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Ray Bradbury Theater – And So Died Riabouchinska (S2E12)

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bradbury02The same short story served as the basis for this episode of Ray Bradbury Theater in 1988 and an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents in 1956.  Good omens: it was still considered viable 30 years after AHP, and 40 years after it appeared as a radio drama on Suspense.  Bad omen: it is not in the 100 Celebrated Stories collection (but then, neither is The Sound of Thunder or The Veldt).

No matter the pedigree, this is another turd.  Maybe I was biased by watching the far superior American AHP version first.

Detective Krovitch is called to investigate the murder of Mr. Ockham.  The prime suspects are ventriloquist John Fabian, his wife Alyce, and his manager Douglas.  Fabian taunts Krovitch by speaking through his puppet Riabouchinska.

Alyce says she married Fabian for love, but the best part of him was only realized through Riabouchinska.  She makes no secret of the fact that she was driven to an affair with Douglas.

The detective theorizes that Ockham knew of their affair and blackmailed them, resulting in his murder.  Alyce says that is crazy because Fabian knew of their affair  So yet again after Three’s a Crowd and The Dead Man, we have a man who seems OK with his wife having an affair.

rbtriabouchinska02Krovitch later seems to think he has discovered something incriminating by producing a poster of Fabian with a different puppet, and another poster of a ballerina named Illyana that resembles Riabouchinska.

Fabian admits that he one time saw Illyana dance and fell in love with her.  They were lovers, traveled the world.  After a quarrel, she ran away and disappeared.  To get her back, he created a doll in her image. Well, not to get her back, but to replace her.  Literally.

From inside her box, Riabouchinska says they began receiving letters from Ockham blackmailing Fabian, threatening to expose Fabian.  The puppet completely rats him out and makes a fool of him.  Wow, she is just like a real woman!

During their quarrel, she helpfully says, he actually struck Illyana and killed her.  In a jarring edit, Illyana is splayed out dead on the steps in the past.  When Fabian rushes to her and picks her up, it is Riabouchinska that he cradles in his arms in the present.

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Alfred Hitchcock Presents version with Charles Bronson and Claude Rains.

Disgusted that he killed Ockham, Riabouchinska devolves silently into just another still wooden puppet.  Heartbroken at losing her twice, he goes with the detective.

This is nearly unwatchable, especially when compared to the AHP version.  Hitchcock’s version was superior in both story and performances.  Charles Bronson played Krovitch and Claude Rains played Fabian.  Rains especially was excellent, truly selling the idea that he was a ventriloquist.  His motions creating the puppet and the very slight movements of his lips as he spoke through her seemed very authentic and kept the episode from drifting off into TZ territory.

Maybe this European RBT cast is beloved over there, but I found them dull and their accents were often indecipherable.  And at the risk of being cruel, Alice in the RBT version has a very distracting mole.  I mean really very distracting.

Even the puppet was far better in the original.  AHP’s version had delicate features and actually somewhat resembled the ballerina it was modeled after.  Maybe AHP had an advantage filming in B&W, but the RBT version really just looked like a tarted up whore.  To the ballerina’s credit, it did not even look like her.

Surprisingly, the 1950’s story is edgier.  In the AHP version, Riabouchinska says Fabian did not kill Illyana.  He did, however, still murder Ockham to keep him from telling the world of Fabian’s man-on-puppet sexual fetish with Riabouchinska:  The love that dare not speak its name without moving its lips.  Kind of extreme for the 50’s, if the audience ever thought it through.

But Hitchcock is the guy who would introduce the country to an incestuous transvestite serial killer in 4 years, so par for the course.

Post-Post:

  • AHP Deathwatch: No survivors.
  • In the AHP version, the voice of Riabouchinska is Virgina Gregg who also provided the voice for another stiff, Norma Bates.
  • In both versions, Fabian’s puppet before Riabouchinska was named “Sweet William.”  Think what you will, haters.
  • Riabouchinska is such an unusual name, I have to think Bradbury borrowed the name of the Russian ballerina Tatiana Riabouchinska.  If I never have to type that name again, it will be too soon.
  • Sadly, I was unable to work in an Ockham’s razor reference.

