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Westworld |  | Actors: Yul Brynner, Richard Benjamin, James Brolin, Norman Bartold, Alan Oppenheimer
Studio: Warner Home Video
Category: DVD
List Price: $19.98
Buy New: $7.91
as of 9/10/2010 18:53 CDT details
You Save: $12.07 (60%)
New (26) Used (13) Collectible (2) from $6.98
Seller: Clyde Parks
Rating:  116 reviews
Sales Rank: 2111
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
Languages: English (Original Language), French (Original Language), Spanish (Original Language)
Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Region: 1
Discs: 1
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Running Time: 88 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.4 x 5.9 x 0.7
MPN: 012569506725
ISBN: 0790744260
UPC: 012569506725
EAN: 9780790744261
ASIN: B00004VVND
Theatrical Release Date: November 21, 1973
Release Date: August 22, 2000
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Amazon.com
Welcome to Delos, the high-tech Disneyland for adults that Michael Crichton created for Westworld, a nifty science fiction thriller from 1973 that also marked the popular novelist's feature-film directorial debut. The movie is so named because the vacationing buddies who travel to Delos (James Brolin, Richard Benjamin) choose Westworld as their destination (the other choices being Roman World and Medieval World), where they are free to indulge their movie-inspired fantasies of the Wild West. From brothel beauties to black-hatted gunslingers (like the villain played by Yul Brynner), the place is populated by perfectly humanlike robots programmed and monitored to cater to every guest's fancy. But fun turns into abject horror when the robots--particularly Brynner's badman--begin to malfunction and Delos turns into an amusement park that's anything but amusing. Westworld has moments of camp and the look of a low-budget backlot production, but two decades before Crichton revamped his idea to create Jurassic Park, this movie made the most of its interesting and exciting premise. --Jeff Shannon
Product Description
Westworld is a futuristic theme park where robots are programmed to fulfill guests' lustful and sometimes violent fantasies-- until something goes wro
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 116
A Vacation To Die For... June 7, 2010
Adam Richter (New York USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've been intrigued by "Westworld" since I first saw it many years ago, but I could never find it on home video. Stores tend to carry plenty of recent science fiction releases as well as old, B-movie bargain titles, but "Westworld" seemed to have slipped through the cracks. It was therefore a nice surprise to finally find the DVD available on Amazon.com.
If you've never seen "Westworld," you've probably seen works that have been influenced by it, including "The Terminator," "Jurassic Park," and even "The Simpsons" (the episode featuring "Itchy and Scratchy Land"). "Westworld" tells the story of a high-tech, adults-only amusement park where guests can explore expertly crafted re-creations of various historic periods (such as -- you guessed it -- the Wild West), which are populated by robots who look and act just like humans. The big draw is the realistic level of interaction that the robots have been programmed for. If a guest wants to have a shootout with a robot gunslinger, he can whip out his six-shooter and fire away... and he doesn't have to worry about losing, because the robots have been programmed to never harm the guests. What could possibly go wrong?
Ah, but things do go wrong, of course, and this is where the excitement really begins. Yul Brynner's relentless, robotic gunslinger easily steals the show, though Richard Benjamin earns the viewer's sympathy as a first-time park visitor, just beginning to enjoy himself, who's suddenly forced into survival mode. The special effects are a bit dated, though it's wise to remember that this is a movie from the early 1970's that didn't have the nine-figure budget that has become the norm for today's sci-fi extravaganzas (interestingly, "Westworld" actually includes one of the earliest uses of computer-generated imagery ever seen in a movie: pixelated "point of view" shots representing robotic vision). However, "Westworld's" effects are more than sufficient to effectively tell the story.
The film, while only about 90 minutes long, takes its time to get going, and I think writer/director Michael Crichton could have shown us a little less of the human characters' adventures in Westworld before the machines went haywire (a slapstick, bottles-flying bar brawl which doesn't advance the plot is just one example of what could have been cut) and a little more of what happened afterwards. Also, it's best not to think too much about the details. For example, why are the guns loaded with real bullets? Even though it's explained that a sensor prevents the guests from shooting other humans, couldn't bullets easily go astray during a shootout? And wouldn't it be prohibitively expensive for the park to have to constantly repair all those shot-up robots?
While certain plot points might seem a bit unrealistic, they do make for a more exciting movie (after all, if the guns were of the harmless "laser tag" variety, how threatening would that be?). If you can suspend disbelief, you'll find "Westworld" to be a truly fascinating film, a disturbing depiction of a futuristic "dream" vacation to the past that quickly becomes a living nightmare.
 Vintage Robot Scare Film June 5, 2010
Christopher Balfer
This film is one of the classic stories about robots developing their own thinking, and revolting against their creators. A pretty good film, with a somewhat anticlimactic ending. While the premise is a good one, I think that there could have been more done with the interaction between robots and park guests after the revolt began. Overall though, not a bad movie.
