Retro Rewatch: Westworld 1973

Retro Rewatch is an ongoing editorial that takes a look into certain films, conventions, crazes, and characters of the horror genre years after their heyday. It is an effort to try and put the magnifying glass up to the horror world with the much needed luxuries of time and perspective applied in order to fully understand the impact and social significance of these projects/themes/ideas (if any). So for this installment of Retro Rewatch, I present to you the criminally underrated film Westworld.

Long before Jurassic Park dropped down on popular culture like A bomb, Michael Crichton wrote and directed a science fiction horror film called Westworld (Many people may not see this as a horror film, but I will let you make that decision for yourself). Just like in Jurassic Park, the story revolves around a terrifying incident at an amusement park where technology inevitably turns into the destructor of man rather than its servant. Delos, an “amusement park of the future” includes three main parks called Medievalworld, Romanworld, and Westworld. In this setting, tourists pay 1000 dollars a day to interact with (mostly) androids for sex, violence, and other forms of companionship throughout various historical periods. It all goes wrong when a supposed computer virus (possibly the first mention of a computer virus in a film, so says wiki) causes the robots to become excessively violent towards the guests which very quickly drops us into the always fun killer robot situation (Like the Simpsons episode where they go to Itchy and Scratchy Land).

For most of the film, we are reliving the rootin’ tootin’ shootin’ days of the Wild West with our two main characters Peter (Richard Benjamin) and John (James Brolin) as they enjoy a whole bunch of liquor, whores, and gun duels on their relaxing fantasy vacation in the old west. We quickly get to meet one of the most terrifying robots in horror history known only as The Gunslinger (Yul Brenner). Originally, the gunslinger was an android that was designed to start gunfights with the tourists which of course the tourists will all easily win. After the central computer goes down and the androids get a mind of their own, the gunslinger becomes an extremely dangerous foe.

Like many movies from that era (especially ~~SyFy~~ Sci Fi) it has a emphasis on being deliberately paced (starts out slow as shit). There is a lot of exposition to tell the viewer where we are, what is happening, and how is this all safe for the tourists? This is all done with an age old Hollywood tradition of bringing in the new guy so that there is someone to verbally explain everything too. I want to take a moment and have you really think about how often this happens, it’s in damn near every cop movie (the rookie), Ghostbusters did it with Ernie Hudson, and it also appears in a ton of war movies as well. We learn with the characters. I’m digressing, so back to Westworld.

There are a ton of philosophical theories and hidden themes prevalent throughout the entire film. The most obvious theme is the idea that technology will destroy us all. Of course with Michael Crichton’s work, it’s never a simple technology like a toaster or an oven mitt, it’s about man creating and manipulating nature and other elements that have been left up to “god” to create and/or manage. The androids in the film are as life like as possible to simulate both sex and senseless violence. The creators did everything to make them as real as possible even to the point of self awareness. How long did they expect the gunslinger to keep dying until he felt that it was enough? How can giving a consciousness to an object that could just as easily kill every single person in the room without any semblance of compassion as they could love them be any type of good idea? Not only are we presented with this deeply philosophical question, but there is also an undertone of dependence in technology.

In the movie, when the “virus” is first detected, the eggheads in the central control room decide to shut down the central computer in order to stop any kind of robot rampage. This of course backfires on them in an absolutely terrible way when then ventilation systems shut down and kill everyone in the control room. The idea here is not only is the entire park dependant on the “control” of the central command room, but by taking it for granted to provide what always appeared to be an abundant resource (air), it led to the death of the people trying to control it (parent figure). The androids were able to run on backup power and without a computer controlled morality system, chaos was imminent.

Westworld at its’ heart is an action movie, however it seems almost impossible to deny it horror status when Peter is getting chased around by the Gunslinger. Yul Brenner gave us an amazing performance as a completely soulless robot hell bent on enacting revenge on the man who killed him. Once the veil of fantasy (and safety) is stripped from Peter, he goes from playing as a gun wielding bad ass to a cowering and feeble man running for his own life. Peter undergoes a great transformation in the film, but the Gunslinger doesn’t. Even when he was programmed not to kill people, he was still menacing and creepy and he stays that way till the end.

Westworld has clearly inspired a number of filmmakers and script ideas since it came out in 1973. John Carpenter went on record as saying that Yul Brenner’s interpretation of his character as a menacing and unstoppable force was a huge inspiration for Michael Myers. It’s also blatantly clear that the first terminator movie borrowed HEAVILY from Westworld, especially in the last half hour. Unfortunately though, Westworld has often fell by the wayside and neglected by everyone except for the devout cult following that seems to be doing its best to get the film some recognition. I hope I can help spread the word.

Is it a cult classic, a fitting analysis, or complete forgettable?: It’s an absolute cult classic. With the lack of popularity after a bad sequel and a terrible TV show it was very easy to forget about the amazing film that spawned it all. Also pack on all the subtly laid deep philosophical questions and you have a movie that needs to be rediscovered by everyone.

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