#rollerball 1975

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On June 25, 1975, Rollerball debuted in the United States.

Here's a new portrait of Maud Adams as Ella!

[theblob1958]

even if you play their game, they still want you dead

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James Caan as Jonathan E. in Rollerball (1975)

Watercolors on Paper, 8.5" x 11", 2025

By Josh Ryals

[buff-borf-bork]

Rollerball had an "individualism is good" tilt for sure, but it wasn't really individualism vs collectivism, it was more individualism vs Foucault's and Rose's theories of power and individualism as a system of docile bodies in a machine.

Where individualism isn't about how you are the most special and original person and have to look out for yourself, but individualism in that the people in power, corporations in the case of rollerball, individualize you by learning and keeping track of every part of you, mind, body, and "soul," then using the information to keep you a seamless part of the whole as you're categorized and utilized, controlled.

I really don't see any argument in the movie against collectivism in people doing what's best for the whole and for the community on any scale (larger local community to smaller scale family community), as that's not even a choice they have in the first place. How can you have community to care about when you can't do something as pick and keep your own partner, being assigned and rotted partners at someone else's discretion. You can't have an argument against collectivism when there's no space for it to even exist in the movie

[theblob1958]

If a champion defeats the meaning for which the game was designed, then he must lose.

Rollerball (1975) dir. Norman Jewison

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On September 22, 2002, Rollerball was screened at the Cinefest Sudbury International Film Festival.

Here's some new James Caan art!

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On March 14, 2002, Rollerball was released on DVD in Greece.

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On January 17, 1976 Rollerball debuted in Norway.