Hackers (1995)

Variety
"...A brisk little thriller....Miller and Jolie are appropriately engaging as the romantic leads..." 09/18/1995

Chicago Sun-Times
"...The movie is smart and entertaining....The movie is well directed, written and acted..." 09/15/1995 p.35

ReelViews 6 of 10
The film industry has discovered computers, and the resulting tide of movies about users -- and abusers -- seems impossible to stem. From Disclosure to Virtuosity to The Net, cyberspace is becoming a hot commodity. The latest picture to cash in on this trend is called Hackers and, rather expectedly, deals with a group of computer addicts who have made a pastime of breaking security codes that guard major systems. The headlines occasionally give us news stories about such individuals, but nothing in the real world has come close to the overblown silliness that functions as this film's main storyline...English director Iain Softley, whose last film was Backbeat, puts a lot of high-tech energy into this production. The soundtrack is loud and the camera never stops moving. It's an MTV-style of film making, but it works perfectly for this sort of story. Hackers is always on the move -- there's not a slowly-paced scene or a dull moment to be found. If nothing else, this film won't bore the average viewer. However, when Hackers has been dissected, what's uncovered beneath the flashy skin is an old-fashioned, film-by-numbers thriller. - James Berardinelli
 
San Francisco Chronicle 7 of 10
"Hackers'' is a shamelessly lousy movie but a shamelessly good one, too...Want a believable plot or acting? Forget it. But if you just want knockout images, unabashed eye candy and a riveting look at a complex world that seems both real and fake at the same time, "Hackers'' is one of the most intriguing movies of the year. What it lacks in substance and plausibility it makes up in inventive imagery and deft shadings of a world of scheming cyberpunks...You get the feeling you're watching a video game or computer graphics, which transform into a hostile urban Manhattan scene where technology and people are more interlinked than we want to acknowledge...Hackers, of course, exist in increasing numbers in the real world. But what do they look like? Director Iain Softley ("Backbeat'') faced a real challenge depicting hackers as interesting characters. Real-life hackers are probably as ordinary as sales clerks or bank tellers. "Hackers'' takes a chance showing them as spirited young genius-eccentrics with a punky rock-and-roll edge and streetwise lifestyle. For reasons that don't always compute, they skate and wear punk clothes and exude a leather-centric counterculture attitude. The main hackers are high school kids played by bright, sexy newcomers Jonny Lee Miller and Angelina Jolie (daughter of actor Jon Voight). - Peter Stack