Life Is NOT A Malfunction: Short Circuit (1986)

I am wholly aware that there are some incredibly absurd movies that made their self aware during the 1980's, indeed, I have even gone so far as to review many of them, almost always with loving admiration or an unhealthy attachment, especially if said films involve things like cocaine smuggling ninjas or satellite based aliens consuming orgy minded suburban parents.  These movies were weird and did not necessarily acquire anything beyond the obvious cult status associated, however, Short Circuit is a film that has managed to retains most of its respect and was decidedly successful upon its initial release could out do every other film in its notes of the absurd.  Indeed, Short Circuit is perhaps the most bizarre film to come from the 80's not in that it exists alone, but that it was so successful.  Between some wonderful smirking by eternal heartthrob The Gutt, one of the more curious performances of Ally Sheedy's career one can pick apart its obvious attractions.  Everything else is completely an enigma though, notably the bizarrely Orientalist spin on the major foreign character within the film, not to mention a decidedly confusing and ethically problematic take on robotics, sentience and human bonding.  I assume this film is intended to be comedic, however, I could not begin to unpack the ramifications and implications of approaching such movie with an awareness that it is chuckling at such deeply social woes.  In contrast to Ally Sheedy's involvement in say WarGames, one almost thinks that Short Circuit is in bad taste, and I would certainly make this claim were it made in any other year than 1986.  It is in this unabashed push towards complete absurdity that one is able to truly appreciate Short Circuit, because what one paper should come off as complete and irreverent politically incorrect satire manages to take on a knowing level of self-awareness, wherein each glance of humor on the part of Steve Guttenberg and moment pun-infested dialogue manages to say everything about an era where excess and decadence were simply a fact and any point of lack or oppression was ignored or made to be a point of frustration.  In the very choice to ignore any palpable reality Short Circuit reconsiders the ability and execution of satire.  It is bad, it is wildly problematic, but it is also delightful.

Short Circuit focuses on the American governments most recent attempts at launching a series of former Cold War robots, known collectively as the S.A.I.N.T. program, as service industry robots.  This appears to be an ideal situation as the precision and focus affords the robots to do both very general tasks as well as specific, detailed endeavors.  Yet, when an intense lighting storm hits the factories, one robot is electrocuted a la Frankenstein and breaks free from the space.  In doing so, the war division of the government goes wild fearing that the number five division of the robot will destroy everything in its path, as the lightning resulted in an overriding of its circuits and reverting to its former Cold War programing.  To make matters worse the robot is equipped with a laser capable of destroying any item nearly instantaneously.  The robot becomes a point of fascination for its creator Dr. Newton Crosby (Steve Guttenberg) who sees this "glitch" as a movement towards a higher degree of sentience, particularly with Number 5 rewires his own switchboard to assure his livelihood.  Eventually, Number 5 travels far enough to meet with food truck entrepreneur and lively twenty something Stephanie Speck (Ally Sheedy) who immediately assumes the robot to be a form of extraterrestrial life, becoming visibly upset when it proves to be the far less exciting government weapon of mass destruction.  Yet, realizing that Number 5 truly desires to become "alive" Stephanie takes it upon herself to teach and train Number 5 while also helping to avoid his own disassembly, or, in human terms, death.  All the while, Dr. Crosby and his wise-cracking Indian assistant Ben (Fisher Stevens) attempt to track down Number 5 with the most advance positioning technology possible.  Eventually, they are able to track down the robot and discover him deep in training with Stephanie, as well as attached in a manner that is noticeably more than platonic.  However, Crosby and Ben realize that Number 5 is indeed advanced and capable of self-control, so much so that when the government eventually attacks Number 5 it proves to be a decoy created by the very robot who has become hyper-sentient.  The film closes with Number 5 assigning itself with the name Johnny 5 and becoming the pal of Crosby, Ben and Stephanie, assumedly planning on undertaking a series of new journeys, a fact shown in the multiple sequels that followed.