One day the robots, always programmed to lose, got fed up... March 14, 2010
H. Bala (Carson - hey, we have an IKEA store! - CA USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The primary image I have of Yul Brynner is distilled from four films: THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN, THE KING AND I, ANASTASIA, and this one, WESTWORLD. And for someone who barely gets any dialogue in this sci-fi western, Brynner wields the most impact, carries the strongest presence. Even though Richard Benjamin and James Brolin co-star, it's Yul Brynner's character people remember best when thinking of WESTWORLD.
Michael Crichton writes the story and directs the thing, and this is his debut at directing things. It's an intriguing concept that he introduces, and one that he'll revisit many years later in the blockbuster JURASSIC PARK. In the story Westworld is only one of the three fully interactive, fully immersive adult recreational theme resorts run by the Delos corporation, the other two being Roman World and Medieval World. Fantasies are fulfilled here, and nightly bacchanals in which to revel. Role playing is taken to the extremes. You can do whatever you want here, seemingly without repercussions. Two friends visit Westworld, thinking this, not knowing just how wrong they are.
In Westworld, which apes the rugged frontier towns of the 1880s, the greenhorn guest engages in gunfights and saloon brawls, and sleeps with the local soiled dove. No doubt all these activities are described in the brochure, and no one even looks at you sideways when you engineer a jailbreak for your incarcerated pal. Westworld's inhabitants are robots who impeccably simulate humans, automatons "scientifically programmed to look, act, talk, and even bleed just like humans do." And so they're shot down or beat up or bedded with impunity. The two friends, Peter Martin (Richard Benjamin) and John Blane (James Brolin), take on a stalker, this pushy gunslinger (Brynner) with dead metal eyes who time and again, as per script, goes down in a hail of bullets. Until he doesn't.
Part of the fun is in seeing what goes on behind the curtain. The film frequently shifts the scenery to the lab techs running the show, fixing and rebooting the machines on a nightly basis, and we note their cluelessness and inability to adapt when things begin to go haywire, when the machines begin to rebel and murder their guests. And, let me tell you, for a thousand dollars a day, I expect better than a sword punched thru the gut. "Nothing can go wrong," the reassuring disembodied voice says twice during orientation. You think the techs would have a solid emergency contingency plan in place. Happily, they don't, and that's why this movie is fun. It's always fun when there's a glitch in the product, a gremlin in the system.
WESTWORLD came out in 1973, so the special effects pale in comparison to what we've got today. There's also this weird lack of energy at times on the screen, and I guess you have to put this at Crichton's feet since he was in the director's chair. Part of that low energy level has to do with the protagonist's tepid sense of self-preservation. In his encounters with the implacable Brimstone Kid he sometimes settles for strolling away instead of urgently running the f--- out of there. Also, with the technological advances proposed in this film, it's really unbelievable that they're still having issues with perfecting the robot hands to pass for human hands. And how the Brimstone Kid can see with its cruddily pixelated robot-vision, I don't know, although, okay, the robot is equipped with a full sensory array. I'm basically grousing because the robotic perspective looks cheesy.
But disregard all that. I think they're minor drawbacks, really. WESTWORLD, with its 88 minute running time, is entertaining stuff. Welcome bits of humor pepper the film, and for a PG rating there's even a dose of suggestively lewd conduct going down. But what really sells this film is Yul Brynner as the enigmatic, terrifying robot gunslinger gone rogue. When the Brimstone Kid flashes a smile in one scene, there's menace oozing from it. What Brynner also does here is wink at his "Chris Adams" role in THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN. WESTWORLD, in its own right, counts as one of Brynner's standout pictures.
But, hey, whatever happened to the tourist who became the new sheriff? Or did I just miss seeing his sad corpse lying somewhere in Westworld?
 Even Just A Little Imagination On Your Part And This Is A Great Movie January 10, 2010
J. Munyon
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Yul Brynner gives a bone-chilling superb performance as the bad guy who just won't go away. The sets are as good as any 1973 western film ever put together and then some, since this is meant to double as a sci-fi film too. Richard Benjamin and James Brolin play a couple of unsuspecting saps who are our two visiting tourists who just want to have fun, and find out computer technology doesn't always do what you tell it to do. Who ever would have thought a western theme movie would have Nurse Chapel from the original Star Trek series (Majel Barrett) playing in it as a saloon madame. But then I guess if Dick Van Patten can end up being the town Sheriff then why not? What a hoot. You'll be mesmerized by the story, dazzled by special effects that are amazing for over 36 years ago's efforts, and no doubt at first wish you could find a place to vacation at like Westworld - that is until the movie shares the dangerous possibilities when things go horribly wrong with the robotics characters. This movie was in my VHS collection and is now in my DVD collection. Beginning to end, I like this movie and none of the sequels ever measured up anywhere even close to the impact Westworld had on its viewers. I saw this movie years ago, and am happy to say I recommend it still today with a big enthusiastic smile and give it a nod. Buy it.
Adventure January 8, 2010
J.V. (Lone Prairie)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
WOOO if man could just perfect that technology it would really be a vacation getaway. An inspiring film
Robots serving us for enjoyment,
not putting people out of work or
making one man filthy rich
Showing reviews 1-5 of 116
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