Monthly Archives: October 2018

Outer Limits – Small Friends (02/05/99)

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OK, Gene Morton is in a maximum security prison.  But instead of working in the laundry for $.15/hour, he seems to work in the clean room of an electronics lab in the prison.  And one of his neighbors has a saxophone in his cell.  Toto, I don’t think we’re in Oz anymore.

When Gene gets back to his cell, it is lights-out.  He pulls a match-box from under his pillow and several small balls of light swarm out.  He is able direct them with a small remote.  In seconds, the balls shape a piece of metal into a lovely 6-inch model of a Disneyesque castle, although a shank would have been more practical.

Gene seems uninterested in his parole hearing the next day.  He doodles while his lawyer talks about his career as a pioneering micro-engineer.  Unfortunately, when someone tried to take credit for his inventions, he killed him.  And he won’t swear it couldn’t happen again.

Lawrence, who I thought could not be more obnoxious than when he played the sax in the cell-block, is a motormouth punk.  During a basketball game, he accidentally breaks the Discman of a brute named Marlon.  Rather than letting the Lawrence problem solve itself, Gene intervenes and says he can fix the device.  That night he sends the swarm to repair the Discman.  Unfortunately, Lawrence witnesses them.

Of course, Lawrence then threatens him.  He bullies Gene into taking him to the clean room that night.  Gene foolishly shows him the MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) and the remote that controls them.  That night, Marlon fire-bombs his cell, and Gene uses the MEMS to melt the cell door lock.  So now Marlon knows too.  A few minutes earlier, he had told Lawrence he chose to remain in jail because it was the only place he could keep the MEMS secret.  It made no sense then, and less now.

The rest is fine without me rehashing it.  It is worth mentioning that Roddy Piper is excellent here.  How is it possible he was in only one movie anyone has ever seen, and one other they might have heard of on Up All Night?  Lawrence is unspeakably grating, and no one else really registers.

Special commendation is also deserved for the MEMS.  This was almost 20 years ago, and they look great both as the glowing orbs and in the close-up shots.  Under the microscope, the tiny propellers, arms and clamps were absolutely convincing as being tiny units that could do almost anything.

 

Other Stuff:

  • Ralph Waite (Gene) was Pa Walton.  But I never saw The Waltons, so it doesn’t exist.

Science Fiction Theatre – Project 44 (12/24/55)

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Truman Bradley has a visitor.  Dr. Robert Richardson of Mt. Palomar Observatory has fortuitously dropped by the clubhouse to talk about Mars.  The doc is a real astronomer who actually worked at Mt. Palomar in the 1930s – 1950s.  I am very impressed that SFT gets the distance to Mars correct thanks to Dr. Richardson.  Even the great Twilight Zone could never be bothered to check an almanac or ask a 10 year old boy for accurate space data.  He opines about the atmosphere and life on Mars.  He is sure that, despite physical and mental challenges, men will someday go to Mars.  And by men, rest assured he means both white men and white women.

Truman shows us some of the stress tests astronauts must endure.  Sadly, after the factual opening, I have to call bullshit right away.  I know they test in centrifuges, but it looks like they would just fly right off of this thing.  He also says these men are tested up to 10 G’s (and the meter goes up to 25).  Maybe that’s why the Russkis beat us into space; we killed all our astronauts.

Dr. Arnold Bryan was one of the men on the centrifuge.  His fiance Dr. Janice Morgan is not happy about the risks he takes.  He tells her that is the last time because he has resigned.  However, he gets a telegram that he must be in Washington on Wednesday for a conference.

The conference room in DC is so close to the capitol dome that it must be on top of the senate.  SecDef Sturgis explains that a new fuel has been developed that will enable a man to go to Mars and return.  He is given one year to determine whether humans can survive in space.  If it is possible, Arnold will select and train the crew.  Janice is not thrilled about this.  However, Arnold explains how important it is and offers her a job evaluating the volunteers.

After several months, the project staff is whittled down to eight people with experience in various scientific disciplines.  Arnold tells them of the problems that might be encountered in space: the monotony and utter isolation.  According to Arnold, the trip will take two and a half years.  That is 8 months to get there, and 8 months to return, leaving 15 months to work on Mars.  I hope one of this group is a mathematician.  8 + 8 + 15 = 30?  Is that one of them hidden figures I’ve been hearing about?

