That’s the plot of this 1957 film from director Bert I. Gordon. Chicago-haters will love this film, especially the scene where General Morris Ankrum announces that he has no choice but to nuke the entire city. If you don’t hate Chicago, you can still enjoy watching Peter Graves somehow retaining his dignity while dealing with the threat of giant locusts.
For the record, I’m enough of a country girl that I fully understand just destructive locusts can be. That said, when it comes to their appearance, they’re not the most intimidating creatures out there. The worst that can be said about them is that they look like really ugly grasshoppers. A giant grasshopper still looks like a giant grasshopper. And, needless to say, locusts do not attack humans.
(I’m also enough of a Southern girl that I can remember collecting the locust exo-skeletons that would always show up in the fall and winter.)
Here is the ludicrous and entertaining BeginningoftheEnd!
Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Freddy’s Nightmares, a horror anthology show which ran in syndication from 1988 to 1990. The entire series can be found on Tubi!
This week, a future Oscar winner shows up in Springwood.
Episode 1.14 “Black Tickets”
(Dir by George Kaczender, originally aired on February 5th, 1989)
Brad Pitt appears in this week’s episode, playing Rick. Rick is a rebellious teenager who elopes with his girlfriend, Miranda (Kerry Wall). Even on a low-budget show like this, Pitt’s screen presence was undeniable. From the minute he shows up onscreen, it’s impossible to look away from him. He had that movie star charisma from the start. It’s a shame that the episode itself isn’t that good.
It’s a typical Freddy’s Nightmares scenario. The first 20 minutes feature Rick having an extended dream sequence after he gets hit by a car. Rick apparently dreams about staying at a creepy hotel with Miranda and then being forced to kill two cops that show up and attempt to arrest him. But, at the end of the story, he sees himself lying in the middle of the road and realizes that everything that has happened since he got hit by the car has only been happening in his head.
The second 20 minutes features Miranda married to Rick. Rick has no settled down but Miranda is worried that she might be pregnant. While she waits for the results of her pregnancy test, she sees herself trapped in the house as a mother while Rick goes from being a rebel to being a police officer. Finally, Miranda snaps out of her dream and discovers that she’s not pregnant. She jumps for joy on her bed but then she slips, hits her head, and ends up with the mind of a child.
This was a pretty bland episode, even with Brad Pitt in the cast. The main problem was that it was all so predictable. The dreams were obviously dreams so there wasn’t really any suspense or tension while they were playing out. Freddy’s Nightmares used the “Its all just a dream” format so often that, by this point in the first season, it had gotten fairly boring. That was certainly the case here.
In Toy Story of Terror!, Bonnie (voice of Emily Hahn) is going on a Halloween road trip to visit her grandmother. When the car gets a flat, Bonnie and her mother have to spend the night in a creepy hotel. Bonnie has brought aome of her toys with her –Sheriff Woody (Tom Hanks), Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen), Jessie (Joan Cusack), Mr. Potato Head (Don Rickles), Rex (Wallace Shawn), Trixie (Kristen Schaal), and Mr. Pricklepants (Timothy Dalton). Mr. Pricklepants says that the motel feels like the setting of a horror story and he’s right! Mr. Potato Head vanishes, leaving behind only his arm. While the toys search for him, they are captured one-by-one by an iguana. The owner of hotel (Stephen Tobolowsky) is stealing his guests’ toys and selling them online.
Toy Story of Terror! introduces some other toys, all of whom have been captured and imprisoned in a glass case. Combat Carl (Carl Weathers) was my favorite but I also have a soft spot for Old Timer (Christian Romano), the alarm clock who spoke like an old man. I like the iguana too. He didn’t know he was being bad.
What makes Toy Story of Terror! so special is that Jessie has to conquer her fear of being in a box to rescue Woody and the other toys. Everyone is scared of something, even brave and confident Jessie. Like Jessie, I get claustrophobic. I’m embarrassed to admit it but I do like to a keep a nightlight on when I’m sleeping. I don’t like the idea of waking up and not being able to see what’s in front of me. Toy Story of Terror! isn’t just about toys. It’s also about how it’s okay to scared because, deep down, we all have the strength to conquer our fears. Jessie proves it when she hides in a box so she can save Woody. Maybe I’ll even turn off the nightlight tonight. Nah, I don’t think so.
Lisa and I have watched Toy Story of Terror! every year since it first aired in 2013. Every time I see it, it makes me smile and it makes me feel like there’s nothing that I can’t do. I don’t know if they’re going to broadcast the special on TV this year. There really haven’t been any special Halloween shows yet, though there’s still another week to go. If they don’t air, it’ll be a shame. It is on Disney+, though. And It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown is on Apple TV! Don’t forget to watch them this October!
Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing St. Elsewhere, a medical show which ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988. The show can be found on Hulu and, for purchase, on Prime!
This week, St. Eligius loses a resident.
