The Running Man

The Running Man is a American science fiction action film from 1987 starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Maria Conchita Alonso, Richard Dawson, Jesse Ventura and Jim Brown where in a dystopian United States between 2017 an 2019 about a television game show called The Running Man where convicted criminals (or "runners") must escape death at the hands of professional killers (or "stalkers"). It is very loosely based on the 1982 novel of the same name written by famed horror writer Stephen King and was published under the pseudonym by Richard Bachman.

Premise
In 2017, after a worldwide economic collapse, the United States has becomes 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 Kilian (played by 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.

By 2019, Ben Richards (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) a police helicopter pilot wrongly convicted of a massacre during a food riot in Bakersfield, California; escapes from a labor camp with two rescue fighters, Weiss and Laughlin (played by Marvin J. Mclntyre and Yaphet Kotto respectively), and finds refuge at a resistance camp headed by the leader, Mic. Instead of joining the resistance, Richards seeks shelter at his brother's apartment. He finds it is now occupied by Amber Mendez, a composer for ICS, the network that broadcasts The Running Man. Richards asks Mendez about the whereabouts of his brother and she says the he was taken for "re-education".

Taking Amber hostage, Richards attempts to flee to Hawaii, but she alerts airport security and Richards is captured and taken to ICS. There, Killian coerces him into participating in The Running Man in exchange for Laughlin and Weiss not participating, but Richards learns that Killian had enrolled him them as runners anyway and swears revenge.

As the game begins, Richards and his friends are attacked by the first stalker "Subzero" but they fight back, with Richards killing Subzero - the first time a stalker has ever died on the show. Then Laughlin and Weiss search for the network's uplink facilities, which they realize are in the game zone. Amber sees a falsified news report on Richards' capture and suspicious of the media's veracity does some investigating, she learns the truth about the massacre, but is captured by her own ICS colleagues and sent into the game zone.

The runners split up, each pair pursued by a different stalker. "Buzzsaw" critically wounds Laughlin, but is killed by Richards. Weiss and Amber locate the uplink and learns the access codes, but "Dynamo" finds them and electrocutes Weiss. Amber's screams lead Richards to her and as the two evade Dynamo, the stalker's buggy flips, trapping him inside. Refusing to kill a helpless opponent, Richards leaves Dynamo alive. He and Amber then return to Laughlin, who before dying, says the resistance has a hideout within the game zone.

Back at ICS, Killian sees Richards' popularity growing with viewers betting on him instead of the stalkers. Off-camera, Killian tries to offer Richards a job as a stalker, but when Richards refuses, Killian sends the next stalker "Fireball". Fireball chases them into an abandoned factory, where Amber discovers the decomposing corpses of the previous seasons' "winners" - realizing that they were killed by Fireball and their victory was faked. Fireball goes after Amber, but Richards rescues her and kills him using his own weaponry.

Frustrated and running out of options, Killian seeks "Captain Freedom" a retired stalker to kill them. However, when Freedom refuses, the network creates digital body doubles of Freedom, Richards and Amber, which are then used to fake Richards' and Amber's deaths on screen. In the game zone, Richards and Amber are found by Mic and taken to the resistance's hideout, where they learn of their "deaths" Using the access codes, the rebels get into ICS' control room, broadcasting footage that exonerates Richards and reveals the truth about the game's previous "winners". As Richards heads to the main studio floor, shocking the audience who had watched him supposedly die, Amber fights and kills Dynamo, the last remaining stalker.

Richards confronts Killian after having dealt with security, who tried to kill him and the audience to cover up everything, not knowing it was being broadcast. Killian begs for his life, saying he crated the show to appease the U.S. love of reality television and televise violence. In response, Richards decides to give the audience what they want right now by sending Killian to the game zone in a rocket sled. The sled hits a Cadre Cola billboard featuring Killian himself and explodes, killing Killian to the delight of the audience. Both Richards and Amber then romantically walk out of the studio.

Merchandise
In 1989, A video game based on the film of the same name was released for the MSX, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC and Atari ST. It was developed by Emerald Software Ltd and was published by Grandslam Entertainment.