Happy Halloween! You probably have a favorite horror movie, but this week my favorite horror movie that was never made is The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders. Saturday Night Live ran the trailer that imagined how a horror film might look if it were made by writer-director Wes Anderson. The clip incorporates references to Anderson’s films, including The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), Rushmore (1998), and Moonrise Kingdom (2012). Edward Norton, who guest-hosted one of the better recent SNL episodes, also does an excellent turn as Owen Wilson. Check it out.
FYI, Merriam-Webster defines “coterie” as “a small group of people who are interested in the same thing and who usually do not allow other people to join the group.”
What is your favorite part of The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders? Leave your two cents in the comments.
Anyone who has ever watched the TV series Bonanza could not help being fond of Eric “Hoss” Cartwright, played by Dan Blocker. Born Bobby Dan Davis Blocker in Bowie County, Texas, the actor was known as a caring man like his Bonanza character.
The real man, however, was much more intelligent than the character. Blocker earned a Master’s degree and worked as a teacher before starting acting. Wikipedia reports that Blocker, who earned a Purple Heart in the Korean War, also was active in political causes, such as taking a stand against the Vietnam War.
Blocker was best known for his role as the middle son on Bonanza, a role that Blocker tried to infuse with kindness. But Blocker appeared in other roles, and he almost appeared in Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove.
One of his very early roles, though, had him appearing in a Three Stooges short called Outer Space Jitters in 1957 during the era when Joe Besser joined Moe and Larry. Blocker’s role as “The Goon” zombie lacks the endearing qualities we would see in Hoss, but it is still fun to see Blocker on screen with the Stooges.
In this short, Blocker first appears around the 7:45 mark looking very un-Hoss-like. Check it out.
Blocker died at the age of 43 in 1972 of a pulmonary embolism after gall bladder surgery. At the time, Bonanza was about to start filming its final season. Although actor Lorne Greene did not think the show could continue without Blocker, the show completed that season.
The series, of course, had to address the absence of Blocker’s character. So, an episode revealed that Hoss died in an accident. Mental Floss reports the episode as the first time in TV history that a show dealt with the death of an actor and mentioned the death of a character.
What is your favorite Dan Blocker scene? Leave your two cents in the comments.
Even if like me you have only periodically watched episodes of Glee, you will be moved by Lea Michele’s emotional performance of Bob Dylan’s “Make You Feel My Love” from last night’s episode. The song is a moving tribute to Cory Monteith, Michele’s real-life and on-screen love who passed away of an accidental drug overdose at age 31 in July. The episode did not delve into the way that Monteith’s character Finn Hudson died, but the show and the song were appropriate tributes to the actor and man who died at such a young age.
The song “Make You Feel My Love” was an excellent choice too. Chimesfreedom previously wrote about how the often-covered “Make You Feel My Love” is one of Bob Dylan’s late-career classics.
What did you think of the Cory Monteith tribute? Leave your two cents in the comments.
Director Guillermo del Toro created the upcoming The Simpsons “Treehouse of Horror XXIV” opening sequence. The nearly three-minute opening features enough movie and horror references to make it worth re-watching to try to catch all of them. del Toro does a cool job of incorporating all of the references with the traditional Simpsons’ opening, including Bart’s blackboard, the trip to the grocery, and the ending on the couch. Watch for some Alfred Hitchock, an appearance by Edgar Allen Poe, and many movie references, including Mr. Burns in a sequence using del Toro’s own Pan’s Labyrinth(2006).
The segment is pretty cool, and at the least, del Toro’s involvement has garnered a lot of press for the twenty-fourth installment of the Halloween tradition. What is your favorite part of the intro? Leave your two cents in the comments.
American author Ambrose Bierce originally published the short story “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” in 1890 in The San Francisco Examiner. Today the story remains in the national consciousness more than one hundred years later, largely due to the story’s appearance in film and TV.
Director Robert Enrico made the story into a 1962 French short film La Rivière du Hibou (“The Owl River”). The film won awards at the Cannes Film Festival and the Academy Awards.
But you may have seen the French film without knowing it was a French film. Rod Serling broadcast it with the short story’s title during the 1964 season of The Twilight Zone.
The Story of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”
In “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” Civil War soldiers prepare to hang a man named Peyton Farquhar at Owl Creek Bridge. When the man drops, the rope breaks, dropping him into the river below. Farquhar escapes and tries to return to his family and loved ones.
In the film, the escaped prisoner, played effectively by Roger Jacquet, conveys his desperation to get back home. If you have never seen the film or read the story, I will not ruin the ending.
The French Film Version
The original French short film won the Golden Palm for Best Short Subject at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival. It also won the Best Live Action Short at the 1963 Academy Awards.
Unlike the short story, the film begins with the execution, omitting the back story but thrusting the viewer right into the action. [October 2015 Update: Unfortunately, the entire French film is no longer available on YouTube, but below is reportedly an excerpt from the original French film with the song “Livin’ Man.”]
The Twilight Zone Broadcast
The French film attained a larger audience when Rod Serling incorporated the film into a Twilight Zone episode. In a series of original productions, Serling’s use of the film in this way was unique.
Different sources give different stories about how the film came to be a Twilight Zone episode. One source claims that Rod Serling attended a film festival and saw the short. Then, he bought the rights for broadcasting on his series.
However, most other sources report that Twilight Zone producer William Froug first had the idea when he showed the movie to a film class. At the beginning of this video, Froug, who passed away in September 2013, explains how the idea arose.
Below is the “special and unique” 1964 Twilight Zone episode that incorporated the French short film and added a Rod Serling introduction. The original French film achieved its tension with very little dialogue and used English for what little dialogue there was. So, the French film easily translated to American TV.
The Twilight Zone episode includes some music around the 15:20 mark that does not appear in the French video above (although one source says the song “Livin’ Man” appears in the French version too).
Reportedly, the Twilight Zone episode of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” was the last one produced for the series. But it was not the final episode that was broadcast.
For a long time after the broadcast and one repeat showing, viewers could not watch the episode. Twilight Zone did not have the syndication rights for the film. So after its initial broadcast and a repeat, for years the “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” episode did not rerun on TV in syndication with the other episodes. Eventually, though, the episode was reunited with the other series episodes on DVD.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
The Twilight Zone episode, however, was not the first to tell Ambrose Bierce’s story on television. Several years earlier in 1959, Alfred Hitchock Presents aired its own version of the story.
The Hitchock version, like the original short story, provided more back story on how the man came to be sentenced to death. [September 2016 Update: Unfortunately, a decent quality of the video is currently not available on YouTube.]
A Song, “Owl Creek Bridge”
Finally, more recently, Montreal-born singer-songwriter David Rubin wrote and recorded a song inspired by “An Occurrence at Owl Street Bridge.” The song, “Owl Creek Bridge,” appeared on his album Secret Agent in 2006.
One can speculate that Ambrose Bierce could never have imagined how his story “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” would reach so many people. It continues to grip us even today because the tale of one man’s desire to get home reflects the tragedy of both death and war.
Which is your favorite version of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”? Leave your two cents in the comments.
Happy Halloween! You probably have a favorite horror movie, but this week my favorite horror movie that was never made is The Midnight Coterie of Sinister Intruders. Saturday Night Live ran the trailer that imagined how a horror film might look if it were made by writer-director Wes Anderson. The clip incorporates references to Anderson’s films, including The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), Rushmore (1998), and Moonrise Kingdom (2012). Edward Norton, who guest-hosted one of the better recent SNL episodes, also does an excellent turn as Owen Wilson. Check it out.
in 2006.