After two Twilight Zones that weren’t very Twilight Zoney, we have an Alfred Hitchcock Presents that isn’t very Alfred Hitchcock Presentable. It’s more like Trans-Atlantic Tunnel with Richard Dix or The Naked Jungle with Charlton Heston.  Or maybe it’s nothing like them since I’ve seen neither.  What it ain’t is AHP.

South of the Border, down Mexico way, Joe Philips is digging a tunnel for Rodriguez Construction.  We open with an odd but nice first-person-minecar shot of the mine ^[1].  Philips is trying to shore up the ceiling, but dirt begins falling.  His crew flees like tunnel-rats from a sinking ship.  They have dug 82 feet in six days, but just lost 20 to the cave-in.

Rodriguez visits the camp and brings Bret Johnson to assist Philips.  He is ready to bail out and let Johnson do the job.  While Philips is packing, Johnson convinces him to stay.  Rodriguez just took off in his plane, and there is no other way to the city.

They continue the job together and make good progress the first day. There is a fiesta that night with the camp’s only guitar and the camp’s only senorita.

That night, Philips hears about a manhunt in Mexico for the murder of an engineer in Colorado over a dispute of safety regulations.  Philips searches Johnson’s bunk and finds a pistol.  Johnson enters and has the gun in his hand.

Philips says he knew the murdered man but that the man cared more about making a buck than about the lives of his men.  And that he deserved what he got, and it would suit him fine if they never caught the killer.

The men are stuck with each other for another five weeks, so they decide to work together on the tunnel.  They get lucky and hit an deposit of rock.  Apparently that is better news than it sounds in tunneling as it enables them to blast.

The next day a boulder falls on a worker.  While Philips helps him, Johnson single-handedly shores another another boulder from falling. It seems the job is not impossible to complete on schedule.  The men have a respect for each other, though, and decide to give it a try.

Four days later, they decide to blast through the last remaining rock.  It is a success and they prepare to leave the camp the next day.

Philips pulls his gun on Johnson.  Turns out Johnson is a cop.  He made a deal with Rodriguez to get the tunnel finished before hauling Philips in.  I think it was supposed to be a big reversal that Philips was the murderer and not Johnson.  Unfortunately, the episode did not go far enough in making us believe Johnson was the murderer, so the ending was a failure.

Except for the way in which it was awesome.  Joe Maross (Philips) and Wayne Morris (Johnson) were amazing in this episode.  Both were strong, smart, industrious, confident men of the type you don’t see on TV anymore.  They had a job to do and weren’t going to let little things like cave-ins or a murder charge stop them.

Even as each had reason to believe the other might kill him, they worked together to complete that tunnel.  Like Colonel Nicholson working with the Japanese^[2] or Johnny Utah working with the Ex-Presidents^[3], it makes no sense.  But there is such a drive for accomplishment in the men that they will do anything to build that bridge or rob that bank or dig that tunnel.

Maybe it is that same logic-free drive for accomplishment that drove otherwise sane people to remake Point Break.  Or The In-Laws, which is kind of a non-sequitur here but still offends me.

At the end, there is a mutual respect.  Philips says he was justified in the killing. Johnson says optimistically maybe they can get a jury to believe that too.

Post-Post:

• ^[1] Meaning the camera is affixed to the mine-car as it goes down the tracks.
• ^[2] Although less treasony.
• ^[3] Although less felony.
• AHP Deathwatch:  No survivors.
• Title Analysis:  No idea what they were going for.

I was immediately befuddled on this one.  Ben Nelson and Sharon Trotter pull up in front of her mother’s apartment.  Maybe this is one of those things like the riddles that reveal what a sexist pig you are.

Seeing Sharon on the driver’s side ^[1] my first thought was great, another bloody English episode.  Still not prepared to accept a woman driver, my next dopey thought was Holy crap! There’s no steering wheel in front of that guy — what a dumb oversight by the prop department.

My brain finally accepted that Sharon is driving.  In my defense, however, that was probably pretty rare in chivalrous 1959.  I would also submit to the jury that it makes no sense for her to be driving.  They are arriving at her mother’s apartment where she is going up to have dinner alone with Mom.  So why is Ben there at all if not to drop her off?

Anyhoo, skipping the first 3 seconds of the episode . . .

Ma sees Ben and Sharon out of her window.  She disapproves of their relationship because Ben is married.  Probably also because he is 21 years older than her daughter, and only 3 years younger than her.  Or maybe because he foolishly put all his assets in his wife’s name.