 

 

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – The End of Indian Summer (S2E22)

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ahindiansummer01We learn 3 things from this first frame:  1) The episode is about the scarily named Triumphant Insurance Company.  2) Its symbol is a sack of money — more likely theirs than the beneficiaries.  3) That phone is juuuust about to fall off the desk.  None of this matters as the insurance company does not turn out to be the bad guy, and the phone does not fall.

Misdirection or mis-direction?

Joe Rogers is in a little hot water for selling a $50,000 life insurance policy to Ms. Gillespie who has already buried 2 husbands with similar policies in the past  years.  His boss orders him to check up on Ms. Gillespie and see if she seems like a killer or just really unlucky.

Rogers, with his wife as camouflage, goes to a realtor’s office and asks about the ol’ Gillespie house.  He says it is not on the market, but that she loves showing it off to complete strangers.  Sure enough, she does give him the grand tour.

She talks about her two dead husbands until she surprises Rogers by introducing a visitor as her new fiancee.  Back at the hotel, Rogers gets a telegram telling him that Ms. Gillespie has taken out another $50,000 policy on her new fella.

Concerned that the old man is walking into a buzz-saw, he rushes to the ol’ Gillespie place to warn him.  Gillespie and her fiancee have already left to be married and go on their honeymoon.  Another man who Rogers has seen around town arrives at the house.

Finally, the two men talk.  Turns out the fiancee has buried three wives, and the other man is an investigator for another insurance company.  So it is just a waiting game to see which one kills the other first.

Not much going on here, no interesting visuals, no salacious subtitles.  Just an OK placeholder episode.  Actually the first frame was the most interesting of the episode.  That phone bugged me the whole episode.

Post-Post:

  • AHP Deathwatch: Only Mickey Kuhn (the Bellhop) is still hanging in there.  He is one of the few survivors from Gone with the Wind.  He increased his odds by wisely being only 7 when it was filmed.

Escape (2012)

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“Norway 1363.  Ten years have passed since the Black Death killed half the population .  The land is barren and the lawlessness is raging.”

So wait, this isn’t Escape: The Musical?

Signe and her brother — don’t get too attached — are in a wagon being pulled by one horse with their parents along side on foot.  While stopped for some grub — probably literally grub — Pa is teaching the kids to shoot a bow.  The boy does OK, but Signe lacks patience.  I’d love to say this was testing my patience as well, but there is something immediately captivating about the setting, the family and the score (little bit of a Dances with Wolves thing going on).

Four minutes in, the family is attacked by 14th century gangstas busting arrows & axes in their ass, caps having hot yet been invented.  Signe, being maybe 15, has some value, so is spared.  The gang is led by a woman, Dagmar, who wants to use her to create a little sister for another young girl they’ve adopted (i.e. also murdered her parents).  The men in her crew support this concept too, but maybe for a different reason.

escape03The other little girl, with the unlikely name Frigg, sneaks some water to Signe who the gang has chained in camp.  Dagmar catches her and threatens to make her cut off one of Signe’s fingers.  The next morning Frigg shows up with a knife, and not only doesn’t cut off a finger, she lets Signe go.

The two homely, homely girls escape the camp and the gangstas take off after them through the woods.  From this point on, it is really just a chase with the girls picking off their pursuers.  But that’s enough.

escape04The girls aren’t Rambo.  There is no crazy kung fu wire-work.  There are no elaborate traps set.  When Signe attacks a man who has 100 pounds on her, she is just as ineffectual as you would expect in reality.  They just use their wits, and take advantage of situations.  Their drab looks and clothing lend a credibility to the scenes as does the use of the woods and rivers.

