Saturday Morning Cult-TV Blogging; Sigmund and the Sea Monsters (1973-1975): "The Monster Who Came to Dinner" (September 8,1973)

Sigmund and the Sea Monsters (1973-1975) is the first live-action Sid and Marty Krofft Saturday morning series to run more than one season. The program ran for two seasons and nearly thirty episodes on NBC, though its record for broadcast was soon usurped by Land of the Lost (1974-1977), which ran three years and forty three episodes.

Sigmund and the Sea Monsters remains beloved by young and old alike, and was recently re-booted for a six episode run on Amazon Prime. The original seventies series follows the adventures of two young brothers, Johnny (Johnny Whitaker) and Scott (Scott Kolden), who live near a beach, and discover a friendly, diminutive  sea monster named Sigmund (Billy Barty) near “Dead Man’s Cove.”

The boys bring him back home to their clubhouse. Notably, Sigmund is unlike the other sea monsters of his kind, because he doesn’t want to frighten people. Having run away from his family of origin, he finds a new family with Johnny and Scott, though he must stay hidden from the family housekeeper, the stern Zelda (Mary Wickes).  Johnny and Scott’s parents are “away” and never seen throughout the series.

Over the weeks and seasons, Sigmund’s sea monster family tries again and again to bring him back home (in part so the family’s rich uncle Siggy, Sigmund’s namesake, will leave the family his inheritance when he dies), and fail repeatedly.

The first episode of the series, “The Monster Who Came to Dinner,” establishes much of this premise. It begins with the boys carrying Sigmund home to their clubhouse on a surf-board, and nearly being run-over at a road intersection (a scene in the opening montage)

Meanwhile, Sigmund’s sea monster world is simultaneously established back in his family’s cave. The gruff, insulting Big Daddy (Sharon Baird) is voiced by Walker Edmiston, and is an obvious knock-off of All in the Family’s (1972 -1979) bigot-in-residence, Archie Bunker, right down to his memorable catchphrases “Dingbat,” “stifle” and (in the episode “Puppy Love,”) even the put-down “Meathead.”  One of the brothers, meanwhile, sounds exactly like Jim Nabor’s beloved Gomer Pyle, from the series of the same name (1962-1964).

We learn in this episode of the Krofft series that the monsters have “Shellovision” (instead of television) and watch their favorite channel: MBC (Monster Broadcasting Company.)  The series they watch in this episode is a knock-off of Sanford and Son (1972-1977) called “Serpent and Son.”  Since Sigmund and the Sea Monsters aired in 1973, both the Sanford and All in the Family references would have been considered very timely and relevant when the series first aired.

“The Monster Who Came to Dinner” may be Sigmund, himself, who nearly ruins a home-cooked dinner between Zelda and her beau, the local sheriff, Bevins (Jim Higgins), or it may be his namesake, Uncle Siggy, who comes to the family cave and is upset that his favorite sea monster, Sigmund, is nowhere to be found.

This episode, like so many episodes of Sigmund and the Sea Monsters ends with a song, sung by the boys.  In this case, the song is “Friends.” 

Next week, episode two: “Puppy Love,” but in the meantime, here’s a look at one series theme song:

Cult-TV Movie Review: Baffled! (January 30, 1973)

The TV-movies of the 1970’s were veritably obsessed with matters of the occult, and with psychic powers too. I reviewed Sweet, Sweet Rachel (1971) not long ago, and now here’s another movie with similar themes and structure: Baffled! (1973).

Like Sweet, Sweet Rachel before it, Baffled! concerns a person from our Modern Age of Reason and Technology (The 20^th and 21^st century) who becomes unexpectedly engulfed in a psychic “mystery” and must solve a crime related to it.  These films are as much detective stories (or film noirs, I suppose you could argue) as they are horror pictures. They involve murder, robbery, and other criminal activity.

And also like that earlier film, Baffled! is a bit slow-paced and over-long. The pacing seems off at points, and some action beats don’t succeed, either because of inadequate staging (bad rear projection) or a lack of suspense.

Finally, Baffled! too was designed to be the pilot for an ongoing TV series.  Sweet, Sweet Rachel went on to become The Sixth Sense (1972), a series that starred Garry Collins and lasted two seasons.

Baffled! never went on to series format, even though the movie boasts some promise

What, exactly is that promise?

