MovieChat Forums > Takedown (2000) Discussion > Hackers 2, I think not...

Hackers 2, I think not...

posted 21 years ago by carbocookie
40 replies | jump to latest

O.K. this movie is often called Hackers 2, but this film has absolutely nothing to do with the mildly entertaining yet completely stupid and irrelevent movie Hackers. There are none of the same characters, this movie doesn't follow up on any of the plot elements of Hackers, this movie is based on actual events and Hackers is a complete fantasy, and this movie is actually realistic in most respects, in fact the only thing these two movies have in common is the fact that there are hackers in them and it pretty much ends there. I think that this movie should always be referred to as Takedown and never, ever as Hackers 2, it's like calling Men In Black a sequel to the movie Alien, it doesn't make any sense.

[–] bdimag 21 years ago

i completely agree and it annoys me just as much.. what can ya do though? :\

[–] 21 years ago

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[–] NzA21 20 years ago

these guys know nothing about hacking, the writers i mean, they're both idiots and both will probably go to hell. Read this article and understand why http://www.rotten.com/library/bio/hackers/kevin-mitnick/

[–] snuggle 20 years ago

They know about as much as you, I'm sure.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] snuggle 20 years ago

I'm very sure. Wtf do you mean try you?

[–] smbuvideo 21 years ago

They started calling it "Hackers 2" because the first Hackers movie was incredibly fake and wanted to show what "real" hacking/cracking was about. I'm sure a few people thought it was a sequel, so they went to see/rent it. The proper name is Takedown, the bootleg name is Hackers 2; no relation however.

[–] sark-2 21 years ago

I think we should start calling movies sequels to totally unrelated movies.

HARRY AND THE HENDERSONS 2: FINAL DESTINATION
EVENT HORIZON 2: THE HORSE WHISPERER
MIMIC 3: SUPERNOVA

etc. etc. A fine marketing technique indeed!

[–] pHo 21 years ago

its a bootleg title, so it has NO meaning. it was never known as Hackers 2 officially, just on pirate copies.

if you've ever seen the asian bootleg market, there's plenty of movies marked up as Titanic 2 or Blade 2 (a week after blade 1 was out) etc, and they have no relation to the real movies. its a tactic in order to convince stupid people to buy the pirates.

why anyone thought it was a good idea to add the "Hackers 2" bootleg title to the imdb description is beyond me, as people now think its Hackers 2 because of this site, and this site alone. admin should remove it, or add "The Lord of the Rings : The Two Towers" to the dozens of 80s fantasy movies that were sold labelled as that in malaysia/thailand last year... sigh

[–] Hi-Rez 21 years ago

ok.
first off, the only things i agree with so far is that Hackers was a mildly entertaining flick (come on, jonny lee miller, angelina jolie, least there was eye candy), even though it had nothign to do with real hackers...

and that bootleg titles are stupid, and prey on the weak of mind to convince them to buy a movie (illegally mind you) that they don't really want once they pop it in the player.

that said, there is the departure?
which of you immature little morons actually thinks this movie is realistic? HELLO!?!

i suggest you wake up, and smell your asses on fire.

first off, this movie claims to be the truth, and based on the real life events in notrious hacker kevin mitnick.
wow, well, for those of you mooks who don't know, which is obviously all of you, this movie was filmed, and on the shelf long before kevins real trial took place. furthermore, kevin, and shimomura only ever met "face to face" in a courtroom during kevins araignment. no words were ever spoken between them.

have yourself a looksy at the movie "freedom downtime" it is a documentary, sorry, no hollywood glitz, and you will not see skeet ulrich in it...

oh, for the record, it was produced by Emmanuel Goldstien, (whom mathew lillards character in hackers was a tribute to), whom actually knows kevin.

[–] mighty2000 21 years ago

Amen Hi-Rez...FREE KEVIN. Who the hell cares about the stupid title of the movie? The movie is truly an injustice to Kevin, because it exposes him to the public for something he didn't even do.

You all have to realize that this man was put in a MAXIMUM security prison for nearly 4 years WITHOUT a trial. They just locked him up! And Miramax wanting to capitialize on this sort of circumstance, while twisting the truth, is just sick.

I'm not going to even acknowledge that this movie even exists.

THIS MOVIE IS PURE SCIENCE FICTION!!! take it that way.

M2k

[–] 21 years ago

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[–] 21 years ago

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[–] revenant83 20 years ago

Interesting post, but I think you meant "indiscriminately," instead of "indiscreetly." The former means without regard to consequence, the latter means non-covert, or openly.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] snuggle 20 years ago

Was that supposed to be related to something in this thread?

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] snuggle 20 years ago

No, I was referring to the other thing I replied to.

[–] razorgod 19 years ago

"its a bootleg title, so it has NO meaning. it was never known as Hackers 2 officially, just on pirate copies. "

I just wanted to let you know, that isn't ENTIRELY true. My family owns a video store and I remember ordering this film, as Hackers 2: The Takedown.
I even remember getting a movie poster in our advertisement kits, with Hackers 2 on the poster. But when the Video arrived, Hackers 2 was nowhere to be seen. So to say that it was NEVER officially titled Hackers 2 is incorrect, but it was NEVER to my knowledge actually printed on the movie box.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] Vassago 20 years ago

There is no "Hackers 2". The title of the movie is "Takedown". "Hackers 2" was merely the "title" given to its illegal release by imbecile bootleggers, in the usual display of their intellectual forte. Therefore, it's absolutely irrelevant and meaningless - a bunch of 8 year olds and their grandma could name this film "Gummi Bears vs the Smurfs", and it would be exactly as valid as the bootleggers' "idea".

