Category Archives: TV

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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Night Gallery – Escape Route (S1P3)

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nightgallery01OK, Rod.  We gets it — Nazis is bad.  In Twilight Zone, we got it in Death’s Head Revisited and He’s Alive.  Six years later, we’re still getting it.  Not to diminish the Holocaust, but we’re just trying to have some fun here.  After episodes in the pilot about a haunted painting and a crabby old woman, this is what we get?  Just a little too real.

Richard Kiley is a former Nazi living in South America.  At a museum, an Auschwitz survivor is looking at a painting of a crucifixion.  He had a friend who died that way in one of the camps.  He believes he recognizes Kiley as a guard from the camp.  Kiley denies it to the old man — ironic because he had only ducked into the museum to evade Israeli agents.  While there, he becomes entranced by a idyllic painting of a man in a rowboat.  As he gazes at the painting, he imagines himself in that serene place.  He is so captivated that at closing time, a guard must ask him to leave.

The next morning, even before the museum is open, he rushes back to see the painting.  Again he gazes longingly at the painting.

That night, through the thin walls of his apartment, he talks to neighbor Gretchen.  He tells her of the painting and his imaging being the man in the boat.  That must have gotten her attention.

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“Yeah, yeah but let’s get back to that man in the boat.”

She knows his true identity.  He tells her he believes he could have willed himself into the picture.  She tells him he has neither soul nor conscience.  Worst hooker ever.

He returns to the museum and sees the old man again.  This time the old man accuses him of being a guard in the camp, and calls him by his true name.  Kiley continues his denials, but after the old man leaves, he tries again to insert himself into the painting.  For a few moments he actually succeeds, seeing himself in the picture, the surface rippling.  The he is in the picture, feeling the water, able to look the other way, out of the picture and into the museum.  .

After the museum closes, he goes to a bar where they are singing the Frito Bandito song.  He coolly maintains his cover by drunkenly breaking into Deutshland uber Alles.  Again, he crosses paths with the old man.  He kills the old man then goes on the run.

The agents find him at a bus station and he takes off.  After an escape sequence which features a few ill-advised freeze-frames, he sneaks back into the museum.

He kneels before the painting and begs God to put him into picture.  In the dark gallery, he does not see that the painting of the lake is gone, having been replaced by the painting of the crucifixion.  He gets his wish.  D’oh!

The pilot had three solid episodes.  An effort was even made to have the stories involve the paintings in the gallery, although the relevance in the 2nd story was a little thin.  Whether the pilot sold the series, or if it was a done deal, it was a high point that Night Gallery would not achieve very often in its run.

Post-Post:

  • Not to be confused with Escape Clause.
  • Rod Serling was a paratrooper in WWII.
  • Richard Kiley was the park narrator in Jurassic Park.  They spared no expense.

Tales from the Crypt – Til Death (S2E4)

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a/k/a the one where they just gave up.

Well this was a let down.  After three very good 2nd season episodes, TFTC finally had a bomb.  I had my doubts when I didn’t recognize any of the cast.  After the first 3 episodes featured the likes of Demi Moore, Kelly Preston and Lance Henricksen, this seemed like the JV team.  Although, to be fair, a couple of them have huge resumes — just almost nothing I’ve ever seen.

Behind the scenes, this is Chris Walas’ only TV directing credit.  Writer Jeri Barchilon is the veteran with 2 TV credits, the other one being an episode of The Facts of Life.  Not even a “very special” episode.

The episode begins with voodoo priestess Psyche placing a blood splattered portrait of Logan Andrews on a fire.  The episode is so poorly constructed that it is not clear that this is a flash-forward; not even when the corresponding scene comes around.

Cut to Andrews yukking it up with his doctor pal over an unfortunate “widow Fitzgerald” who dies leaving him some valuable land.  Who is Mrs. Fitzgerald?  Why did she leave Andrews the valuable land?  We will never find out.  For that matter, who is Andrews?  Playboy?  Is he rich?  Overextended?  Scam artist?  All we know for sure is he buys his clothes a size too large.

tftctildeath02Andrews sets eyes on the beautiful Margaret Richardson and we suspect the cycle is about to repeat (even though we don’t know what the cycle is).  She is supposed to be a very classy snob, rudely criticizing everything and everyone.  Why did she come here if she hates it so much?  No help on that one from the writer.

