I remember watching this when I was a little younger, mid teens I think, and at that time being able to get a home computer to access any other computer via a phone line took someone with the brain of Einstein’s tutor and a computer the size of Buckingham palace with a conservatory fitted to the side, but considering the most modern computers at the time where the Commodore 64, the ZX80, ZX81, Sinclair Spectrum and then there was the Atari, and with these home computers having at the most a 1MHz CPU and less than 100 kilobytes of RAM the chances of ’hacking’ into anything other than the weed at the bottom of your garden was pretty remote. (and think about it, the world wide web was not even an idea in Tim Berners-Lee head at the time…oh for the old days without computer viruses and spam).

After two US Air force officers fail in their ‘silo’ duties during a simulated Nuclear strike they are replaced by a ‘supercomputer’ named War Operation Plan Response, or WOPR for short, which will predict the outcome of a Nuclear strike and also eliminate the possibility of human error during a Nuclear threat.

When this was first aired in the mid eighties it was well received by the public, and I suppose at the time this was top of the range computer hacking movie with that end of the world fright factor, but this day and age it is simply a good movie which would fall flat on its face if it was released today. But when you watch this as long as you remember it was released over twenty years ago then you will enjoy the rather ‘prehistoric’ action thriller as it is supposed to be enjoyed.

The acting is pretty good throughout the movie, (it is the mid eighties remember), with Broderick playing Lightman, the teenage ’hacker’ with the ability to start a war from his bedroom, very well indeed, although looking a little wooden in parts. And Ally Sheedy as his close friend Jennifer, with her flirty ways and cheerful mannerism.
There are many supporting cast members, mainly military members, but each one seeming to have as an important role as the other, bringing together a rather nail biting movie without the over the top special effect and CGIs

The DVD was released in July 2000 and is a lot better picture/sound quality, but the movie was still the same hour and fifty minutes of entertainment, albeit sometimes on the silly side.
Extras on the DVD, which can be bought form www.amazon.co.uk for less than a fiver, are nothing to write home about but consist of director and writers commentary, a little bit of information about the movie and the original trailer.