YEAR: 1988
DIRECTOR: Penny Marshall
PINBALL MODEL(S): Pin·Bot (1986, Williams)
GAME LOCATION: Loft apartment
NOTES: In this urban fantasy, set in the waning years of Reagan's presidency, Tom Hanks plays a boy living the life of an adult. Upon taking a loft-style apartment in NY, he proceeds to fill it with the paraphernalia of youth; none of which was available to him during his modest suburban upbringing.
The pinball machine is, of course, framed as an object of youthful lust, but more intriguingly it takes on a slightly political tone when one considers the consumption-drunk spirit of Reagan-era America. The acquisition of goods—especially those related to entertainment and lifestyle—is one of the defining attributes of this era, and its not surprising that the first impulse of Hanks' character is to (literally) fill the space of his empty new loft/life with material goods. It's an interesting, if not light-hearted, articulation of the prevailing cultural logic of 1980's America.