Episode 2.21 “Rough Cut”
(Dir by Eric Laneuville, originally aired on May 9th, 1984)
Bobby Caldwell and Joan Halloran decide to stop being Boston’s most boring couple by taking an impromptu trip to Paris. But then Bobby catches himself in his zipper while trying to put on his pants sans underwear and the trip is cancelled. Bobby spends the rest of the episode walking very carefully.
Fiscus agrees to pose for a story on eligible Boston bachelors and soon finds himself being photographed wearing only a bow-tie and a pair of black briefs. That’s more of Howie Mandel than I’ve ever wanted to see. Potential suitors start to call the hospital. Fiscus is excited until his discovers that they’re all men.
Dr. Wendy Armstrong commits suicide.
St. Elsewhere was a show that frequently mixed comedy and drama but it was still undeniably jarring how this episode went from Howie Mandel getting half-naked and Mark Harmon stiffly moving down a hospital corridor to Dr. Armstrong downing a bunch of pills and dying in the OR. Wendy killed herself after she was told that she would be invited back to do the second year of her residency. (The first two seasons of St. Elsewhere represented a year in the life of its characters.) Bulimic, feeling guilty about a patient who miscarried, and traumatized by her assault at the hands of Peter White, Wendy ended things.
Before Wendy’s suicide, Westphall, Auschlander, and Craig had decided to cut Morrison from the program. While Craig and Auschlander respected Morrison as a person, they felt that he was still struggling as a doctor. Seriously, Dr. Craig? You took his dead wife’s heart but you won’t find him a place at the hospital? However, with Wendy dead, Morrison is invited to take her spot. Morrison accepts. So, I guess that worked out for him.
To the surprise of no one, Dr. White is also cut from the program. He loudly announces that he’s going to sue for his right to continue as a resident. “I’ll be back,” he shouts, sounding like Warren Stacy at the end of 10 To Midnight. Remember how that turned out?
10 To Midnight (1983, dir by J. Lee Thompson, DP: Adam Greenberg)
This was a good episode. Even though I never really cared much for Wendy’s character, her death was still handled well and it was emotionally effecting. Next week, the second season of St. Elsewhere comes to a close.
Like Ed Kemper, the 2023’s The Company We Keep is based on the crimes of Edmund Kemper.
The Company We Keep does take a few liberties with the true story. For one thing, it’s set in the present instead of the 70s. As well, Carter Holcomb (Cary Mark), who is this film’s version of Kemper, works not for the Highway Department but instead at a grocery store. His boss is Pete Matthews (Eric Roberts). Pete is a terrible manager but he’s played by Eric Roberts so you can’t help but like him.
Otherwise, The Company We Keep sticks closer to the facts of the case than some of the other films that I’ve seen about Kemper. Carter Holcomb has just been released from prison. His juvenile record has been expunged. He’s living with his harsh mother (Sharon Jordan). And he’s murdering hithchhikers, keeping their remains in his closet, and imagining having conversations with them.
It’s a creepy movie, largely because Ed Kemper is a very creepy killer. It’s also rather oddly paced and it doesn’t really have much a plot, beyond Carter getting annoyed with his mother and killing people. Like the real Kemper, Carter is friends with the cops who are investigating the murders and that certainly adds an interesting wrinkle. There’s a clever scene where Carter gets arrested just to discover that it’s his friends playing a trick on him.
Though the film has some pretty serious pacing issues, It’s still a well-acted film. Cary Mark is appropriately awkward as Carter Holcomb and Sharon Jordan wisely doesn’t play his mother as being an over-the-top tyrant but instead as someone who has suddenly found herself living with a son who she really doesn’t know. And, of course, the film features Eric Roberts, giving an amusing performance as the incompetent boss from Hell. As I’ve always said, any film is improved by the casting of Eric Roberts.
Previous Eric Roberts Films That We Have Reviewed:
Today’s horror song of the day is perhaps not as well-known as some of the other songs that I’ve shared. It appeared in Lucio Fulci’s controversial (to put it mildly) giallo, The New York Ripper. That film is so infamous for its violence, nihilism, and killer who quacks like a duck that it is something overlooked that it features a great score from Francesco De Masi.
This is the main theme from The New York Ripper and it captures the movie’s mix of horror and police procedural. It’s the 70s cop show theme from Hell.
For today’s horror on the lens, we have a 1973 made-for-TV movie called Satan’s School For Girls.
After her sister turns up dead, Elizabeth (Pamela Franklin) refuses to accept that official conclusion that it was a suicide. Instead, Elizabeth is convinced that it was murder and that it has something to do with the exclusive school that her sister attended, the Salem Academy for Women.
Well, honestly, the Salem part is a dead giveaway. I think we can all agree on that.
Anyway, this movie features a Satanic cult, an old school clique, and plenty of early of 70s fashion choices. It may be silly but it’s also definitely entertaining.
