History Film / OverdrawnAtTheMemoryBank

InAWorld where oppressive {{MegaCorp}}s rake in billions of ill-earned dollars while treating their [[{{Salaryman}} workers]] like slaves... a Toronto production company decided to adapt one of Creator/JohnVarley's ''Literature/EightWorlds'' short stories into a MadeForTVMovie. Finding financing from New York Creator/{{PBS}} station WNET and [[WTHCastingAgency somehow acquiring]] RaulJulia as the lead, they unleashed a production called [[PunBasedTitle Overdrawn at the Memory Bank]].

* ActingForTwo: Fingal's scenes with "Rick".

* InherentlyFunnyWords: "Anteaters". It's the only explanation for the constant anteater bashing. Same with "Fingal," which the MST3K crew gets a lot of mileage from in their treatment of the movie.

* MisappliedPhlebotinum: In this future world, they apparently have the technology to remove someone's mind and transfer it to other bodies, and nobody is using it for immortality or life-saving procedures. Instead it is being used to place people's minds into animals for brief periods of time.

** In the author's other works in that universe, it is made clear that the primary application of the memory recording technology _is_ for that purpose, although when restored, your memories are only as recent as your last recording, with someone who doesn't make regular backups being regarded as poor hygiene.

* PlayfulHacker: Fingal just wants to watch classic movies... when he should be working.

* SmallReferencePools: Fingal's ''Casablanca'' simulation comes complete with a PeterLorre character who hangs around for almost the whole movie before he helpfully sacrifices himself to buy time for Fingal. In ''Casablanca'', Lorre's character Ugarte is a OneSceneWonder who shows up, gives Rick the {{Macguffin}} and then dies off screen.

** As well as the concept of screwing around watching films while at work.

* WeWillUseWikiWordsInTheFuture: "Reconst," "flavo-fibes," "identicubes;" Servo snaps fairly early. "Medico," surprisingly, is an informal term for doctor or med student recognized by Microsoft Word and Firefox.

At first Fingal creates a simulation of a typical work day, but he quickly grows bored and starts boinking a simulacrum of a hot co-worker. Once cybersex loses its charm, Fingal builds his own version of Casablanca, complete with a Rick character that is his own digital double. Apollonia warns him not to cause too much trouble, but our Fingal is a little rebel, and starts messing around with Novicorp finances while inside the [=HX368=], also [[WhatTheHellHero causing catastrophic weather disasters around the globe in a fit of whimsy]]. Soon the Chairman is dispatching his own electronic agents to kill Fingal, while Apollonia sides with the renegade programmer as she tracks down his body.

* InherentlyFunnyWords: "Anteaters". It's the only explanation for the constant anteater bashing. Same with "Fingal," which the MTS3K crew gets a lot of mileage from.

* InherentlyFunnyWords: "Anteaters". It's the only explanation for the constant anteater bashing.

* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotSymbolic: At one point Apollonia confronts Fingal in the computer to try to dissuade him from messing with the computer systems, appearing out of the sky like a Messenger Of God, complete with a CherubicChoir, GodivaHair and two stone tablets. "Thou shalt not screw around with things thou dost not understand. Thou shalt not meddle in Novicorp hardware, or Novicorp shall hold thee responsible! Thou shalt not break out of [=HX368=]! Thou shalt not program!"

In a future that is only marginally more dystopian than the present, [[AwesomeMcCoolname Aram Fingal]] is a bored programmer working for [[MegaCorp Novicorp]], and earns his superiors's ire by "scrolling up cinemas" at work, particularly ''{{Casablanca}}''. The solution, of course, is "prophylactic rehab," a two-week (or two days, depending on the scene) vacation in which his consciousness is "doppled" into a wild animal at a nature preserve. Under the supervision of Computech Apollonia James, Fingal experiences life as a decrepit old baboon until the animals on the preserve get trashed on ripe fruit and [[HolodeckMalfunction place his temporary body in danger]], prompting him to activate an escape clause.

