Night Visions – The Doghouse (08/30/01)

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nvdoghouse4Stephen Baldwin is getting the crap beat out of him.  Shockingly, it is not by his brother Alec.  He owes money to some bad eggs who think nothing of taking a Louisville Slugger to his gut and standing on his guitar hand. He is able to brain the guy with a liquor bottle and make a run for it.

Brief aside: Next time you get your hands on a liquor bottle — i.e. now, for me — note how thick they are.  It is really possible to break one over a person’s head and not kill them?  The windows at the White House are not as thick as a bottle of Gentleman Jack.

He carjacks Amanda who is driving though an insanely dangerous part of town.  She is a veterinarian, but still agrees to stitch up Baldwin’s wounds.  Did they learn nothing from Tea-Bag?  No, the one in Prisonbreak — wow, there’s a word you don’t want to Google too deeply [1].  Naturally, she takes the beaten, bloody stranger back to her house; then invites him to spend the night on the sofa.  The next morning, before he wakes up, she has gone to the pawn shop and rescued his guitar with the ticket she found in his pocket.  I don’t get treated this nice at family reunions.

That night, the guy with the bat comes up in rotation again.  When he lets himself in Amanda’s window, Baldwin sics her two dobermans on him.  Amanda comes downstairs to see what the racket is and Baldwin tells her the dogs killed the man. “Good dogs,” she says.

nvdoghouse6Amanda takes charge, burying the man.  Even Baldwin thinks this is a little extreme.  He goes upstairs to get his guitar.  When he is at the top of the stairs, one of the dogs goes up on his hind legs and shoves Baldwin down the stairs.  He wakes up in Amanda’s bed with a broken ankle.  She has set the break using her mad vet skillz.  She must also have some mad weight-lifting skillz as he is, for some reason, now upstairs again.

He limps downstairs and tries to use the phone, but one of the dogs is guarding it. When he finds another phone, the other dog yanks the cord out of the wall.  The dogs then block him from the exits.  He cleverly drugs the dogs with the pills Amanda had given him, but passes out.  When he awakens, the dogs are gone.  He begin walking out and slips on some brown chunky material which, thankfully, he identifies as dog food.  They trap him in the bathroom, even turning the knob to come in after him.

Amanda shows up and literally calls off the dogs.  On the other hand, she does plunge a syringe into him.  He awakens in the basement chained to the wall.  Blah, blah, blah . . . she is treating him like a dog.

All this is fine as far as it went, but it seems to be missing a final act or twist. There are a couple of red herrings that seem more like sloppiness than misdirection.

Amanda’s dogs seem to be far more intelligent than normal dogs; they seem more intelligent than the dog in Watchers.  They shove Baldwin down the stairs, yank phone lines from the wall, and open doors as if they had once been human, but are now stuck in the bodies of dogs.  Hmmmmm, but that goes nowhere.

Amanda asks Baldwin to play her a tune on his guitar which she got out of hock for him. He refuses in a way that sounds suspiciously like he doesn’t know how to play.  This also goes nowhere.

Finally, Baldwin ends up chained to the basement wall.  I guess that is OK, I was just expecting something more — maybe she would use her vet skillz to transform him into a dog, like the walrus in Tusk.[2]  Amanda tells him he will have to learn to behave, unlike her previous victim.  OK, what then?  What is the end game here?  What happened to the previous victim?

Post-Post:

  • [1]  Although, it seemed to work out for Mike Ehrmentraut who got a bullet wound sewn up, a job offer and a snausage.
  • [2] Or the snake in Sssssss.
  • The only TV episode directed by JoBeth Williams.
  • The last of many TV episodes written by Earl Hamner, Jr.
  • In no way relevant, but this episode aired 12 days before 9/11.

Suez Souvenir – Jerome Hyams (1934)

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sascoverWhat the hell?  Another story featuring Cliff Downey of The Consolidated Detective Agency of Chicago?  Cliff, we had some good times, but are you going to pop up in every other story regardless of author?

