The Running Man (1987 film)
| The Running Man | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Paul Michael Glaser |
| Produced by | George Linder Tim Zinnemann |
| Screenplay by | Steven E. de Souza |
| Based on |
The Running Man 1982 novel by Richard Bachman (pseudonym for Stephen King) |
| Starring | |
| Music by | Harold Faltermeyer |
| Cinematography | Thomas Del Ruth |
| Edited by |
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Production
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| Distributed by |
TriStar Pictures (North America) Republic Pictures (Europe) |
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Release date
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Running time
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101 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $27 million |
| Box office | $38,122,105 (US) |
The Running Man is a 1987 American science fiction Technicolor action film in Panavision directed by Paul Michael Glaser and starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, María Conchita Alonso, Jesse Ventura, Jim Brown and Richard Dawson. It is very loosely based on the 1982 novel The Running Man, written by Stephen King and published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman. The story, set in a dystopian United States between 2017 and 2019, is about a television show called "The Running Man", where convicted criminal "runners" must escape death at the hands of professional killers.
Original director Andrew Davis was fired one week into filming and replaced by Glaser. Schwarzenegger has stated this was a "terrible decision" as Glaser "shot the movie like it was a television show, losing all the deeper themes". Schwarzenegger believes this hurt the movie.Paula Abdul is credited with the choreography of the Running Man dance troupe.
In 2017, after a worldwide economic collapse, American society has become a totalitarian police state, censoring all cultural activity. The U.S. government pacifies the populace by broadcasting game shows where convicted criminals fight for their lives, including the gladiator-style The Running Man, hosted by the ruthless Damon Killian (Richard Dawson), where "runners" attempt to evade "stalkers", armed mercenaries, around a large arena, and near-certain death for a chance to be pardoned by the state.
Two years later, Ben Richards (Arnold Schwarzenegger), a police helicopter pilot wrongly convicted of a massacre during a food riot in Bakersfield, California, escapes from a labor camp and seeks shelter at his brother's apartment. He finds it is now occupied by Amber Mendez (María Conchita Alonso), a composer for ICS, the network that broadcasts The Running Man. Richards asks Mendez about the whereabouts of his brother, and she says that he was taken for "re-education", possibly hinting at his fate.
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Wikipedia