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The Vic Morrow segment should have been deleted from the movie just out of basic decency and respect. However, they would have had to film another segment or redo it with another actor. It was probably not in their budget to do so.
The whole movie was a disappointment. I know a few people who liked it, but I didn't. The old TZ filmed in black and white had a special, spooky, other wordly feel to it. Also, I think they should have written a whole new script for the film instead of recycling a few old episodes.
John Lithgow, wonderful actor, but he can't compete with a screaming, over the top William Shatner! I remember reading that he was the male Fay Wray of television. LOL
Don't mean this as a criticism. I am a huge Shatner fan, Captain Kirk was my favorite Star Trek Captain. He does get a lot of crap for his screaming and "over emoting." However, he did it so well! In my opinion, NO ONE can overact as well as William Shatner.
At that time, stores across the country would be closed on Sunday. In the late sixties, major grocery stores (like the A&P) might be open for a few hours on Sunday. I know they were in our town. But everything else was closed. I remember because my parents were huge smokers and once in a while they would (gasp!) run out of cigarettes on a Sunday! It was a big panic moment. Where to get some smokes? They'd usually send my sister down to our grandmother's house a few blocks away to borrow a few cigarettes.
I'm familiar with the episode in question. But I haven't seen it in a long time. As I recall, I thought Barney said that he was going to walk down to the filling station to get a bottle of pop. Could be wrong though. But that's what I remember.
I think that's a typo. You meant Donald Spoto! I have all three of his books on Hitchcock. The one you mentioned, The Art of Alfred Hitchcock and Spellbound by Beauty:Alfred Hitchcock and and His Leading Ladies.
The last book really gets into the psyche of the man through his choice of leading ladies, his involvement in shaping their roles and his (sometime) obsession with them. Some of his leading ladies liked and admired him. Some couldn't get away from his controlling behavior fast enough.
Yeah, agree about the sloppy continuity. But it was a good change of pace episode. Endora was even nice to Darrin. She was too busy being annoyed with her brother Arthur.
Uncle Arthur was hilarious as usual.
Something I never thought about before, it was Halloween, so where were the trick or treaters? In the other Halloween episodes there were lots of kids in the neighborhood. Very convenient that no children rang the Stephens' doorbell while they were holding an "out of this world" party!
And Gladys Kravitz staring at the Stephens house, again!! It WAS Halloween. Would it be SO unusual for people in strange costumes to show up at their house? Geez! Sometimes that woman really needed a hobby! LOL Maybe watch TV instead of watching your neighbor's house all the time.
Oh my goodness! You're a mind reader! I've been watching season three (with an eagle eye to look for goofs) I noticed the window seat was gone in the Halloween episode. It was just there the week before. Ha! And it was clearly built in, not something you could move.
I noticed it because I love window seats. I had one in an apartment I used to live in. I just think they are so quaint and charming. But in the third season Halloween episode, it's gone!
Another thing about the Halloween episode, it contradicts the first two seasons. In the seasons one and two Halloween episodes the witches are upset with the mortal view of them as ugly and covered in warts. In the first season episode Samantha says that her mother always leaves the country until the celebration is over. It upsets her too much.
In season two Endora who has disguised herself as a little girl trick or treater, turns Darrin into a werewolf.
Now in season three we learn that Endora hosts an annual Halloween party! Well, which is it? I suppose the writers could only go so far with the "witches hate Halloween" theme and decided on something different even though it contradicted what was established. Uncle Arthur even goes so far as to describe the menu to Darrin from last year's Halloween party. LAST year Endora was angry about Halloween and turned Darrin into a werewolf.
I love this show! But this was rather sloppy writing as far as continuity was concerned! However I think that maybe with color episodes, a Halloween party hosted by Endora would be fun in a visual sense. The writers just went in a different direction and ignored what had already been established.
I will definitely remember him from Apollo 13! But the first movie I ever saw Mr. Paxton in was Aliens.
Hudson was such a great character! He was full of bluster, but when the situation turned bad, Hudson voiced the fears of the audience. Now I think of his famous line, "Game over man, game over!" with sadness. Too young for his life to be over. RIP and thanks for the great performances.
All I know is that The Hitchhiker was one of the most genuinely scary episodes I ever saw!
I think it's kind of like The Sixth Sense. Cole says that the dead people he sees don't know that they are dead. They just go on with their "lives" as if they are still part of the living world. Perhaps Nan Adams did not really interact with the people in the episode. She just thought that she did because it would be the normal thing to do, such as getting a mechanic to change her tire. Her spirit went on doing the usual things. She didn't yet realize or couldn't accept that she died in the accident.
Maybe we are supposed to think that most people cross over naturally but if you are taken abruptly from this world when you aren't prepared, i.e., young and healthy but in an accident, your spirit has trouble accepting it. Thus the "hitchhiker" to help you on your way. Geez, still spooks me!! I hate looking in my rear view mirror in my car at night. LOL
Ah those TZ mysteries, I love 'em.
Stopover in a Quiet Town reminds me of some disturbing dreams that I've had. I think most people have the dream where they are unprepared for a test or find themselves naked in public.
I've had those dreams but I also have had dreams where I am someplace and I can't leave. I am trying to get somewhere else or get home and I can't. I am in the same place, trapped and doing the same things over and over. It is such an anxiety dream. Stopover seems to address those types of fears, i.e., anxiety and a feeling of being trapped.
