The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes

Author: Robert Butler

Disney has tried to make science fiction for decades, and rarely do they manage to make something anywhere near as fun as Kurt Russell's The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes. The story is pretty much the beginning of every Silver Age super hero – Dexter Riley is in the computer lab, there's a lightning storm, he's given all the knowledge of the computer. Oh yeah, and the computer had been used by the mob. Simple, silly, and fun, right? The movie was meant for a teen audience, but even nearly 50 years later, it holds up. Russell has so much charm as Dexter, and the band is misfits he hangs out with are a lot of fun. The film's villain, Arno, is played with a somewhat muted glee by Cesar Romero. He doesn't dive headlong into it like he did with The Joker on Batman, but he's a legitimate heavy who makes the most of every second he's on the screen. Why it's on the list Probably the most realistic of the films that considered the way computers were seen in the late 1960s, coupled with Disney's sometimes weird love for science fiction stories, makes this a must-see!