As two films about lethal theme parks celebrate landmark anniversaries, Roger Crow looks back at 50-year-old Westworld, and Jurassic Park as it turns 30; chats to expert Phil Tippett about the pioneering JP effects, and assesses other offerings from Michael Crichton, the master of high concept fantasy projects…

Michael Crichton and Steven Spielberg on the set of Jurassic Park

There was obviously something in the water in Chicago, 1942. Three months after Harrison Ford’s arrival in the world, Michael Crichton was also born in the Windy City. And like that rather successful actor, Crichton would go on to achieve greatness in his relatively short life.

Raised in the picturesque region of Roslyn, New York, Michael clearly inherited his journalist father John’s flair for words. The writing bug bit in his teens, but he trained in medicine, and proved rather good at it. By 1965, Michael was in Blighty at the University of Cambridge, paying the bills as a visiting lecturer, but his passion lay elsewhere.

The same year he penned the novel Odds On, under a pseudonym, John Lange. The tale of a computer-planned robbery on Costa Brava found a publisher, and though the film rights were also snapped up, that movie never happened.

After a string of books written under aliases, Crichton read Len Deighton’s The Ipcress File while studying in England. That inspired his 1969 page-turner The Andromeda Strain. Published under his own name, Hollywood jumped on it, and the successful 1971 movie conversion changed Michael’s life.

By the early 1970s, Crichton made the inevitable leap from writing movie-worthy stories to crafting the films themselves. And his first attempt wasn’t bad at all.

Fifty years ago the cinematic Western had enjoyed its time in the sun. It was the space age; millions had watched man go to the Moon, and Planet of the Apes had given sci-fi movies a massive boost.

Suddenly genuine Westerns felt ancient. Technology was the new frontier, and cyborgs were cooler than liquid nitrogen, as The Six Million Dollar Man proved in the same year.

Crichton’s directorial debut was a sound business venture. A Western sci-fi thriller ticked a lot of boxes, and the premise was simple: Delos is one theme park with three zones: Medieval, Roman, and you can guess the other. Westworld’s heroes are Richard Benjamin as Peter Martin, and James Brolin (brief 007 front runner and father of Josh) is his laid-back buddy, John Blane. Like the guys from City Slickers 18 years later, they’re a couple of thrill-seeking mates tapping into their inner cowboy, but encounter a nemesis who changes their lives.