Shudder Original Series: Cursed Films 105: Twilight Zone: The Movie
Photo credit: Shudder
Shudder Cursed Films 105: Twilight Zone: The Movie-When the curse is the people who make the film, and the tragic memories the innocent keep.
WARNING: This episode includes the footage of the fatal accident. Although nothing gory can be seen(despite what the YouTube versions say-this is the exact same footage), it does show the actual footage of the crash that results in Vic Morrow’s, Myca Dinh Le’s and Renee Shin-Yi Chen’s deaths.
The Film
Photo credit: Shudder
Twilight Zone: The Movie is based on the popular television series that ran from 1959-1964. The movie borrows from the three of the most popular stories that aired, and adding one original. The movie is made in segments independent of each other. It is available on demand, but is out of print on DVD.
On-Set Deaths
Twilight Zone: The Movie is the only other film in this series besides The Crow that had death occur on the film’s set.
A Time of Hubris
This film was made by directors and producers that were given carte blanche to make films however they wanted. Hollywood deemed them untouchable because they made money. Some said they made art.
Art, Ego, and the Twilight Zone
Stephen Farber, author of Outrageous Conduct: Art, Ego, and the Twilight Zone Case covers the tragedy that began in the planning of Jon Landis’s segment of the movie, and the debacle of a trial afterwards. I’m currently trying to find a copy that isn’t $150.00. Hopefully, this documentary will bring about its reissue.
Richard Sawyer
Apart from the deaths(quite a distance apart) the hardest hit was Richard Sawyer, Production Designer for Landis’s segment of the movie. Landis’s decisions made without Richard’s consent or knowledge cost Richard his career after the accident. Richard’s interview is the hardest to watch on this episode.
“Time Out”
Landis’s segment is titled “Time Out,” and deals with a racist named Bill Connor(Vic Morrow). After spewing racist epithets at a bar, Vic’s character leaves, but walks out the door into Nazi Germany, where he is treated as a Jew. He then ventures to 1950’s South as a black man and Vietnam as a Vietnamese during the Vietnam War. Richard’s locations and set design were realistic. He wasn’t told about the explosive charges under the Vietnamese set his team built, and was livid. But in Stephen Farber’s opinion, Landis was very cavalier with the lives of his crew and cast-therefore the bigger the explosion, the better.
The Accident
Originally, Bill was redeemed by saving the lives of two Vietnamese children. As a result of his change of heart, Bill wades through a river and gets them to safety while under fire, returning to his own time a better man.
The parents of the children involved asked if it was safe. They were told it was just like a Disney ride.
On July 23rd, 1982, Landis was filming illegally with children at night. A pyrotechnic shot up and damaged the rotor of a helicopter. The pilot lost control, and the helicopter fell, killing Morrow, and the two children instantly. The parents were on set during the fatal accident.
After the fatal accident, the ending of the segment was changed, omitting the children and sending an un-redeemed Bill on a train to die in a Nazi concentration camp.
The Funerals/The Trial
Landis went to all three funerals, even speaking at Morrow’s.
Criminal charges were brought against Landis and other members of the crew.
The case was acquitted.
Safety
A movie is only a movie.
On the other side of the safety coin is Troma director, Yale alumni Lloyd Kaufman. Kaufman demands safety at all times for the actors, crew, and any passers by. This has become part of Troma’s motto. Kaufman has always rightly maintained that no film is worth anyone’s life.
Experts note that a director of “small” studios like Troma would have lost everything had a fatal accident occurred on their set.
Who To Blame
Who is ultimately to blame? Should anyone be blamed at all?
Shudder Cursed Films 105: Twilight Zone: The Movie. A film remembered only because of the tragedy.
Special Effects Supervisor Max MacDonald(The VVitch) sums things up perfectly:
We’re making a movie. We’re not saving the world or splitting the atom, or taking a shot at the moon…
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