Fuck John Landis
I never intended to watch this movie, something I will get into more, but I am a person who forces myself to watch things I don't want to watch. This is a reputation movie. These movies have an allure that forces me to watch them; I hope I get over this soon. I often have conversations about them. Sometimes they are made by not-so-grat people, and the topic of separating the art from the artist emerges. This is a hefty decision whose stance depends on an individual's unique perspective.
Something I often ask myself is, "If you're discussing a movie, how far into the conversation can you go until the elephant is addressed?" For 'Twilight Zone: The Movie', it isn't too far.
Before I go on my tangent, I think it's only fair to review each segment (I'll be talking about Landis' segment last), similar to a regular review before delving into this film's notoriousness.
'Prologue' - 3.5/5:
This is by far my favorite segment of the movie. The use of shadows, the setting, and the confined cinematography lead to a sense of claustrophobia. Dan Aykroyd and Albert Brooks have great chemistry, mirroring the love that the directors have for the series. The build-up is strong, and while the final jump might be goofy, it's simple and effective. It's a shame John Landis directed this.
'Segment Two' - 2/5:
Steven Spielberg's segment is shockingly one of the weakest parts of this movie. There are some fun uses of shadow, and Scatman Crothers is great as usual, but it tonally clashes with the rest of the segments. It's fairly predictable, extremely sappy, and sticks out like a sore thumb amongst the others. It feels like Spielberg didn't put much care into it, probably because of what had happened months before filming.
'Segment Three' - 1.5/5:
This was definitely my least favorite segment. Joe Dante is a fairly hit-or-miss director for me, and this echoes the worst parts of 'Gremlins 2'. It's tonally confused with poor acting that didn't support the intended tone. The practical effects and production design in this part are the best of the bunch, but I gained absolutely nothing from this.
'Segment Four' - 3/5:
The best of the main segments, shocking, considering how George Miller left during post-production over the incident. John Lithgow is great, and Miller truly captures the intensity that would translate into his later 'Mad Max' movies. The camera angles are great, and it is thoroughly entertaining throughout.
'Segment One' - 2/5:
Vic Morrow gives a solid performance as a racist veteran who experiences the turbulence of the minorities that he criticizes. The sets are great, and it is a noble idea. Unfortunately, it is extremely predictable with no tension, probably due to how much wasn't filmed.
Incoming rant:
This movie isn't remembered as the collaboration between four of the biggest directors of the time to deliver an anthology feature based on one of the most famous TV shows of all time. Instead, it's known for the tragedy that occurred on the set. During the filming of the climactic moment of segment one, Vic Morrow, carrying two child actors (Myca Dinh Le and Renee Shin-Yi), was in a shallow river. While filming, the helicpoter 9that was only 25 feet in the air), the explosive leads ot the pilot losing control, and resulted in the deaths of Morrow, Le, and Shin-Yi.
The scene was shot at night when they didn't need to; they illegally hired the child actors, which broke many permits (one of which was allowing child actors near the heavy explosives), and many other truly reckless antics, which resulted in their deaths. I don't want to sugarcoat anything because it was fucking bad. While doing some research afterwards, I found out that you can easily watch the video on YouTube; apparently, you can upload the full recording of three people being hit by a propeller, but get demonitized if you even talk about it. This is what pushed me away from the movie for years.
I added this movie to my watchlist after I watched An American Werewolf in London for the first time during my Sophomore year of high school. AAWIL is a movie that I enjoyed a bunch, and I saw that John Landis directed an anthology movie with Joe Dante, George Miller, and Steven fucking Spielberg! Shortly thereafter, as an edgy 15-year-old, I was getting into controversial movies like Salo, Antichrist, The Last Temptation of Christ, and more. As stated, when I read what happened, I wasn't truly interested.
As time went on, I learned more about what happened, and I had no desire to watch it. Every time I mention John Landis is converation, I mention the crash. As a journalism minor and somebody who writes for my college paper. I would prefer to have the proper context before going into in-depth conversations. I wanted to know if it would affect the other segments. It does.
Since the accident was so tied into the production, it destroyed the friendship between Landis and Spielberg, while other directors distanced themselves from the movie. This movie reeks of death. It infests nearly every aspect of this movie. If something like this involving Landis were involved in a different production, it would still be worthy of conversation, but it wouldn't have watered down a movie with so much potential. This showed Landis' true colors are a scumbag, and while he has made good movies (The Blues Brothers is a banger), I don't think the separating art from the artist applies here. It's unfortunate because of how it affected the entire movie.
This was one of the saddest experiences I've had watching a movie, and if I saw an edit without the Landis segments, I think it would be slightly better. I appreciate many aspects of it, such as a few great performances, creative camerawork, and visuals, but I wish I had never watched this.
Accumulative rating:
3.5+2+2+1.5+3=12
12/5=2.4 (rounded up to 2.5)
-1 for death=1.5 rating
