Title:
Twilight Zone The Movie
What Year?:
1983
Classification:
Irreproducible Oddity
Rating:
Ow, My Brain!!! (Unrated/ NR)
As I write this, I’ve
been continuing to think over what I want to do with my blog and writing in
general. In the process, I recently found myself with a string of movies that
could all have suited my purposes. These included a movie I had thought about
for a very long time, which I decided was enough to kick off a feature I had
considered before as a spinoff to my Super Movies feature. This will be a look
at movies based on other properties, which as a further twist will focus on
things besides books and comics. Our first entry for consideration will be a
film so notorious it could literally be its own category. I present Twilight
Zone: The Movie, and yeah, I know all about the backstory.
Our story begins with a
driver and a friendly hitchhiker singing TV themes and talking about a certain
famous series, until the encounter turns lethal. We then see an unfolding
anthology that starts with a middle-aged racist who finds himself transported
back in time as the minorities he hates. We then meet the denizens of a
retirement home who regain their youth with a game of kick the can, only to
discover a price that won’t be a clear downside. Things are looking up as we
move on to a school teacher who is invited home by a quirky little boy who
proves to be a godlike superhuman with a captive “family”. Finally, we meet a
fussy intellectual on a plane who sees a mysterious creature sabotaging the
engines, but can’t convince anyone else of the threat. It’s all kinds of pretty
good, I guess- but can anything be scarier than Dan Aykroyd?
The Twilight Zone: The
Movie was a 1983 dark fantasy/ horror anthology film released
by Warner Bros, based on the TV series created by the late Rod Serling. The
film was produced by John Landis (An American Werewolf In London)
and Steven Spielberg (Duel, ET), who directed the first two
segments, “Time Out” and “Kick The Can”. Additional segments based on the
original TZ episodes “It’s A Good Life” and “Nightmare At 20,000 Feet” were
directed by Joe Dante (InnerSpace, Gremlins 2) and George Miller
respectively. Frequent TZ contributor Richard Matheson (see… Jaws 3?)
received writing credits for 3 out of 4 sequences. The soundtrack was scored by
Jerry Goldsmith (see Link, Deep Rising, etc, etc, etc), whose early work
included the TZ episode “The Invaders”. The cast included Vic Morrow (see Message From Space... wait, my first review?), Kathleen Quinlan and John Lithgow (Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai), with Burgess Meredith (Batman, The Manitou) as the narrator and Dan
Aykroyd as the Hitchhiker/ Monster in a prologue sequence. The film became
notorious for an accident that resulted in the deaths of Morrow and two child
extras. It was a moderate commercial success, earning $42 million against a
$10M budget, but subsequently suffered from controversy and limited
availability on home video. Among series fans and genre critics, it was poorly
received except for Dante’s segment. As of early 2023, it is available for
digital purchase and rental.
For my experiences, I
will say right off the bat that my usual format and length was out the window
from the start. As far as the present film, what really stands out in hindsight
is that I literally had no awareness of it until at least the middling 1990s, and still didn't watch it until around 2017.
The astonishing part of that is that I was an absolute TZ junkie virtually from
the time I had regular access to television at all. I would watch the original
series, I would watch the ‘80s revival, I would read the tie-in books, I would
narrate episodes to innocent bystanders. All of which is just to say, for me to
have known nothing about this film means somebody really screwed up. The most
obvious reasons, I must also say at the outset, are ones I won’t go into. I
have reviewed movies with body counts before (see Brainstorm, which
still wasn’t as uncomfortable as Hardware), and the only thing that
really works is to keep it out of the picture. In those terms, my diagnosis is
that this was always on track to be sleek, expensive and completely
forgettable, which is not what it deserves.
Moving forward, I really
couldn’t avoid a paragraph on the opening segment(s). The prologue is, if
anything, underrated, especially in light of Dan Aykroyd’s performance. At face
value, the role isn’t even against type, yet the actor becomes subtly
unsettling well before the end, enough to ponder what might have been if he had
gone further into roles outside comedy. We then get the embarrassingly good
modernization of the TZ opening, with Meredith swinging for the fences.
Finally, we get to Morrow’s segment, which I feel I am committing heresy by endorsing
probably the second strongest in the entire movie. We get a strong set-up
through the introduction to a very unsympathetic character who (in arguable
contrast to the antiheroes of “Judgment Night” or “Death’s Head Revisited”) is
never so monstrous that he can’t be identified with people a viewer might meet.