I am currently pinpointing my research interests within the field of film studies and, as I have noted earlier, this includes South Korean cinema.  However, realizing that just having a regional focus does not entirely suffice for the deeper I delve into school, I have decided to also focus on the ways in which gendering and body politics emerge within films about beings that are non theoretically human, including things like cyborgs, robots and dolls which become sentient.  As such, much to my surprise and elation, Short Circuit very much fits within this new vein of research, especially in regards to the gendering of Johnny 5, who moves from being a purely servile non-human other to that of a war based threat to eventually being a thing of fraternal and pseudo-sexual interest to at least two characters in the film.  In theory, Johnny 5 should not be a figure with a specific gender, but it is rather clear from the onset that viewers are supposed to define him as masculine, whether it be a result of his phallic like laser or his male-inclined vocal pattern, his gender is fixated within the masculine, making its creation by Dr. Crosby and the American government all the more ethically curious.  Indeed, his very war like identity suggests an entrenched notion of war as sexual aggression wherein each element of warfare finds its ties to the male phallic privilege, perhaps most famously explored in Kubrick's uproariously funny Dr. Strangelove.  Here it is becomes more heady intellectually, because if Johnny 5 is indeed a phallic extension of the government, he too is one that is anthropomorphized, suggesting a desire that war not only be a sexual act, but one that in the process "gives birth" to new entities that are vaguely human but still less than in the important factors.  The levels of control and privilege that emerge in such a scenario are complex and fascinating and could certainly extend on to consider other films within this genre.  The fact that Stephanie has a pseudo-romantic encounter with Johnny 5 takes on a reverse-Pygmallion element, although she is not the creator so again it is a bit more confusing.  There are also a ton of ways in which to consider how gender is performed and how a viewer is to understand that Johnny is supposed to be masculine, all tying to an assumption that a non-human body could still exist within a gendered dichotomy.  It is also no small coincidence that Wall-E is clearly based on Johnny 5.

Key Scene:  Johnny 5's quest for knowledge through reading the encyclopedia from front to end is both hilarious and deeply curious from an ethical standpoint and is dealt with in a near perfect way.

This is a solid rental through and through, although it is cheap enough on DVD that buying it might prove equally inexpensive.

Doesn't Anything Work Around Here?: Westworld (1973)

While I intend to include one highly experimental western, as well as an acid western in this month of movies devoted to one of cinema's classic and severely under seen genres, I am quite certain that Westworld will prove to be the biggest stretch in terms of falling within the confines of the genre.  Of course, it does have a heavy western feel and centrally exists within the landscape of the traditional west, it is primarily a science fiction feature, therefore, affording it the opportunity to expand beyond this space, to which it does with great pleasure.  Again, it is a sci-fi film at heart, but given that it is decidedly centered in creating the world of the western, I would suggest that Westworld, at the very least does for the period piece, what Cabin in the Woods did for horror films, or considering that it was written and directed by Michael Crichton it would be just as easy to suggest that this is a sort of Jurassic Park version 1.0, although I would contest that the believability is slightly higher in this setting, especially since it involves robots and the false safety individuals place within their control over machines, as opposed to a dangerous landscape occupied by genetic recreations of some of the most ferocious and dangerous beasts to ever roam Earth.  Much like other sci-fi classics that consider the role that artificial intelligence will play within the future and what threats are faced when the machines move closer to sentience and an understanding of their role, of course, Westworld exists in multiple fabrications of fantasy worlds, but Crichton, who both wrote and directed this film seems to be doing something particularly intriguing by focusing primarily on the wild west in his narrative, considering why somebody would decidedly travel to such an unruly and dangerous world, further extending an inquiry as to why viewers desire the decidedly violent, unruly world of the western for escapism, as such becoming a meta-cinematic reflection on the very nature of viewership and gazing on the threat of death in a vicarious desire.  Westworld, like many classic genre films, manages to exist in a perfect space between various genres, subsequently, becoming a hybrid of all that is great about science fiction, westerns and to a brief degree horror films.

