Top 10 Favorite Film Robots — GeekTyrant by Joey Paur Hollywood has introduced us to a ton of awesome robots over the years. Robots have always been extremely cool, and they've sparked the imagination of what is possible. The robots we've seen in the movies have inspired technology and science. There are engineers out there who have created robots of their own and are constantly trying to perfect them. One day those robots will take over the world and destroy us all. We all have our favorite robots, and I thought I'd come up with a top 10 list of my personal favorites. Note: Cyborgs like RoboCop don't count as robots on this list. If you'd like to share your own favorites, please feel free to post them in the comments section below! Iron Giant - The Iron Giant The Iron Giant is by far my favorite robot. He's the one I would have loved to play with as a kid. Excluding the yells and groans, he only said a total of 53 words. Vin Diesel voiced the character but the studio also considered Peter Cullen, Sean Connery, Frank Welker, and James Earl Jones.

Robby the Robot - Forbidden Planet This might just be one of the most iconic robots ever. I don't know anyone that isn't familiar with the design. It not only appeared in Forbidden Planet, it has also shown up in a ton of other sci-fi films such as The Thin Man and Lost in Space. It even showed up in some TV shows like The Twilight Zone, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Addams Family, and Mork & Mindy. Johnny 5 - Short Circuit I loved this movie when I was a kid, and I just thought Johnny 5 was the funniest damn thing. The filmmakers wanted to show what a real life robot might look like in the real world, so every part of Johnny 5 was built to have a specific, logical purpose. For example, Johnny's signature "eyelids" were created as sun guards/camera coverings. Gort - The Day the Earth Stood Still "Klaatu barada nikto!" This thing just looked like a menacing badass! When I first saw this thing as a kid I was a little terrified of it. It looked like it couldn't harm anything, but it was the ultimate weapon.

The guy who played Gort was Lock Martin, who was the doorman at Grauman's Chinese Theater. He was hired because he was so freakin' tall. He wasn't that strong, though, so he had difficulty with the heavy Gort suit and could only stay in it for about a half-hour at a time. Terminator - The Terminator I don't know any movie geek that doesn't love the Terminator. This thing is the ultimate killing machine, and it was really fun watching him kick ass. It has been revealed that the POV shots through the Terminator's eyes shows a dump of the ROM assembler code for the Apple II operating system. Apparently, if you own an Apple II and enter "] call -151 * p" at the basic prompt, it will give you the Terminator view. T-1000 - Terminator 2: Judgement Day A liquid metal machine? Are you kidding me?! What an amazing idea for a robot! I remember seeing this character on the big screen for the first time and being blown away. When Robert Patrick played the character he mimicked the head movements of the American bald eagle, and when moving patterned himself after a shark closing in on its prey.

Gunslinging Cowboy Robot Model 406 - Westworld First of all, if you haven't seen this movie yet, you need to put on your list because it's great! The renegade robot cowboy played by Yul Brynner was such a creepy character. The story is about a robot that malfunctions and terrorizes the guests at a futuristic theme park for adults. Optimus Prime - Transformers: The Movie Yes, I'm going with the version of Optimus Prime from the animated movie because he's so much cooler than what Michael Bay came up with. That sequence when he goes out to fight Magatron in the movie was so intense. I was really sad when they killed him off, and it was all Hotrod's fault! I was shocked by how many characters they killed off in this story! Other characters that died included Ironhide, Ratchet, Prowl, Brawn, Wheeljack, Windcharger, Megatron, Starscream, Skywarp, Thundercracker, Shrapnel, Kickback, Bombshell, and Huffer. What the hell were they thinking?

C-3PO and R2-D2 - Star Wars It was really hard to choose just one of these characters, but since they are basically a team that is almost always together in the films I'm going to count them as one unit on my list. Hey, it's my list, and I can do what I want! In early drafts of the script, R2-D2 could speak standard English, and apparently had a foul vocabulary. Both of the characters have been inducted into the Robot Hall of Fame — R2-D2 in 2003 and C-3PO in 2004. Max - Flight of the Navigator There's definitely some nostalgia with this character. I watched this film a ridiculous number of times growing up. Max is a Trimaxium Drone research ship with a personality. It can travel faster than light speed and also has a time travel function. This allows him to return samples exactly as he found them without missing a second in-between the abduction and return. This way he doesn't disturb the environment he came to observe.

These New Images From HBO's 'Westworld' Reboot Show Just How Awesome This Show is Going to Be — moviepilot.com These New Images From HBO's 'Westworld' Reboot Show Just How Awesome This Show is Going to Be July 15, 2015 at 09:44AM By Allanah Faherty , writer at Creators.co Staff Writer and resident Walking Dead expert at MP. Tweet me @bananallanah or email [email protected] In 1973 the film Westworld was released under the direction of Jurassic Park writer Michael Crichton. The sci-fi western was set in a high-tech theme park that was staffed by robots who authentically replicated Roman, cowboy and medieval times. After the park's computer system breaks down, the robots ran amok and guests found themselves stalked by a gunslinging robot, played by Yul Brynner. The movie was pretty iconic, and over four decades later, HBO have been working on a TV adaptation with Jonathan Nolan and J.J. Abrams at the helm.

The Westworld TV series is also set to star Anthony Hopkins, Ed Harris, James Marsden, Evan Rachel Wood, Jeffrey Wright, Ingrid Bolsø Berdal and Thandie Newton. After spending quite a long time in development, HBO have now announced that the show will debut in 2016, and after debuting a trailer at Comic-Con, have released some brilliant looking images to pique interest. The premise of the show itself sounds amazing, and the images look even more promising, take a look: James Marsden and Evan Rachel Wood pictured here as Teddy Flood and Dolores. Thandie Newton definitely looks the part in this image, she will play Maeve Millay. Anthony Hopkins will play Dr. Robert Ford, the creative director of Westworld. Here he is pictured with Jeffrey Wright who plays Bernard Lowe, the head of the programming division. The TV series version of Yul Brynners 'the gunslinger' character, played by Ed Harris.

