Monthly Archives: December 2014

Ray Bradbury Theater – Touched with Fire (S4E3)

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bradbury02Like And So Died Riabouchinska, this is a story that appeared first on Alfred Hitchcock Presents (under the title Shopping for Death), and has been recycled 30 years later for RBT.

During a heatwave, a couple of retired insurance salesman are observing the adverse reaction, carelessness or violence, that people have to the heat.

The AHP version gives a few illustrations of their theory — a traffic accident where the driver was reckless, a surprising graphic suicide (we clearly see the body fall 12 stories), and a raging warehouse fire.

In both versions, the men have selected a particular woman that they have calculated is about to crack.  Or more specifically, this being an Alfred Hitchcock joint, she is portrayed as such a shrew that she will bring the violence upon herself.  So it’s really her fault if, for example, her husband guts her with a longshoreman’s hook.

Considering themselves to be good Samaritans they want to protect her from harm. Waiting outside her apartment, they follow her to the local butcher shop.  Jo Van Fleet (AHP) is just a lunatic — shrill, sneering, yelling at everyone, shoving them, littering. Eileen Brennan (RBT) is less of a caricature.  We will still get the sneering, but at least she isn’t yelling at everyone.  Although maybe she did chew out the producers for misspelling her name in the credits.  And for both women — the hair! My God, the hair!

IImage 003n both versions, the aptly-named Mrs. Shrike is rude and abusive to the butcher. She criticizes his meat — ouch! — and accuses him of putting his thumb on the scale. The AHP version is more true to the concept, having the butcher glance at large knife probably thinking of adding a new cut to his inventory.

Her next stop in both versions is a fresh-produce store, with similar results.  Her behavior further convinces the men she is a ticking time bomb of insanity, just begging to be murdered.  Or rather, creating a situation where the man has no free will and must kill her and end up in jail, ruining his life.

They go upstairs to her apartment.  Even before entering they can hear her yelling and music blasting.  They try to explain that she is putting herself in danger, but her natural reaction is to yell at them.  She is abusive to the point where one of them actually fulfills their own prediction and whacks her with his cane.  Well, technically, he merely brandishes it on AHP, but he does swat her on RBT — but it’s still all her fault,mind you.

Leaving, they pass her husband on the stairs.  He is racing up, carrying a longshoreman’s hook.  Damn her for driving him to this!

Post-Post:

  • Sadly, this blog picked up AHP Season 1 after this episode, so I have to slog through it now.
  • AHP Deathwatch:  No survivors.  Michael Ansara, last seen in The Baby Sitter, gave it a good try, making it to age 91 last year.
  • The RBT episode was directed by Roger Tompkins who also directed the previous episode.
  • I like that, even though it is a heatwave and even though they are retired, the two men are still wearing suits. Different time.
  • The AHP butcher was at least wearing a a full t-shirt whereas the RBT butcher was wearing a wife-beater.  But I’m sure Sir Alfred would have approved.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – The Dangerous People (S2E39)

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ahpdangerouspeople01Bellefontaine enters the train station as a siren whoops in the background.  In the office, another man is warming himself next to a pot-belly stove.  Bellefontaine tries to start a conversation, but the other man — Jones — doesn’t seemed interested.

The clerk in the station tells him the siren is coming from the Home for the Criminally Insane.  They had one go over the wall today.

Bellefontaine observes Jones’ tattered clothes, and the way he muses about the criminally insane as he fondles a fireplace poker.  He concludes that Jones might just be the escapee.  In a panic, he goes to the restroom and loads a pistol that he was carrying in his bag.

In the second act, Jones begins ruminating on the possibility that Bellefontaine is the escaped lunatic.

ahpdangerouspeople10

And that’s when he developed his drinking problem.

There are lots of voice-overs as we hear each man’s rationale for believing the other is the escapee.  I’m not sure if it helps the story that we know neither of the men is the escapee, but maybe there is no other way the story could be told.

It is just a very dull slog. Bellefontaine gives a good performance, but the episode’s strength is that unnerving siren that periodically whoops in the background.

The titular danger here is being bored to death.

Post-Post:

  • AHP Deathwatch: Only bit-player David Armstrong seems to be among the living.
  • Jones was Danny Noonan’s father in Caddyshack.
  • Last episode of Season 2.