It would be tough for a story to get much simpler than this and still have images moving around on the screen.  Signe looks a little like Jennifer Lawrence, but this is no Hunger games; no fancy story, just a simple, picturesque thriller.  The girls are both great.  Of the cast, Dagmar could have benefited most from a deeper characterization, but that would be a different movie.  In short, everything on the screen works, and I didn’t miss anything that was not in there.  And at 78 minutes with about 6 minutes of credits, it never lags. escape05Highly recommended.

Post-Post:

  • Original title in Norway: Flukt.  Starring Frigg.
  • Signe by Eric Clapton.

Alien Abduction (2014)

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alienabduction01The following is leaked footage from the US Airforce.

This film had one strike going in — the horribly generic title.  And another strike just a few seconds in as they misspelled US Air Force.  They pulled it out, though, with a home run . . . ummm in the park . . . maybe on an error.

The film starts out in an alien ship with the found-footage camera being tossed out a garbage chute.

Then we truly begin with some allegedly true accounts of the Brown Mountain Lights including mysterious lights, creatures, abductions, and certain anti-gravity antics reported by a woman who would have really stress-tested the technology.

The Morris family is going camping at Brown Mountain.  It is refreshing that they are not all assholes as is typically the case.  Mom and Dad are there with kids Corey and Jillian. Younger son Riley is autistic which is used as an excuse to have him hold on to that camera like grim death.  He is pretty chatty for an autistic kid — it seems to come and go.  Maybe it’s that 24 hour autism.

As the gals and the guys are setting up the tents, naturally the woman finish before the men figure theirs out because mens are stoopid.  It still has not occurred to Hollywood that this same constant joke is actually patronizing to women.  At least they let a man make the fire.  With a barbecue grill lighter.

alienabduction03That night, after some strange flashes of light that illuminate the tents, they go outside and see the famous Brown Mountain Lights.  At first it is just 3 lights forming a triangle. Then they slowly move around, and zip away very quickly.

The next day, back in the mini-van, the GPS predictably goes out as they travel on back-roads.  They run low on gas because Dad was too stoopid to fill the tank, but do make it to a tunnel which contains several abandoned cars randomly scattered on the road.  Doors are open and toys, baby seats, CDs, and broken seat belts ominously litter the road.

The cars all seem recently er, abandoned.  They are just sitting there empty and fueled up for the taking, but Dad decides to explore the tunnel instead.  There is even a police car there with a radio blaring, but no time for that.

There is a very chilling incident in the tunnel which I will not spoil.  The lights, editing, and sound design actually sent chills through me.  You can bitch about Riley continuing to film, but would you rather not see anything?  Shut up.

The survivors get back in the van and tear out for the 50 yards the gas lasts them, then hoof it on foot.  They go up a dirt driveway that they had noticed on the way in.  Up until this point, I would rate this film as excellent.  However, the redneck who lives down the lane is the weak link in the film.

Sean greets them in his front yard with a rifle.  Its not like he’s moon-shining and these are revenuers — he just seems to be acting like an asshole.  He has the standard over-the-top southern accent, camo, trucker cap, manly-man beard and butt dangling from his mouth as he takes aim at them.  Like all movie hicks, he lives with his brother.  Shockingly, the script does not have him request anyone to squeal like a pig.

Once he sees what they are up against, he does take them in.  Luckily Sean does prove to have some good survival instincts.  He cleverly realizes that the police car in the tunnel will be the object of a huge search, and strings cans around his property to act as alarms.  That night, Sean’s place is flooded with light as the aliens attack.  Tragically, their galaxy-hopping technology enabled them to outwit the tin can strategy.

alienabduction06Sean is able to find his brother’s empty truck.  He is taking the survivors — which are now fewer in number — to town.  Once again, they see the bright lights.  Sean gives them direction to a barn to hide in.  A couple more are taken in the standard Fire in the Sky bright light tractor beam — but now with back breakage!

After a minute of credits, there is an utterly unnecessary epilogue.  But it does break up the 11 minutes of credits.  As always, I applaud them for not padding out the movie.