In 2011’s Me Again, David A.R. White stars as Rich.
Rich is a typical David A.R. White character. He’s a preacher with a young family and he has lost his ability to excite his congregation. His sermons are dry and boring and show little connection with the concerns or lives of those listening. Rich is burned out and his wife, April (Ali Landry), is tired of listening to him complain. When they were children, April promised Rich that they were meant to be together. Now that they are adults and married, April and Rich are separated and April wants to make the divorce final.
Poor Rich! No one respects him and he’s about to lose his family. His one friend, Tony (Tommy Blaze), tries to offer some good advice but Rich doesn’t want to hear it. Rich just wants to feel sorry for himself and watch an odd infomercial hosted by Big Earl (Bruce McGill). Big Earl says that if you call his number, he can change your life. Rich doesn’t call the number but his life gets changed anyways.
Rich finds himself being transported from one body to another. When he wakes up, he’s a wealthy man who has no friends and who has a heart condition. Just as quickly, he finds himself in the body of Chloe (Andrea White Logan), an insecure super model with an eating disorder. Then, suddenly, he’s in the body of a fish floating in a fish tank in Tony’s restaurant. Then he’s his daughter’s teen boyfriend, who is pressuring her to start taking birth control. (AGCK!) Then he’s in his wife’s body. Briefly, he takes control of Della Reese. He even spends some time in jail, talking to Big Earl.
And I guess the idea is that, from going to body to body, Rich learns why he needs to stop feeling sorry for himself and actually make the effort to make his marriage work. He also comes to understand the problems of a few other people. The rich man needs to go to church. The model needs to do something about all the disparaging post-it notes that she has hanging around her house. Her daughter’s boyfriend needs to be handcuffed with a sock in his mouth. The fish need as new home. You get the idea.
This movie …. well, let’s give credit where credit is due. David A.R. White is not a bad actor and his comedic timing is adequate. There were a few moments when he did make me smile. I laughed out loud when he suddenly became a fish. As a director, though, White goes a bit overboard. The whole thing with Rich becoming a model starts out as relatively humorous but then it just goes on and on. As well, I appreciated the message of taking care of other people but I’m not sure that the best way to communicate that message was for the very white Rich to briefly inhabit the body of a black housekeeper. The intentions may have been good but the execution often left me cringing.
MeAgain is like a lot of faith-based comedies. There are a few humorous moments but, in the end, it’s just too uneven to really work.
Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Thursdays, I will be reviewing Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi and several other services!
This week, Jonathan is a dream warrior.
Episode 4.19 “The Correspondent”
(Dir by Michael Landon, originally aired on February 24th, 1988)
Journalist Hale Stoddard (Darren McGavin) sits in a South American prison cell and waits to be executed. One-by-one, the other prisoners are dragged out of the cell and shot by the country’s new government. Hale passes the time by writing a letter that he knows no one will ever read.
Suddenly, Hale is no longer in the cell. Instead, he’s in the basement of his house. And there’s Jonathan. Jonathan explains that time has stopped and now, Hale is in his wife’s dream. Martha (Patricia Smith) dreams of Hale never being at home. She dreams of their son having both arms, even though he lost those arms in an accident when he was younger. (She also dreams of their now-adult son as always being a child.) Martha dreams about Hale’s former mistress, Eleanor (Eileen Barnett), standing around the house. (Hale argues that Eleanor was never in the house but Jonathan explains that, in Martha’s dreams, she is.) Hale comes to realize how often he deserted Martha because he couldn’t deal with settling down and raising a family. And now, while Martha dreams of him, Hale is about to be shot and killed….
Except, he’s not. It turns out that the South American prison was Hale’s dream. When Hale wakes up, he’s still at home. He tells Martha that he won’t be going to South American after all.
Awwww! How sweet.
This was a bit of a weird episode but I liked it. I appreciated how the show created Martha’s dream world by adding randomly weird details (like an oversized chair at the breakfast table, which was meant to represent Hale’s absence). Darren McGavin gave a good performance as Hale and resisted the temptation to overact. With the episode, the show tried to do something different and, for the most part, it succeeded.
Long before he achieved holiday immortality by playing the father in A Christmas Story, Darren McGavin played journalist Carl Kolchak in the 1972 made-for-TV movie, The Night Stalker. Kolchak is investigating a series of murders in Las Vegas, all of which involve victims being drained of their blood. Kolchak thinks that the murderer might be a vampire. Everyone else thinks that he’s crazy.
When this movie first aired, it was the highest rated made-for-TV movie of all time. Eventually, it led to a weekly TV series in which Kolchak investigated various paranormal happenings. Though the TV series did not last long, it’s still regularly cited as one of the most influential shows ever made.
The Night Stalker is an effective little vampire movie and Darren McGavin gives an entertaining performance as the rather nervous Carl Kolchak.
Through the Shattered Lens 