It’s in the performances, specifically. Leonard Nimoy and Susan Hampshire star as the duo investigating the unusual supernatural events, and there’s some good, interesting chemistry between the performers. For those of you who are familiar with Nimoy primarily as the unemotional Spock on Star Trek (1966-1969), Baffled! is a remarkable counterpoint. He’s charming, laidback, and quite funny in the telefilm. Susan Hampshire, playing an occult expert, is surprisingly sweet and innocent in the role, which is an interesting twist too.  Where Alex Dreier and Gary Collins both performed their “psychic” support roles with utter solemnity and seriousness, Hampshire plays it all sincerely, but gently. 

In all, Baffled! is intriguing, but not great.

“Evil forces do exist. Always have…”

During a competitive car race at the Pennsylvania Run, ace driver Tom Kovack (Nimoy) runs off the road when he experiences a psychic vision of a woman in trouble, in a manor house in England.  An expert in psychic phenomena and student of the occult, Michelle Brent (Hampshire) meets with him later, and suggests to him that his vision was true; that he possesses a “rare and mysterious insight.”

At first, Kovack dismisses this possibility out-of-hand, but soon experiences a second and a third vision.  In one such vision, he falls from the manor house -- which Michelle has identified real place, Wyndham House in Devon -- into s turbulent ocean over the cliff-side.  After the startling vision, Kovack discovers that he is actually soaked.

Realizing he needs help to understand better what is happening to him, Kovack teams up with Michelle, and they had to England together, to stay at Wyndham House and investigate.

There is another guest staying there too, a famous movie star, Andrea Glenn (Vera Miles). She is waiting for her estranged husband, and has brought their twelve-year old daughter, Jennifer (Jewel Blanch) to the house as well. 

After Jennifer receives a necklace with a wolf-head pendant from her mysterious, absent father, the girl seems to age dramatically in a day, acting like a fifteen-year old, surly teenager.

Mrs. Farraday (Rachel Roberts), who runs the house, however, starts to appear much younger.

Tom becomes convinced that Andrea was the woman in danger in his first vision, and that some dark force has taken control of her daughter, Jennifer, and is plotting against her.

Baffled! is one of those cases in which a movie’s set-up is more intriguing, finally, than the actual plot or resolution of the plot. After all is said and done, the psychic plot is just a gimmick and the real motive here is for someone to acquire Andrea Glenn’s fortune.

The best part of this telefilm is the first half-hour, wherein Tom Kovack experiences his first psychic visions, and encounters Michelle, who encourages him to pursue them.  The writing is strong, the performances a good, and there’s even a bit of a cinematic feel to the production.

Once the film has settled down in the British manor house, by contrast, the movie loses some of its interest, and comes to a near stand-still in terms of pacing. Unlike Sweet, Sweet Rachel and its follow-up, The Sixth Sense, the visuals in Baffled! aren’t even particularly stylish. Stylish, colorful murder sequences enlivened both earlier productions, and yet are absent here.

The movie’s real virtue is, frankly, Leonard Nimoy, who is so un-Spock-like here it is astounding.  Tom Kovack is a mellow seventies bachelor (and race car driver), trying to make time with the ladies and commenting ironically on everything that happens to him. I wouldn’t say that Nimoy is Shatner-esque in the film, but he seems is downright effusive compared to his buttoned down, controlled performances as the half-Vulcan.

The mystery itself is a bit odd, and uninspiring, and director Philip Leacock fails to wring substantial suspense from the action, even when Kovack and Michelle become trapped in the bottom of the elevator shaft in Wyndham House. The film’s ending -- and restoration of order -- can be seen coming a mile away, and reflects the laws of the occult established as far back as The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890).

Baffled! also ends with a plug for a series that would never come. After the mystery is solved at Wyndham House, Kovack and Michelle decide to go their separate ways. But then -- just as he is getting in his car – Tom conveniently experiences another vision that shows someone (strangers) in danger. He summons Michelle, she jumps into his car, and they’re off to solve another psychic case.

So, they’re a team!

There’s a part of me that is sorry that Baffled didn’t make it to series so we could see that team solve more intriguing mysteries. I would have loved to see Nimoy and Hampshire work together again, and feel that if the episodes were an hour instead of 90 minute, there would be less chance for the tediousness that impacts some moments here.

Today, Baffled! is more of a curiosity than an artistically satisfying endeavor, and I can’t help but wonder how history would have been different if the concept had become a hit, and Nimoy became well-known not just for Star Trek, but for playing a groovy, 1970s psychic investigator.

