Nina Metz: 1986′s Chicago-shot ‘Running Scared’ is a time capsule of the Thompson Center

CHICAGO — “Helmut Jahn’s State of Illinois Center is the most cerebral, the most abstract, yet easily the most spectacular building ever constructed in the Loop,” Tribune architecture critic Paul Gapp wrote when it opened in 1985.

A year later, it would be featured prominently in “Running Scared,” the 1986 buddy cop action comedy starring Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines. The movie’s climax takes place in the atrium, and it is a cinematic love letter to the building’s soaring rotunda with its pale blue and salmon colored interiors that Gapp called “no less than breathtaking.” Even the spiraling mosaic tile floor is memorable.

Those distinctive design elements may not survive the upcoming gut rehab. Last year, the state sold the building (renamed the James R. Thompson Center in 1993) to Google, which plans to demo the interiors and revamp the space in the coming months.

Much as I hate the idea of changing the building’s idiosyncratic look, few who worked there liked the open plan layout, which created all kinds of issues including wonky temperature control. Neglect hasn’t helped things either.

But as Gapp wrote: “In a city where architects so long worshipped the 90-degree angle and black curtain walls, the center’s asymmetry and multicolored skin appear as almost impudent nose-thumbing at the past.” For decades it’s functioned as a visual palate cleanser to the more traditional-minded buildings around it.

If you’re feeling nostalgic and want to wander around this gorgeous, modernist space one last time before it’s obliterated, the building is open to the public Thursdays through Saturdays thanks to the Chicago Architecture Biennial, which has an exhibit there through the end of the year.

Or, you can revisit “Running Scared,” which is streaming for free (with ads) on Freevee.

Crystal and Hines star as streetwise police detectives more adept at trading quips than nabbing bad guys. But don’t tell them (or the screenwriters) that. Their worldview: Everybody’s a scumbag except for them, thanks to Chicago’s hard-boiled everything. Their easygoing banter is just this side of smug, and you realize their light way with the material is a talent that’s been missing on screen lately. It’s striking to encounter it on a rewatch.

Their captain is fed up with them (of course) so he tells them to take some time off. Crystal slaps the desk: “No! We got too much going on!”

“You know,” their captain replies, “it’s a very bad sign when a cop thinks that Chicago will fall apart without them.”

So they’re off to Key West, where they hook up with a succession of beautiful women and decide to retire and open a bar under those sunny skies instead. Back in Chicago, they give their 30-day notice. “Show me another career where they let you shoot people!” their captain says incredulously. It’s meant to be a funny line, but, wow, talk about hitting close to the truth.

Before they hang up their badges, they have one last bust to make. Their target is an elusive, suit-wearing, Mercedes-driving kingpin played by Jimmy Smits, and the final showdown takes place inside the Thompson Center. Director Peter Hyams doubled as the film’s cinematographer and he has a real eye for capturing the building’s unique qualities and dimensions. Even the exposed, glass-walled elevators play an important plot point.

The movie makes the most of its wintry Chicago setting. It’s cold, naturally. Snow is everywhere. Their Florida fantasy makes sense.

But more importantly, the film looks like it was shot in Chicago, which sounds obvious, but isn’t always the case depending on what’s filming here. (A good chunk was shot on a soundstage in Los Angeles, with location work in Key West and Chicago.) There’s a car chase that takes place on the “L” tracks. In another scene, you can glimpse the old 666 Lounge in the background, located at 666 S. State St. We also see a church with a large sign reading “Christ died for our sins.” What we don’t see is that, in real life, these buildings were literally right next to each other — in conversation with one another, really — which is such a hilarious detail and a missed opportunity by Hyams.

But it’s the film’s use of the Thompson Center that stands out in the way it shows off those glorious interiors.

Why so much color, Gapp wondered back in 1985? “Some view Jahn’s personal and rather peculiar palette as better suited to Acapulco or Miami Beach than to Chicago. Jahn replies that he is trying to make brightly ‘optimistic’ architecture. Too many people, he says, have stopped believing in the future.”

Jahn wasn’t wrong, then or now.

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