He frankly tells the group of other dangers.  He name-checks Fred Whipple, another real astronomer, who estimates they would encounter only one meteor every 6 years.  So the odds sound pretty good.  They would sound better if he knew the difference between a meteor and a meteoroid.

One of the four women raises her hand.  “I’m almost afraid to ask this, but are we women just being included in the test or do we get to go to Mars too?”  Arnold assures them that if they pass the test they will go to Mars, prompting several sighs of relief; mostly from the four men.

Arnold is very progressive.  He points out that women are at least as able to work in different pressures, and “women adjust themselves better to drastic temperature changes.”  These tests were clearly not run any any freakin’ office I ever worked in.

Arnold reminds the volunteers that they have signed a contract to remain single.  However, the government is now encouraging them to pair off with other members of the mission.  Joyce has looked uncomfortable with this whole presentation, but this is just too much.  She says, “This project is insane, completely insane!”  She implores them — the group she recruited — not to throw their lives away.  “You won’t be heroes, you’ll be fools and lunatics!”  The volunteers stand by Dr. Arnold, and Joyce storms out.

The group is put into a small cabin to simulate the close quarters of space travel.  They quickly begin getting on each other’s nerves. They are subjected to other tests of physical stress and endurance.  Sadly, one of the women drops out, and one of the men is thrown out for sabotaging the tests.  The crew is not shorthanded, though, as Joyce returns and she and Arnold take their places.  The final shot is them blasting off to Mars.  It ain’t a train going into a tunnel, but this was 1955.

The domestic drama is the only problem with this episode.  When it stuck to the recruiting and training for the mission, it is pretty good (grading on massive curve as always).  In fact the stress tests seen here are no crazier than what would eventually happen at NASA (the clip from The Right Stuff is not available).  I can imagine a kid in the fifties digging this.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – I Can Take Care of Myself (05/15/60)

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Georgia is belting out a tune as Bert Haber plays piano at a swanky nightclub.  And she’s pretty dang good.  For a change, a singer on TV that I would pay to see.  But I went to see Bob Dylan this week, so my judgment is not to be trusted.

Infamous gangsta Little Dandy Dorf enjoys her just as much as me.  He sends a couple of martini’s up to the stage which strikes me as stupid:

  1. You don’t want a great singer slurring her words.
  2. Is she supposed to drink them on stage?
  3. Why did he send two?  Was he going to join her on stage?

Georgia walks away, leaving the drinks on the piano with no coasters.  The diminutive Dorf is highly insulted by her snub and disregard for fine spruce.  Bert tells the bar owner Joey that Dorf has been “dogging” Georgia for two weeks.  Joey advises them to be careful.

Bert goes backstage to Georgia’s dressing room.  Apparently this writer is too smart for me:

  1. Georgia refers to the owner as Bert’s pal Joey.  I get the reference, but I don’t think Pal Joey was a good guy.  The Joey here seems like a good egg.
  2. Georgia off-handedly says to Bert, “I love you.”  He replies, “You’re key is B flat, not A flat.”  Someone please explain what that means.
  3. She refers to Dorf as “the working girl’s nightmare.”  OK, she is literally a girl who works, but that usually refers to a hooker.  What does it mean here?

One of Dorf’s henchmen, who makes Luca Brasi look like George Clooney, comes to the door with a bouquet of flowers from Dorf.  They pretend not to know who Dorf is until Georgia says, “Oh you mean Little Dandy Dorf.”  Luca warns her, “He don’t like to be called Little.”  But Dandy and Dorf are acceptable?  She tells Luca to take the flowers back and “tell him they don’t smell — they stink!” Zing, I got that one!

As Georgia walks through the crowd to the stage for her second show, Dorf grabs her hand.  He stands up, showing himself to be a few inches shorter than her.  He is so persistent that she finally pours a martini over his head.  Bert runs to her defense.  There is a scuffle and Dorf falls to the floor.  He, Luca and Clemenza beat it out of the club.  Bert goes to the bar and orders a double.  A well-dressed goon tells him Mr. Dorf recommends he buy some insurance.

The next night, Georgia does not show up at the club.  A detective calls Bert over to his booth.  He asks for identification of a photo.  It is a photo of Georgia dead in an alley.  The detective interrogates Bert for the next 9 minutes — an eternity in TV time.  Well, with that investment of time, there’s one thing Bert can be sure of — this is a real policeman!