When Ma expresses some sympathy for Ben’s wife, Sharon continues, “His house, his factory, his invest-ments, everything.  And she’s not going to let go of it.  Now do you understand what kind of woman she is?”  [sexist remark redacted — maybe that riddle was right!]

The next day, Ben is surprised to get a visit at work from Sharon’s mother. She asks Ben to stop seeing her daughter because he is ruining her life.  He says he thought she was old enough to make her own decisions, and that he wants nothing more than to marry her daughter.

That night, he rats out Ma’s visit to Sharon.  Sharon is starting to get nervous now as they have been dating for a year and Ben has done nothing to free himself up.  She worries about losing him “because she has no protection.”  You know, like the assets they want to bilk his wife out of.

Ma then goes to see Ben’s wife.  Mrs. No-Name Nelson ^[2] is pretty accommodating to this stranger who has taken a long bus trip to see her for reasons unknown.  She pours them a couple of glasses of ice tea in pilsner glasses.  Mrs. Nelson recognizes Sharon’s name, but doesn’t seem to know about her husband’s cheating.  Ma finishes wrecking the home that Sharon was working on.

That night, Mrs. Nelson confronts her husband.  She is willing to give Ben “his freedom” but nothing else.  Turns out the aforementioned assets were left to her by her father, so the fact that they were in her name makes sense.

Sensing that she can still do more damage that night, Ma goes to Sharon’s apartment. While Sharon is changing, Ma answers a call from Ben.  Not realizing he is speaking to Ma, he says his wife is dead and tells her the alibi she must give to the police to protect him.  She is to say he was in her apartment from 6 to midnight.

Ma tells Sharon about the call, saying that Ben spoke so fast, she didn’t get a chance to say who she was.  Sensing a way to protect Sharon, she relays the opposite message — that Ben wants her to say he wasn’t here all evening.

OK, that is a great twist, and certainly nails Ben — but how is Sharon so dumb that she doesn’t see the problem?  She is going to provide an alibi for a murder suspect by saying he was NOT with her at the time of the murder?  Don’t alibis usually work the opposite way?

This is a pretty somber affair, but has a few things going for it.  Although a little slow and talky, the story has a lot going on.  Yet, there is also a leanness to the simple story that makes it effective.  Robert Alda is great as Ben — yet another AHP poser who will get what’s coming to him.  I’d like to see some stats on how many wives were killed on AHP.

Jeanette Nolan was especially good as Sharon’s mother.  She had to be concerned for daughter, reluctant in visiting Mrs. Nelson, then distraught at the pain she has caused her, and conflicted at lying to Sharon.  Even as she is spreading the truth, she reflects a horror and self-loathing at knowing she is intruding, that this has hurt Mrs. Nelson and ultimately killed her, set the wheels in motion that led Ben to resort to murder, and denied Sharon the chance to be happy with Ben.

Post-Post:

• ^[1] Things I will never remember if I live to be 100:  In a car, is the left and right from the driver’s POV or the guy about to be run over?  Also, which is ectomorph vs endomorph?
• ^[2] Portrayed by Fay Wray who has a history of being involved with big apes.
• AHP Deathwatch:  No survivors.
• Title Analysis: No idea how they came up with this.
• Dorothy Provine (Sharon) was in It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World where, in a cast of thousands, she was the only one to have no funny lines.
• There’s Got to Be a Morning After.
• IMDb and Hulu.

Oh my God.  I am really growing to hate John McGiver.  He was a very memorable character actor, but a little goes a long way.  I remember liking him on an episode of Gilligan’s Island when I was a kid.  Then decades later, I saw him in AHP’s Fatal Figures.  That pace seems about right.

Unfortunately, he was just in The Bard yesterday, and is now in this episode.  That incessant, crabby whining and moaning is killing me.  Out of 268 episodes, this one is 263rd in IMDb’s newly-respected, formerly always-suspect ratings. ^[1]

McGiver’s insufferable presence might have been forgivable in service of a decent story, but this ain’t it.  The good news is, this is his final appearance on AHP.  Oh well, let’s get this over with . . .

Arthur Motherwell comes home from his job at the funeral parlor and goes straight for the liquor cabinet, beating the viewers by about 5 minutes.  After his third shot, his wife Rhoda asks him what the problem is.  He pulls a note out of his pocket — department store magnate Stanton C. Barryvale has croaked. The only thing that could make this episode worse is a flashback.

Oh, crap.