What follows is a reasonably satisfying series of vignettes that never needed
any other ending than its chilling final sequence. The “problem” is that this
never quite reaches the level of true irony, unless you count the jerk’s
surprisingly plausible ability to stay alive as long as he does, and there
really isn’t a lot that could have been done differently. To me, the one good option
would be to put him through the slights and resentment even “model” minorities
in “modern” society face, perhaps by a “body swap” with the individual he's
really mad at, but then, that would require political subtlety in an ‘80s
movie.
The other segment I had
to write up on its own is “It’s A Good Life”, based on both the TZ episode and
the short story by Jerome Bixby. This is the one segment that is at least as
good as it’s usually made out to be. I would go so far as to make favorable
comparisons to the original series episode (one of the ones I can remember
retelling). The most intriguing part is that this “remake” is even bolder than The Thing in reconceiving the source material as well as its “classic”
adaptation. (The short story is still far more horrific…) Here, the
child god-demon is content to hold power over a single house, resulting in a
claustrophobic focus and significant ambiguities that certainly “work”. It’s
never clear if this version of the character is less powerful, less ambitious
or simply mature enough to preserve a line of contact with the “real” world.
His meeting with the protagonist teacher is similarly debatable. It makes sense
that she would succeed in connecting where others have failed, but it’s very
possible that the miserable captives we meet in the house thought the same at
some point. As events proceed, the cinematography and effects convey a sense of
unravelling reality as much as Anthony’s power, augmented by the prominent
cartoons. The materialized creatures truly feel like toons brought to life,
still not as unnerving as the on-screen monster that dispatches the “sister”
sent into its domain. Of course, there are many things I considered for the
“one scene”, which will be from here. My own favorite is the would-be
magician’s reluctant rabbit-out-of-a-hat trick, followed by the deceptively
drawn-out reveal of Anthony’s real sibling.
That still leaves two
whole segments, including Spielberg’s contribution. That is quite justly Ground
Zero for the hate this movie usually gets, to the point that I am hard-pressed
to say anything save that yes, it is that bad. My only dissent is that I
don’t buy the suggested narrative that he was thrown off by the legendary
troubles of the production. On the contrary, I find it typical of the
sentimental, allegedly kid-friendly material that he was either being saddled
with or bringing on himself before Jurassic Park forced the “system” to
take him seriously again. Then there is the finale, which tends to get a
measure of goodwill that I have yet to muster. For me, Lithgow simply does not
work in the role. I also have to say, I find the gremlin strangely ineffective.
Much of the time, you really can’t see the damn thing, and when you can, its
wonky design borders on comical rather than threatening (yes, even compared to
the suit they put Nick Cravat in…). The only thing that his improved my opinion
after several viewings is the surreal camerawork, which at its best achieves a
“comic book” feel akin to Creepshow. I can put in an extra good word for
John Dennis Johnston as the quite sympathetic pilot, who really comes close to
being in the right even with the gremlin.
Now I still have the “one
scene”, and I finally went with the opening of the best segment. The teacher
comes into a diner, where Anthony is playing Tempest (see… Night of the Comet?). The proprietor behind the counter is none other than
everyone’s favorite cameo actor, Dick Miller (Night of the Creeps,
Terminator, etc). He’s as entertaining as ever with more meat than usual as
he charms the lady, throwing out multiple franchise references in the process.
Meanwhile, an adult male patron becomes disgruntled at interference on a TV
screen. In a curious bit of foreshadowing, he accuses Anthony of causing the
static. The situation only escalates when the proprietor dismisses him.
Finally, the patron takes matters into his own hands. As often happens, what
follows is less interesting than the buildup. Does this mean that the
townspeople suspect that Anthony is different? If so, does this also mean that
Anthony’s abilities are weakened or largely nullified away from the house?
Either way, why hasn’t anyone come to look for people who must be missing?
Perhaps his powers are still effective enough to make people disregard the matter, or
perhaps that is where some of the captives came from. As usual, no more will be
said about it, which just makes it more interesting.
In closing, I would usually
be defending the rating. This is one where there is simply too much baggage for
me to venture a rating. As a whole, it’s better than people have wanted to give
it credit for. The downside is, there are also things that are actually worse.
All in all, that’s a pretty accurate representation of the series it’s based
on. You can take it or leave it, but it’s time we stopped ignoring it. With
that, I can find a little peace.
Image credit The Legendary VHS (Tumblr).