Check out the trailer for the original 1973 version of Westworld for an idea of what to expect from the HBO series next year: 1000+ images about Yul Brynner on Pinterest | Elizabeth taylor, Jack warden and Tony curtis Yul Brynner - Anti-Smoking Commercial. This commercial aired after Yul Brynner's death. Now that I'm gone, I tell you: Don't smoke, whatever you do, just don't smoke. Produced by the American Cancer Society. See More Anthony Hopkins and Evan Rachel Wood Join J.J. Abrams' 'Westworld' | Movie News | Movies.com "Everything makes me nervous - except making films." Movies.com > Movie News > Anthony Hopkins and Evan Rachel Wood Join J.J. Abrams' 'Westworld' Anthony Hopkins and Evan Rachel Wood Join J.J. Abrams' 'Westworld' Anthony Hopkins and Evan Rachel Wood Join J.J. Abrams' 'Westworld' Tweet Anthony Hopkins and Evan Rachel Wood will star in the pilot episode of Westworld, based on the 1973 movie starring Yul Brynner, Richard Benjamin and James Brolin. J.J.

Abrams and Jonah Nolan are serving as executive producers for the proposed HBO series. Nolan, who has cowritten The Prestige, The Dark Knight, The Dark Knight Rises and Interstellar with his brother, director Christopher Nolan, also created the successful TV show Person of Interest. He has written the script for the Westworld pilot with his wife, Lisa Joy, herself a TV veteran (Pushing Daisies, Burn Notice) and will direct the episode. Novelist Michael Crichton made his feature film debut as a writer and director with the original movie, which was set in an elaborate theme park for adults that featured three "worlds" (the Old West, ancient Rome and medievel Europe) populated by humanoid robots. Benjamin and Brolin played guests who visited the Old West, only to be hunted by a gunslinging robot (Yul Brynner) when things go very, very wrong. Reportedly , the series will focus on the robots rather than the human guests. It's described as "a dark odyssey about the dawn of artificial consciousness and the future of sin." Wood will star as a "sassy farm girl" who may or may not be a robot.

In a supporting role, Hopkins, who has never had a recurring role on television, will play the creator of the park. Still to be cast is the male lead, a robotic character opposite Wood. Choice roles for two villains -- another gunslinger and a wealthy guest -- are also up for grabs. The movie was smart and entertaining. Advances in robotic technology over the past 40 years certainly opens up a lot of potential storylines, but it makes sense that the series will evidently begin in the Old West. HBO hasn't had a series set in the Old West since the much-missed Deadwood, which adds another intriguing factor to the mix. We hope the pilot episode turns out well and that the series gets the green light for production. Having Anthony Hopkins around on a weekly TV show would certainly give us extra incentive to watch. Science Fiction Films Science Fiction Films Notable Robots or Droids in Sci-Fi Films: A special subsection has been created on the subject of robots in film. See: Robots in Film (a comprehensive illustrated history here). Throughout cinematic history, especially in science-fiction tales, robots have played a primary role.

Robotic characters were chosen, in part, as a way to probe and examine prototypical humans endowed with anthropomorphic (but artificial) intelligence or characteristics. Terms related to robots include: robot or 'robotic' is often used pejoratively, to refer to any device that performs mechanically or automatically without original thought android (or humanoid) refers to an automaton or artificial man that possesses human features and resembles a human being cyborg (or bionic man/woman) refers to a human whose body and physiological processes are aided or controlled, in whole or in part, by electronic or mechanical devices Robots functioned as either servant-helpers or oppressors of humanity, portraying the good and evil sides.

Herein are examples of various films with robotic characters: Metropolis (1927) - one of the earliest robots (probably the first) in film, portrayed by Brigitte Helm; constructed and brought to life by mad scientist Rotwang as a metal android (resembling Star Wars' C-3PO), to deceptively assume the role of the virtuous hero Maria (also Helm) - and perform erotic dances The Wizard of Oz (1939) - with the Tin Woodsman, actually a robot (lacking a heart) The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) - featuring the giant, all-powerful robot Gort, instructed by creator Klaatu to warn Earth about its destructive path; with the film's famous command: "Gort, Klaatu barada nikto" Forbidden Planet (1956) - with the famous, classic movie robot: the cone-shaped and jukebox-headed Robby the Robot, built by Dr. Morbius from plans left in an alien computer system. Robby was "tinkered together" by Morbius based on his understanding of Krell technology.

[Note: Robby was reprised in various cameos and appearances, such as Robot B-9 in the TV show Lost in Space, in the TV series The Thin Man in 1958, and in Rod Serling's TV series The Twilight Zone; also in the films The Invisible Boy (1957), Gremlins (1984), Earth Girls Are Easy (1988), and Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003)] The Colossus of New York (1958) - about a murderous, Frankenstein-like, hulking, glowing-eyed caped robot Alphaville (1965) - the capital of a totalitarian state, Alphaville, was led by an almost-human computer called Alpha 60 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - based on Arthur C.

