The 'dork-trips' (3-D equations flying around in an aquamarine network-scape) were a bit '`80s' for my taste, but--other than those--I would call Hackers a tale of the 'pirates of today.'
See; just as the "pirates of the caribbean" were simply people in the enterprise of that time (sea-faring) who found it more-prosperous to work without regard to the 'laws of government,' so are the 'hackers' simply I.T.'s who see more logic in handling things without "approval."
There was really a revelatory moment near the end (No! not 'Angelina Jolie nearly naked in the after-credits') something the lead hacker Dade said to The Plague: "You beat me; I lose, but we win!"
That phrase is Christianity's lynch-pin: even if the 'greater' power forces you to register "wrong"; stay right with the Holy power, and the unholy 'greater ones' will come around to see how right you are!