Movie review: ‘Looker’

FloridaGator80
A promotional still photograph from the movie “Looker.”

Nudity in films in the early 1980s was programmed to be a part of the movie’s cool edge. With “Looker” from 1981, you get nude scenes from unexpected and expected quarters – from TV’s “Partridge Family” alumnus Susan Dey as well as a couple of Playboy magazine models. Unfortunately, this part of the “edge” distracts from the prescient forecast about artificial intelligence and its creation of lifelike illusion. The “edge” of “Looker” ultimately sinks it, where it was a ham-handed attempt to boost it. Just don’t ignore the forecast! With a neat story written by and the film directed by celebrated novelist Michael Crichton, “Looker” totally wastes whatever talent its actors could have brought and that’s disappointing because there was a lot of promise with the movie. Sorry, Michael, but you fumbled this one in its entirety.

‘Looker’
(1981; 93 minutes; rated PG (originally R for nudity); directed by Michael Crichton and starring Albert Finney, James Coburn and Susan Dey)

YOU MIGHT LOOK, BUT YOU CAN’T TOUCH

(NOTE: I expanded this review with some more opinion, additional trivia and the updating of links on Feb. 10, 2018. I again expanded it on March 20, 2021. I again expanded it on Feb. 13, 2026.)

The only summation I can write about “Looker” is the phrase “wasted opportunity.” It didn’t have to be: “Looker” brings great premise; a wonderful cast of actors; and it had the chance to be a minor classic in the sci-fi world. Well, the actors don’t do a good job (it’s a wooden effort by all); the plot has holes that were filled for a television release version (really); and the writer-director diminished his reputation with this one (luckily, he could afford it).

“Looker” throws nudity at the audience from the opening credits and even has onetime TV teen Susan Dey do a nude scene, although I will note that this film was four years after she was nude in the sexually charged “First Love.” However, this shouldn’t be some film that hopes to get some buzz from nudity, even from “Laurie Partridge” – and it doesn’t.

It just so totally drops the ball in the quality category that the issue of nudity is usually near the top in any discussion because there really isn’t much left to talk about beyond the nudity issue.

A promotional still photograph from the movie “Looker.”

The blame lies squarely in the lap and shoulders of writer-director Michael Crichton. “Looker” has just as good a plot as his screenplay from his novel for “Jurassic Park,” but without Steven Spielberg at the helm, “Looker” falls flat (no pun intended to the former Playboy models).

Crichton couldn’t replicate the quality here that he had in previous directorial efforts “Coma” and “Westworld.” The gaping wound for the film is plot deficiencies that shouldn’t have happened in filmmaking. Really, you put the bad guy’s motivation for killing the women into the TELEVISION cut? You didn’t want to illuminate the mass audience?

A promotional still photograph from the movie “Looker.”

Sigh.

Just as wasted as the overall filmmaking is the utter failure to make the most out of two very interesting and talented actors – James Coburn and Dorian Harewood. Thanks, Mr. Crichton. Another of your failures with the film.

Ah, well. Since I have to give you a rundown of the plot, here goes:

Models, who have been surgically altered to exacting specifications on their faces and across their bodies, are dying and, as the investigation cranks up, the prominent plastic surgeon who did the work on them becomes embroiled in what reveals to be the threat of technology and its use on the future of society (such as marketing a politician and as if what they were doing with video wouldn’t be totally accepted today).

A company has commissioned the women’s surgical changes because they are trying to optimize their bodies for video – and then go a step further by doing 3-D digital scans of them so they can use digital images instead of live models (what you see today – 45 years later – is what artificial intelligence produces as predicted in the film).

However, there’s a problem with the whole shebang and women begin to die.

With Susan Dey, who plays model “Cindy Fairmont,” the last model to have been scanned, the surgeon, “Dr. Larry Roberts” played by Albert Finney, becomes protective of his love interest and therefore becomes part of what’s going on.

Evidence is planted that implicates him and the LOOKER device comes to the fore (it is a light optical flash gun that temporarily immobilizes humans) and everyone’s off and running – especially a hulking threatening man who’s the killer of the girls and now has Dey and Finney in his sights.

Of course, Finney comes out on top in the end, but if you choose to watch “Looker,” I’ll leave the details for you to discover.

Here’s a rundown of some of the principal cast:

  • A five-time Oscar nominee (not for this one), Finney look(er)s like he’s trying to do a good job. However, his lines, his character’s motivation and the just-awful screenplay is more than even his considerable talent can overcome. It’s only that talent that doesn’t allow the character to drag the entire film down. Finney was much better in nominated roles in “Murder on the Orient Express” and “Tom Jones.” I won’t mention the overrated crapfest called “Erin Brokovich” with the equally overrated Julia Roberts that earned him another. His other two were for “Under the Volcano” and “The Dresser.” Finney died at 82 in 2019 of complications from a chest infection.
  • A promotional still photograph from the movie “Looker.”

