I love thrillers but in order to thrill me they must actually be thrilling.  Nothing about Paranoia is thrilling, with the possible exception of seeing a bald Harrison Ford.  No, not even that.  A young up-and-coming computer geek (Liam Hemsworth) at a big, powerful tech company finds himself out of a job, but is recruited by his former employer to do some industrial espionage from the inside at a rival company.  The rival CEOs are Gary Oldman and Ford, and any tension that this movie sustains is due specifically to their efforts.

Robert Luketic’s film tries to be fresh while following a very obvious, well worn path as Hemsworth is reluctantly recruited, then enjoys the spoils of luxury, then realizes he has sold his soul, then looks desperately for a way out of the predicament in which he has put himself.  The ending, too tidy and anticlimactic, provides him an out; I was really hoping that this dope would find himself in prison explaining basic computer science to his unsmiling comrades in orange.  But no, he not only saves his soul but wins the girl (Amber Heard) as well.  Pity.

The setup is fairly interesting and the movie has a slick veneer that belies its hollow interior.  Actually, its slickness is very appropriate, because that very sheen of hip style and state of the art technology cannot hide how old and rickety this formula has become, no matter how much star power is injected (even Richard Dreyfuss shows up as Hemsworth’s tired old father).  ☆ 1/2.  8 September 2013.