Interesting though how a race of people on a planet light years away would have the same technology as Earth. Kitchens, phones, trains, etc. The church vestibule even looked like a Christian Church. Interesting... yeah I shouldn't read too much into it, just a show, but it makes me wonder... Maybe it WAS Earth and the couple just shrunk during the night! LOL No, the unseen mother tells her daughter to be careful with her new pets. Her father traveled far away to get them. Just a great episode though.
An Unlocked Window. Scared the heck out of me as a little kid. I always thought it was so dangerous to be a nurse!
From force of habit, I went there a few times after they killed the boards. But I haven't gone there since. There are things I want to look up, but I hate to give them the satisfaction. I've been trying to find the info I need elsewhere.
It's a combination of hurt and anger. But ranting won't do any good. All I can do to voice my feelings is give them no voice at all.
I've heard this complaint from other people. The actors never seem to eat. The popular explanation seems to be that they have lines to say and it's hard to do that with a mouthful of food.
I think it takes a very skilled actor with good timing to be able to take a bite and swallow before his next line. On All in the Family, they were frequently at the dinner table. Archie and Edith were obviously eating and still able to their lines. Carroll O'Connor was really good at talking with food in his mouth.
Of course it is annoying when they offer a guest a cup of coffee or some other beverage and he just holds it during the scene and leaves without even taking one sip.
Another annoying moment in movies is how the hero always manages to find a parking spot right in front of the building no matter the time of day, in places like New York City. There's always that one magical empty spot that no one else saw.
Cats always jump out and scare people. Jones in Alien was the worst culprit! LOL
Gee, never thought about "sleeping on the couch" when they had a spare bedroom! Yeah that would've made a lot more sense. I seem to recall a very early episode when Samantha zapped Darrin onto the couch after an argument. I think the idea was that the husband was supposed to suffer by having an uncomfortable night on the sofa.
Mary Grace Canfield? Well she filled in as Abner's sister, not Gladys. Alice Pierce had been diagnosed with cancer before she got the role of Gladys Kravitz. Amazing how she was able to play the role even though she was so ill.
Miss Canfield's role was obviously a last minute fill in until they found a new Mrs. Kravitz. She wasn't given very much to do with the role. I did like her as Ralph Monroe on Green Acres. I doubt if the character was a lesbian though, a tomboy perhaps, she wore those baggy work coveralls, no make-up and did a traditionally masculine job as a carpenter. But Ralph was so in love with the country clerk, Hank Kimball. I think they finally had a date in one of the episodes.
Not too long ago I saw an Andy Griffith episode where Mary Grace Canfield played a visiting cousin of Thelma Lou. THey arranged a date for her with Gomer. She wore a very feminine dress in that episode and I couldn't help but notice was a great figure she had. Those baggy work clothes of Ralph Monroe covered up a very nice figure!
Those horror movie cliche's! In some ways I feel sorry for directors who have to come up with new ways to create suspense ans surprise. It seems as though everything has been done a dozen times before.
My favorite director Alfred Hitchcock pioneered so many of the suspense techniques and the scares. And he has been imitated so much. It's a tribute to him. But after a while the audience is familiar with every technique. Like the famous shower scene in Psycho. From what I have read, it scared the heck out of audiences when they saw it for the first time. But now?? Female character gets in the shower? Ho hum. Might as well start writing her obituary.
I don't envy writers and directors. They have a hard job trying to surprise audiences who have become so familiar with every technique and cliche' that they are totally jaded. Still, the film makers COULD try harder sometimes!
The character hears a "strange noise"....gee I think I'll go investigate and NOT turn on a light.
Thanks for all your hard work Jim! Great site.
The horror movie cliches are so bad that the movie Scream parodied all of them.
The heroine Sydney is talking on the phone and saying how she NEVER watches horror movies because it's always some big breasted girl running up the stairs when she should be running outside. She adds, "It's insulting." Five minutes later she is being chased by the killer and she runs upstairs!
Don't know what it is about the safety of the bedroom when a killer is chasing you. Maybe you could pelt them with pillows. LOL Not like it would make any sense to run into the kitchen to grab your OWN knife when a knife wielding maniac is chasing you.
I don't know. But I just rented it from Redbox. Pretty funny. But not as funny as Madea's Witness Protection. I thought that was the funniest Madea movie.
Not a big fan of action movies, but some of those car chases defy the laws of physics and gravity. Cars fly up in the air like they were airplanes and land just fine. No damage to the vehicle, it keeps moving. Vehicles fly over empty spaces as if they can behave like an aircraft. The worst was in Speed. Saw a documentary on that film. Just because the bus gathered speed before it went over that big gap in the road, that doesn't mean it would stay airborne! A bus can't fly. It would've been falling as it moved forward and it would never have gotten to the other side of the highway. Fun movie though. LOL
It's just a little goof but it was one of the first movie mistakes I ever noticed, so it's my favorite. In Tootsie when Dorothy Michaels (Michael) arrives for dinner at Julie's apartment, he gives her flowers. They are walking down the hallway to her kitchen with the audience viewing them from behind. Julie tosses the flowers through the doorway onto the (unseen) kitchen table. The scene shifts to the kitchen and we see them enter. Julie is still holding the flowers and puts them on the kitchen table.
It was the first time I realized movies make those mistakes . Obviously scenes are shot from different angles and not everything matches up. Now I look for that stuff all the time.
Hey kittensandpuppies!! So Glad to see you made it! Hope James and some of the others come too!