Clarke's The Sentinel; it must be noted that the villainous HAL 9000 computer (voice of Douglas Rain), although appearing robotic, was not a robot THX 1138 (1971) - George Lucas' feature debut film, with a world ruled by hundreds of identical, black-clad robot enforcement cops Silent Running (1972) - featuring two, beautifully-designed drones or robots named Huey and Dewey Fantastic Planet (1973) - an animated film about giant humanoid creatures on the futuristic planet Yagam Sleeper (1973) - Woody Allen's satirical comedy about the future, with Allen as a health-food store owner who woke up in the world of 2173 after being accidentally cryo-frozen; he must pretend to be a robotic household butler, and later join rebels to overthrow "The Leader" Westworld (1973) and sequel Futureworld (1976) - the original film from writer/director Michael Crichton, about a remote entertainment park on an island populated with androids, including Yul Brynner as a beserk gunslinging, black-clad cowboy Roboman (1974) (

aka Who?

(1975)) - with Joseph Bova as an injured American government official turned into a cyborg by the Russians The Stepford Wives (1975) - in which housewives in New England were slowly being tranformed into loving androids; the original film was remade in 2004 Demon Seed (1977) - about an artificially-intelligent supercomputer, dubbed Proteus IV (voice of Robert Vaughn) - "something more than human, more than a computer.

It is a murderously intelligent, sensually self-programmed non-being." It was able to take over a house computer control system and a wheelchair device with a robotic arm (named "Joshua") attached to it, enabling it to trap, kidnap, hold down, rape, and impregnate with its "seed" the lady of the house Susan (Julie Christie) Star Wars (1977) episodes (from 1977 to 2005) - George Lucas' golden robotic droid C3-PO was patterned after the robot in Metropolis and Robby the Robot in Forbidden Planet; also with the barrel-shaped robot R2-D2 that spoke only with electronic squeals or bleeps, and was capable of short-circuiting with blue flashes of lightning Alien (1979) - one of the spaceship's crew members, Ash (Ian Holm), was an android; in sequels Aliens (1986) and Alien 3 (1992) , another android named Bishop (Lance Henrikson) was prominent Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) , its sequels, and the Star Trek Next Generation films - with androids, such as

 the white-skinned, yellow-eyed android Commander Data (Brent Spiner) Galaxina (1980) - a science-fiction parody featuring a sexy android (Playboy Playmate Dorothy Stratten in her last film before her murder) Saturn 3 (1980) - a research scientist couple (Kirk Douglas and Farrah Fawcett) in space were threatened by a menacing robot Android (1982) - in the year 2036, Klaus Kinski (as eccentric scientist Dr.

Daniel in a satellite laboratory), who has already made an illegal android named Max 404, struggled to create a female android, using escaped convict Maggie as a model Blade Runner (1982) - Ridley Scott's classic cult film, with 'replicants' (androids considered "more human than human") that were hunted down by 'blade runner' Deckard (Harrison Ford); one was Rutger Hauer (as Replicant Roy Batty) Runaway (1984) - Michael Crichton's techno, sci-fi action film with robot-hunter Tom Selleck and pretty Cynthia Rhodes as two cops who must derail attacks by evil, runaway robots sent out by maniacal Gene Simmons (rock singer from the group KISS) The Terminator (1984) and Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) - from director James Cameron, with Arnold Schwarzenegger as an unstoppable, villainous model T-800 cyborg (with a human exterior and cold metal interior) in the first film, and a protective T-800 Terminator in the second film battling a seemingly-indestructible Terminator android composed of liquid metal named T-1000 (Robert Patrick); followed by

 director Jonathan Mostow's Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003) with a female Terminator model T-X (Kristanna Loken) D.A.R.Y.L.

(1985) - a sci-fi drama about an android boy (Barret Oliver) named Daryl (Data Analyzing Robot Youth Lifeform) Aliens (1986) - Bishop, the upgrade, pacifistic, knife-carrying model (portrayed by Lance Henriksen) from Ian Holm's devious android Ash in the 1979 film, who was ripped in two by the alien Queen Mother, but kept fighting Short Circuit (1986) - about an endearing, adorable, sophisticated robot known only as "Number 5" that was struck by lightning and came alive; with a sequel in 1988 Robocop (1987) - a graphically-violent film featuring a cyborg, half-human half-robot supercop (Peter Weller); with sequels in 1990 and 1992; the film also featured the stop-motion animated ED-209 robot - a giant, awkward, top-heavy, failed law enforcement robot Cyborg (1989) - a post-apocalyptic tale with Jean Claude Van Damme as a mercenary who must rescue a beautiful, but abducted cyborg Robot Wars (1993

) - set in the year 2041, about a renegade 'Megarobot' pilot who must defeat a giant robot resurrected and controlled by evil rival Centros Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (1996) - with robots Tom Servo and Crow T.

Robot who provided sarcastic commentary on This Island Earth Bicentennial Man (1999) - based on Isaac Asimov's short story The Positronic Man (only his second writing adapted for the screen), featuring Robin Williams as Andrew, a domestic android robot who craved to become fully human Iron Giant (1999) - an animated film about a friendly, fifty-foot robot (voice of Vin Diesel) A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (2001) - Steven Spielberg's science-fiction fairy tale with Haley Joel Osment as David, a "mecha" (robot of the future), with a similar plot-line to Disney's Pinocchio a CGI/live-action thriller titled I, Robot (2004) - from Australian director Alex Proyas, a futuristic film inspired by the stories in the 9-part anthology of I, Robot stories from Isaac Asimov and penned in the 1940s; the premise of the film was that a US Robotics creation - a robot named Sonny, was uncharacteristically suspected of murder by Chicago homicide detective Will Smith and a psychologist (Bridget Moynahan), thereby breaking the First Law of Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics (that "a robot may