Shanghai Jester:  Cliff’s hairy right fist was thrust deep into the pockets of his coat, the capable fingers clenched around the comforting butt of a service .38 automatic.

Suez Souvenir:  The detective’s  hairy right fist closed over the cold butt of the automatic in his coat pocket.

Maybe if Cliff Downey had gotten his hands on Babs‘ butt instead of his pistol’s in Shanghai, his hands wouldn’t be so hairy.

This time, he is in Suez searching for an American dame named Wilda Rhodes.  Her parents fear that she has been kidnapped.  Two French girls, a German, and a Brazilian have also disappeared, but Wilda is the only blonde [1] so only she is featured on FOX radio every night.  Downey fears she has been sold into “white slavery”, or as it is also known — slavery.  The US Consul, fortunately not under Hillary Clinton’s watch, is alive to helpfully point him to Azbar ibn Barakah, rumored slavemaster.

Black Murder:  The figurette was unmistakable — it was Wynne Dana herself, entirely nude, with white jutting breasts tipped and pointed.  The head was lowered over a long, shiny pin that transfixed the left breast.

Suez Souvenir:  Buried to the hilt in the firm white flesh of her young, virginal, rounded left breast was a short oriental scimitar.

There are breast-men (i.e., men), then there are impaled–left-breast-men.  That is 2 out of 3 stories in this collection with that weirdly specific — and creepy — fetish.

Downey finds Wilda tied up nearly naked.  He remedies one of the two problems and they escape the torture chamber.  They are quickly caught and taken to Barakah. When Wilda slashes his face with her nails, he vows to “possess her charms” then kill her. Seeing an ornamental metal chastity belt on the wall, she slips off her few clothes, leaving her “completely, gloriously nude.”  She straps on the chastity belt “encasing her intimate femininity in a shining metal prison.”  Barakah is furious, and frankly Downey is probably also not totally on-board as Wilda locks the device and throws the key out the window.

Four henchmen take Downey and Wilda back to the torture room.  Barakah threatens to blind Downey with a branding iron and melt the chastity belt off of Wilda before handing her off to the henchmen.  As the men take the German girl’s dead, naked body off the rack to be disposed of, Downey is able to smash his padlock with a conveniently placed rock.

When Barakah returns, Downey catches him by surprise, lassoing him with the chain that had bound him “smearing eyes and nose and mouth into gory jelly.”  Downey beats the man to death and takes pistol from him to kill his henchmen.  He frees Wilda, although doesn’t go as far as tossing her a shirt or anything.  Barakah’s torn clothing reveals him to actually be a white dude.

Downey tells naked Wilda that he knew it all the time — that Barakah was actually the American consul with make-up and a beard.  He explains to naked Wilda how the consul kidnapped hot babes.  He further explains to naked Wilda how he caught on to the deception.  He picks up naked Wilda “in his strong arms and carried her upstairs.” He takes naked Wilda out into the street. Finally at that point, he takes a burnoose off a dead Arab and gives it to the nude woman standing naked in the street to cover up.  And really, how much material could be in a burnoose? [2]

Downey suddenly remembers her chastity belt.  It’s not like it was covered up or anything. Wilda says she only pretended to toss the key, that it was hidden in her hair. She says, “I wanted you to have it, always.”  See, by “it” she means her vagina.

Much better than Black Murder.

Post-Post:

  • [1] Wilda is later described as having coal-black hair, so the interest in her disappearance is inexplicable.
  • [2] I thought a burnoose was just Arab head-dress, but it is actually the entire cloak.
  • First published in September 1934.
  • Also that month:  Bridget Bardot and Sophia Loren both born.  But Bridget will always be a week younger.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents – Safety for the Witness (11/23/58)

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ahpsafetywitness2A police lieutenant comes into Cyril Jones’ gun shop and asks when is the last time Jones sold a gun to Dan Foley.  Without asking for a warrant or subpoena, Jones sings like a canary showing the officer that he sold Foley a gun in January.