Cult-TV Movie Review: A Cold Night's Death (January 30, 1973)

A scientist named Vogel who is station at the Summit Research Station atop snowy Tower Mountain, mysteriously goes radio quiet after communicating erratically. Specifically, his final transmission involves the claim that he is in communication with Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Augustus Caesar, and other historical leaders.

Two other scientists, Robert Jones (Robert Culp) and Frank Enari (Eli Wallach) are assigned to investigate Vogel’s silence, and continue with his research, which involves subjecting chimpanzees to extreme environmental stress. 

The mission is the work of NASA, which wants to understand how different environmental stresses may impact astronauts on long-term space voyages.

Once they research the station with their helicopter pilot, Robert and Frank discover Vogel locked in the base’s electronics room… and frozen to death.  His corpse is is taken away by the helicopter pilot for investigation back home.

The laboratory, meanwhile, has been ransacked, or overturned.

Robert and Frank acquaint themselves with the facility and clean it up. They also acquaint themselves with the apes -- Aggie, Gengi, Allie, and Geronimo -- and resume experiments on them. Before long, however, strange events begin to occur. Windows are left open at night, freezing the pipes, for instance.

Suspicion grows between Frank and Robert, as if some force is pitting them against one another.  When Robert gets locked out from the base, he fears he knows the answer.  But Frank has grown violent, and pulls a gun on him…

“There’s nothing unnatural here. Or supernatural. There’s just you and me.”

A Cold Night’s Death (1973), a TV-movie that aired on ABC in the early 1970s, is a spare, contained and very effective horror piece. The film’s virtues involve the heightened senses of claustrophobia and isolation it carefully nurtures, and, not least of all, a creepy electronic score from Gil Melle that makes the action all the more unsettling.

After one watches the film, one may not feel totally satisfied as to the nature of the mystery on Tower Mountain, at the Summit Research Base, but in this case, the destination may not be quite as important as the journey is.  

In this regard, director Jerrold Freedman provides many shots of darkened corridors or laboratories, anticipating John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982), and on the soundtrack is the ever-present howl of an arctic wind. The film succeeds as an anxiety-provoking, slow-burn kind of horror film.

It’s true that some of the exterior sequences don’t hold up well today, with the snowstorms realized by (obvious) double exposures, but this limitation hardly matters.  Instead, A Cold Night’s Death comes alive by settling down in that dark, creepy base, and buffeting the facility (and its inhabitants) with relentless wind and snow. 

It’s clear that Robert and Frank can’t expect help, as they are far removed from civilization. And it is equally plain that they can’t go far from the base, without risking their lives. In one of the climactic moments, Robert finds himself locked outside the base, and realizes he will die within fifteen minutes, from exposure to the environment. Desperately, he seeks a way inside, and the tension ramps up.

This is also a story of two men who, dealing with isolation and claustrophobia, come to view each other suspiciously.  Actually, they begin to view each other with sheer paranoia.  Robert is convinced that some “unseen force” killed Vogel. Frank is convinced, however, that Robert is running an experiment on him, trying to get him to believe that theory.  Robert is arrogant. Frank is defensive.  It is a fatal chemistry they share.

Another reason that A Cold Night’s Death succeeds involves the fact that, for a good, long while, the audience can’t be certain who is right.  

Is there an unseen force at work? Or did Vogel go crazy, with Robert and Frank following suit?

When the answer arrives, it is satisfactory, certainly, but my favorite part of a mystery is never the solution, but rather the set-up. Here, if you’ve seen the film, you’ll remember the answer: the chimps are experimenting on the scientists, much as the scientists have been experimenting on them.

If you think about it more deeply, the film truly involves circles within circles, or layers within layers.  Scientists conduct experiments involving extreme conditions on the chimpanzees, unaware that because of their location and altitude (as well as the intelligence of the apes), they are similarly being subjected to a test involving extreme conditions.  It’s an intriguing narrative circle, and the film’s final shots are actually, terrifying, because of the loop they close.

One scientist has killed another scientist, out of paranoia and fear. The survivor goes to the electronics room -- where Vogel died -- to contact help.  Too late, he witnesses the door closing, and locking, trapping him inside, in a room exposed to the outdoors.  Then, a face rises into the window pane of the door.  It is an inhuman, or primate face.

