English cinema has a long history of horror films and they always come up with interesting ideas to scare the audience. Some work, some don’t. The Tower was a made for TV movie from the early 1990s. It explores the techno-horror genre. It was written by John Riley and directed by Richard Kletter.

A “Tower”, a high rise building is the central character of the movie. It is a “smart” office building run by artificial intelligence. It is designed in a way to ensure it safeguards itself from all things it perceives as a threat and proceeds to eliminate or “delete” the threat by the use of technology. That is the central theme of the movie. Is your workplace really safe in the world of AI? That is perhaps the question posed in this movie.

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The Plot

The film begins with a terrifying scene. A harmless bird is perched on top of the tower. The tower perceives it as a threat to security and kills it with the help of the ventilation system. “Security Breach Deleted” is the message displayed on the computer screen.

This is an introduction to the Tower, which is a “smart” building with state of the art features. It makes use of Artificial Intelligence to smoothly run the building’s operations and detect and delete any security threat.

The Tower is the headquarters of a company called Intercorp. Its 6.00 a.m. and time to open the offices. Mr Wilson (Richard Grant), the security in-charge walks in. He is greeted by CAS (Cybernetic Access Structure), which is the main computer in the basement of the building. It “talks” and sounds like a modern virtual assistant (Alexa!).

Wilson activates all the security zones in the building. CAS gives the time and temperature and all sundry information that you can request if you have the correct code (like baseball scores and so on). CAS waters the plants and fills up the coffee machines. Wilson enjoys his coffee while CAS does the work! That’s the advantage of a smart building.

CAS confirms all is O.K. but this is going to change soon with the arrival of a new employee.

Meet Tony Minot (Paul Reiser). He is a musician by profession but has been forced to take up a proper job (the reason is not clear). It is his first day at Intercorp and he is leaving his flat to drive to the Tower. He forgets his flat keys and opens the door by inserting the access card issued by Intercorp. This action damages the card slightly.

He reaches Intercorp Tower in his car. He needs to swipe his card to enter the parking area. He swipes it but the system fails to read it properly. But Tony is a resourceful guy. He follows another car and quickly rushes inside before the barrier comes down. In other words he tailgates which is a violation. He parks the car. CAS tells him that he needs to move his car to its assigned place but he doesn’t know where it is.

Apparently, there was an orientation video which he was supposed to watch but he doesn’t consider it important. As evident, he is a reckless guy who doesn’t care much of rules and regulations. He leaves the car as is and enters the office reception. He meets Wilson and tells him his name and that he is the new joiner in Business Research department. Wilson is already aware of the parking violation. He checks the access card and confirms it should work fine.

Tony waits downstairs while Linda Ferillo (Susan Norman) comes to meet him. She works in Human Resources and was apparently responsible for securing him the job. He is thankful to her and gives her a gift. She doesn’t care and tells him clearly that he needs to follow all the rules from dress code to everything else when he is in the Tower. Else he will get a security violation. This is not acceptable to Little Hill (Roger Rees), the owner of Intercorp. Hill’s office is on the top floor.

Tony tells her that he knows his way with computers. Linda counters that he doesn’t how smart the building is. It would be good if he abides by the rules. He has never dealt with something as intelligent as CAS. Linda accompanies him to his work station. She helps him to activate voice recognition on his work PC, so he can talk to CAS and give any instructions. He asks CAS to play music and make coffee. He is genuinely amazed when the instructions are completed. He starts scratching his face with the access card. Linda warns him to stop doing that. He will be literally helpless if anything happens to the card.

An employee comes and informs Tony that Mr Hill is expecting him. He like to meet new employees on their first day. Mr Hill is the ruthless businessman character. He hands Tony an empty file and asks him to fill it up with some useful details. After the meeting, Tony boards the elevator to go down to his office. To pass the time (and tease CAS!), he keeps inserting and removing the card in the elevator slot and tries to “chat” with CAS. He just thinks it as a game for the sake of confusing CAS. Unknown to him he is being marked for “elevator violation.” That is violation no. 2 after the parking incident. He has been classified by CAS as a “Security Risk.”

Tony continues to be the “bad boy” in school. He is whiling away his time. He inserts his own music chip in the office PC. In doing so, he uses the access card to fix the chip in place. Linda reminds him that this will be another violation and he better remove it before things get escalated. But its too late. CAS has noted it as another violation (System Invasion == Possible Intruder). Tony continues with his disregard of rules and the violations keep piling.

The day has ended and Tony has a date. But Mr Hill has other plans. He sends him a handful of files to be worked upon as soon as possible. That means Tony will have to stay till late in the night to complete the task. Tony is not amused. Wilson is leaving for the day. The security is put on Night Mode. He notices that Tony is still in the office and goes to investigate.

Tony is on his way to Hill’s office but his card is not working properly. Wilson comes and inserts Tony’s card to access the elevator. CAS immediately marks him (i.e. Tony) for deletion. It has had enough with all the violations tagged to this employee. CAS assumes that Tony has entered the elevator and proceeds to “delete” the threat called Tony. As a result Wilson gets brutally crushed by the elevator doors courtesy of CAS. That shows the shortcoming of CAS. It can only sense the intruder’s presence. It is unable to rely on facial recognition.

Tony is trying to figure out how to go to Hill’s office when Hill comes down the stairs. He tells Tony that he always uses the stairs. Poor Tony has no choice but to follow Hill all along the way to the top by climbing the stairs. He tries to tell Hill that there is some problem with the way CAS behaves but Hill is in no mood to listen. For him, CAS is the most reliant system. They reach the office. Hill is preparing for a sauna bath (yes, he has a sauna in his office). He tells Tony to set the sauna temperature. Tony inserts the card and sets the temperature. But CAS sees this as another violation. Apparently it realises that the intruder is still alive and marks him for deletion again. Hill tells Tony to go to his office, work on the assigned task and come back with the answers.

Hill enters the sauna. (Tony tries to use the elevator, is unsuccessful and reenters Hill’s office.) Meanwhile, CAS is trying to eliminate Tony. It has assumed that Tony has entered the sauna and starts increasing the temperature to dangerous levels. Tony is horrified to see that Hill is trapped inside the sauna. The door has been locked by CAS. He tries everything including calling the police. But he cannot save Hill as the sauna door explodes due to excessive heat. Tony enters the sauna and CAS senses his presence. Tony realises the sauna itself is about to explode and slides down through a pipe to save himself.

This is just the beginning. CAS cannot stand his presence and will do everything to kill him. Will it be successful? Later Linda returns to the building and both are trapped in the deserted building. They try everything to thwart the attempts by CAS.

Will CAS be successful in eliminating Tony? Can he beat the system?

The Music

There is nothing much to write about the music. It tries to be sinister but is repetitive and boring.

My Thoughts

The Tower is good as a concept and the result could have been better. Its not the big studio mega budget movie so the central character’s actions seem toned down. The building’s response could have been faster to make it look like the terrifying pursuer that one would expect it to be – “delete at all costs”. CAS is smart but it does not have facial recognition capability. That is a big design flaw. Still it manages to create a sense of fear in the minds of the protagonists.

Acting wise, the lead Paul Reiser is irritating to say the least. He needs the job but is not ready to adhere to the rules from the first minute. Why would he have this approach is not explained.

Overall, the film is entertaining and raises the question of over reliance on AI which remains relevant today.