This episode apparently takes place in the alternate universe occupied by anti-gun zealots where criminals buy their guns at licensed gunsmiths and are subject to and bound by all laws on the books.

Lieutenant Flannery tells Jones that they picked up a friend of Foley’s and they just want to be sure the witness is safe.  Jones thinks witnesses don’t fare too well in this town; he thinks more should be done to protect them.  I would tend to agree as the local newspaper prints a large picture of the witness which might was well have had concentric circles painted over it.

The Witness Relocation Program is much more successful than its predecessor, The Witness Location Program.

Sure enough as Jones is walking home, he sees some gangtas bust multiple caps in the witness’s ass. I’m not sure if we are supposed to wonder just what the hell Jones was doing there.  Was he following the witness?

Jones recognizes the shooters and even greets them by name.  This is not the wisest move as they respond by shooting him and leaving him nicely parallel to the witness on the sidewalk (see below).

Flannery and the Police Commissioner visit Jones in the hospital.  After 3 weeks in the hospital, Jones still will not give up the shooters.  A nurse tries to shoo them off, but Flannery says they need to question Jones because they need a witness to find out who killed the witness, “It’s our first obligation to protect the . . .”  Kudos to the writer for highlighting this paradox.

After the police leave, the nurse tells Jones that he ratted out Foley & his partner Felix while talking in his sleep.  He checks out of the hospital that night.  The nurse gives him 8-to-5 odds that he doesn’t live until Tuesday.  He goes back to his shop that night.  The phone rings, but there is no one there when he answers.  If only he had some way to protect himself — oh, wait he’s in a freakin’ gun shop!

ahpsafetywitness6Rather than go home, he gets a hotel room “with a view” for $3.50 ($75 if he uses the mini-bar).  The next morning, he has a clear view of Foley & Felix across the street.  He loads up his rifle and takes aim at the two pin-striped bastards.

OK, I know they showed Jones picking up a silencer at his shop, but the shots he fires literally produce no sound other than the click of the hammer.  Using a sight, he neatly lays both of them out in the same parallel configuration we saw earlier.  More kudos for the hat placement which is just beautiful (see below — the June Taylor Dancers didn’t line up with this precision) [1].

Jones is a good citizen, so goes to the police station and confesses to the murders.  He says he “killed them both with a high-powered rifle from the sixth floor” eerily mirroring a murder that would take place, also with a mail order rifle — one day short of exactly 5 years from the date this episode aired.  Fittingly, the desk Sargent does not believe Jones’ double-bullet theory.

ahpsafetywitness999

Left to Right: witness, witness, gangster, gangster.

The Sargent recognizes Jones’ name as the witness who would not finger Foley &
Felix when he was shot earlier.  Jones is oddly proud of this fact.  The Sargent calls the lieutenant and strangely asks what Jones name is despite just having recognized it seconds before.

Jones admits that he should have identified his assailants when he was in the hospital. He was afraid, reasonably knowing that snitches get stitches.  The Commissioner is skeptical that mild-mannered Jones killed the two thugs.  He claims that they “get guys in the station once a week that swear they shot McKinley.”  If it’s any consolation to them, that McKinley talk should dry up in about 5 years.

The lieutenant is also skeptical, demanding evidence that Jones assassinated the men. The District Attorney is concerned that Jones’ confession is a smear against the police that they are unable to protect witnesses.  He is quite rightly concerned that the Grand Jury will just consider Jones a hero.  Much to Jones’ dismay, to avoid embarrassment, the city sets him free.  He will be fine as long as some sleazy titty-bar owner doesn’t catch him in the garage.

Meh.  Not much going on here, but it is nice to see some old character actors doing their thing.

