One of the summer projects that I have going on at EYG is watching at least one episode daily of the EYG Hall of Fame classic series, The Twilight Zone. I got interested after reading a graphic novel on Rod Serling’s life. I have started the fifth and final season today and I thought this would be a good day to rewatch the movie from 1983. I watched this years ago and I remember not being a huge fan of it. Things may have changed.

Twilight Zone: The Movie is an anthology film featuring several stories based on episodes from the original series which ran from 1959-1964 on CBS. The four separate stories were directed by John Landis, Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante and George Miller. Quite a murderer’s row of directors, for sure.

There was a prologue featuring Albert Brooks and Dan Aykroyd. They were two men driving in a car, trying to get by without any radio or music.

The four stories included section one “Time Out” which is a remake of the season five episode (one that I have yet to arrive at in my Daily Zone watch) called “Back There.” Vic Morrow starred as a bigoted man who was passed over for a job and was out to blame every minority imaginable. However, he learns a lesson as he bounces around time and finds himself in other minority bodies.

The second story is a remake of the Twilight Zone episode “Kick the Can.” I actually like this version, with Scatman Crothers as Mr. Bloom, much better than the episode of the series. There was much more magical of a situation here and ends with more of a choice from the old people who had been made young.

Story number three has some mash up involved in it, but is basically a remake of “It’s A Good Life.” At first I thought this was going to be Hitch-Hiker, but then they mentioned Willoughby (a town in a classic episode), but once we get Kathleen Quinlan’s Helen Foley to Anthony’s house, we see that Anthony (Jeremy Licht) is the powerful kid who can make any wish come true. He did not send anyone to “the cornfield” as in “It’s A Good Life” but Anthony seemed to have even more power. Jeremy Licht was a former General Hospital kid actor so it was fun to see him again. I thought parts of this was better than the original too, though perhaps not overall. This felt a little too cartoony.

The final story was the remake of “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” with John Lithgow taking the William Shatner role. I just watched that episode today so it was fresh in my mind. This felt way too hectic and Lithgow, who I usually love, feels just too over-the-top. Perhaps since I saw the outstanding Shatner performance today this one just did not measure up.

This had ups and downs as many anthology films have. I found it a much richer experience after watching the episodes that this movie used as inspirations. Twilight Zone: The Movie was good fun. It was great to hear Burgess Meredith, who was one of the most valuable actors from the original series, get to do the Rod Serling narration voice over and I liked how the ending circled back to the beginning with Dan Aykroyd. A fan of the Twilight Zone should find a lot here to enjoy.