There Is A Fifth Dimension...

Twilight Zone: The Movie
Mahoning Drive-In Theater - Lehighton, PA
Tonight's Thursday Thread-Up was the film adaptation of the most successful anthology series in the history of television, and one of my personal favorites, The Twilight Zone.

Show banner designed by Andrew Kern

Show poster designed by Tom Bifulco

The creature on this week's show poster was giving me serious Donnie Darko vibes.

I'm on a mission to set the high score on the Ms. Pac-Man machine in the snack bar, but it's going to take a lot of practice to beat Rob's score.  I was able to crack 100k points, but I'm still about 70k short.

Twilight Zone: The Movie premiered on June 24th, 1983.  It was a source of controversy before it was ever released due to the death of actor Vic Morrow and child actors Myca Dinh Le and Renee Shin-Yi Chen.  They were killed in a helicopter crash in July 1982 during the filming of the first segment of this anthology film.  The investigation into their death revealed that quite a few labor laws were broken in the production of this segment which resulted in civil and criminal charges for those involved.

The controversial segment of this anthology movie was the only original story in the film.  Each of the other three segments were remakes of three classic Twilight Zone episodes: Kick The Can, It's A Good Life, and Nightmare At 20,000 Feet.  The first two are good, but I think the theatrical adaptations pale in comparison to the original episodes.  The only one that I think is as good (or possibly better) than its television counterpart is Nightmare At 20,000 Feet, and that is largely due to an incredible performance from John Lithgow.

And that's a wrap on Twilight Zone: The Movie.  I'm not sure if there are any 35mm prints of old episodes floating around out there, but if so, I'd love to see a follow-up next year with the television series being shown on the big screen as a Twilight Zone Marathon.