Post-Post:

  • [1] Former co-stars of Art Carney (Jones) on The Jackie Gleason Show.
  • AHP Deathwatch:  No survivors.
  • Why is Sargent capitalized in spell-check but lieutenant is not?

Black Murder – Carl Moore (1935)

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sascover

Well, I didn’t get too far into this story set in Haiti. First sentence:

Thunder rumbled and crashed, reverberated across white-topped distant mountains.

Was the author under the impression that it snows in Haiti?  John Martin isn’t thinking about the snow in them thar hills, he is more concerned about the voodoo drums, the tom-toms.

A year later John’s brother Don arrives in Haiti with John’s fiancee Wynne.   Don is searching for his older brother and is led by the police to his deserted home.  There the couple is left with two guards — Dumonnier and Manbrun — for protection.

Once inside the house, “their bodies fused, her lips restlessly on his, his arms encircling and crushing her loveliness.”  Say, isn’t she John’s fiancee?  How hard are they really looking for him?  Wynne says she just thought she loved John, but that it was really Don all the time.

That afternoon, the voodoo drums start again, or maybe it is just Bolero on the stereo. Overcome, Don carries Wynne to the bed.  It is already occupied by a naked clay figure of Wynne with a pin through it.  There is no no time for a menage-a-trois as they hear demonic laughter and find Dumonnier sprawled on the lanai, “his sightless eyes staring straight ahead, his bloodless lips grinning and mocking.  His head was split open as if from the blow of a great axe.”  Also, it is mentioned that his hat is missing.

Manbrun howls, turns on the couple, then charges into the jungle.  Don and Wynne think maybe they’ll just head out and come back when Sandals has built a walled compound in Port-au-Prince.  They run back through the jungle, their clothing slashed by thorns and sharp branches.  Don is conked on the head and he wakes up with in captivity with Wynne and his brother John.

There really is not much to the rest of the story.  There is a dance that seems to go on longer than The Matrix Reloaded rave-in-the-cave, a priest and priestess, and John Martin fakes being in a trance so he can facilitate their escape.

Later, as they are standing with police, John says, “Take me home, Don.  The spell is broken at last.”  Yeah, but I think it is going to be an uncomfortable moment when they decide who gets to ride in the back with Wynne.  John might even call shotgun.

These stories are so simplistic that they almost defy criticism.

Post-Post:

  • Published in Spicy Adventure, April 1935.
  • Also that month:  Erich von Däniken born, paving the Naza Lines for the Ancient-Alien-Industrial Complex.  For a dose of reality, here is an awesome debunking.

Twilight Zone S4 – The New Exhibit (04/04/63)

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We open in Ferguson’s Wax Museum.  Do these things even exist anymore? [1]   Mr. Ferguson himself is leading a tour which includes two sailors on the tamest furlough since Gomer Pyle went back to Mayberry. After checking out waxy Marie Antoinette [2] (who is sadly not topless in either sense of the word), they move on to waxy Cleopatra. This place ought to be called the Museum of Murdered Women.[3]

Next they are led to “the most infamous black-hearted killers of all time.”  They first meet the flesh-and-blood curator Martin Senescu who introduces them to the Murderer’s Row exhibit:

  • William Burke & William Hare – They suffocated their victims with pillows, frequently prostitutes.
  • Henri Desire Landru – French serial killer of spinsters and lonely widows.
  • Jack the Ripper – English serial killer of prostitutes.
  • Albert W. Hicks – A mate on an oyster boat who killed his entire crew with an axe. Given the attitude of this museum, I have to suspect that it was an all-girl crew.

Martin Balsam is excellent as Senescu.  He is clearly devoted to this exhibit, and is slightly creepy.  He steps on a switch that causes Mr. the Ripper to slash away with his knife.  This is a pretty good gag, but freaks out the sailors who “blow this creepy joint.”