Other than Sean’s caricature of Hollywood’s perception of a southerner, this is a very good, efficient, chilling film.  Everyone else is great in their roles, it it moves at a perfect pace, and has some good scares.  Special kudos to the sound design which is literally chilling.

Highly recommended.

Post-Post:

  • Wouldn’t The Brown Mountain Abductions have been a more obvious and much more interesting choice of title?
  • The “actual” Lights have an official site featuring a clip which should embarrass The National Geographic Channel.  The Travel Channel also has a clip but I’ll be damned if I’ll sit through a 30-second commercial to see it.
  • For an opposing view: Skeptoid.
  • Is it even possible to have an in-the-park home run that does not include an error?
  • What kind of asshole does this to the rocks?  That’s who ought to be abducted and have their back broken.  You know, after a trial.

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Alfred Hitchcock Presents – Number Twenty-Two (S2E21)

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ah2204

Wipe that smirk off your face, punk!

Coppers are chasing a ne’er-do-well through an alley.  The young man, with a big smile on his face, seems to be taking this as a real hoot, daddio.  Ultimately cornered on a fire escape by the police, he gives up.  The punk with the smirk is Rip Torn, although so young here that he is unrecognizable.

He is pretty proud of himself over his crime-spree of a single robbery.  Of an old man.  In a candy store.  With a toy gun. Lest you underestimate him, he did slug the geezer with the toy gun.

He has a big smile the whole time he walks down the cell-block to his new home.  These are just temporary holding cells, but these are some of the best dressed criminals I’ve ever seen — suit jackets, ties, a nice fedora.  This is the anti-Oz.

He gets to his cell and meets his new roomie, an old man named Skinner, who has clearly been here before.  When Torn finds out he will be photographed for the mug shots, he gets excited.  Will reporters be there?  Will he get his picture in the paper?  Having his priorities straight, he is hoping to impress the “big shots” back at the pool hall.  However, he does worry that the papers will spill the beans that his gun was only a toy swiped from a 5 & 10 (The Dollar Store before inflation).  Wow, guess that really was a spree!

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Forced perspective trick now used by Tom Cruise.

Torn and Skinner are taken to a line-up where they are questioned from the back of the room by a man with a microphone.  Skinner and Torn are kept for additional questioning.  During the bonus round, Skinner claims not to remember anything in answer to all their questions.  Doesn’t remember last time he worked, or anything about the crime.

Torn continues to take it all as a joke until the detective tells him the old man he slugged in the candy store sustained a cracked skull and died.  That’s murder, baby!  Although, that must have been some toy gun to fracture his skull.

This is a pretty slim story.  The big final twist here is the standard plot point we would expect at the end of the first act in a contemporary crime show.  Maybe it was shocking 60 years ago, but I expect better from Evan Hunter.  Credited with the story, he also wrote the screenplay for The Birds and the 200 87th Precinct novels.

I rate it 8 out of 22.

Post-Post:

  • AHP Deathwatch:  Rip Torn and Martin Wilkins are still with us.  Although with a 1905 birth year, I suspect Wilkin’s bio might need updating.
  • AHP Proximity Alert:  Ray Teal was just in an episode 4 weeks earlier.
  • Would it have killed them to delay this one week and make it the 22nd episode of the season?
  • Alfred Hitchcock directed movies titled Number 13 and Number 17.  I like to think that if he had directed this episode, he would have renamed it Number 23 just to keep the prime number theme going.  And would have delayed it two weeks.
  • Hmmm, just noticed that there is already a movie named The Number 23.
  • And then there is this strange piece of business.  The man below does not seem to be drunk or stoned.  He does, however, have a snappy haircut and a stylish blazer-over-t-shirt that Miami Vice would not popularize for another 25 years.  The only thing I can think of is that they are hinting at some gay-related crime, but that would be pretty bold to put on TV in the 50’s.

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