Futureworld

Plot

In 1985, the Delos Corporation brought its park back into operation, two years after the catastrophic events at Westworld. That earlier park was closed, and the company invested $1.5 billion to make the resort safer. To generate positive press, they invited journalist Chuck Browning and television reporter Tracy Ballard to experience the park. Before the trip was announced, Browning met a Delos employee who claimed to have damaging information about the company.

The man handed Browning an envelope, then was shot in the back and died. At the resort, guests could pick from four themed areas: Spaworld, where aging and pain were supposedly eliminated; Medievalworld; Romanworld; and Futureworld, a simulation of an orbiting space station. Browning and Ballard chose Futureworld. There, robots provided entertainment, including boxing and sexual encounters.

A guide named Dr. Duffy showed them around, insisting all previous problems were resolved. The reporters were shocked to discover that the Control Center was run entirely by robots. Their meals were drugged, and while they slept, Delos performed medical tests to create clones of them. A Russian general and a Japanese politician were also cloned.

Ballard woke up terrified, thinking it was a nightmare. Later, the pair sneaked into the underground areas and accidentally activated a cloning machine, which produced three samurai from a planned Eastworld park. A mechanic named Harry rescued them and brought them to his living quarters, where he shared space with a robot he called Clark. After they spoke with Harry, Dr. Schneider and two security officers arrived and escorted them back to their rooms, where Browning and Ballard kissed.

Production

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the studio behind Westworld, started developing this sequel. Michael Crichton declined to work on a follow-up, so original producer Paul Lazarus III was brought in. He came up with a story set in a new park where robots clone world leaders. MGM chose to produce only one sci-fi film that year, Logan's Run, and shelved Futureworld.

Lazarus struggled to find another studio willing to pick it up, as MGM's rejection made others wary despite the first film's success. Former MGM president James T. Aubrey then stepped in and secured funding from Samuel Z. Arkoff's American International Pictures. This movie became the first major feature to incorporate 3D computer-generated imagery, showing an animated hand and face. The hand was a digital copy of Edwin Catmull's left hand from his 1972 short A Computer Animated Hand, and the face came from Fred Parke's 1974 short Faces & Body Parts.

Digital compositing was also used to make characters appear over backgrounds. Filming took place largely around Houston, including Intercontinental Airport, Jones Hall, the Johnson Space Center, and a chase sequence in the city's underground pedestrian tunnel system. The bar set was reused from Logan's Run and redecorated.

Release

Lazarus admitted the film was not a very good picture but attributed its poor commercial performance to AIP focusing on its prestige film A Matter of Time. In 1979, Futureworld became the first modern American film to achieve general theatrical release in China. Richard Eder panned the film in The New York Times, quoting Ballard's line about the water works and claiming the film is as much fun as running barefoot on Astroturf. He wrote that it is ordinary hardware science fiction full of computers and empty of thought, and that Danner and Fonda have absolutely nothing to do, concluding that starring in Futureworld must be the actor's equivalent of going on welfare.

Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave two stars out of four, criticizing the dumb story but noting some of the best gadgets since early James Bond pictures. Arthur D. Murphy of Variety called it a strong sequel that keeps personal drama moving smartly through gadgetry montages. Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times called it an extreme rarity, a sequel that is a decided improvement over the original. Gary Arnold of The Washington Post wrote that unlike Westworld there is nothing shrewd or compelling behind the events, with the big mystery being an old wheeze about power-hungry scientists who clone influential guests.

John Pym of The Monthly Film Bulletin expressed disappointment that the scriptwriters neglected interesting implications of self-programming robots and instead led players through standard caper movie diversions. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 31% based on 13 reviews, with an average grade of 4.7 out of 10. For its initial television broadcast, an alternative version of a scene was shot where Browning performs a bras d'honneur instead of giving the finger.