That morning, Arthur goes to work at the funeral parlor about 9 am.  There he meets an attorney who is sadly not a client.  He represents the Barryvale estate and wants Arthur to take care of the funeral.

Barryvale is wheeled in for his final layaway and Arthur is excited to work on such a local celebrity.  He actually has a smile as he prepares to dig in.  The attorney calls to inform Arthur of the requirements for the funeral — 30 limousines, a string quartet, a choir, orchids, accommodations for 300 guests, etc.

As Arthur is washing his hands, Barryvale clears his throat and sits up on the slab. ^[2] Arthur explains that he is in the funeral parlor, having died the night before.  Barryvale believes he was brought back from the dead to assure that his estate is not wasted on a lavish funeral.

Wait — he really thinks his heirs are going to squander the money on a lavish funeral rather than bury him in a pine box and head for the Porshche dealership after the service?

He wants the money to go to his various charities and foundations.  Oh, OK — they might as well have a nice party if the rest of the loot is just going to be wasted on sick kids.  That makes more sense.  He tells Arthur to plan the cheapest possible burial — the titular six people and no music. ^[3]

Arthur is distressed to hear this as he apparently would have made a tidy profit on the previous plan with the limousines and singers.  Barryvale writes out instructions for his more austere funeral.  Then he lays back down and dies again, conveniently on the slab.
Dull story short, Arthur destroys Barryvale’s instructions and puts on the lavish funeral. Arthur and Rhoda go out to the theater.

Which is what I should have done tonight.

Post-Post:

• ^[1] I posted about 2 of the 5 episodes rated even lower than this one — The Legacy and The Hidden Thing.  I don’t remember them being nearly this awful.
• ^[2] For a more pleasurable take on a stiff regaining consciousness on the slab, I direct you to After.Life.  Christina Ricci awakens during her autopsy and, as I recall, was naked for about half the movie.  Not be confused with the Night Visions episode After Life.  And thank God, because Randy Quaid was the corpse in that one.
• ^[3] Six people and no music — Describe Mike Huckabee’s inevitable 2020 presidential announcement rally.
• Heyyoooo — I got a Carnac chill there.
• AHP Deathwatch:  Joby Baker (Thor) is still with us.
• Teleplay by Richard Berg.  His son is the author of several well-received books, A. Scott Berg.  I can vouch for Lindbergh, which was great.  But what’s with the “A”? E. Howard Hunt, G. Gordon Liddy, J. Edgar Hoover, L. Ron Hubbard, J. Fred Muggs — are these people (or a sub-human in at least one case) you want to be associated with?

Her master’s vice.

Mrs. Herman runs a boarding house which, like the United States, has only one boarder — her crotchety Uncle Bill.  Money is tight as he apparently doesn’t cut her in on the revenue from his still on the hill.^[1]   He also has an unspecified fortune which Mrs. H thinks he should contribute to expenses. Maybe part of the problem is that her two favorite hobbies are playing the Victrola at concert hall pitch and knocking back the hooch which she conveniently stows in the Victrola cabinet.

Mrs. Fenimore comes in response to Mrs. Herman’s ad in the paper.  The rent is $10 per week, which I can tell you won’t even get you an hour these days.  Mrs. F says she is an actress with a travelling show but has decided to take a rest.  Mrs. H takes her upstairs to see the accommodations.

Mrs. F takes the room.  One day as the gals are sharing a drink, Mrs. Herman says that Uncle Bill is an old man who has outlived his usefulness.  “What has he to look forward to except the lingering agony of a helpless old age?” asks the lonely old spinster running out of money and hitting the bottle.  She has been waiting for the right boarder to come along.  Mrs. H offers Mrs. F $2,500 ^[2] to help kill Bill so she can inherit his loot and maybe get some nice Bose speakers.

Their scheme begins with Mrs. F becoming much more friendly with Bill.  As they are playing a game of crokinole, Bill is actually smiling for the first time in the episode, and maybe ever.  She begins reading to Bill in a soothing voice similar to his late wife’s.  The first selection is The Lay of the Last Minstrel ^[3] by Sir Walter Scott.  If he weren’t eighty years old, I would think Bill was more interested in being the last lay of this minstrel.  Or maybe he is — i just don’t want to consider it.

