The Running Man - Director: Paul Michael Glaser (1987)

Despite being made in 1987, The Running Man is still a very entertaining and not too dated film. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as Ben Richards, a pilot of a military helicopter gunship who is framed for a massacre and sent to a prison labour camp (the movie is set in 2017). He manages to break out of prison but is later 're-captured' to take part in the world's most famous TV show, The Running Man.

The Running Man is like a more extreme Total Wipeout...prisoners/convicts take part to 'run' through four courses whilst being pursued by stalkers with names such as Subzero, Buzzsaw and Dynamo. The stalkers task is simple; to kill the runners. This is not a lightweight game show, this is one where 'justice' is served although as it transpires later on, it's a manufactured reality TV show where runners are often set up to be 'the baddies' and no one wins.

Based upon Stephen King's novel, The Running Man is actually pretty ahead of its time. With today's TV schedules packed full of reality dross and increasingly perverse tasks, you have to wonder how long it'll be before we do actually have a bloodlust to see live death on TV. The film Untraceable touched upon this and we lap up our multiplex offerings of torture porn with Hostel and Saw, etc... being extremely popular.

It's got some great Arnie one-liners in it of course; whilst chucking a man off a building, Arnie quips 'I'll give you a lift' and refers to the electric-charged Dynamo as 'Hey, Christmas Tree!'. A very enjoyable film.