After Bert tells the detective about the incident with Dorf, the detective offers him police protection.  He follows the detective to the police car.  Only after the car pulls away does he notice the other passenger is the guy who earlier suggested he might want to invest in some insurance.

It’s a long way to go for a quick twist.  That is often the case with AHP, but the journey is almost always well done, and the ending worth the wait.  The biggest negative about this story was unavoidable.  I would have been happy to see Linda Lawson (Georgia) singing, wise-cracking, or just standing around for much more of the episode.  Sadly, that was not the story they were telling.  This series sometimes has the same actors appearing again within 2-3 weeks.  Inexplicably, it will be 4 years before AHP has her back (that’s about 20 in Genre Snaps years, so adios!).

The 5’3″ Frankie Darro (Dandy Dorf) was perfectly cast as the little man who was used to getting what he wanted.  He was truly menacing in a humorless, entitled performance.  He leaves the stage about the same time as Georgia, and his absence is felt as much as hers.  Of the other men, only Luca Brasi was truly memorable (but not enough to recall his name).

The 9 minutes of conversation with the supposed detective went on a bit long between 2 ordinary actors.  But never once did I think he was not a cop.

Other Stuff:

Twilight Zone – Street of Shadows (01/21/89)

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It’s no fun kicking around a family down on their luck.  So, simply stated, Steve Cranston is an unemployed construction worker.  He is currently residing in a shelter with his wife Elaine and daughter Lisa.  The bad luck continues as he learns the shelter is about to be foreclosed on.

It is, however, fun to kick around the narrator.  Like last week, he trots out his best twee NPR voice to tell us “Steve Cranston, is a man living what Thoreau called ‘a life of quiet desperation’.”  Nope, still not fun.  Steve’s wife is supportive and his daughter clearly loves him even as they cuddle on a cot in a shelter.  Frustrated that he can’t provide for them, he blows up at his wife, and goes out for a walk.

Seriously, is this supposed to be something other than a shadow?

A police car passes him, shining a light in his face.  As the car passes, there is a shadow of the car from a streetlight.  I’m not sure they didn’t enhance it to last a little longer and be blacker.  There is even a musical stinger.  But ultimately it was a rectangular shadow that did nothing a normal shadow would not do.  Was this the titular shadow?  Or was it like the mist in the previous episode which cruelly got our hopes up for something . . . anything to happen.  Then disappeared. [1]

Steve finds himself on the sidewalk at the front gate of the mansion of local rich guy Frederick Perry.  His butler and a tech from Sleepwell Security are having an unsecure conversation about the security system.  The repairman needs a part, so the system will be inactive that night.  The butler and the man go their separate ways, leaving the security fence open, so neither of these guys is too bright.  As Steve watches, the fence begins to automatically close.  Wait, I thought it was inactive. [2]

Fortuitously having missed a few meals, Steve is able to squeeze inside before it closes.  He is so desperate for cash that he slides open a patio door and enters.  I guess it is the alarm system that is inactive tonight, although it seems to have deactivated the mechanical locks too.

In a possible sign of Steve’s real problem, surrounded by rich guy stuff, Steve first steals a swig of Mr. Perry’s booze.  On the way in, he has also knocked over a plant, left the door slightly open, and left a trail of muddy footprints.  Maybe this guy’s problem is not the economy — he’s just not very smart.

As Steve cases the room, we get a close-up of hands pulling a pistol from a drawer and nervously fumbling with the magazine.  The scene is so ineptly edited, though, that we don’t know which man has the gun.  Both men have reason to be scared.  Steve is reluctantly committing a crime to help his family, and a gun would just get him in deeper.  Perry knows that if he shoots a burglar in his own freakin’ house, he will be put on trial; worse, all his rich, liberal friends will know he owns a gun!

OK, it is Perry that has the gun.  He catches Steve just as he finds a wallet full of cash.  Steve tries to talk him into not calling the cops.  Perry is determined to make the call.  As the noted sociologist Billy Ray Valentine said, “You can’t be soft on people like that.”  Steve backs up until he hits the liquor cabinet  . . . funny how his hands always seem to find the hooch.  He slings the heavy decanter at Perry’s noggin just as Perry shoots him.  Both men go down like Frazier.

