The Warriors (1979)

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Overview:

Cyrus

The Warriors is set in a dark, alternate future New York City. Hundreds of rival street gangs control territories throughout the city. At the beginning of the film, representatives of most of the gangs are summoned to Central Park for one large meeting. This meeting is conducted by Cyrus, the leader of the Gramercy Riffs, the biggest gang in the city. At this meeting Cyrus proposes all the gangs join together as one large gang to take over the city. However, something goes wrong and the representing members of The Warriors gang are on the run. The rest of the film follows The Warriors as they try to make it home to Coney Island.

While the film is set in the future, nothing about the film is actually futuristic. To its credit, the film has such a vague setting that it avoids dating itself.

The majority of the film takes place at night. Bright, reflected lights and neon colors are a visual theme. Before the film began production cinematographer Andrew Laszlo asked director Walter Hill if an early scene in the movie could have rain. This would establish the "wet" look of the film and allow for watered-down streets to reflect lights.

Ultimate Director's Cut

In 2005 Paramount released a new version of The Warriors called The Warriors: Ultimate Director's Cut. While not substantially different from the original 1979 release, this new edition does include the "comic-book-style" scene transitions director Walter Hill originally envisioned. This edition also contains four behind-the-scenes featurettes about the creation of the film and its release.

Adaptations

Games

The Warriors Game

In 2005 Rockstar Games, the creators of the Grand Theft Auto series, released a video game based on The Warriors. It was a beat-em-up in which the player can take control of multiple members of The Warriors. The story took place both before and during the events of the film. Some actors from the film reprise their roles in the game, including Michael Beck as Swan.

The game was released for the Xbox, Playstation 2, PSP and later as a download on the Playstation Network. Critically, the game was well-received, with the Xbox version achieving an aggregate score of 85 on the website Metacritic.

In 2009 Paramount Digital Entertainment released a download-only game called The Warriors: Street Brawl. It was a much smaller game than Rockstar's released, containing very basic side-scrolling beat-em-up gameplay and no missions. This game did not receive the same positive reviews as its predecessor, receiving only a score of 40 on Metacritic.