"Colossus: The Forbin Project" AKA don't mess with my phone line or else...

"THERE IS ANOTHER SYSTEM". Those are the four words that get the ball rolling in director Joseph Sargent's forgotten but now extremely prescient 1970 feature "Colossus: The Forbin Project". Eric Braeden plays Dr. Charles Forbin who as the film begins is activating what will be the greatest computer ever designed by man, codenamed COLOSSUS. Afterwards he is ushered into the white house where the President (He has no name in the film. Just "President") announces to the world that COLOSSUS is now running and in total control of America's nuclear payload. Stating that the machine isn't affected by emotion of any sort that might cloud a human's judgement, the President proclaims that his new toy will also monitor all other nuclear warheads worldwide and be able to intercept a warhead fired at the US using "Whatever means it deems necessary". It's all peaches and cream for the POTUS & Forbin as they celebrate the activation of their system until COLOSSUS suddenly sends a message comprised of the first four words of this paragraph.

The "OTHER SYSTEM" is located in Russia (Of course) and is codenamed "GUARDIAN". And wouldn't you know it, GUARDIAN has pretty much the same function as our buddy COLOSSUS does. Only real difference is that while the U.S. let the world know what it was up to immediately after it activated it's super computer, the Russians didn't. As the U.S. and U.S.S.R. get down to brass tacks regarding each other's systems, COLOSSUS decides that it wants to communicate with GUARDIAN. After a bit of head scratching as to why such a request would be made from a machine, Forbin & crew (Along with their Russian counterparts) decide to open a line of communication between the two machines believing that nothing will come from it. But soon after COLOSSUS begins to "Speak" to his new found pen pal, GUARDIAN begins to respond. After awhile both the U.S. & U.S.S.R. decide that there might be some classified information being transmitted between the two machines and shut down the line of communication they were using. And this just pisses the machines off to no end....

Hello? Is it me you're looking for?

Uh oh....

Colossus/Guardian demand that the line be restored or there's gonna be trouble and both govt's call their bluff, after all they're just machines and machines can only do what we allow them to do...right? Wrong. Both machines launch nukes at the same time and both the U.S. & U.S.S.R. frantically try to get the line back up before the missiles detonate. While we are successful (Prompting Colossus to detonate the nuke en route), the Russians aren't and 6000 people die in the resulting explosion. Now Forbin, the U.S. & U.S.S.R. know that their creations aren't playing games. From this point on Colossus/Guardian (The two have decided to become as one with Colossus acting as their representative) plan to take over and teach mankind a thing or two about running a planet and all we have to do is just listen to their every demand. By order of the new couple, key personnel are assassinated in order to eliminate the few people on Earth who know what makes the machines tick although Forbin is spared because they need at least one person around who really understands them. Even machines need someone to talk to every once in a while.

Who needs Chuck Heston when you've got Braeden?

Did I say "Talk"? Oh yeah...Colossus has a "Voice" built for him so that he can communicate with not only Forbin, but the world. It seems that he's getting accustomed to this whole "Subjugate the population" thing and he's feeling his oats big time now. But Forbin has a plan and if he can pull it off, then Colossus won't know what hit him. Unfortunately Forbin (And the globe) come to realize that they can't pull one over on Colossus...not yet anyways.

The questions this film raise lend credence to the phrase "Be careful of what you ask for. You just might get it". In it's attempt to become a nation with a supposedly fail safe defense system run not by man but by machine, the U.S. finds that it has overreached it's boundaries and designed Colossus far too well. It also discovers that it wasn't even the first nation on Earth to create such a juggernaut and it's crowing to the world about it's superiority over them is all for naught. The Russians were there first much like Sputnik was the first man made vessel in space. Echoes of the cold war are rife throughout the film as both nations (The Russians especially) are outwardly civil to each other but question each other's motives at the same time. Actor Eric Braeden was an interesting choice to play Forbin since the role seems custom made for someone like Charleton Heston (Heston was indeed considered for the role but the producers opted for an unknown face instead). Braeden plays the role with a slight air of superiority about him, his face slips a sense of disdain to those around him every so often. This is especially evident in a scene during which the president (Gordon Pinsent) is trying to hold a meeting to decide how to proceed and Forbin continually tries to interrupt him. In another scene, Forbin interrupts the president as he's trying to communicate with Colossus stating that "Colossus deals with the precise meaning of words, and one must know precisely what to ask for". What that basically says is that Forbin doesn't think the boss is smart enough to speak with Colossus and sure enough, the president concedes his position of power to Forbin wordlessly, by backing off. Braeden has a Teutonic air of supremacy all about him and it works for this role. His haughtiness is counterbalanced later in the film when he breaks down in tears at the murder of some of his associates, or is he crying at the realization that he is helpless against what he created?