* WhatTheHellHero: Apollonia gives Fingal a well-deserved thrashing when she catches him using his "powers" to make a co-worker have sex with him.

** The film itself may have been trying to follow ''{{Tron}}''.

* HardWorkHardlyWorks: Zig-zagged. To pass the time, Fingal takes a computer programming course. Since time is accelerated for him, it seems to take months for him while it takes only hours in the real world. It felt like six real months of effort to him, though.

* YearInsideHourOutside: In the short story, they told Fingal that they were searching for his body all over the world, at various doppling institutes, for six months, when really they were searching for his body at the one institute for six hours. But had he ever realized that because he was in the computer he was experiencing time dilation, he would have GoneMadFromTheRevelation and broken everything. (The Literature/NineteenEightyFour elements were [[ExecutiveMeddling not present in the story]], and the company was really just trying to be helpful.) This element was somewhat in the film with the "Cube Time/Fingal Time" display, but never really discussed.

* InherentlyFunnyWords: "Fingal."
** "You want to tinkle, Fingal? How 'bout some pringles, Fingal?"
** "You make me tingle Fingal? Fingal, are you single? Give me a jingle."
** "I've got spurs that Jingle Jangle Jingle."
** "Please, I can see your little Fingal."

* JapanTakesOverTheWorld: Not really, but the corporate world everywhere seems to have adopted the Keiretsu system.

*** There's really no indication that ''anything'' extends beyond two office buildings.

**** Both of which are [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atrium_on_Bay The Atrium on Bay]]. ''Yaaaay Toronto!''

-->-- '''[[MysteryScienceTheater3000 Crow T. Robot]]'''

InAWorld where oppressive {{MegaCorp}}s rake in billions of ill-earned dollars while treating their [[{{Salaryman}} workers]] like slaves... a Toronto production company decided to adapt one of Creator/JohnVarley's ''Literature/EightWorlds'' short stories into a MadeForTVMovie. Finding financing from New York {{PBS}} station WNET and [[WTHCastingAgency somehow acquiring]] RaulJulia as the lead, they unleashed a production called [[PunBasedTitle Overdrawn at the Memory Bank]].

For the ''MysteryScienceTheater3000'' version of the film, please go to the [[Recap/MysteryScienceTheater3000S08E22OverdrawnAtTheMemoryBank episode recap page]].

**** Both of which are [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atrium_on_Bay The Atrium on Bay]]. ''Yaaaay [[HollywoodNorth Toronto]]!''

At a final showdown at Rick's bar, Fingal "interfaces" with the mainframe, orders the Chairman into a month of compulsory rehab, redistributes Novicorp shares to the downtrodden employees, and makes new ''Casablanca''-themed identities for himself and Apollonia as he vows to fight the system. It's like if someone combined ''FightClub'', ''[[Literature/NineteenEightyFour 1984]]'' and ''TheMatrix''...

* FollowTheLeader: Amazingly, the film, made in 1984, is far ahead of its time. It would be another 10 plus years before the virtual reality craze began, including films like ''TheMatrix''.

*** Predates the ''StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' holodeck by three years. (Though ''StarTrekTheAnimatedSeries'' did sometimes use something similar.)

InAWorld where oppressive {{MegaCorp}}s rake in billions of ill-earned dollars while treating their [[{{Salaryman}} workers]] like slaves... a Toronto production company decided to adapt a Creator/JohnVarley short story into a MadeForTVMovie. Finding financing from New York {{PBS}} station WNET and [[WTHCastingAgency somehow acquiring]] RaulJulia as the lead, they unleashed a production called [[PunBasedTitle Overdrawn at the Memory Bank]].

InAWorld where oppressive {{MegaCorp}}s rake in billions of ill-earned dollars while treating their [[{{Salaryman}} workers]] like slaves... a Toronto production company decided to adapt a JohnVarley short story into a MadeForTVMovie. Finding financing from New York {{PBS}} station WNET and [[WTHCastingAgency somehow acquiring]] RaulJulia as the lead, they unleashed a production called [[PunBasedTitle Overdrawn at the Memory Bank]].