    A Golden Globe winner (not for this one), Dey doesn’t have much reach as an actress – and you just have to take a peek at “First Love.” So, she cannot do much with this one-dimensional character. It’s as if Dey was still doing television daily and was distracted while filming “Looker.” She was an interesting casting decision and it almost paid off. Dey was better on TV’s “L.A. Law,” for which she won a Globe as well as four other nominations. She was also nominated for “The Partridge Family” and hasn’t had an acting credit since 2004.

  • A promotional still photograph from the movie “Looker.”

    An Oscar winner (certainly not for this one), Coburn plays bad guy “John Reston” and he could have made this a memorable film. The operative word is “could.” He looks to bust out with a flash of greatness each time he’s on screen, with his cool aloofness, but Coburn never manages to score with it. He has just the right edge to him and is truly comfortable in front of the camera. Coburn was much better in “The Great Escape” (click here to read my review) and “Affliction,” for which he won his Oscar. I also enjoyed his work in another World War II film: “Cross of Iron” (click here to read my review). Coburn died of a heart attack at 74 in 2002.

  • A Primetime Emmy nominee, Harewood plays “Lt. Masters” and he’s the cop on a mission to solve the murders. At times he looks to know that it isn’t Finney, but, like Coburn, doesn’t get the chance to use his talent to elevate the role. Harewood looks to bust out, too, but just doesn’t get there because of the limitations of his screen time. He was great in “Falcon and the Snowman” and was a pure treat in “Full Metal Jacket” (click here to read my review). He was nominated for an informational TV show about baseball great Hank Aaron.
  • A two-time Golden Globe nominee (not for this one), Leigh Taylor-Young plays “Jennifer Long” and she’s Coburn’s alter ego in this one. Taylor-Young doesn’t come off well and actually appears if she’s the test subject of an experimental group that received too many muscle relaxants. She just doesn’t go any good work that I could observe. You’ll like her better in the sci-fi classic “Soylent Green” and I found her great in an episode of TV’s “The Love Boat” (click here to read my review of the series). Other TV work by her includes potboilers such as “Peyton Place” and “Dallas.” She was nominated as “most promising newcomer – female” at the 1969 Globes for “I Love You, Alice B. Toklas!” and for TV’s “Picket Fences.”
  • A promotional still photograph from the movie “Looker.”

    The final most-seen actor is Tim Rossovich as the threatening killer called the “Mustache Man.” Although his delivery is one-dimensional and his screen time is limited, Rossovich does a better job in “Looker” than actors who have much more talent. He was in “Night Shift” and was way down in the credits in the terrific “The Long Riders” (click here to read my review). He died at 72 in 2018 of a respiratory arrest.

So much more should have been accomplished here. The story is inventive and flexible for the screen; the actors have true talent; and you couldn’t ask for better opportunities for great cinematography.

Alas, it doesn’t happen.

The technology from the 3-D scans to robot garbage cans to computerized digital video was all pretty much science fiction to most audience members in 1981 but now you kind of yawn at its futuristic theme (unlike a sci-fi classic such as “Logan’s Run,” with its campy technology that still looks a bit futuristic today), with the exception of how artificial intelligence has begun to pollute society.

So, one final sarcastic “thanks” to Crichton for fumbling this one. Too bad, it could have been great. Also, note that Crichton died at 66 in 2008 of lymphatic cancer.

For whatever reason, “Looker” didn’t make the list of 1981 films and their ticket sales on Box Office Mojo. According to Wiki, “Looker” made $3.28 million, which would have put it at 85th (replacing “Zoot Suit” and its $3.25 million). The No. 1 film of the year was instant legend and now iconic “Raiders of the Lost Ark” with $212.2 million. Other films from 1981 that I have reviewed include:

Assorted cast and film notes (via IMDb.com):

  • Coburn’s full birth name was James Harrison Coburn III; Dey’s middle name is Hallock; and Harewood’s full birth name is Willie Dorian Harewood. On the height front, Crichton was 6-foot-9, which was 14 inches taller than Dey.
  • The screenplay is original by Crichton and not adapted from one of his or any other novel.
  • The film was re-rated as PG from its original R – which it earned with several nude scenes by both Dey and several former Playboy models.
  • Taylor-Young is the former wife of Ryan O’Neal (the couple has one child and were married from 1967-1974).
  • Terry Kiser plays the director of a commercial but would later make his mark playing a dead guy in “Weekend at Bernie’s” (click here for my review).
  • Directly from com: “LOOKER is an acronym in the film that stands for Light Ocular-Oriented Kinetic Emotive Responses. It has a double-meaning as its dictionary definition defines it as a very attractive person; in this movie, it refers to good-looking female models.”
  • TV’s favorite game show hostess Vanna White has a bit part as a “Reston Girl.”
  • Finally and directly from IMDb.com: “The first ever film to create 3D shading with a computer that produced the first ever CGI human character was the model Cindy (Susan Dey). This movie achieved this feat before Disney’s more famous TRON (1982) hit the screens. The Web site Filmsite said of Cindy: ‘Her digitization was visualized by a computer-generated simulation of her body being scanned–notably the first use of shaded 3D CGI in a feature film. Polygonal models obtained by digitizing a human body were used to render the effects.’”

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