 not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm") the adaptation of Douglas Adams' classic wacky sci-fi satire The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005), with its bubble- or moon-headed, permanently dour Marvin the Paranoid Robot (Warwick Davis, voice of Alan Rickman) Major Action-Sci-Fi Film Hybrids: Director/writer James Cameron brought two views of an apocalyptic, post-nuclear wasteland to the screen with Arnold Schwarzenegger first playing an action villain, and then an action hero in two brilliant films: the first was a low-budget, intensely exciting film The Terminator (1984) , with a twist on time-travel films, featuring an indestructible cyborg robot sent back to the 20th century from a distant future (the year 2029) intent on 'terminating' a woman before she could give birth to a son - John Connor - who would grow up to lead a rebellion against the robot's future masters; the film imagined a future in which robotic machines, aberrant creations of humans, were masters of Earth (echoing the mythical fear of the Frankenstein films) an equally impressive blockbuster

 sequel was Terminator 2 - Judgment Day (1991) - a film noted for its spectacular "morphing" through computer-generated special effects; a killing terminator is sent back in time by Skynet (a 21st century computer warring against the human race) to destroy the leader of the human resistance as a boy Lucas' and Spielberg's Contributions: [George Lucas' first feature film was the dystopic thriller THX 1138 (1971), an atmospheric film about a repressive Orwellian futuristic, dehumanized, subterranean society that forbade love and sexual intercourse.] By the late 1970s and early 1980s, films by Lucas and Spielberg consciously paid tribute to serials of the 1930s, with hero Luke Skywalker, swooping space battles, imaginative bar creatures in Mos Eisley's Cantina, revolutionary special effects, Harrison Ford at the controls of the Millennium Falcon spacecraft, and a vast universe.

Aliens could be more friendly and benevolent, evidenced by loveable robots (R2D2 and CP-30) and Chewbacca in the popular Star Wars fantasy space epic "trilogy" - all modern blockbusters. The first in this space opera trilogy set another standard for action-propelled, special-effects science-fiction: Star Wars, Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005) [Note: Another Star Wars film was released 10 years later in 2015, Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015). It was the first part of a sequel trilogy of Star Wars (Episodes: VII, VIII and IX). It was the first of the Star Wars films without series creator George Lucas' involvement, and the first film to be released following Disney's 2012 acquisition of LucasFilm. Many box-office records were broken almost immediately. See Star Wars Films: Reviewed and Ranked .] The preceding years of fearful dystopias and menacing aliens were dismissed by Steven Spielberg's pre-E.T. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) .

It was an enchanting sci-fi film filled with awe and wonder at numerous appearances of UFO spaceships, a mother ship, and the first communication between earthlings (led by real outer-limits researcher Jacques Vallee, played by Francois Truffaut) and friendly extra-terrestrial aliens - conveyed with bursts of sound and light. Spielberg followed Close Encounters in the early 1980s with one of the most endearing and charming films about benign extraterrestrials ever made - E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982) . The 90s: A Mix of Action and/or Sophisticated Story-Telling By the 90s, sophisticated digital effects were overtaking science fiction films, and creating spectacular and monstrous creatures such as the living dinosaurs in Spielberg's Jurassic Park (1993) , The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) , and Jurassic Park III (2001) ; the female alien invader in Species (1995), the giant marauding bugs in Starship Troopers (1997), and the bulbous-headed aliens in Tim Burton's alien-invasion spoof Mars Attacks! (1996).

The sci-fi alien invasion comedies Men in Black (1997) and Men in Black II (2002) were remarkably successful films that combined both special effects and great acting from its two leads Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones. Demolition Man (1993) pitted 1990s cyrogenically-defrosted LA cop-hero John Spartan (Sylvester Stallone), after release in the year 2032 from cyro-prison in the megapolis of San Angeles, to combat another defrosted individual -- violent psychopath Simon Phoenix (Wesley Snipes - with blonde hair). Wolfgang Petersen's Outbreak (1995), released at the height of the AIDS crisis with additional fears of bioterrorism, was a traditional disaster thriller about the pervasive spread of a killer African virus. The ultra-patriotic sci-fi epic Independence Day (1996) by director Roland Emmerich told of the extra-terrestrial invasion of the world with the destruction of the White House as an opener.

The roller-coaster action film, a summer blockbuster with stunning, thrill-ride, Oscar-winning special effects, was a return to the themes of disaster epics of the 1970s and the alien-invasion content of 50s science fiction. Two blockbuster Hollywood films released in the summer of 1998 portrayed the threat of Earth-threatening asteroids: Mimi Leder's character-driven sci-fi action film Deep Impact (1998) (Tagline: Heaven and Earth are about to collide), with Robert Duvall as an astronaut heading up a government mission in outer space to destroy the comet; and Michael Bay's Armageddon (1998) (Tagline: It's Closer Than You Think), with Bruce Willis and his core drilling team called to thwart the space rock by the use of nuclear weapons. 'Virtual Reality' Sci-Fi Films: Science-fiction films could easily portray a world in which reality was unsure, unreliable, dreamlike, virtual, or non-existent. VR (or virtual reality) films began in the early 80s, and really blossomed in the 1990s and 2000s.

The blurring of reality with 'virtual', look-alike, or fake universes or worlds created by 'virtual reality', computer simulations, or imagination itself fascinated various film-makers. The first VR film was reportedly the sci-fi western Welcome to Blood City (1977). In the film, five strangers awakened in the countryside with no memory of their past, with only an ID explaining that they were convicted murderers. Sheriff Frendlander (Jack Palance) brought them to the western town of Blood City - where they were forced to either become enslaved, or try to take a top place in society by killing an older unarmed resident. In the film's sci-fi twist, it was soon revealed that they were in a VR game, created by technicians Lyle (John Evans) and Katherine (Samantha Eggar), who were trying to identify their skills and possibly select them as potential elite killers for future combat. The revolutionary, landmark Disney cult film TRON (1982), with its astounding CGI and computer animation, was one of the first films to visualize another world. It also took advantage of the video-gaming craze of the early 1980s.

