12:00 AM, 07-JUNE-07 Ray Talks Westworld Remake Writer/director Billy Ray told SCI FI Wire that he's currently writing the script for a new version of the SF film Westworld for Warner Brothers, but added that he may not direct it. "There is no director attached," Ray (Shattered Glass) said in an e-mail interview to promote the DVD of his film Breach. "I would resist the idea of directing it myself, not that they've offered it to me, because I don't want the pressure of that kind of a budget sitting on my shoulders."
Michael Crichton wrote and directed the original film, which was released in 1973 and starred Yul Brynner, Richard Benjamin and James Brolin. The futuristic drama cast Benjamin and Brolin as visitors to an amusement park where visitors can play out entertainment fantasies with the help of virtual reality and robots. The trouble starts when the robots begin to fight back.
"I love the basic idea of the movie, which is that our amusements can kill us," Ray said. "I also think the movie provides a great platform for exploring how sometimes machines can behave like humans while humans can sometimes behave like machines."
Ray said he'd love to speak with Crichton at some point. "My understanding is that he was offered the chance to do the first draft of this remake a few years ago, and his response was, 'I already remade that movie; the remake was called Jurassic Park,'" Ray said. "In many ways, he was right." —