Steve wakes up in Perry’s bed.  Even stranger, the butler recognizes him as Frederick Perry. [3]  He tries to call his wife at the shelter but is told she went to the hospital with her husband who has been shot.

He goes to the hospital.  Looking like the man who shot Steve Cranston, that goes about as badly as you would expect.  As long as he is stuck in the body of multi-millionaire, he decides to do something good.

Soon, for no apparent reason, the two men later swap bodies again.  Frederick Perry abides by Steve’s good deed (i.e. the deed to the shelter).  Steve even gets a job out of the deal.  Whether Perry understands what happened is never addressed.  They all live happily ever after.  God bless us every one.

Except anyone who tuned in looking for an episode of The Twilight Zone.

To be fair, it was fine.  I’m just tired of the get-the-girl, save-the-family-farm, move-out-of-the-shelter endings.  I still get shivers thinking of the ending of On Thursday We Leave for Home which I saw 2 years ago.  I will forget this episode before breakfast.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] Upon multiple viewings, it appears they CGI’d some eyes into the shadow.  If so, it is still so detached from the “event” as to be pointless.
  • [2] Perry’s Rolls Royce is parked just inside the gate.  Why is it down by the gate?  Wouldn’t it be under the porte-cochère at the house, or in the garage, or in front of the local nudie bar?  I guess that is to inform us Perry is rich just in case the security perimeter and butler don’t clue us in.
  • [3] No big deal, but the boom mike is visible a couple of times here.
  • Title Analysis:  What street?  What shadow?  That thing?

Tales from the Crypt – Whirlpool (10/31/94)

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They are going for a meta motif tale about a sub-par story being handed in just before deadline at the office of the Tales from the Crypt comic book.  The episode seems even more meta than they realized.

In a dark seedy hotel room, Jerry calls floozy Velma to get in the tub with him.  Surprisingly, he is wearing a t-shirt and an open dress-shirt in the filled tub.  More surprising to him, I suspect, is the belt that Mr. Velma loops around his neck to kill him.  He strangles Jerry as he thrashes about in the water.  Thankfully, he not Porky-Pigging it but does have on some fabulous blue plaid boxers.  In the tub.  In the water.

The topless Velma cheers her husband Roger on as Jerry croaks; then dies.  The couple had used Jerry in a con, and were just getting rid of him.  Roger criticizes her for enjoying her work too much.  She admits she had some good memories.  Suddenly Jerry rises up and breaks her husband’s neck.  He says, “I’m glad you feel that way.  I’m all choked up!” as he reaches for her throat.  She screams, and that frozen shot dissolves into the last panel of the TFTC comic book submission from Rolanda.  Good stuff.

But what do I know?  Her editor Vern says he doesn’t understand.  Is Vern dead?  Is Roger dead?  Is one or both of them a ghoul?  “What kind of ending is that?”  Vern declares it “a piece of shit.”  Even with 2 hours to deadline, the story is deemed not good enough. [1]  He fires her and has security throw her off the elevator in a nice little uncushioned fall by Rita Rudner.  She comes back that night and blows him.  Away.  For some reason, 6 cops are waiting in the lobby and blow her away.

She wakes up the next morning to a sunny day, birds chirping, and complete lack of being dead.  The vignette with Roger, Jerry & Velma plays again, although notably beginning this time after Velma put on a bra.  Rolanda is stunned as the day replays just as it did before with Vern hating her submission and him having to use the story about the head.

Again, Vern calls her into his office.  This time she stops his hand from buzzing security; although it was later in the day when security killed her the first time.  I guess this, at least, saved her from being thrown to the floor again.

That night she goes back to see Vern.  To be safe, she leaves the gun at home.  Vern pulls his own gun on her, though.  In a scuffle, she ends up killing Vern in this iteration also.  She gets on the elevator and pushes floor 13 rather than 1 as she did before.  Wait a minute, I understand her not wanting to go to 1, fearing she would be shot.  But why go UP to 13?  Then what?  What’s the plan?  Why not just go down to the 2nd floor and take the backstairs?  No good, the cops are miraculously waiting for her on 13 and mow her down.