Westworld focuses on a time not too far in the future where the wealthy are afforded the opportunity to spend their money to escape to vacation spots not of exotic beaches or isolated mountain peaks, but, instead; of past worlds with a certain degree of intangible lure.  In this world a person with enough money can go to either the hyper decadent Romanworld and engage in various forms of condoned debauchery, or they can go to the lavish and extravagent Medieval world to engage in their fantastic whims of being royalty.  A third option exists for the particularly daring who seek a world of constant threat and danger in Westworld, a recreation of the desolate and wild world of the American west.  Two friends John (James Brolin) and Peter (Richard Benjamin) decide to engage in this trip based on John's assurance that it is a great experience and completely harmless, in fact, John confesses that he feels it to be the perfect opportunity for Peter to move on past his recent divorce.  Once in Westworld John and Peter engage in all the vices offered in the historical west, whether it be whisky or prositutes, however, this is not before Peter has a run-in with Gunslinger (Yul Brynner), to which he kills, realizing the power he has as a tourist in a world of cyborgs.  After this shootout, Peter and John move through Westworld with a carefree attitude enjoying their vacation in what is essentially a sanitized version of the past.  The film occasionally cuts to one man's vacation in Medievalworld, where he finds himself engaging in a relationship with a young chambermaid, although it appears as though the cyborgs begin going against orders.  At this point the narrative exposes the world behind the simulacrums, where scientist run through algorithms and tests to assure safety, stating specific concern for a recent spike in robots going against orders.  After a flat out refusal to briefly shut down the resort things take a particular turn for the worse when Gunslinger emerges again and kills John in cold blood, going against his orders completely.  This falling apart occurs simultaneously to the other worlds, even causing an electronics issue in the main room of the resort.  The breakdown leaves Peter solely on the run against Gunslinger a chase the breaks outside of Westworld and through the various other worlds, eventually leading to a final showdown with the robot which requires Peter to exploit his heightened technological features to destroy him a task that requires multiple fatal blows.  In the end, Peter has one final run-in with another non-threatening robot which causes him to reconsider his entire understanding of humanity, as well as its blind reliance on the good of technology.

Again, Westworld is not really a western primarily and is certainly concerned primarily with being a science-fiction centered consideration of the role technology plays in society and to what degree its reliance is productive and where to draw they line in regards to heavily exploiting its non-human nature, particularly in a highly destructive manner.  However, I am quite convinced that a second layer exists in which Crichton is considering what exactly draws humanity towards curiosity for the violent and unruly.  One could extend this critique in many different directions whether it be a direct attention placed on violence and war on television or a concern with physical violence in social settings, these considerations are certainly present in Westworld, but it is not unreasonable to think that the film also really wants to consider why a person seeks westerns as a form of escapism, particularly since, compared to other periods or fantastical settings they are particularly ripe with terror and danger.  The western film, to pull in a trope as planned, exists in a state of despair or sadness for most characters, whether it be isolation based paranoia or post-gold rush induced poverty all is rarely good in the world of the western, in which matters are only worsened when an individual is of a non-white race or non-male gender.  I would boldly posit that much of the enjoyment in the world of the western is its decided set of signifiers between good and evil as well as its embracing for the lack of certainty and understanding that chaos serves a better world model than oppressive regimentation.  The wealthy within the context of this film, as well as those who seek westerns as escapism, are attempting to grapple with their own existential issues about humanity and in the process seek the inherent seeming order and signifiers of authority or villainy which underlie even the most chaotic world of a western.  Suffice it to say, the western manages to be an insane whirlwind of a film genre, while also managing to create rather clear borders on ethical questions, even in the most antiquated of sense.  While I am fully aware that westerns are loved by many ages, there is a particular age group that seems to absolutely adore them, whose young life was inevitably defined by the trouble good guy making sense of a chaotic world, something they perhaps brought along with themselves to their adult lives, applying it to their psychological and philosophical world view.

Key Scene:  The last fight between Peter and Gunslinger is intense and has a ton of jump moments, proving to be a great closing element to an all-around solid film.

This is an excellent movie and well worth nabbing and the bluray while a bit pricy is worth the investment.