The Twilight Zone Revisited and Reviewed: Walking Distance,
Season One, Episode Five
Inspired or perhaps hoodwinked into reviewing and revising my
opinion of The Twilight Zone, I'm watching Walking Distance. As a child, I saw
the ham-handedness, the melodramatic obviousness of what were and are supposed
to be Whoa! mind-blowing concepts. For example, in this episode, our man Sloan
remarks in the drugstore how the proprietor was always sleeping in the backroom
up until he passed away. The soda jerk is a kind of cardboard character who
just listens to all the ruminations. Then after Sloan leaves, the jerk walks up
to the backroom and we see the old man sleeping in the chair, as if we couldn't
be left to wonder. No, we have to be bludgeoned with it, and there's this
throwaway dialog about needing more chocolate syrup.
What I failed to appreciate as a child was the missed
opportunity for humor. Like Kafka, these episodes are actually quite funny and
could have been done as a parody, even back then. Like the original Star Trek,
there's an over-the-top ridiculousness that I believe got lost in the
misplaced, earnest sincerity and adolescent sensibility which pervade these
episodes. Star Trek had a sense of humor about itself; it was ridiculous even
to me as a child but I was still vastly entertained.
Walking Distance continues, and even though we already know the
setup, every encounter with the townsfolk hammers home what would have been
obvious to any actual person in such a time-warped setting. Clothes, buildings,
every little detail would have shrieked to anyone not overwhelmingly obtuse --
something like the audience of the show who needed all these clanging clues to
the fact the guy is back in time in his hometown, WOW.
Okay, so as a springboard for some pathetic nostalgic musing,
"I wonder what that would be like?" in the weak imaginations of
viewers this is not entirely horrible. However, what I find even more telling
are quotes by Rod Serling criticizing contemporary tendencies in TV production
to follow the leader with Westerns and private eye shows both of which arguably
have just as much imagination-inspiring quality as Twilight Zone episodes,
albeit in very different, emotional directions.
Similar to Hitchcock movies, Rod Serling's TV baby struck me as
overrated when I first watched it. Later, when someone explained to me the
production and story boarding skills Hitchcock's movies evince, I still came away
with the conclusion that the subjects and treatment of subjects overwhelmingly
made his films mediocre compared to Citizen Kane, or even an Astaire-Rogers
musical. Emotionally, an action movie or Western like The Big Country was
ultimately more satisfying. I was more blown away by the original Planet of the
Apes, not knowing in the beginning where it was going, and when the first ape
on horseback appeared, I was interested to see how it played out. Of course,
the film kind of went downhill from that point for me but that one moment was
good enough.
I doubt anyone will change his or her mind about these
matters. Enjoyment remains in the mind of the audience member and, as with comestibles, the French expression holds true, each to one's own, but I do hope
my observations will inspire or perhaps hoodwink others to reflect a little
more while consuming.
KLK
12/16/2018
No comments:
Post a Comment