AppleWorks in the Hot Tub Time Machine
| Filed under Mainstream coverage; 2 comments. |
Some movies make strong first impressions that don’t always prove accurate. Hot Tub Time Machine‘s name and trailer led me to believe it was an immature, over-the-top guy flick. Imagine my surprise when it actually received good reviews. Its quick release on DVD gave me the opportunity to try it at no cost, courtesy the local library, and I was pleasantly surprised by what I found: an immature, over-the-top guy flick that was actually fun, funny, and clever. But that’s not all I found.
When the four main characters first time-travel from present day back to 1986, they’re unaware of their situation. It’s only when they step into a ski lodge and are assaulted with the memorabilia and styles of the era that they begin to grasp what has happened. It’s a very quick montage in which they are presented with leg warmers, tape decks, Ronald Reagan, and…
Wait, what’s that?!
Faster than someone reaching for the mute button during a vuvuzela concert, I rewound and paused the film and engaged in a slow-motion crawl through the scene. Sure enough, I spotted the object of my desire:
What says the Eighties like an Apple II?
Behold: this ski lodge is powered by an Apple IIc with a missing key and a copy of AppleWorks. What version of the software is in use and what the files and timestamps are, I can’t tell without a higher resolution look at the scene. But we can see that word processor, database, and spreadsheet files are all in evidence.
I wonder what production crew member dug into his archives and volunteered this hardware to appear on the silver screen? What a fun interview that would be!
Wow, how did I miss that? I remember catching a glimpse of the IIc, but not AppleWorks. I’ll have to add HTTM to my Netflix queue.
If you can get a closer look at the screen, I’d much appreciate a report back with more details about what AppleWorks is doing in this scene!