Viking Night: Westworld
By Bruce Hall
August 17, 2016
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Maybe that sounds unfair, but I can remember seeing Westworld on television for the first time and not having any idea that what I was watching had ever been released in a theater. I sure didn’t have any idea who Yul Brynner was. I just thought the killer cowboy was cool. I remember mentioning to friends how much he reminded me of the Terminator, and getting shouted down because one is technically a “cyborg” while the other is a “robot.”
Coincidentally, this was also one of my first encounters with the sort of myopic trolls that now inhabit most of the internet.
Still, one was indeed reminiscent of the other, and it would be far from the only time that Michael Crichton would serve as someone’s inspiration. What do I mean by that? Here’s a test. When I die, I have no idea what’s going to happen to all the books on my Kindle. But when I was a kid, if someone died, and they had a bunch of books in your attic, sometimes a kid like me got a free box of books. If you’re old enough to remember things like that, then you’ve probably read some Michael Crichton. For those of you who aren’t, he’s the guy who invented Jurassic Park.
Better? Good. Because if you liked Jurassic Park, or the more recent Jurassic World, you might want to check out Westworld, because all three are pretty much the same story. The difference is that in Westworld there are no kids, precocious or otherwise, and there are robots instead of dinosaurs. And you can replace Chris Pratt with a running gag about sexual abuse, so there’s also that.
Westworld begins with an awkwardly period appropriate promotional reel for a thousand dollar a day, adult themed amusement park called Delos. The park is split into three sections. Roman World, Medieval World, and Westworld. Each area is designed to be as authentic a period recreation as possible. All three are populated with lifelike robots, nearly indistinguishable from humans and programmed to make your stay as fun and exciting as possible. The reel ends with the Delos slogan “Boy have we got a vacation for you!”
Obviously that’s meant to be prophetic but it’s also what happens when you let interns write your advertising copy.
So, there’s your setup. Westworld is a decadent playground for bored, rich people who want to experience what it’s like to get their Grand Theft Auto on in real life, but with none of the risk and all of the reward. So what kind of shallow twit would want something like that? I’m glad you asked. Let’s meet the rather generically named John Blane (James Brolin) and Pete Martin (Richard Benjamin). John is the square jawed adventurous type, and Pete is a successful lawyer with an appalling mustache and all the adventurous spirit of a middle aged house cat. The moment they arrive, Pete starts complaining because the 19th century beds are uncomfortable and there’s no place to get a good martini.
Yeah. He’s the vacation partner who would complain the whole way up the Eiffel Tower that Pokemon Go wasn’t working.
Our boys finally gets into the spirit of things when they’re confronted by the town heavy, known only as the Gunslinger (Yul Brynner). Pete makes short work of him, apparently unaffected by the realistic blood and gore. Of course, you and I know it doesn’t take guts to fight when you know you can’t lose, but Pete is still learning. Of course this is allegory, and on many levels. Do we take technology for granted? Possibly. Have we become a society of pleasure seeking sensory addicts?
Who cares? I just bought an Oculus Rift and a 12-pack of Mountain Dew. These were pertinent questions in 1973, and they’re even more so now. The biggest difference is that back then, this movie had not already been made a hundred times. If this was the first time I’d seen it, I might be impressed. But from a storytelling standpoint, the seams really show. I can forgive sub-par set design and visual effects in a film this old. What I can’t accept is a story that raises all sorts of interesting philosophical questions and then makes little effort to explore them.
Crichton himself wrote and directed Westworld, and therefore the story contains his hallmark touches. There’s a fascination and familiarity with technology, coupled with an almost paranoid suspicion of closed technological ecosystems. Great, but the first half of the movie is an underwhelming slog. It’s full of interesting visual touches and concepts, but it’s also badly weighed down by bad dialog and clumsy exposition.
There are fly on the wall sessions with the scientists who run the park. Delos is a technological marvel; a Bond villain’s lair come to life. It’s a self contained, entirely foolproof system where everything is closely monitored and controlled. It’s kind of a Hunger Games meets Epcot situation, plus paying customers and minus the child-murdering. The place is conspicuously run with one eye on customer safety, and one eye on making a profit. Anybody want to guess what ends up being the central conflict of the second act?
Meanwhile, John and Pete would very much like for us to know that you can tell robots from humans because they haven’t perfected the hands yet. The simulation is full of failsafes designed to keep visitors safe, no matter how stupid and clumsy they are. “Nothing can go wrong,” drones the PA as visitors arrive. That seem like an unnecessary assurance, as well as further proof someone needs to fire that intern.
These are all things we need to know, so I don’t fault the film for going through its paces. The problem is that when the exposition feels forced, the drama begins to feel artificial. It’s like when you blow up a picture too far and it turns into pixels. It’s the same story template Crichton would later use for many stories, most notably Jurassic Park - another dry, vaguely scientific procedural that is also punctuated by confusing chase scenes. This made Crichton's novels easy to read, but on screen it looks like two hours of video game cutscenes, linked by the ironic theme that technology can never replace friendship.
In other words, take Jurassic Park, put it on the set of “Gunsmoke” and replace the dinosaurs with robots. That’s Westworld. Oh, and also replace Jeff Goldblum with sexual abuse.
Wait, what?
That’s right. I know this is an old film, but it actually ends up being a plot point so I say it’s fair game. Early in the film Pete and John visit a bordello, and decide to take advantage of the local flavor, meaning “bang some prostitutes.” That’s fine, but it becomes immediately clear that specific fem-bots in all three parks are there for men to do with entirely as they please. They’re specifically programmed to give in if you decide you want a little more than what’s on the menu. I know it was a different time, but Westworld’s treatment of this subject as a running joke is an anachronism that fails to translate.
And by the way, they say that the way you can tell the robots from the humans is by their cheap looking hands. You mean to tell me they’re real enough to convincingly have sex with (or rape, evidently), but they can’t get the hands right? And did you ever notice notice how in the movies, everyone automatically knows how to ride a horse no matter who they are or where they’re from?
This is also a largely ugly, cheap looking film. During a climactic sword fight late in the film, the characters’ weapons are badly bent, clearly made out of melted kitchen implements from K Mart’s housewares section. I assume the movie focuses on Westworld instead of Roman World because at the time, that’s what was already lying around every backlot in Hollywood. Whenever you can film high concept on a low budget that’s almost a no brainer. But Westworld looks feels like a rush job, and it abandons whatever theme it’s trying to explore toward the end in favor of the Big Chase.
I do want to mention that Yul Brynner’s Gunslinger is probably my favorite thing about the movie. He gets a fair amount of screen time for someone who speaks maybe 20 words, but his presence speaks volumes on its own. It’s not enough to save the film from itself, but I also wouldn’t call Westworld a “disappointment.” It inspired countless other books and films, and really does raise some fascinating questions. What happens when the machines we create evolve faster than we do? What does it mean when we become so reliant on technology that we inadvertently hand it dominion over our future?
It just doesn’t dig very deep trying to answer them.