Image credit: Milad Fakurian on Unsplash
Part of an ongoing series of recommended movies, shows, books, music, artworks, or other form of expression relevant to our present times.
What is it about the mid-1970s and dystopian films set in the 2020s? What was going on that had creators envisioning varying degrees of oppression a quarter way into the 21st century? Maybe it was because they were just a few decades removed from World War II and the fascist regimes that nearly broke the world. The 70s were still chilly with Cold War, freshly shellshocked from the Vietnam War, not quite to the joyful disco explosion, and years away from the self-assured 80s.
Whatever it was, Rollerball is a quiet gem among the dystopian melodramatics I wrote about here.
Utopian Sport
Rollerball hit theaters on June 25, 1975, making the movie, released just a week before Independence Day, a summer blockbuster. On top of that, Rollerball’s star was a young James Caan, who was then a very hot property having just starred in Brian’s Song and The Godfather andThe Godfather Part II.
James Caan was a big deal, and so was his Rollerball character, Jonathan E. in the sport du jour of this 21st century.
Rollerball came up in a recent conversation with a friend about artificial intelligence and how many young people don’t read books anymore. She said something along the lines of, “Oh, like that movie where knowledge gets lost because all the books are in a computer?”
Well, color me interested.
Let the Games Begin **Spoilers Ahead**
The year is 2018. Rollerball opens with Bach’s Toccata and Fugue for Organ in D Minor — the famously spooky, foreboding, dramatic baroque organ tune. An arena is being prepared for some kind of sporting competition. Spectator stands ring a banked track, separated from the action by chain link-topped hockey boards. At the center are the team benches and a raised tower where the Controller sits.
The Controller works the computer that, well, rolls the ball.
Then the athletes appear. On roller skates (10 skaters). On motorbikes (4 bikers). Wearing two-bar football helmets, shoulder and elbow pads, leather pants, and studded gloves.
The first 15 minutes of the movie are pure action. Is it lacrosse? Is it roller derby? Is it a gladiator game? Yes.
A shiny ball about the size of a softball pinball-launches out at 120mph and speeds along the rim of the track like a roulette marble. The object is to get the ball and make a goal, which, on this round track, is a single location. But also… don’t hang around that rim unless you want to be cannonballed.
The bikers zip around the track, sometimes with skaters hanging on to gain speed. Punches, tackles, body checks, and headlocks are part of regular gameplay.
Rollerball players are tough, and their faces and bodies show their hard-earned scars.
For the Common Good
Jonathan E. is the toughest, and about to go into his tenth championship games. Crowds chant his name. He wears orange to play for Houston, which represents the Energy sector. The other majors of the league are Transportation, Food, Commerce, Housing, and Luxury. They play in metropolitan areas like Houston, Tokyo, and New York.
Those places aren’t in countries anymore, by the way. After the Corporate Wars, the world was divided up into capitalistic sectors, each run by an executive. It’s good times! Jonathan’s boss, Mr. Bartholomew, the Energy Executive, sums it up:
Nations are bankrupt, gone. None of that tribal warfare anymore. Even the Corporate Wars are a thing of the past. Now a few of us are making decisions on a global basis for the common good.
There’s no poverty, no sickness, no needs, and many luxuries. Management makes decisions no one questions and corporate society takes care of everything. It’s easy to slip into submission here.
Guess what Jonathan does?
“I don’t know.”
Rollerball is kind of a slow burn as it comes to 1970s dystopian flicks. Instead of a dirty-faced Charlton Heston screaming at fascist apes or about forced cannibalism, you get a polished James Caan’s Jonathan coolly lacing up his roller skates and periodically mumbling, “I don’t know.”
What he doesn’t know about is retiring, which has been demanded by Mr. Bartholomew and the rest of the Corporate overlords who meet via Zoom. They want him to hang up his skates, a seemingly unbeatable athlete in his prime. Why should Jonathan retire just a few games away from taking his tenth consecutive championship?