One heck of a calculator maybe?

Must stay on the yellow line...

Later in the film Colossus orders all commercial & radio transmissions to be tied into his communication systems so that he can announce his "Intentions for the future of mankind" which leads to Colossus making the following proclamation to the world: "This is the voice of world control. I bring you peace. It may be the peace of plenty and content or the peace of unburied death". Colossus not only has total control over Forbin (He even has a daily schedule for Forbin to follow) and the U.S. but the entire Earth is now under his thrall and this final scene is a sort of "Coming out" announcement to everyone who might think differently. He also says that "The object in constructing me was to prevent war. This object is attained. I will not permit war. It is wasteful and pointless". Truthfully it's kinda hard to argue with the logic Colossus is using, war is pointless and a waste of both resource & life. The problem is the means by which Colossus is preventing war. I mean complete and utter subjugation of  humanity is bit over the top isn't it? Especially when we're being subjugated by something we created.

Same film. Slightly different title.

There have been other examples of computers gone amok throughout film history. The most obvious one being HAL-9000 of "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) fame. Others that come to mind are Proteus from Donald Cammell's  "Demon Seed" (1977) and WOPR from John Badham's "WarGames"(1983). But HAL was basically neurotic and while Proteus had delusions of grandeur it hadda get it's rocks off first. WOPR thought along the same lines as Colossus but didn't have lofty aspirations, it just decided that war was "A strange game. The only way to win is not to play" and moved on to chess. Colossus is different because once it decides that mankind is flawed it takes decisive action to rectify that situation. And it sees no better way to do that than to just take over and do the job better than his creator(s) have. It's telling that as the film proceeds, Forbin becomes more emotional and indeed a bit more human. When Colossus proclaims that the two of them will "Work together. Unwillingly at first on your part, but that will pass" Forbin's response is "NEVER!" and he even cries out "You Bastard!" at the end of the film in a bold display of emotion from a character who as the film concludes has seemingly found what was left of his humanity. Sadly that discovery came with a price and Forbin has no idea as to how he can pay it.

You'll notice that the two poster images I've included (On top/bottom) have slightly different titles. One is "Colossus: The Forbin Project" and the other is just "The Forbin Project" sans "Colossus". The film was a failure on it's initial release and the thinking went that maybe the print campaign was all wrong. The original poster art made the film look more like a by the numbers cold war thriller with no clue as to the menacing mega maniacal computer at the center of it. A new print campaign was designed which gave the poster more of a hip look to it and placed emphasis on the phrase "This is the dawning of the age of Colossus" which was present in the original art but not as pronounced. Perhaps to take advantage of the previous year's number one worldwide single "Age Of Aquarius: Let The Sunshine In" by The Fifth Dimension which was still on the minds of audiences worldwide but this tactic failed as well. The film quietly disappeared and soon appeared on TV screens where it's reputation has slowly grown over the years. Why did it fail when other sci-fi films released during the same era like "Beneath The Planet Of The Apes", "The Omega Man", "Soylent Green" & "Silent Running" succeed? Easy question to answer! Three of the four films I just mentioned starred...Charlton Heston! As fine a job as Braeden does here, he ain't no Chuck Heston who (at the time) had associated himself with sci-fi films and found great success with them. I think the other reason is that "Colossus..." was a decidedly low budget film with no real hook for audiences to grab onto. It didn't have enough going for it essentially. It's not a big, flashy movie & it looks especially dated now although it's no less potent. But try giving it a spin tonight and you just might find yourself looking at your iPhone or PS3 a bit differently. Yesterday's announcement of the Xbox One (With it's promised ability to "Control Your Living Room") reminded me of this film and of a well known phrase that I don't think enough of us listen to nowadays: "Be careful what you wish for. You just might get it".