In the story (director Steven Lisberger’s live-action debut), video-game arcade owner/hacker Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) was transported inside a mainframe computer world (after being transformed by an experimental matter transmutation program into data bits). Inside the beautifully-visualized world dominated by an evil operating system with a giant Lego head, the software-based humanoid found an action-oriented, neon-colored video-game in which he had to compete against an evil boss who had metamorphosed into another video-game character. [The film was remade decades later as the long-awaited sequel TRON: Legacy (2010). Jeff Bridges reprised his role as hacker Flynn and as his ageless, power-hungry computer avatar, Clu.] Director and visual effects pioneer Douglas Trumbull's final Hollywood feature film was Brainstorm (1983), notable as being the last film for Natalie Wood (who died of drowning during production), and one of the earliest films about virtual reality. Scientist Dr.

Michael Brace (Christopher Walken) and his assistant Lillian Reynolds (Louise Fletcher) created a unique communications "Brainstorm" device that could record the visual, aural, sensory and emotional experiences of one's brain with a headset and sensor chips - and allow playback by another person to share the VR experience. The film's main attraction was the visceral thrill of the playback of an orgasmic sexual experience (on a continuous loop), and also of a heart-attack and entrance into the after-life. In Alien Intruder (1993), set in the futuristic year of 2022, an evil, extra-terrestrial computer virus (in the form of beautiful Tracy Scoggins) intruded itself into the thoughts of the crew of the spaceship USS Presley. The sci-fi VR horror-thriller Brainscan (1994) featured the tagline: "Goodbye Reality! Welcome Virtual Reality!" Video villain Trickster (T. Ryder Smith) appeared in an interactive computer game called "Brainscan" - within a computer video screen. The "ultimate experience" horror game was available to be viewed on 4-CD-ROM discs.

It was ordered by 16 year-old misfit, disenfranchised loner teen Michael Bryer (Edward Furlong), who viewed the first disc "Death by Design." It was a disturbing but exciting snuff film that featured the VR experience of a murder from the killer's POV. The disembodied Trickster then encouraged Bryer to engage in gruesome, violent thrills by becoming the killer - to his own horror. Johnny Mnemonic (1995) was a derivative adaptation of scriptwriter William Gibson's own cyberpunk short story, and a Keanu Reeves-precursor to The Matrix (1999) , about a courier with downloaded information in his data-packed head who had to transport the top-secret data from China to New Jersey. And in director Brett Leonard's (known for the ground-breaking The Lawnmower Man (1992)) crime sci-fi-thriller Virtuosity (1995) set in 1999, former disgraced L.A.

detective Parker Barnes (Denzel Washington) (in jail for murdering the killer of his family, but on parole) pursued invincible opponent Sid 6.7 (Russell Crowe), a synthetic killer android (with composited evil traits of Hitler, Charles Manson and other serial killer felons), through in a VR training program for cops. Threatened with the shut-down of the failed testing program, Sid's deranged software creator gave mass-murderer Sid a real-world body. Director Kathryn Bigelow's dystopic tech-noir Strange Days (1995) opened with an illicit 'playback clip' (a "snuff" clip called a 'blackjack') of a failed robbery attempt of a Chinese restaurant by masked criminals. The clip was recorded (or "wired") directly from a head device called a 'squid' (short for Superconducting Quantum Interference Device) connecting into the cerebral cortex ("It's pure and uncut, straight from the cerebral cortex"). Sleazy ex-vice squad cop and peddler of illegal software clips Lenny Nero (Ralph Fiennes) often watched the playback of clips of sexy ex-girlfriend Faith Justin (Juliette Lewis).

However, there were also more disturbing contraband snuff clips - of brutal rape, strangulation and death. Human freedoms were almost non-existent in the world of genetic monitoring and engineering found in Andrew Niccol's Gattaca (1997). Peter Weir's fanciful The Truman Show (1998) satirized how TV ratings dictated the imprisonment and victimization of a show's star by the unrestricted media, all for the unethical purpose of sustaining a hit TV show. [It was partially inspired by Albert Brooks' satirical media comedy Real Life (1979) (based on PBS' mini-series An American Family in 1973).] Then, director Ron Howard followed with a similar but lackluster EDtv (1999). Alex Proyas' visually-stunning and visionary sci-fi noir Dark City (1998) (Tagline: "A world where the night never ends. Where man has no past.

And humanity has no future"), one of the best films to effectively twist unreal reality, starred Rufus Sewell as a man with memory problems living and pursued in a nightmarish, retro 40s-style futuristic world managed by malevolent, underground alien beings called Strangers. The aliens possessed telekinetic powers that could stop time and alter reality. Writers/directors Andy and Larry Wachowski's hyperkinetic The Matrix (1999) (Tagline: "Be afraid of the future") illustrated how to superbly combine amazing action scenes with an intelligent story-line (a modern-day updating of the man vs. machine tale). It examined the nature of reality in the external world - seemingly uncertain, in which reality was a computer simulation, and the actual Earth was scorched. The explosive and successful trilogy featured sensational special/visual effects, with the same cast in each offering (Keanu Reeves as Neo, Carrie-Anne Moss as Trinity, Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus, and Hugo Weaving as Agent Smith): The Matrix Revolutions (2003) Josef Rusnak's tech-noir sci-fi film The Thirteenth Floor (1999) (Tagline: Question reality.

