The Grave - Twilight Zone Late Night 2022 4th of July Marathoning

One of the great images of The Twilight Zone

 This is one of my great joys from The Twilight Zone. It currently sits at #7 on my Twilight Zone ranking (Read here.).

Pride and ego are bruised as Conny Miller talks up how Pinto Sykes, the feared gunman he was paid by a small town (the hometown of Pinto) to hunt down and kill, never was anywhere he went very long, despite what Pinto said to contrary while dying from a lone gunshot wound despite eight men firing at him. While all the character actors in the episode are just splendid, along with future movie star, Lee Marvin, it is the actress who wasn't in the industry very long (mostly television westerns; though, I did see her in an episode of "Perry Mason" just recently) named Elen Willard, who played the creepy Ione, sister to Pinto, equipped with this unnerving laugh and sinister aura. But Ione is accompanied by the stark atmosphere of the episode, the way the wind just seems to be a menace, how the graveyard is lumpy, with dead trees and bush patches...it's all grim and spooky...this would not work in anything else than B&W photography. I wish this got a lot more love, but it's really a ghost story, or perhaps a story about a town so crippled by fear, cowardice, and anxiety, they allowed one man to terrorize them as much as he wanted while Conny, paid to nab him, seemed to purposely avoid him. And I love the ending where Van Cleef's Steinhart attempts to rationalize why Conny is dead. Ione brings up the wind, while Mothershed (the wonderful Strother Martin) and Johnny Rob (James Best, even more marvelous casting) realize she might just be right. Steinhart can't explain why Conny's coat got caught if Ione's dress and cloak are going in the same direction his would have...carried with the wind in the opposite direction.

This is the cast:

Lee Marvin

Lee Van Cleef

Strother Martin

James Best

William Chalee (as Jasen, the observer of the gunfight, later greeting Conny as he arrives in town...just after Pinto was killed)

Stafford Repp (Ira, the bartender)

All memorable faces from the great television westerns and such of the 50s and 60s, all cast for this little ghost story, most of which is a conversation in a saloon. But I think Ione is the standout...she is sure her brother wasn't about to let Conny slide without making sure one last debt was paid. Whether or not you believe that is up to you. Steinhart sure remained as pragmatic as he could...but in the end, Ione had the last laugh.