Westworld (1973)

A robot malfunction creates havoc and terror for unsuspecting vacationers at a futuristic, adult-themed amusement park.

Director:

Michael Crichton

Writer:

Michael Crichton

Stars:

Yul Brynner, Richard Benjamin, James Brolin

3 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Yul Brynner	...	Gunslinger
Richard Benjamin	...	Peter Martin
James Brolin	...	John Blane
Norman Bartold	...	Medieval Knight
Alan Oppenheimer	...	Chief Supervisor
Victoria Shaw	...	Medieval Queen
Dick Van Patten	...	Banker
Linda Gaye Scott	...	Arlette (as Linda Scott)
Steve Franken	...	Technician
Michael T. Mikler	...	Black Knight (as Michael Mikler)
Terry Wilson	...	Sheriff
Majel Barrett	...	Miss Carrie
Anne Randall	...	Daphne
Julie Marcus	...	Girl in Dungeon
Sharyn Wynters	...	Apache Girl

Storyline

An amusement park for rich vacationers. The park provides its customers a way to live out their fantasies through the use of robots that provide anything they want. Two of the vacationers choose a wild west adventure. However, after a computer breakdown, they find that they are now being stalked by a rogue robot gun-slinger.

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Plot Keywords:

villain played by lead actor | computer | vacation | evil robot | future | 

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Taglines:

...Where nothing can possibly go worng!

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Genres:

Action | Sci-Fi | Thriller | Western

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Certificate:

PG

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

27 February 1974 (France)

Also Known As:

Mondwest

Filming Locations:

Old Tucson - 201 S. Kinney Road, Tucson, Arizona, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$1,250,000 (estimated)

Gross USA:

$10,000,000, 31 December 1973

Company Credits

Production Co:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

88 min

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo

Color:

Color (Metrocolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

There were several minor injures during filming. During a shootout scene a piece of wadding from a blank cartridge struck Yul Brynner in the eye, scratching his cornea and leaving him unable to wear his light reflecting contacts without his injured eye turning red and tearing up, so shooting had to be maneuvered to allow time for his eye to heal. And during the scene where James Brolin's character was bitten by a rattlesnake, while the milked rattler was attached to Brolin's arm, he was bitten by the teeth on the snakes lower jaw, despite wearing padding on his arm made of leather and cotton.

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Goofs

The robot girl in the dungeon shorts out when Peter gives her a drink of water, yet the robot Miss Carrie was seen drinking whiskey earlier in the film with no ill effects.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Interviewer of Delos Guests: [hosting a commercial] Hi. Ed Renfrew for Delos again. If there's anyone who doesn't know what Delos is, well, as we've always said: Delos is the vacation of the future, today. At Delos, you get your choice of the vacation you want. There's Medieval World, Roman World and, of course, Westworld. Let's talk to some of the people who've been there.

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Connections

Referenced in Westworld: Chestnut (2016)

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Soundtracks

Home on the Range
(uncredited)
Lyrics by Brewster M. Higley
Music by Daniel E. Kelley
Performed by Richard Benjamin

User Reviews

"Boy, have we got a vacation for you...where nothing can go wrong!"

"Boy, have we got a vacation for you...where nothing can go wrong!"

Well, as the old saying goes..."famous last words."

"Westworld" is supposed to be set in the future (as visualized back in 1973 when the film was made, apparently the computers of the future are really, really big, and the monitors are really, really small, lol), where pampered rich folk can go to a vacation resort named "Delos", where they choose one of three "worlds" to visit and interact in: Medieval World, Roman World, and Westworld. Our protagonists John Blaine and Peter Martin (played by James Brolin and Richard Benjamin, respectively) choose Westworld. John is a Westworld veteran, having visited many times. Peter is his friend and first-timer at the resort; uttering childlike statements such as "Do we get a real gun? Wow!" In the various "worlds", the guests interact with each other and with anatomically-correct, extremely realistic robots. They are able to *ahem* interact very closely with the female robots, and also shoot the mean robots for fun (the guns they are supplied with will not work on real people) as they wish. A real "cowboys and indians" scenario for the child in us all. Roman World is promoted as a big sex resort, and Medieval World is geared towards the romantic, it seems.

The film starts out with quite a lot of intentional comedy and satire, and frankly starts out very much like it could have been a 1970's TV "Movie of the Week", but once the robots start to go bad...what we have for the rest of the film is a truly creepy western/sci-fi film. It's a gunfight! Albeit a Sci-Fi one. The last half-hour of the film is essentially a silent movie, as Crichton said he wanted, save for the great soundtrack, which sounds something like a bow being drawn against piano strings, or a cello; anyway it has the same unsettling effect as the out-of-tune piano in another classic, "Wait Until Dark" (1967).

Movies with robots/androids...there have been many I have seen and loved. But for this review I will cite examples of what I consider to be scary robots in film, besides "Westworld": "The Stepford Wives" (1974), "Alien" (1979), "Blade Runner" (1982), "The Terminator" (1984), "Aliens", "The Companion" (1995).

But "Westworld" was the first scary robot film I ever saw. And even after the others that followed, nothing quite equals Yul Brynner in his role as the gunslinger robot gone bad in "Westworld." His performance is what really makes the movie. Brynner was a good actor, and even (aybe especially) playing a machine, his skill is used to great effect. His performance was anything but wooden (unlike the always wooden Ah-nold in "The Terminator", for instance).

When Brynner's robot gunslinger commands "Draw", with the slightest twist at the corner of his mouth, he is completely creepy and scary. Even the way he walks when hunting down Richard Benjamin's character has an element to it that I have never seen again.

What's also great about this film is the development of Benjamin's character of Peter Martin. He starts out as the inexperienced nerdy sidekick to Brolin's John Blaine, and ends up showing his true mettle as the going gets rough. The nerdy naive Martin quickly learns how to survive.

This was Sci-Fi writer/director Michael Crichton's first foray into big-screen film-making. Crichton has said he made the film in thirty days. I would expect that finding pre-made sets were easy at least; there was bound to be at least a western set sitting around the studio lots. And of course, back then there were fewer and less complicated special effects.

If you find a DVD of this to rent, and you've never seen the film before, I recommend that you do not watch the trailer first! It's a real spoiler.

Note: Look for Majel Barrett (of "Star Trek-Generations", and she is also Gene Roddenberrys' widow) as the whorehouse madam.

Brynner's part was a play on his role in the classic western film "The Magnificent Seven."