It would be like the CEO of Exxon forcing Tom Brady to retire right before Super Bowl 49, which he would not only win but would go on to play in four more Super Bowls and win three of them.
(Full Disclosure: I had to Google about Tom Brady. Listen, I don’t celebrate him. While not a football fan per se, living in Western New York my whole life requires a certain allegiance. Therefore, to counter even mentioning him… GO BILLS.)
“What are they afraid of me for?”
Jonathan continues to defy the order to retire with a soft, Bartleby-inspired “I prefer not to”-attitude. The documentary filmed to celebrate him and, presumably, serve to announce his retirement is going to be screened at a swank party that’s giving Gatsby vibes.
And it’s a banger. There’s jaunty jazzy 70s guitar music, dancing, debauchery, and plenty of dips into tins for what is clearly some kind of good-time drug. There’s also plenty of women, who serve pretty much as ‘comfort women’ throughout the movie.
Jonathan disengages from the party and confides in his old friend Clete, who remembers the long extinct NFL and the World Cup. Jonathan tells Clete he’s puzzled by the pressure to retire and further by the absence of any history books at the Luxury Centers. (Side note: All the books have been digitized at the main computer in Geneva. If he wants to learn something, no problem! He could get a Corporate Teacher. Complimentary, of course.)
He wants Clete to help solve this mystery that he can’t quite name.
Clete says, “They’re afraid of you […] all the way to the top.”
I’m still not sure what the sunrise tree-lasering sequence is all about, but I guess if after partying all night and you find a laser pistol you go outside in your tuxedos and gowns to blast pine trees. Clapping and giggling like children, they leave six tall pines as smoldering skeletons on a hill.
The 70s were weird, man.
“No player is greater than the game itself.”
Houston advances to play Tokyo in the championship tournament. By now, Jonathan’s quiet refusal is really riling Bartholomew who says, “Let the game do its work.”
Coincidentally, the Rollerball rules are going to change for this game—limited penalties and substitutions. In an already violent sport, that’s saying a lot.
Prepping for the Tokyo match isn’t without some period racism. The team trainer’s session to analyze the death blow skills of the Japanese players is shouted down by western bravado—the skill of ‘tiny’ men are no match for their height and brawn. <pounds chest>
We’ll see.
This is when Moonpie, Jonathan’s good-time buddy and a golden retriever of a man, finds himself at the business end of a non-penalized, on-track near-fatal beating.
Moonpie was not only the team enforcer, but he was also Jonathan’s close friend. Jonathan simply laces up his skates and goes back out on the track to score some points…and do some damage along the way.
“Comfort is freedom.”
What does Jonathan want? Besides to play Rollerball alongside the teammates he trusts and believes in. Besides getting some books to understand mysteries. Besides riding his horses at his stylish 70s ranch.
Jonathan wants Ella. His wife. Who years ago was, uh, redistributed to an Energy Executive who took a fancy to her.
He’s had other comfort women, sure. It’s his right as a successful 21st century man and Rollerball champ.
Have you noticed how all these 1970s takes on 21st century dystopias seem to relegate women back to property? Why is that do you suppose?
Consider: Rollerball was originally published as a short story in 1973. At that time America was around 50 years beyond women’s voting rights being acknowledged by the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. In late 1971, the Supreme Court agreed to hear Roe vs. Wade and in early 1973 ruled that the 14th Amendment’s ‘Right to Privacy’ protected the choice (or medical imperative) to end an unintended pregnancy. (In 2022 activist conservative judges on a packed Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, returning the decision back to individual states to legislate.)
In mid-1973, a bill was introduced to end banking and credit discrimination based on sex or marital status; the Equal Credit Opportunity Act became law in 1974. Until then, women could not obtain credit cards, bank loans, or even open bank accounts without a male relative co-signer.
So, yeah, I wonder why 1970s mainstream stories envisioned a future where women were property, playthings, and set pieces for powerful men?