You can go there even though it doesn't exist) blended both The Truman Show (1998) and The Matrix (1999) with its blurring of the lines between reality and virtual or artificial reality, in its contrast of mid-1930s and late 1990s Los Angeles. Another 'virtual reality' film in the same year, David Cronenberg's cautionary and plot-twisting eXistenZ (1999) (Tagline: Play it. Live it. Kill for it), explored how a 'virtual reality' game could tap into a person's mind. Steven Spielberg's cyber-noirish action and sci-fi thriller Minority Report (2002), set in the futuristic year of 2054 from an adapted Philip K. Dick story, starred Tom Cruise as a cop preventing pre-committed murders. In the science-fiction related romance Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) with a script by Charlie Kaufman, Jim Carrey had his memories of his romance with an ex-girlfriend (Kate Winslet) wiped clean - until he abruptly changed his mind.

The sci-fi thriller Gamer (2009) was a hyper-kinetic action film where real-life and video-games were merged, with the creation of an ultimate interactive video game dubbed "Slayers." 17 year-old game expert Simon (Logan Lerman) was able to miraculously defeat other opponents in the game - using a real-life video-game avatar named Kable (Gerard Butler). Kable was a death-row inmate placed unwillingly into the VR playing field of the game, while also recruited to escape the dehumanizing game and defeat the game's corporate leader Ken Castle (Michael C. Hall), a reclusive billionaire. In another sci-fi thriller in the same year, the thought-provoking Surrogates (2009) was set in a futuristic utopian world. There, artificial robotic, avatars or life-forms substituted for living people as a fail-safe mechanism. The surrogates were perfect, 3-dimensional mechanical (or cloned) representations of their original humans - who remained safely at home and controlled the actions of the beings with their minds.

Bruce Willis and Radha Mitchell portrayed two FBI agents, Tom Greer and Peters, who were forced to investigate a strange double homicide in which the destruction of two surrogates also resulted in the deaths of their human hosts. And James Cameron's Avatar (2009) was the ultimate fantasy sci-fi film, in which paraplegic Marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) took part in a mission to the distant world of Pandora, inhabited by the giant, indigenous humanoid race of Na'vi. With the aid of a sophisticated Avatar program, Jake was linked to a genetically-bred, human-Na'vi hybrid, so that within his avatar's blue-skinned body, he could function as a Na'vi native and breathe the hostile air of the planet. In the action-oriented, time-travel thriller Source Code (2011), a variation on Groundhog Day (1993), Jake Gyllenhaal starred as Captain Colter Stevens - tasked to participate in a top-secret government experiment called "Source Code." To identify a threatening Chicago commuter train bomber, he repeatedly entered the body of one of the train's male passengers to relive his life during the 8 minutes before he was killed on the exploding train.

As Stevens continually repeated the tense mission, he attempted to gather enough clues to prevent a massive terrorist attack. And in the thought-provoking sci-fi cyber-thriller Transcendence (2014), eccentric yet charismatic AI science researcher/teacher Dr. Will Caster (Johnny Depp) was fatally shot by an extremist anti-technology group of radicals known as RIFT (Revolutionary Independence From Technology). After his consciousness was uploaded into a super-computer to save him, a phenomenon known as Whole Brain Emulation, Caster returned via a hologram. However, the fear emerged that he would become a dangerous megalomaniac force when his capacities vastly expanded and he created an army of nanomites in his desert HQ to aid his quest.

Animated Science Fiction Films At the Turn of the Century: From the mid-1990s to the early part of the next century, a number of animated films contained science-fiction themes, such as: the cyberpunk Japanese anime Ghost in the Shell (1996) was set in the year 2029 in a world where all crime was conducted in cyberspace and led by a master hacker called the Puppet Master; a specialized police force in the Asian metropolis named Newport's Section Nine directed an investigation to cope with the problem, headed by female android-cyborg undercover officer the Major, Motoko Kusanagi -- a babe-like Playboy centerfold cross-bred with the Terminator and the Bladerunner -- who was also searching for her own identity The Iron Giant (1999), about a friendly and benevolent robot the space adventure saga Titan A.E.

(2000) the Japanese anime Pokemon the Movie: 2000 (2000) the fantasy Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius (2001) with green alien Yokians Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) the updated space adventure Treasure Planet (2002) the first feature-length CGI film Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within (2002), in which a female scientist in the year 2065, Dr.

Aki Ross searched for a cure to ward off infection by alien phantoms Lilo & Stitch (2002) about a young girl's friendship for a blue extra-terrestrial, with six Elvis Presley songs on its soundtrack John Kenneth Muir's Reflections on Cult Movies and Classic TV: CULT MOVIE REVIEW: Westworld (1973) John Kenneth Muir's Reflections on Cult Movies and Classic TV One of the horror genre's "most widely read critics" (Rue Morgue # 68), "an accomplished film journalist" (Comic Buyer's Guide #1535), and the award-winning author of Horror Films of the 1980s (2007), The Rock and Roll Film Encyclopedia (2007) and Horror Films of the 1970s (2002), John Kenneth Muir, presents his blog on film, television and nostalgia, named one of the Top 100 Film Studies Blog on the Net.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011 CULT MOVIE REVIEW: Westworld (1973) In 1984, Arnold Schwarzenegger portrayed an emotionless, homicidal android in James Cameron's The Terminator...and an iconic movie villain was born. But in the decade before The Terminator arrived in theaters, there was another silver screen model for relentless android villains: Yul Brynner's 406 model "Gunslinger" from the 1973 Michael Crichton (1942 - 2008) sci-fi/horror thriller Westworld. And like Schwarzenegger after him, Brynner returned to this iconic role for at least one theatrical sequel, 1976's Futureworld. The Westworld franchise also spawned a TV incarnation years after the original film, 1980's short-lived Beyond Westworld. Today, a remake of the original Westworld is being planned for theatrical release in 2012, though it has apparently been in the works for a decade or so at this juncture.