She wakes up the next morning to a sunny day, birds chirping, and complete lack of being dead.  Both Velma and her boobs are MIA this time.  Rolanda tears up her story and calls in sick.  While she’s on the phone, Vern rings her doorbell.  He came to tell her she’s fired, then pulls a gun on her.  Wait, what?  What is the motivation for that?  Sure, he is under pressure with the deadline, but he was under pressure in the other iterations also.

But he turns the gun on himself and fires.  Again, why?

Like all innocent people on TV, she picks up the weapon just as the cops arrive.  Surprisingly, they do not riddle her with bullets this time.  I assume she got a fair, though incorrectly decided, trial because she is facing a firing squad.  They fill her full of lead and that scene dissolves into the last panel in a new comic strip.

The scene reboots again.  The roles are reversed and she begins speaking Vern’s dialogue from earlier in the show.  There is a new bit about him using her likeness in the comic which does not belong because it introduces a new element.  When she calls Vern into her office to fire him, he says “Oh shit.”  But why?  This is his first iteration.  He doesn’t know what’s coming.

There really is a lot to like in a short episode here, but the story ain’t part of it.  And a tip to aspiring screenwriters, story is kinda important.

First of all, whose story is it?  OK, Rolanda does a bad thing when she kills Vern the first time around.  It’s not like she gets away with it; she is executed.  Is the 2nd go-around a Groundhog Day-esque shot at redemption or her own personal Hell?  In either scenario, why would the roles reverse at the end?  Ya might think, well, karma is going to force her to experience Vern’s death as well as her own — double the torture!  Interesting, but Vern’s “Oh shit” tells us he is now the one aware of the inevitable future.  How did this become his story?

Ya say, he committed suicide, ergo he is going to Hell.  Not so fast, then where is the resolution to Rolanda’s fate?  Did this get her off the hook somehow?  And don’t forget, this episode began in reality, then went into cosmic iterations with magic police and body-switching.  That dimension is where Vern killed himself, not in the real world.

One more puzzler from the reversal scene.  Vern is Rolanda and Rolanda is Vern.  OK, it makes no sense, but here we are.  Then why are the two other prominently featured characters, other TFTC writers, played by different actors, and one is now a woman?  Maybe it is the actress who payed Velma, but that would make no sense because she was a dramatization in the first iteration.  She is blonde, but has glasses, different eyebrows, and a different hairstyle.  If TFTC was trying to be clever by making that Velma, it would take CSI to prove it.  This possibility is also made unlikely by the fact that I have no idea who the new dude is.  He bears no resemblance to Jerry or Roger.

And what is the point?  I’m sure getting killed is no day at the park, but is it really cosmic-level Hell?  Vern takes it in the melon.  Rolanda gets hit by a fusillade of bullets.  Both had to be pretty quick and painless.

The episode is only 20 minutes including credits and the odious Crypt-Keeper.  Maybe they could have ironed these issues out; they had a couple minutes to spare if a scene needed to be expanded or added.  For example, why are the cops magically waiting for Rolanda on the 13th floor?  Ya might say they are the cosmic enforcers; they will appear wherever Rolanda is to mete out her punishment.  True, but they could have made it credible.   For example, what if Rolanda had used my 2nd floor strategy, and the cops were waiting for her?  I would think “good strategy”, they split their team up, expecting such a ruse.  However, I don’t think they had 13 teams in position.

And yet, I liked it.  I stand by my theory that the writers giddily pitched a meta story about deadline pressure because they had to come up with a story quickly after they spent all their time smoking pot and campaigning for Bill Clinton.  But then it came to life when the other creators performed magnificently.

Richard Lewis and Rita Rudner were more known as stand-ups.  In fact, this was Rita’s first TV role.  They both totally nailed it, seeming to understand the show better than most of the producers.  The whole production was beautiful.  The office and workers had a 1950’s vibe, but was populated by dandies and hipster doofuses that I could imagine in the comic book biz.  The suits, suspenders, and fat colorful ties created the perfect atmosphere.  The pacing was brisk and there were a number of wonderfully composed shots.

If the screenplay had made a lick of sense, this could have been a model for what TFTC was supposed to be.  As it is:  Slightly guilty pleasure.  But a pleasure.

Other Stuff:

  • [1] The replacement story is about “a guy who wants to be head of the company, so they cut his head off.”  That’s how bad Rolanda’s story must have been.
  • From the writer of Outer Limits’ Alien Radio a couple days ago.