In a last ditch effort to extract Jonathan’s obedience, Ella suddenly shows up at the ranch. They frolic on the horses (and other places). They chat in Jonathan’s well-appointed and very 70s living room conversation pit. (Check these out. You will not be disappointed.)
(And, c’mon. “Ella.” As in, “girl.” She doesn’t get an identity beyond what she means to Jonathan.)
Jonathan is happy to see Ella. Even happy to learn that her life is happy. But he knows she’s a bribe and he ain’t playing that game.
And he finally gets it:
“People had a choice between having all those nice things and freedom. Of course, they chose comfort.”
Knowledge is Power
Jonathan goes where all the knowledge now resides: the main library and computer center in Geneva. It’s known as the World’s Brain and is all ‘fluid mechanics,’ says the lab-coated, white-gloved librarian.
All the world’s books have been digitized to this one central brain, which is named Zero and apparently contains all of history, all of knowledge.
Lab Coat casually mentions that there’s a glitch — all the 13th century is missing, glossing over it as “just Dante and a few corrupt popes.” The moment passes quickly, but what is actually missing?
- 1215 – The Magna Carta, which limits crown power and establishes the foundation of what would become constitutional law.
- 1296 – The beginning of the first war for Scottish independence.
- The Peak of the Islamic Golden Age of science, culture, and prosperity.
- 1209 – founding of the Franciscan Order, which committed to addressing poverty and serving the marginalized.
- Prosperity, power, and advancing civilizations across Asia, Africa, and the Americas.
- And, yes, Dante Alighieri, who wrote The Divine Comedy which skewers the corruption and power of the few.
The 13th century was a heady time politically, when feudal structures were straining, education was catching on beyond the historically privileged classes, and philosophical thought was breaking from the Dark Ages to re-engage with Classical themes and ideals.
You know, the era that paved the way for the Renaissance which transformed Western civilization toward freer thought and egalitarianism.
Oops, did I go off on a history tangent again? Sorry, it’s my habit to consider The Big Picture.
So, Jonathan stands before Zero the Computer and is invited to ask his question. It’s a simple one: “Who makes the corporate decisions?”
Does Zero answer? What do you think?
Who wins?
My one complaint about Rollerball is we never get a clear ‘why’ about the pressure for Jonathan to retire. What we do get is Mr. Bartholomew’s imploring:
“It’s not a game a man is supposed to grow strong in. It has its purposes, and you’ve served those purposes brilliantly.”
All that’s left for Jonathan is to go play that final championship Rollerball match in New York. It will be a worldwide broadcast with another rules change:
No penalties. No substitutions. No time limit. (I.e., a death match.)
It’s a capacity crowd and everyone is wearing team swag, screaming and waving banners, and the arena is as loud as The Ralph when the Bills are home (IYKYK).
There are kicks, punches, fiery crashes, and on-track brawls. One by one, players get knocked out (literally) and we’re down to two New Yorkers and a bloodied Jonathan, his orange jersey nearly torn from his body. The Houston and New York team coaches scuffle, one shouting:
“This wasn’t meant to be a game! Never!”
In the final confrontation, Jonathan uses the rollerball to bash one of his last opponents but pauses from doing the same to the final man.
By now the arena is silent as Jonathan limp-skates to the goal and scores the winning, and only, point. He’s won a tenth Rollerball championship, something never done before, and became bigger than the game itself.
As he takes his victory lap, the lonely sound of his skate wheels on the track is drowned out by the crowd beginning to chant his name: Jon-A-than! Jon-A-than! Jon-A-than!
Are you not entertained?
What would happen next in this dystopia? What happens when any ‘winning’ formula shows cracks and is tested? What happens when the colors of your team are soaked in blood and violence?
And what happens when the information to make sense of your world is archived, withheld, and casually lost?
You can choose comfort, or you can choose freedom.
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