It's Not Quite Serling, Now Is It?

Tonight was my latest viewing of Twilight Zone, The Movie (1983), and I have to be honest, I was hardly compelled by it. Without those last two tales, I would have been dead to rites. The "prologue" with hitch-hiking Aykroyd and chatty driver, Albert Brooks, was amusing to me mainly for how it ends before Burgess Meredith substitutes for Serling as narrator of the incoming stories to be featured throughout the movie. Brooks and Aykroyd in the same car brings a smile to my face every time just because of their comic talents. But going through "guess that television tune", singing to CCR's "Midnight Special", and talking about Twilight Zone episodes (never a bad conversation in my opinion) perhaps might lull an audience immediately. I guess it is a means to an end. It shows Aykroyd who looks and appears harmless, emerging as a monster much to the shock of Brooks who is all smiles expecting "something really scary" to be a good gag for the two of them to laugh about. It is unexpected (well, if you hadn't watched it before at the time) and kind of tells us to always expect the unexpected.

I was indifferent to the first tale. When you consider the horrible results of the infamous helicopter crash which haunts it to this day (and should, quite frankly), this tale didn't deserve to lose Vic Morrow or those two unfortunate kids. It wasn't really much of a true-to-the-spirit TZ tale, either. Quite frankly, Landis has done so much better, with this tale leaving out the customary off-the-wall humor that stamps his work. It is heavy-handed and sledge-hammers its message with blunt force. Morrow portrays a jaded racist pig overwhelmed because a Jewish employee at his job got the promotion over him. He rants about the Jews and blacks and Japanese races in a bar to his two buddies who certainly look uncomfortable due to being in the vicinity of the very people Morrow criticizes. Then Morrow leaves the bar under scrutiny for his belligerence, and "takes the place" of those very races he despises. He's a Jew being hunted by Nazis. He's a black man in the midst of a possible lynching as the Klan have a burning cross and a tree long enough to support a long rope with a knot-tied noose. He's narrowly dodging the machine gun fire of Americans in Vietnam. I think the reasoning behind it is to allow us to picture a bigot getting a taste of his own medicine, but the message (and I'm not excusing Serling; he's made some loud statements about social issues in his stories as well; One such about a night that all-encompasses a town preparing to execute someone in I Am the Night--Color Me Black)  is a bullhorn that I just assumed to earplug.

The second tale means well and has its heart in the right place (and Scatman Crothers can light up a screen with his warm smile that I'm sure those who really knew him miss), but is so schmaltzy and sugary-sweet, I felt a diabetic coma coming on. The Goldsmith score, while rich and manipulatively "good for the soul" just rings in the ears still. It isn't some raging cynic here writing this, but the "youth is more than how old you are" message thunders and roars in its approach to strum your heartstrings and bring a tear or two to your eye. Scatman visits old folks' homes with a little magic in the form of returning the elderly to their childhood, giving them a chance to relive life again. One of the old folks was dumped at Sunnyvale by his son and wife, and he's damned cranky about it. The others try to offer him friendship and speak of the days of their youth while he rambles on about needing to accept old age. One among them won't, leaving the home as an adventurous lad emulating Douglas Fairbanks, chooses youth while the others learn to accept that they're 80 but deciding to feel much younger at heart. It is sentimental and reeks of feel-good. Spielberg goes for the warm blanket comfy hugs approach with the tale; out of the many TZ stories that could have been updated, "Kick the Can" was not a choice I would have went with for a 1983 audience.

Joe Dante's updating of "It's a Good Life" breathed some welcome life into the movie, though. Using the advantage of Warners Bros. funding this picture, cartoons of old are playing on television sets and inspired with actual Rob Bottin effects for monsters showing up thanks to the child's conjuring them up out of his imagination and mental power. The use of color is a knockout! Kathleen Quinlan was absolutely stunning, and the way Dante's terrific crew lights and shoots Jeremy Licht, he's ominous enough despite having a rather innocuous face and presence. This is my favorite because of the casting (William Schallert and Patricia Berry as Licht's terrified fake parents, forced to agree to keep him happy and wear false smiles doing so, Kevin McCarthy as an uncle in given title only, trying to keep from pissing his pants and having a nervous breakdown while exhaustively holding an agreeable nature and performing magic tricks on cue even though it all depends on the kid to make it happen, poor Nancy Cartwright as pretend sister who is grudgingly adopted by Licht despite her objections eventually unable to carry on the charade and paying for it when she's willed into a cartoon and gobbled up by a monster (!), Dick Miller as a diner owner fancy on Quinlan, and including a cameo spot by Billy Mumy who played the kid with evil power in the original TZ episode), use of TZ characters and places in the dialogue (where Quinlan came from and plans on going, her character's name, etc.), and the numerous sight gags and special effects. Dante and his team pull out all the stops and steal the show.

The final tale is all John Lithgow. I'm a big fan of this actor. I just love the guy. What a fuckin' awesome face. He was made for the movies. His hysterics and histrionics are off-the-charts fun to watch. This is all Lithgow taking what Shatner was doing in Nightmare at 20000 Feet and carrying it to the Nth Degree. You can't blame the passengers and crew on board the plane for considering him unhinged and a flight risk to all involved. Of course, the monster on the plane is detailed a bit more ghoulishly. I think George Miller has a style that is quite in-your-face and maddening, quite in league with Lithgow's terror and tormented features. By the end, as the gremlin that had been ripping up the engine has Lithgow right where it wants him (hanging out of the window trying to shoot it with an ankle pistol), that strait-jacket will be a proper dress for the poor fellow.

I think the final two tales redeem TZ: The Movie from being a forgettable misfire. The energy, vitality, verve, and creative ways to light and shoot the cast and scenarios by the last two directors usurp the intentions by Landis and Spielberg wanting us to examine race relations and attitudes, and not allow aging bodies to be a detriment in living a young life in our heart. The show could do that because it had a way of not essaying its message (most of the time, not all the time)  too bluntly or forcefully. Deaths-Head Revisited has a message about Nazism and the horror it caused, done in a chillingly poetic way that left an impact, not a thud. Landis admitted that the crew used illegal foreign children, with them dying in a chopper crash due to a stunt gone wrong at night. Recipe for disaster. This kind of diffused the message his tale meant to signify. Spielberg ratcheted up the cutes and left a tummy ache as a result.