RUNAWAY. A Fast-Paced 1980s Sci-Fi Action Flick

Runaway is, in broad strokes, a formulaic film—but one that’s very interesting in its details.

The United States, an unspecified point in the future. Automated robots perform most physical labor and services: they remove pests from crops, help construct skyscrapers, cook meals, and take care of children. Sometimes, however, these machines malfunction and become dangerous “runaways.” In such cases, the Runaway Squad is called—a special police unit trained in robotics, tasked with neutralizing faulty robots. Sergeant Jack Ramsay, a top officer in the unit, and his new partner Karen Thompson are assigned to investigate the first-ever murder of humans committed by a household robot. The investigation reveals that the robot had been equipped with unusual microchips that disabled its safety protocols and reprogrammed it for attack mode. The trail leads to Charles Luther—a brilliant but psychopathic inventor of a revolutionary new smart weapon technology.

Undeterred by the commercial failure of his previous film Looker (1981), Michael Crichton once again turned to science fiction, this time grounded in technophobia. However, the American author and filmmaker emphasized that Runaway was not meant as a warning about technology, but rather a futuristic police thriller focused on action. “Movies are about the here and now, about what you see on screen. I don’t see the point of writing a very cinematic book and then making a very literary movie,” Crichton admitted. The film was shot between May and August 1984 in Vancouver, with the lead roles played by Tom Selleck (Ramsay), Cynthia Rhodes (Thompson), and Gene Simmons (Luther)—the musician from the band Kiss. Runaway was released in American theaters in December 1984 and turned out to be a box-office flop. Reviews were mixed as well: for instance, Gene Siskel criticized Selleck’s acting and remarked that after an exciting start, Runaway quickly devolves into “a routine chase thriller.”

There’s a kernel of truth in that last critique: Crichton’s film is a fairly standard police thriller wrapped in a sci-fi setting. The plot is thin and predictable, and the characters come straight from action-movie templates: we have the noble widowed cop raising his son alone, his new inexperienced partner with whom he’ll develop more than just a professional bond, and finally the mad genius with his deadly inventions—like robotic spiders that spit acid. Fortunately, Runaway never pretends to be more than a sci-fi action flick. Unlike other Crichton films (or adaptations of his novels, such as Mike Hodges’s The Terminal Man [1974] or Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park [1993]), it doesn’t offer warnings about unchecked technological advancement, nor does it delve into philosophical or ethical questions. Instead, it delivers fast-paced, albeit formulaic action and an engaging, if nonsensical, plot.

But there’s something else in Runaway—something surprisingly accurate, though likely accidental: futurology. The world Crichton created is remarkably believable and far more compelling than the stereotypical characters and clichéd storyline—especially since what was mere speculation in 1984 has, over forty years later, become part of our everyday reality. The filmmakers managed to foresee not only household robots, but also camera drones, voice-controlled devices, biometric security, digital photo retouching, autonomous vehicles, wireless headsets, voice assistants like Alexa, portable tablets, remotely guided mini-missiles (a.k.a. smart bullets), video mail, and even the global information network—essentially, the internet. The most fascinating elements of Runaway, then, live on the periphery of the film itself.