Considering the movie’s setting, it’s appropriate to call the final punctuation of the film “chilling.”  It definitely reflects Frank’s line that “there’s nothing unnatural here, or supernatural.” That much is true. However, his next comment is wrong: “There’s just you and me.”

Clearly, he didn’t factor in the chimpanzees, who all boast the names of brilliant leaders and tacticians. In this way, the story may be about human arrogance or vanity. Frank and Robert never even entertain the only other possible source of the strange events in the lab: the chimpanzees.  In the final shot of the film, we see what a mistake this is, as man is led into a trap by the apes.

There isn’t a great deal of action or thrills in A Cold Night’s Death, and it has been termed “talky” and “ponderous” by genre scholars. And yet the finale is perfectly executed, and perfectly prepared for.  It may feature what some deem a preposterous ending, but at least the ending isn’t a betrayal of anything the audience sees, or is told.

Watching A Cold Night’s Death, I must again reflect on how remarkable many of these 1970s horror TV-movies truly are.  In terms of resources and budget, they have nearly nothing to offer. In terms of special effects, again, there’s nothing to see here.  

But so many of these films, this one included, master a real sense of unease, and discomfort.  There’s something subtly terrifying and disturbing about every moment this film. Even more than 40 years later, the sounds (thank you, Gil Melle...) and frozen sights of A Cold Night's Death will leave you mesmerized until the final revelation.

Cult-TV Movie Review: The Horror at 37,000 Feet (1973)

This TV movie, The Horror at 37,000 Feet -- from 1973 -- has not, historically, received a lot of love from critics or audiences.  

It stars William Shatner as an alcoholic ex-priest, and even Shatner’s die-hard fans, believe that the movie is the worst production the icon has ever been associated with.

Well, I’m going to buck conventional wisdom a bit and give the telefilm a little much-needed love today. 

Although it is undeniably a cheap-jack production -- with virtually no resources upon which to draw -- The Horror at 37,000 Feet does succeed in effectively generating a sense of terror.

And it does so the old fashioned way.

Largely by hiding the titular horror from our eyes, and letting, instead, film grammar “sell” the scares. 

First, a confession: I first saw this made-for-TV movie as a child, and it terrified me. 

I have recalled, for probably three decades, isolated moments or images from The Horror at 37,000 Feet, such as a gaudily made-up baby doll “oozing” green death, or an unlucky passenger ejected from a plane in flight into the infinite sky at dawn.

I suspect that these images resonate, in part because director, David Lowell Rich, realized he had very few options. He had to marshal all the (meager) resources he had to create images that carried frightful impact.

There was no budget, apparently, to showcase bells and whistles. The was no budget to reveal the face of evil, to orchestrate elaborate special effects, or even afford the audience a single, solitary gaze at the “haunted” Druid altar that informs the film’s supernatural scares.

So Rich, instead, figured out, in many instances, how he could heighten suspense or anxiety utilizing visual compositions.  I’ll write about a few of those in this review. But long story short: he picks the right tools for the right job. He finds the best angles to utilize -- at key moments -- to ramp up feelings of discomfort and ambiguity.

Essentially, his approach of necessity -- not to really show anything – echoes the movie’s narrative, which concerns a plane flight wherein something dark and malevolent mysteriously suspends the laws of physics.

It’s not clear what that force is -- Satan, Druids, or H.P. Lovecraft’s Old Ones -- but for one night, the summer solstice, this unseen power exerts control over one tiny corner of the human world.

Sure, the actors are mostly 1970s TV has-beens (Buddy Ebsen, Chuck Connors, Russell Johnson) and the writing is muddled at times.

But consider that the scariest movies aren’t always the ones that make the most rational sense, or which present the clearest explanations of things. 

Sometimes the best ones are those in which “sense,” as we understand it, is almost graspable, and then, suddenly lost. We are scared by uncertainty, after all, not certainty.

Whether intentional or not, this kind of irrationality also echoes the dream language of nightmares.

The Horror at 37,000 Feet is a modest but effective little nightmare, for certain.

“The air feels funny tonight.”

AOA Flight 19X leaves Heathrow Airport by darkest night, bound for Long Island, New York.  It is a cargo flight with only a few passengers aboard. 