Unfortunately this role, like Andrews, was either terribly miscast or terribly directed.  Pamela Gein gives it a good try, but just is not able to pull the humor or snideness out of the character.  She looks nice and she’s given some good barbs, but it just doesn’t work.  And her hair!  My God, her hair!  That net makes it look like a beaver tail.

The foreman comes to get Andrews to show him that the land he inherited is quicksand, unsuitable for building.  And when I say foreman, I mean foreman in the sense that Cleavon Little was a foreman in Blazing Saddles.  So Andrews turns his eye to Margaret.

tftctildeath04Really, this whole story was written in the title.  “Til Death” indicates a marriage or hook-up will occur.  Given the genre, you know there will be a literal death involved.  And being Tales from the Crypt, you know the living person will be stuck with the dead person for ever after.

But originality is over-rated.  Just having a good setting and interesting characters can make an episode.  The voodoo setting works, but might be a little too politically incorrect for some squeamish viewers.  Sadly, of the 3 leads, only the doctor really makes his character work.

To end on a positive note, the effects of Margaret decomposing are very well done.  That might because most of the director’s credits are in make-up and special effects.  He is not credited on this episode, but did get a make-up credit in The Switch.

I rate this one “mostly dead”.

 Post-Post:

  • OK, so Andrews is saddled with this decaying zombie forever in order to fulfill some cosmic justice or irony or karma for his sins.  But no one in these tales ever thinks about the zombie.  She seems pretty OK with it at the moment, but she is facing eternity as a rotting corpse.
  • Throughout the entire episode, D.W. Moffett reminded me of Angel or that guy on Warehouse 13.  Except like he’s the guy if you can’t afford the other two.  Despite having just seen him in an Outer Limits, I had no memory of him at all.  He’s very successful, though, so maybe it’s just me.
  • In re the doctor’s head: 1) why did Maggie cut it off?  2) why is Psyche carrying it around in a cage?  3) Why is he so chirpy about it?

Outer Limits – Under the Bed (S1E10)

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olunderthebed01Not to be confused with Under the Bed.

I feared I was on thin ice when I saw director René Bonnière had not only an accent grave in his name, but also an accent aigu.  What is this, Ray Bradbury Theater?

Ridiculously cute kids Jillian and Andrew Rosman are sent to bed by their single mother Sharon.  Andrew is missing his teddy bear and hears it beckoning him from below the bed.  Not being named Teddy Ruxpin, this is suspicious behavior even to a dumb little kid.  When he tries to retrieve the bear, his sister sees a tentacle grab him.  The girl does a great job of registering the attack, and even gave me a little chill.

After a particularly awful opening narration, TV’s favorite yuppie Timothy Busfield arrives to save the day.  He meets up with detective Caitlin Doyle who immediately suspects the absentee dad.

The next day, Busfield goes to Police headquarters where Doyle has dragged in Mr. Rosman for questioning.  I was happy to see the police station is at the Strughold Mining Company from The X-Files.

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Left: Outer Limits, Right: X-Files. Are they ever going to fix those windows?

Being a 40-year old guy on TV, naturally Busfield has daddy issues.  Turns out they became estranged after Busfield’s brother mysteriously disappeared much like Andrew.  The next day, Busfield is again pumping the detective about Andrew’s father.

Busfield then asks Jillian to act out the abduction with dolls.  Jillian tosses the Daddy doll away.  As she is searching for a way to explain the abduction, Busfield again prompts her to implicate her Daddy.  “Not Daddy,” she says, tossing away the Daddy doll she already tossed away seconds before.  Jillian names the boogeyman as the abductor.

Jillian just won’t give Busfield the answer he wants so he finally resorts to hypnotizing her to get more information.  As she relives the trauma and screams about the thing under the bed, Busfield once again tries to inject Daddy into her mind as the culprit, “What makes Jillian afraid?  Is it Daddy?”  Thank God Jillian is more honest than Busfield, and she blames the boogeyman again.

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This guy has more daddy issues than a season of Lost.

Later, Jillian is called to the window by Andrew.  As she opens the window, Andrew becomes the boogeyman and grabs her arm.  Busfield shows up and immediately asks again if it was her father.

This obsession would have made sense if that were the point of the B-story with his father, but it really wasn’t.  He never suspected his father was responsible for his brother’s disappearance.  This was just him being the worst, most leading anti-father child psychologist in history.

Busfield finally gets off the Daddy-wagon and figures out that it really is the boogeyman.  But not before Jillian is taken.  Busfield and the cop find Jillian and kill the boogeyman.  It is strange that zero-mention is made of her brother Andrew.  Presumably he is dead, so I credit them for not going for the feel-food ending.  It is just kind of strange that they don’t mention him or look for his body.