Night Gallery – Midnight Never Ends / Brenda (S2E7)

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ngmidnightn everends01Wow, I have to combine these two vacuous segments to really have anything to grab onto.

Midnight Never Ends

In the first segment, Rod Serling is actually the subject of the featured painting.  His one meta-appearance in TZ was awesome, so you might think that would indicate this was something special; but consider how god-awful most of these oil slicks are.  And WTF is he holding a guitar?

The lovely Susan Strasburg is driving through a pitch-black night — and I mean that literally. The minimalist sets in this segment, including the car, are lit only in the immediate area where the actors are.  Anything outside of the car or the room they occupy is completely black.

She picks up a soldier holding a sign for Camp Pendleton.  They are perplexed that they seem to know things about each other.  It takes 20 minutes to get to an ending somewhat similar to Five Characters in Search of an Exit.

The sets are interesting, and Strasburg is good (however, the soldier is pretty bad), but the whole thing just feels like Serling phoning it in again.  And I think I saw this same premise as a sketch on a variety show many years ago.  Played more seriously, the build-up could have worked, but then the let down at the ending would have been just that  much greater (think M. Night Gallery Shyamalan’s The Village).

Even the synopsis on the DVD menu is half-assed:  “Two men can’t shake the uncanny feeling they’ve shared previous experiences.”  Yes, there are other men in the episode, but the soldier and the woman are really the main characters.

Brenda

ngbrenda03aA lot of potential in this one.  Laurie Prang plays a lonely young girl who has her moments of bitchiness — being rude, trampling over sand-castles, etc.  She encounters a monster in the woods — or is it a manifestation of her inner demons?  It is a menacing creature, but not horrific; it mostly just looks like a compost heap, not having any discernible head or limbs.

Laurie Prang is excellent in the role, and also sells her transformation when a year elapses and she ages from maybe 12 to 13.  There really is nothing wrong with this segment, and I actually enjoyed it as I watched it.  It just has kind of a meh ending; and after the first segment, I really needed something more.

Post-Post:

  • Twilight Zone Legacy:  Robert Karnes was in The Arrival, and Robert Hogan was in Spur of the Moment.  I saw Hogan in something a long time ago and wondered why they would have used the same name for the character in Hogan’s Heroes.  It also bugged me as a kid that there was a Sgt. Carter on both Hogan’s Heroes and Gomer Pyle.
  • There is more of a connection to Star Trek, where four of the actors in the episode appeared; most notably, Glenn Corbett as Zefram Cochrane (before Farmer Hoggett got the gig).

Tales From the Crypt – Carrion Death (S3E2)

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tftccarriondeath01The question is, how much of a suspension of disbelief are you willing to concede.  I’m pretty lenient — I’ll normally check my brain at the door.  And I mean my door, before I even leave for the theater.  Sometimes, even the previous day.  There is one huge glaring flaw here, but it doesn’t prevent me from enjoying the episode.

We start off in a town that reminds me of the facades of Rock Ridge (when they come in to destroy the real Rock Ridge, they’ll actually be destroying the fake Rock Ridge, but they’ll think it is the real Rock Ridge, but we’ll know . . .).

Hoping to steal a few G’s, including a 2nd one for last name, Earl Digs (Kyle MacLachlan) has just robbed the local bank.  This, after escaping from Yuma Prison where he was to be executed for the murder of 3 student nurses (during a slumber party — just speculation on my part).  The radio says he escaped in “a late model” Cadillac, although the one on screen looks pretty beat-up.

tftccarriondeath08Driving through the desert, Digs notices a cop trailing him.  The cop pulls up beside Digs and immediately takes a shot at him.  Digs edges him off the road and he and the bike go down.  But he bounces back, rights the bike and continues his pursuit.  I’m starting to like this guy.

When Digs hears the siren again, he spins the car around and begin charging the cop.  The cop rolls off his bike and down a rocky hill, but the bike continues riderless and rams Digs car creating a huge fireball like the car was made of C-4 and the bike was made of anti-matter C-4.

Digs decides to make it on foot, using the little-known route to Mexico.  This cop is like a Terminator — he regains consciousness, climbs back up the hill and pursue Digs on foot through the desert.