Among those passengers: a defrocked priest, Paul Kovalik (Shatner), a cranky business-man, Farley (Ebsen), a British physician, Dr. Enkalia (Paul Winfield), a model (France Nuyen), and an architect, O’Neill (Roy Thinnes) and his wife, Sheila (Jane Merrow)

The cargo in the hold belongs to O’Neill. He is transporting in a large crate the stones of an ancient altar found in an English abbey, from his wife’s land.  The O’Neills' decision to remove the ancient stones from their native soil is a source of controversy, especially for another passenger, Mrs. Pinder (Tammy Grimes).

Once in flight, strange things begin to occur. 

The pilot (Connors) and flight crew are shocked when the plane appears to be suspended in air, using fuel, but not moving. At first the crew suspects a dangerous, powerful head-wind. But even upon turning around, the plane can make no progress through the skies.

Then Mrs. O’Neill faints, and after awakening, speaks words in Latin.  Paul identifies them as words used in a Satanic black mass.

The force in the cargo hold soon breaks loose, trapping an attendant on an elevator, and freezing Mrs. Pinder’s dog, Damon, solid.  It then kills a flight engineer (Johnson).

Soon, strange green ectoplasm begins appearing all over the plane in flight, and the passengers panic. 

They believe that they must sacrifice a passenger, preferably Mrs. O’Neill, to the dark forces manifesting on the jet.

But Kovalik -- who has lost his faith -- chooses to confront the terror for one just one glimpse of the supernatural world.

“We’re caught in a wind like there never was.”

I could easily make the case, as many other reviewers have done, that The Horror at 37,000 Feet is a bad movie.’:

That argument would look like this:

First, the movie is unoriginal in setting and conflict.  At heart, it’s just another a 1970s Airport movie, about a plane in flight experiencing some form of existential jeopardy. 

Been there, done that.

I could even go outside the “plane-in-flight” genre and note that as a horror production, this telefilm has superior antecedents. “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet,” a classic episode of The Twilight Zone (1959-1964) certainly generated scares aplenty, and it also featured William Shatner in a starring role.

So I could argue, without much effort that The Horror at 37,000 Feet is overly familiar, a retread.

I might also note the film’s inherent cheapness. As I noted in my introduction to this review, we never even see the altar that is the cause of the terror. It is crated up. Hidden from the eye.  After a few scenes set an airport, we're on the plane for the whole movie. On the upside, this does generate a feeling of claustrophobia, at least.

And yes, the teleplay mixes up Devil Worship, Paganism and H.P. Lovecraft willy-nilly. All those aspects of the apparent “occult” are thrown into a cocktail blender and mixed, none-too-elegantly.

Then, finally, you have the actors chewing the (very limited) scenery, and a total lack of visual effects to back up the horror.

As Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1989-1999) once noted (of a different production) “Bad movie? You’re soaking in it.”

But let’s travel beyond surface values for a moment and dig a little deeper.  

What The Horror at 37,000 Feet truly concerns is an outbreak of the irrational and supernatural in a world explicitly of the modern, the technological, the reasonable. Something older than Christianity itself awakens and seizes control of state-of-the-art human technology, a plane in flight.

Just the sight of this thing can kill you. It can freeze your blood.

And the old, irrational force, cannot be reckoned with using science, engineering, or any “daylight” recourse. 

The flight team attempts maneuvers to escape the strange, inexplicable jetstream…all of which are (impossibly) ineffective.  The interior of the plane freezes, even though the jet’s skin or hull has not been breached.  And all over the plane, outbreaks of ectoplasm -- green goo -- sprout up.

In total, the forces of the irrational and nightmarish are infecting the plane, coming into the sunshine world of reality. It's a highly localized invasion, of a sort.

What does the Dark Force want?  The passengers become a mob and settle on human sacrifice as the best answer.  What do they sacrifice? Well, Mr. Farley burns all of his money. The wealthy businessman who has spent his life negotiating profitable deals immediately forsakes his God (capitalism) to save his life.  How quickly he gives up a lifetime of greed and avarice in the face of something he can’t rationally grapple with.

But it is Paul’s journey which I find the most fascinating.  He has given up his life as a priest because he never saw one iota of the Divine. All he wanted was one second of validation for his belief system that God exists.  He never got it. And he turned to the bottle for comfort and succor.

Finally, Paul gets the opportunity to confront something beyond the concrete, beyond the rational. He dies for one peek at the “world beyond” ours. What he sees is terrifying, but also, ironically, a confirmation of the life he abandoned. 

As Dr. Enkalia notes, “If there are Devils, there must also be Gods.”