At one point, there was even talk of Schwarzenegger taking on the role of the Gunslinger, which seems appropriate given the actor's career history. Gazing back at the original Westworld today, it's not difficult to determine why audiences responded so enthusiastically to the film and its seemingly unstoppable, silver-eyed bogeyman. Indeed, the film still excels as a lean, efficient thriller, and the movie capitalizes ably on a universal human fear (also marshaled in the Halloween films) of being pursued by a seemingly inhuman being that absolutely won't stop; no matter what. Like Michael Myers himself, you can shoot, stab or burn the Gunslinger android and it doesn't seem to phase him one bit. And again like The Shape, the Gunslinger wears a mask of sorts; an inexpressive "human" face that reveals nothing of his internal motivations, needs or desires. He's impossible to read, beyond the fact that he absolutely wants to kill you. After the thrilling action elements of Westworld, there's also a fascinating science fiction premise operating here, one specifically involving modern human morality.

In this regard, the film concerns an amusement park called Delos where rich patrons can pay 1,000 dollars a day to relive past epochs in "Western World," "Roman World" and "Medieval World." More than that, these patrons pay for the right to have sexual intercourse with subservient androids (with no consequences...) and even kill those androids (again with no consequences) in the various theme parks. Clearly, there's a statement here about the activities that human beings consider entertaining. Is it okay to commit violence when the target of such violence is a machine? Is it okay to engage in casual sexual relations with a slave, too? Also, though it isn't heavy-handed about it, the film comments broadly on technology and the use we put it to. There's the suggestion here that the androids are beginning to develop some sense of awareness of themselves and their rights as intelligent beings. And their uprising in the film -- though terrifying -- seems justified given their cruel treatment at the hands of the wealthy elite. In many ways, Westworld forecasts Terminator and also the re-made Battlestar Galactica of the last decade in exploring such a notion.

It's a science-run-amok Frankenstein story in which the technological children of man, perhaps rightly, turn on their biological parents. Westworld received decidely mixed reviews upon release in the mid-1970s. Newsweek's Paul D Zimmerman wanted the film to go further than it did, noting "What's the point of fantasy if it's rated PG?" Meanwhile, Pauline Kael assessed the film "moderately entertaining." Audiences were more enthusiastic, and today the film is indeed considered a genre classic. Uniquely, Crichton returned to the narrative template of Westworld while fashioning his most famous novel (later a movie), Jurassic Park. In that instance, another high-tech amusement park also fell prey to a rebellion by its denizens: genetically-engineered dinosaurs. "The best amusement park in the world...." Westworld opens with a TV commercial that promotes the concept of the amusement park Delos to future clients. Here, in this world, you can escape complex reality and live another life all together.

In Western World, Roman World (a place of "sensual, relaxed morality"), and Medieval World, visitors can indulge their most elaborate fantasies all while interacting with robots programmed to act, talk and even "bleed" just like humans. You can kill, or fuck, for sport. When the commercial's spokesmen interviews visitors to Delos, they enthuse about the amusement park, noting that it is "the realest" thing they have ever done. One senior citizen raves about having played "sheriff" in Westworld for a week. Another client, a woman, blushes at her memories of Roman World. After the advert ends, and a hover craft lands at Delos, two visitors to the park, the macho John (James Brolin) and the neurotic Peter (Richard Benjamin) choose Western World as their "world of choice" and are shuttled by tram to a re-created town mimicking conditions in the American West of 1880. In short order the pair indulges in whoring and gunfights..and even murder. On two successive occasions, Peter is confronted by a bald, dressed-in-black Gunslinger (Brynner), an android who seems to have it in for him.

And in both instances, Peter bloodily guns the robot down. While John and Peter enjoy their week in Westworld, the scientists tasked with overseeing the vast Delos grounds toil in subterranean environs to repair and service hundreds of androids. A new concern soon arises. Android breakdowns are on the rise, almost as though an infectious disease is passing from one android to another. The scientists watch concerned as android behavior begins to turn...rebellious. Instead of shutting down the park, the scientists opt to continue observing. This delay in decisive action proves to be a mistake, since the androids revolt and begin to murder the Delos guests. In Westworld, the Gunslinger returns one last time, looking to even up the score. He murders John in a shoot-out. The machine then sets off on a relentless pursuit of Peter through Roman World and Medieval World. A desperate Peter now must utilize every survival instinct and weapon at his disposal (including hydrochloric acid and fire) to survive the machine's endless attacks. "The realest thing I've ever done..." The first thing to acknowledge about Westworld is that the Michael Crichton has directed the low-budget picture with a real sense of competence...and most importantly, consistency.

For instance, all of the scenes set in the underground complex utilize lengthy camera pans. These pans (of high-tech machinery, infirmary beds for the robots, whirring reel-to-reel computers, etc.) cover a tremendous amount of territory and successively give one the impression of Delos' massive control apparatus. We return to this underground complex several times in the film, and Crichton universally deploys these lengthy pans; not just to provide the setting a sense of scope, but also to keep things moving in the film. We're constantly aware, via these frequent panning shots, of the momentum necessary to keep Delos operational. Underground, nothing ever stops. And the nighttime "clean-up" scene in Westworld with vehicles and workmen gathering the "dead" androids for repairs likewise adds to the film's sense of reality; to the sense of a real-life park at an apex of activity. Inside Westworld, Crichton adopts a different technique to film the "fake" cowboy moments; the moments that seem to be straight out of old Western films and TV shows.