Bill is still a nasty beast to his niece.  He is irritated by her presence and stomps off to bed.  Mrs. F thinks the plan is a failure, but Mrs. F predicts Bill will ask her to read to him in his room the next night.  When he falls asleep, she is to leave, and Mrs. H will make the arrangements.  The next afternoon, though, Mrs. H is a little concerned to see Bill and Mrs F dancing.  He is still a cranky old shit, but does seem to be excited about going to a matinee, dinner and dancing with Mrs. F.

Bill’s character is baffling.  Clearly he is just an asshole.  You would have thought his orneriness was due to depression or loneliness.  Going out with Mrs. F barely raises a smile out of him even though he eagerly goes through the motions.  He just can’t help complaining constantly, though.  I think the actor’s sneering face has always been his paycheck, so he’s going to use it.  Mrs. F is a master at manipulating him; more so than the director.

That night, Bill falls asleep to Mrs. F’s soothing voice.  Mrs. H executes her plan . . . and Bill.  She turns on Bill’s gas hot-plate and leaves him to die.

The next morning, Mrs. F drops the bombshell that she and Bill were secretly married. She will be inheriting his fortune and giving Mrs. H just $2,500.  This is one of those endings that is satisfying until you think about it.  The best AHP endings have justice being served.  Here, however, who are we to root for?  It is nice to see the scheming Mrs. H get swindled out of the loot she coveted.  On the other hand, Mrs. F carried out the scheme and is just as guilty of the murder.

Alfred Hitchcock famously said “Television has brought murder back into the home — where it belongs.”  Lately, it has brought murder back to the old folks home.  After the previous AHP and Passage on the Lady Anne, I’m ready for a nice episode set in a college; maybe a women’s college.

Post-Post:

• ^[1] I could have sworn it was “My Uncle Bill”, but it seems to be “My Brother Bill” in all the versions I can find.  It’s just too catchy to delete, though.
• ^[2] $21-Large in 2016 dollars.
• ^[3] You can connect the poem to the episode via the aging minstrel / actress, story-telling and feuding clans / relatives.  It’s a bit of a stretch, though.
• AHP Deathwatch:  No survivors.  Really, how could there be?  I think the Victrola outlasted this bunch.
• AHP Proximity Alert:  Wesley Lau was just in the previous episode, for crying out loud.  Give someone else a chance!
• For a much more in-depth look at the story and production, check out bare*bones e-zine.

Sheriff Jeff rides out to the Tom & Ben’s shack in the desert.  The town council is concerned about the two old coots living with no visible means of support.  They claim to be homesteaders but can provide no evidence of being farmers or prospectors.

Sigh . . . this is a pretty thin story that relies on a ludicrous plot-point and has a familiar ending.  There just isn’t much to grab onto here.

The Sheriff assures them that the town council just has their welfare in mind.  The fact that this beautiful location would be the perfect spot for a red rock spa resort surely plays no role in their decision, and is not mentioned here.  And where is this utopia where the government is so concerned about old people who pay no taxes and give no campaign contributions?

The Sheriff is on their side and just needs some evidence, any evidence that they are really homesteaders — say, growing a single crop or mining enough gold to sustain them.  The absurd plot-point is that they finally agree that if the geezers can grow a single rose bush that flowers, they can can technically be considered farmers.  Are we sure these guys aren’t making campaign contributions?  That kind of sleazy technicality is the essence of politics.

As luck would have it, they get a visitor.  A stranger’s car breaks down just in front of their shack.  The old guys tell the man — credited spoilerifically as Killer on IMDb — that the nearest town is 47 miles away.  They claim they can walk it in a day and a half which seems unlikely.  Killer pulls a gun and insists that they lead him to town.  Tom — or Ben, it really doesn’t matter — gets his hand on a pistol and shoots Killer with one of those AHP patented one-shot kills.  This series wounds less people than Jack Bauer.

One month later, the Sheriff comes by again looking for Killer.  He doesn’t find Killer, but the boys do show him a thriving rose bush on top of a burial plot-shaped mound of dirt.

In Alfred Hitchcock’s closing remarks, as usual, he assures the audience — and by audience, I mean FCC —  that the old fellows were caught and punished.  In an unusual departure, however, he actually says that after using Killer for fertilizer, they continued the practice with other criminals and innocent passersby.

That comment and the camaraderie of the guys are the only reasons to sit through this episode.  I rate it 17.5 out of Isaiah 35.

Post-Post:

• AHP Deathwatch:  No survivors.
• Title Analysis: Very good.  Streamlined from the source, but still identifiable.  Even more on-point if you look at the original.
• Killer played Chief Bell in The Thirty-Fathom Grave.