I’ve written before about the Zeitgeist of the late 1960s and early 1970s, leading up to the premiere of Star Wars (1977). It was an era of intense cynicism and doubt in America, and in the pop culture. We lost a war, we had a president resign in disgrace, and one of our most popular weekly periodicals asked the question, on its cover, no less: “Is God Dead?”

We all seemed to be brooding in a state of existential angst and uncertainty.

The horror genre responded in full force to this period of questioning, and from 1967 – 1976 we saw a slew of films raising our doubts: Rosemary’s Baby (1968), The Exorcist (1973), The Omen (1976), and beyond.

The Horror at 37,000 Feet is preoccupied with the same questions. It is of a piece with that historical and entertainment context. As it acknowledges with its settings, we’ve created a world of amazing technology and innovation. But are we spiritual beings? 

And is there a spiritual order to the universe beyond the gadgets and forces we harness through science?

With no real budget to speak of, and no special effects, either, The Horror at 37,000 Feet visualizes an incursion of the supernatural realm into the realm of “reality.”  The director deploys some terrific shots to do so.

Consider the moment, for example, wherein a flight attendant becomes trapped in a rapidly freezing elevator. The window is a narrow, vertical rectangle. But the director doesn’t limit our view to the glass. Instead, he shows us the whole door, so that as the flight attendant screams for help, her visual space in the frame is constricted by a considerable amount. She is inside a box within a box, to put it another way, trapped.  

In a way, that’s a metaphor for all the passengers.  They are trapped on a plane, a box of another sort, with no possibility of escape. Science has put them there (at 37,000 Feet), but the unknown is holding them there.

Secondly, as I’ve noted above, the film is about Paul’s desire and attempt to see the forces beyond human understanding. As The Horror at 37,000 Feet nears its conclusion, the perspective switches --for the only time in the movie, if memory serves -- to a P.O.V. shot.

Clutching a torch, and moving to the darkened back of the cabin (and the source of the terror), Paul approaches his moment of discovery.  

It quickly becomes -- through the subjective camera angle -- our moment of discovery too. We see a fleeting glimpse of a person shrouded in a cloak.

And then we get the pay-off. An extreme close-up of Paul’s face as he sees his “proof” of the other world. It is a moment not of transcendence, but utter, soul-shredding terror.  I know that many film lovers and critics love to dismiss Shatner as hammy or over-the-top in his acting choices.  But it is his reaction shot, lensed in that extreme close-up that serves as the punctuation for the whole movie.  

Paul gets his wish to see the other “reality,” and what he sees is so terrible that he cannot reckon with it. 

I would say Shatner pulls this moment off.

When Paul is ejected from the plane, however, terror gives way to something else.  We see him in the sky, at dawn. The sun is emerging. 

He will die, of course, and yet the order of the universe (the sun rising and setting) is restored. Paul paid for his glimpse of the “the Old Ones” with his life, but the next shot suggests the restoration of order, and perhaps, then, even the journey to Heaven.

Another sequence in the film is also well-shot.  Late in the story, the passengers decide to attempt to trick the Old Ones. They use a child’s baby doll as a sacrifice. They cut Sheila’s hair and fingernails, and put it on the hunk of plastic.  

Then, they give the doll to the dark force.

This sinister power sees through the trick, instantly, and green, bilious ectoplasm pours forth from the toy.  

This is a creepy moment that requires virtually nothing in terms of expense. It is dream horror at its finest, bringing the doll to life, in a sense, as the lifeblood of The Other Side boils up within it.

I don’t argue that Horror at 37,000 Feet is a great production, or one of the all-time great horror films, only that it has something that makes it effectively unsettling.  

That something, as I've hopefully pinpointed, is likely a grounding in the language of film grammar.  The shots, in some weird way, enhance the irrationality of the teleplay, and therefore bring forward the idea of an irrational horror, and a time and place where -- for a horrifying 71 minutes -- two worlds seem to collide.

I find that many 1970s TV films manage to be extremely frightening, even today. This isn’t merely because my generation experienced them in childhood. It’s because they were made in a time when American society was questioning the pillars of our nation (faith, and patriotism), and because they were cheap as Hell.

If they were to work at all, the talents making telefilms such as The Horror at 37,000 Feet had to find (cheap) ways to showcase the horror in unusual but effective ways.

On those grounds, The Horror at 37,000 Feet may be silly and muddled and hammy, but it sure as Hell sticks the landing.

The Films of 1973: Westworld

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. 

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.