[–] MiNX-TEK 20 years ago

Okay, I downloaded Takedown a long long time ago, and deleted it cause I thought it was some other movie (as in, not Hackers 2). Anyway, I tried looking for the REAL Hackers 2 movie (before readint this thread) and didnt find a damn thing. BUT, I did however (Amazon.com) find soundtracks for Hackers 2, and Hackers 3, whats up with that? If any one knows anything about this, please to reply.

[–] snuggle 20 years ago

They're sequals to the phenominal soundtrack.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] andrew-591 20 years ago

I think hackers was a great movie, especially the music. The plot might not be very good, but having a movie based on the subject of hacking is rare indeed. A seqeul would be fabulous. And Takedown was BORING!!

[–] lordmola 20 years ago

I agree. I think they called it Hackers 2 just to make more people go see it. It's all about the money.

[–] you_know_what_it_is 20 years ago

Pho was the only person who was right in this entire thread, The copy floating around on the internet was called "hackers 2", nothing more nothing less.

But Anyways I too think its ridiclous to call this hackers 2, I think ever who was the first to do that, is completely stupid.

And its ridiclous to say it was called hackers 2 for the money, mainly because movies based on "hackers" rarely do good, or even make theater, Only "computer" people who think they have some knowledge about hacking, Watch movies like these, I'm not saying all "hacker" movies flop, but most do.

And I'm not saying that to be cocky, because I dont know anything about hacking.

[–] r00t3d 20 years ago

Ok, first off, lets dispell some internet lingo for you people.

Hacker - someone who hacks for the purpose of gaining knowledge. a lot of the time its also a power trip, ie, they are able to get into a system once thought to be secure. no damage is done, nothing is harmed.

Cracker - someone who hack with the sole intent of doing damage. these are the more malicious of people and are typically rare. they can cause minor damage (such as a webpage defacement) or total damage (such as system failure, etc). either way, it was done with the sole intent of doing damage.

Now, I'm not gonna badger on the ethics of either, or on the validity of the movie Hackers, or even on why Takedown was called Hackers 2. but the point is, ITS NOT HACKERS 2. Who care's if some dipshit bootlegger wanted to boost his download stats by calling it Hackers 2?

before people go off on rants on why this movie sucked or on why Hackers sucked, they need to get a few points straight.

For one, Hackers was made at the height of the dotcom boom to make a buck. pure and simple. it was pure money making at its horrid worse. Think about the movie "The Wizard" with Fred Savage. That was pure Nintendo propaganda. To make money!

Now, Kevin Mitnick is called the "most notorious hacker" of our time. its because he's the only one they've arrested and thrown in jail. yes, virus writers get put in jail all the time, but they arent hackers. and Mitnick wasnt even given due process. He's out now, though, and thats a good thing. But, dude can't even touch a computer.

Put two and two together people before you decide to try and cypher out the theory of relativity.

anyways, sorry for kicking a dead horse...

[–] snuggle 20 years ago

[hacker vs cracker spiel]

Thank you! That was very informative and arbitrary.

Who care's if some dipshit bootlegger wanted to boost his download stats by calling it Hackers 2?

The more logical explanation is that street vendors were trying to capitalize on the mindshare of Hackers, a very common practice.

For one, Hackers was made at the height of the dotcom boom to make a buck. pure and simple.

1995 was not the height of the dot-com boom. In fact, most people didn't have decent Internet access. The movie was however made to make a buck, a very good observation.

Now, Kevin Mitnick is called the "most notorious hacker" of our time. its because he's the only one they've arrested and thrown in jail.

Or, hey, maybe because Markoff put an exponential spin on things and everything ended with a rather extended nation-wide man-hunt. That sounds marginally better.

But, dude can't even touch a computer.

His probation is over. Welcome to January of 2003. He's a computer security consultant.

Put two and two together people before you decide to try and cypher out the theory of relativity.

Put your eyes and a dictionary together before you decide to try and use "cypher" in a sentence.

r00ted, you say...

[–] pHo 19 years ago

FINALLY

imdb have removed that Hackers 2 aka. at least now we can reduce the amount of poeple who refer to this as a sequel to hackers. its amazing when a film full of kids "hacking" in 3D is so much more superior to a film that is supposed to tell the truth. (personally, i think Hackers is a wonderfully fun movie and has so much rewatch potential, and Takedown is just nasty propaganda.)

This is where i'd insert the standard Fear and Loathing sig. but there's just not enough space.

[–] shmulik123123 19 years ago

hackers: fiction or not, it's a great movie that got you pumped up.
takedown: is ok and nice, but not true. but it's nice to see a hacker movie with social engineering and trashing.

hackers soundtrack = the soundtrack for the movie (official soundtrack)
hackers soundtrack 2 & 3 = soundtracks made by people inspired by the first soundtrack.

one good thing takedown writers did is show kevin isn't all that supernatural uberhacker, and showed him as not guilty (although the script idea was taken from the book by markoff that is pointing the finger at mitnick)

btw: freedom downtime dvd has easter eggs (and a competition to find them with great prizes in www.2600.com)

also watch "war games", "project manhattan", and documentaries

+ mitnick is more a phreaker than a hacker.

[–] gh0stface 19 years ago

I dont see why, in germany and austria, the movie got released as Hackers 2: Takedown, so while it might still be stupid the aka is justified

[–] wjmeyer 19 years ago

Hey, does anyone know where to get that one movie about Kevin Mitnick, it was called Hackers 2?

[–] apextreme 19 years ago

Kevin Mitnick says Mirimax demonized him.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] PacoDeth 19 years ago

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/1999/mitnick.background/

The Truth, or so you would hope coming from CNN. About Kevin and his jailtime.