (Angelina Jolie), who sends him to the swimming pool on the roof. After getting into the school's computer system, Dade resets the indoor sprinkler system to go on during classes. When Kate asks Dade, who's standing underneath an umbrella in the hallway, what's going on, he says: "The pool on the roof must have a leak." At home when his mother asks, "What did you learn in school today?" he replies: "Revenge."

Eventually Dade makes friends with fellow hackers Cereal Killer (Matthew Lillard), Phreak (Renoly Santiago), Joey Pardella (Jesse Bradford) in search of a handle and respect, Nikon (Lawrence Mason), and Kate. Kids are into telephone tapping, rollerblading, video-arcade games (Dade bests Kate's previous high score), and trying to hack a Gibson supercomputer. The terminology from 1995 - Pentium, RISC architecture, 5 ¼" floppy disks - matches the busy imagery of psychedelic cyberspace with its metropolises of datascrapers, for me being like returning to the fashions and music of the '70s.

Joey gets caught by the anti-hacker team under Secret Service agent Richard Gill (Wendell Pierce), who's computer illiterate but regards hackers as terrorists. In a contest between Crash Override and Acid Burn to determine which is the better hacker - if the latter wins, the former becomes her slave; if the former wins, the latter has to go on a date wearing a dress with the former - agent Gill becomes their victim. The characters are virtual, unreal; the plot lacks subtlety.

In trying to help out Joey, the teens discover that a worldwide ecological disaster is about to take place by capsizing oil tankers operated by the Ellingson Corporation, whose security specialist, Eugene Belford (Fisher Stevens) aka The Plague ("No right and wrong … just fun and boring"), and his accomplice Margo Wallace (Lorraine Bracco) are preparing to frame the hackers ("temporary allies and enemies") to cover their theft of $25 million from the company, using a worm.

Initially Eugene, referring to himself as a keyboard cowboy capable of taking control over the herd of humans, attempts to recover a missing file Joey downloaded by enlisting Dade as his inside informant, giving him a laptop computer and threatening his mother with a trumped-up crime; but Crash Override replies: "I don't play well with others."

The film ends in an actual swimming pool on the roof of a highrise. (Oh yeah, the four most common passwords were "love," "sex," "secret," and "God.") In a bit part Penn Jillette plays the part of Hal, a computer technician for Ellingson. "Hackers of the world unite!"

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Copyright © 2008 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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