In this case -- for bar fights and shoot-outs that aren't real -- he deploys slow motion photography so that immediately our minds seize on the concept of movie Westerns; and of a history of being entertained by them. These heightened, almost exaggerated (and again, lengthy) sequences remind us that this world of Delos is all but "play acting;" that the world Peter and John engage with in Delos is not real or authentic. It's a game. When things turn sour inside Westworld, Crichton makes another pivot in terms of stylistic flourishes. He does away with the artificiality of the slow motion photography and relies instead on staging and shooting tricks we most closely associate with the horror genre. He thus adopts first person subjective shots, tracking shots, and even stages a decent "jolt moment" as Peter backs up into terror. All of these moments combine to ramp up the tension, and carry us through the film's exciting climax. There's even a sting-in-the-tail/tale involving the (scorched) Gunslinger as he gets up for one last kill.

It isn't so much that any of this workmanship represents revolutionary or trail-blazing filmmaking; it's merely that Crichton's approach is economical and adroit; efficient and well-done. Without being show-offy, he almost universally finds the right shot for the right scene, and the result is that Westworld moves effortlessly from set-piece to set-piece with a bit of good visual grace to go alongside the film's subversive and extremely witty sense of humor. "There are no rules..." If Crichton proves deft as a film director, it's fair to make the same case for him as the film's screenwriter. Even though Westworld features a fairly straight-forward narrative that devolves into a last-act chase sequence, Crichton has nonetheless layered on social commentary in a way that proves both appealing and funny. These touches earn the film a serious appraisal in terms of the genre and what it can accomplish. Specifically, Westworld ponders the human race and its unlucky creation, the androids of Delos. First let's consider the humans. These are creatures who pay an exorbitant fee to escape from reality into a more primitive, less comfortable past. That fact alone says something about us, doesn't it?

Specifically, it says that we've built ourselves an uncomfortable modern world in which the only outlet or escape is a fantasy that looks to the past; to "less complicated" times. Ironically, we romanticize that past and yearn for the "simplicity of it" instead of making the present more tolerable and liveable. As Star Trek's Mr. Spock would say...highly illogical. In this more primitive past, the vacationing guests at Delos can indulge sexual and violent fantasy, all without feeling the slightest bit of guilt or remorse about the behavior because the target of these fantasies is a machine...and we don't consider machines to be life-forms. Again, this is a statement about us as a species. We find killing...fun. And we consider machines to be subservient; not our equals. Intriguingly, Delos also makes it possible for people lacking in any real survival skills or abilities (like Dick Van Patten's character) to buff up their egos and feel like larger-than-life heroes.

Yet those feelings of heroism and bravery stem from killing machines who are programmed to be slow on the draw; or by bedding female androids who are not entitled "to refuse a guest's seduction." In other words, it's a stacked deck. There's no danger here and no real adversity either. And where there's no adversity, there's no growth and no learning. Again, it's all just a game, a delusion to make a guest feel "special" when in fact the androids have no choice but to die on cue or submit to sexual advances. As a species, we're easily fooled into believing we're pretty terrific, aren't we? And that's where Peter (Benjamin) proves an interesting character. He's a neurotic, insecure lawyer still hung up on his ex-wife (who took him to the cleaners during their divorce). He's the stereotypical modern "sissy" man, and he feels "big" about himself for bedding an android, and for shooting down an android gunslinger. He thus mistakes the world of Delos for one that really matters. This error becomes plain to him when the androids malfunction and commit murder.

Suddenly, Peter is thrown into a situation that is all-too-real, and he must use his wits, imagination, constitution and other human gifts to survive the day. His previous (and short-lived) confidence was based on a sham. But at the end of the film, a battered, sweating, exhausted Peter realizes the truth. That he survived something "real" and that it wasn't at all a game. Rather, it was terrifying. The last shot of the film is a close-shot of Peter recognizing human folly. He recognizes his own folly (in treating the game like it mattered) and the Delos creator's folly: in believing that nothing here could ever possibly go wrong. In terms of the androids, the film hints (and just barely so...) the idea that the machines are gaining an awareness of how badly they are being used by the human guests. In Brynner's case, one gets the sense that the android is tired of losing to a sissy human who he knows he could beat in any fair fight. The androids here are "sex models" and gunfighters, and every single day they have to die or put out so that men like Dick Van Patten or Richard Benjamin can feel better about themselves.

Men like the character played by James Brolin are not much better: macho thugs who see people simply as receptacles for their urges and appetites, both sexual and violent. It's an unflattering portrait of modern man. In this scenario, as in films like Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, audience loyalties become increasingly divided. It's not right to enslave any creature, and yet nor do we wish to see humanity subjugated before an enemy. Westworld offers a very interesting take on all this, and I agree with reviewer Zimmerman that the film would have been even better had it been R-rated; so that we could understand even better the plight of these machines who suddenly realize it isn't so pleasant to be cast as the villain (or the prize...) in another creature's fairy tale. Finally, I just have to comment on Yul Brynner's famous performance. He gives new meaning to the term "steely eyed," and brings an intense sense of physicality to the role of the android gunslinger. He moves with a strange but purposeful carriage (even while riding a horse) and successfully evokes the feeling of something that is more than human.

Although his face rarely shows expression of any type, there is also something in Brynner's gait and stance that implicitly suggests an under-the-surface malevolence. Even though he is an emotionless machine, he's clearly a bad ass. This is a really accomplished performance, and Brynner isn't just portraying a machine...he's portraying a machine with a (data?) chip on his shoulder. He's a lot of fun to watch in this movie. When I wrote Horror Films of the 1970s back in the years 1999-2000, I finished off a review of Westworld with the thought that "what man has forged to serve him will dominate him unless stopped, or conversely, treated with common decency." Today that conclusion still seems apt. Someone organize those androids at Delos a union...before it's too late. Posted by

Question: Who played the gunslinging cowboy robot 406 in the 1973 movie Westworld?
Answer: Yul Brynner