Later as Senescu is dusting Landru, Ferguson tells him that the museum is going to close so he can sell the location a company for a supermarket.  Ferguson decides not to open a new museum because, even 60 years ago, he sees this is a dying industry.  He reasons that people see too much horror in every day life.

tznewexhibit03Senescu asks to buy the wax figures as he can’t bear to see them destroyed; although, he doesn’t seem to care much for Cleopatra and Marie Antoinette.  Movers deliver the figures to Senescu’s house.  He installs the exhibit in the basement which he has rigged up with a new industrial strength air conditioner.[4]

Weeks later, Senescu’s very patient wife is concerned that her husband still has no job and the new A/C is costing a fortune.  Senescu seems to spend all his time in the basement acting as a valet for his new friends.  Emma tells her brother Dave about the problems she is having with her husband.  He suggests that sabotaging the A/C might solve the problem.

That night, Emma sneaks down to the basement to take care of the A/C.  She is creeped out by the figures, but makes her way to the plug.  As she reaches to unplug it, Jack the Ripper’s arm slashes toward her and she screams.  The next morning, Senescu finds her dead on the basement floor and detects blood on Jack’s knife.

Fearing he will be blamed, Senescu buries his wife in the basement and repaves the floor.  Emma’s idiot brother Dave — an incredibly obnoxious performance — stops by and becomes suspicious.  After Senescu throws him out, he breaks into the basement. When he finds traces of Emma’s blood, Albert Hicks takes an axe to him.

tznewexhibit07Ferguson stops by and tells Senescu that a museum in Brussels wants to buy the figures.  While Ferguson is measuring them for shipment, Landru garrotes him.  When Senescu sees another dead body, he chews the wax figures out for betraying him.  He grabs a crow bar to destroy them, but they become animated.  They stiffly move toward Senescu claiming that he committed the murders, and fall on top of him.

At the Murderer’s Row home in Brussels, there is the titular new exhibit — Martin Senescu leaning on a shovel as he digs his wife’s grave.

After several very good 4th season scripts from Charles Beaumont, this one was a bit of a let down.  Everyone has an off-week, but this one might be due to the fact that Beaumont’s deteriorating health forced him to farm the job out to another writer.  There are a few rough edges that maybe Beaumont could have polished.

The causes of death are a little muddled.  Emma’s murder could be related to the switch that Senescu revealed during the museum tour — was she murdered or did she just step on that switch which made the wax figure slash her throat?  Dave’s murder is not seen which lends credence to the figures’ assertion that Senescu is the real murderer.  Then when Ferguson is murdered, we actually see Albert Hawks strangle him.  So are the murders 1) accidents, 2) committed by Senescu, or 3) committed by the wax figures?

When the wax figures advance on Senescu, how does he die?  He is portrayed as a murderer in the titular new exhibit, so it must have been a heart attack.  If he had been axed, suffocated, slashed or strangled, he would have been considered just another victim.

All of that is mostly just being churlish.  The strength of the episode is in Martin Balsam’s performance as Senescu.  He and Will Kuluva as Ferguson ground the episode.  Despite a few rough spots, this is still a good episode in the unfairly maligned 4th season.

Post-Post:

  • [1] Apparently they do exist, and there are even a couple of chains.  Here is fun article from Vice about a visit to one.
  • [2] Like Cersei on Game of Thrones, Marie Antoinette was put on trial for multiple crimes including incest.  Both had their hair cut off and were stripped naked (Marie at least got to put on a simple white dress (in front of her guards)).  Both were paraded through town to the jeers of the peons.  Marie was tied up, but at least got to ride in an open cart while Cersei was perp-walked naked on foot.  On the plus side, they didn’t chop off Cersei’s head at the end of the trip.
  • [3] It is not clear whether Cleopatra was murdered or committed suicide-by-snake. It is interesting that, like Cersei and Marie, her downfall was a nude-fest.  Several paintings (many sharing the unimaginative title The Death of Cleopatra) portray her as topless at her death.
  • [4] Oder, auf Deutsch.
  • Martin Balsam was last seen in The Equalizer.