They finally have a showdown in an abandoned store.  The cop is able to handcuff his wrist to Digs, but Digs is able to grab a gun and shoot him.  The cop’s last act is to swallow the key.  So now Digs is free to head south of the border down Mexico way, only 6 miles away, but he has a dead man attached to his wrist.  He resumes his trek with the cop slung over his shoulder.

tftccarriondeath26a

Bloody hell — It’s always just after you washed the car!

Here is the problem:  There is a simple, obvious solution to his problem — just hack the cop’s hand off at the wrist.  Find a sharp rock, bite it, or just break his wrist and start a-twisting.  Digs can’t be squeamish, after all he was in the can for murdering 3 student nurses (in their lingerie — again, just speculation on my part).  He even admits to killing another 5 in Chicago.  So a little cop’s blood isn’t going to phase him.

The rest of the episode is a Weekend at Bernie’s scenario with him dragging or carrying the cop to Mexico.  It finally does occur to him to hack the cop off at the wrist.  But it doesn’t work out as he planned.  And the buzzard makes another appearance.

Despite that one oversight, it is a fun episode.  Although, would have killed them to have a flashback to the — just speculating here — nude pool party where the nurses were killed?

tftccarriondeath28a

I always appreciate the use of the official “$” logo’d bank robbery bag.

Post-Post:

  • I could also take issue with the title.  Like Lower Berth, someone here doesn’t seem to know how puns work.  Carrion Death makes no sense because Carry-On Death or Carrying Death is not a well-known phrase. A better title would have been Carrion Baggage.
  • Surely that title was not dreamed up by Steven E. de Souza.  He has writing credits on Commando, Die Hard, Die Hard 2 and 48 Hours.  I think he knows what he’s doing.
  • Digs, not Diggs?

Outer Limits – Mind Over Matter (S2E5)

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olmindovermatter15At Horton University, Dr. Sam Stein (Mark Hamill) is giving a demon-stration of his Computer Aided Virtual Environment (CAVE) system. He is assisted by Dr. Sarrazin and Dr. Rachel Carter (Debrah Farentino).  The subject is a paranoid schizophrenic who has visions of his dead father telling him to kill his girlfriend.

Stein and the patient are hooked into the CAVE which basically puts them in The Matrix. Together, they occupy a virtual setting which can also be televised to observers. The virtual space is a nightmarish construct of roaring hell-fire.  It is later revealed that Stein can control the environment, for instance, to be a tranquil lake setting.  Maybe this would have been a better setting for therapy of the homicidal maniac.

olmindovermatter07There is a strange series of hiccups in logic in the next scene:  1) Dr. Sarrazin interprets a 78% chance of recovery as meaning the patient can “absolutely” be cured.  2) The CAVE system asks for more input on the emotions of fear and love, yet we were just told “everything written on human psychology is cataloged in the CAVE’s RAM.”  And 3) Stein comments on skiing:  “Call me crazy, but sliding down an icy hill on two planks of wood just seems to challenge the laws of gravity.”  Well, that’s more a demonstration of gravity than a challenge of it.

Stein is hot for Dr. Carter, but too shy to make his move.  Once he finally approaches her, she is run down by a car and put into a coma.  Luckily, he has an app for that.

olmindovermatter22Stein is able to meet with the comatose Dr. Carter in the CAVE. But they are not alone  — there is another entity.

There is a great story here, but it is somewhat undermined by Mark Hamill who is just a terrible actor.  I never once got the feeling he was the character or had any idea of the meaning of the medical jargon he was using.  On the other hand, Debrah Farentino is going to be awesome anywhere she appears.

Post-Post:

  • Peter Breck gets a strange “Special Cameo Appearance By” credit.  And is it technically a cameo if you are in two scenes?
  • Jonathan Glassner also wrote Valerie 23.  His stories are good, but the casting is awesome.
  • Debrah Farentino is the daughter of James Farentino from Since Aunt Ida Came to Stay.
  • Can it be just coincidence that there is a Dr. Sarrazin in this episode and Michael Sarrazin starred in the previous week’s episode?
  • Is it just my imagination, or were Dr. Carter’s breasts about 50% bigger in the CAVE?  It could have actually been justified by the denouement.  Now that’s good writing!
  • Hulu sucks.