The last scene of the episode shows the Eiffel Tower and then a French kid about to be abducted.  I knew René Bonnière was going to jam France down our throats at some point.

Some good performances, and I actually got a legitimate chill.  But still only manages to be so-so.

Post-Post:

  • The police station / Strughold Mining pictured above is located at the Britannia Mining Museum in British Columbia.
  • William MacDonald (Daddy) played 5 different credited roles in the X-Files.  I thought that would be a record, but there were at least 4 other actors in the 5-timers club.
  • Per IMDb, this is the 2nd lowest rated episode from Season 1.  Of course, the worst was White Light Fever.

Ray Bradbury Theater – Tyrannosaurus Rex (S2E10)

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rbttrex06I thought maybe we were back in the USA given the subject matter of this one.  Sadly, no.  And that is really too bad since it it features a uniquely American art form, and is personally relevant to Ray Bradbury.

Young Terwilliger brings a demo reel of his stop-motion animation to nasty, brutish film producer Mr. Clarence for review.  In case we did not know Clarence was a jerk, he is given a huge squarish protrusion above his left eye.  Cuz different people is evil. Clarence likes the demo, but grudgingly offers Terwilliger only $2,000 to do the special effects for his next film.

I am tempted to say his is the kind of film destined to be included in a collection of 20 for $5.  Sadly, none of those 20 has yet shown the skill and dedication required for stop-motion animation.  But, to be fair, I haven’t gotten to Gingerdead Man 3 yet.

rbttrex10Terwilliger accepts the contract and we watch him designing the dinosaur models.  We get small insights into the process, such as how the artists use peanut shells to impress texture into the clay skin of the models.  Also, that artists like peanuts.  The filming commences and we see a little of the painstaking work required to move the models 1/16th of an inch for each shot.

Despite the work Terwilliger puts in, and how much Clarence’s lawyer praises the effects, Clarence rolls out of the shadows to berate them both and claim ownership of the models.  He also demands constant changes to the bodies, more spikes, bigger teeth, angry eyes, claws like razors.  Clarence demands that the dinosaur be a monster!

rbttrex01Clarence is finally satisfied at the screening when he sees a dinosaur that is a true monster.  Terwilliger is a little fearful of his response, since the monster was clearly based on Clarence.  I guess there’s not much you can do to make a dinosaur look like a man, but giving it a huge knot over its left eye was a pretty clear shot across Clarence’s brow.

Leaving the screening, Clarence realizes the dinosaur was based on him and screams for Terwilliger — for God’s sake, let’s just call him T!  Clarence catches up to T in the studio and fires him, threatening a lawsuit.  The lawyer tells Clarence that the film was actually a tribute to him, hero of the motion picture industry.  The dinosaur represents the lonely, cunning, strong producer, all thunder and lightning, never appreciated.

Clarence, literally a blockhead, is vain enough to buy this load of crap.  He generously offers, “You’re both still on the payroll, but just until the preview.”  This is especially generous to the lawyer who pointed out earlier, that he had not been on the payroll for months.

At Le Cinema that night, the house is filled completely with hot French teenage girls, illustrating once again that I went into the wrong business.  After the movie, the girls swarm Clarence for autographs.  T is baffled by this response until he discovers that the girls are a Scout Troop recruited by the lawyer through his niece.

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Final shot of the episode which suddenly puts the knot on the other side of the dinosaur’s head.

Clarence is reveling in the adulation, and the lawyer tells T, “Looks like we both still have jobs.”  This despite the fact that the lawyer had no job, and T was just a contract worker for that one film.  T points out that this time it is the lawyer who has created the monster.

Although, surrounding this bitter, lonely, middle-aged man with adoring underage French girls for the first time in his life might just be entrapment.

Post-Post:

  • This episode and the short story are considered to be an homage to Ray Harryhausen, king of stop motion animation and friend of Bradbury since their teens.  A great overview of his work can be seen here.
  • No mention of Harryhausen, but a good article here on the group of young men in southern California who shaped sci-fi and horror during the 50s and 60s.
  • Out of 65 episodes in this series, this one is rated #64 by users on IMDb. That seems harsh.  It’s no masterpiece, but there is a little fun to be had here.  And God knows the bar is pretty low for this series.
  • Are there really this many open fires in the streets of France?

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