Prologue • written and directed by
John Landis Two men are in a car driving along a country road late at night. The conversation turns to what episodes of
The Twilight Zone they found scariest. The passenger then asks, "Do you want to see something
really scary?" and says to pull over. He transforms into a monster and slaughters the driver as the opening sequence begins.
Cast •
Albert Brooks as the Driver •
Dan Aykroyd as the Passenger
"Time Out" • Written and directed by John Landis Bill Connor is an outspoken bigot who is bitter after being passed over for a promotion at work in favor of his Jewish co-worker Goldman. Drinking in a bar after work with his friends Larry and Ray, Bill utters racist remarks and slurs towards Jews, Blacks, and East Asians, blaming them for America's problems. A Black man sitting nearby asks him to stop. After ranting some more and declaring himself better than the minorities, Bill angrily storms out of the bar and finds himself in
Nazi-occupied France during
World War II. A pair of
SS officers patrolling the streets spot and interrogate him. Bill cannot answer satisfactorily since he does not speak
German. A chase around the city ensues, in which Bill is shot in his left arm by one of the German officers. Bill attempts to hide in an apartment of a French family, but the lady of the house quickly betrays him by shouting a warning to the German soldiers. Bill climbs out on a ledge of the building, where he finds himself trapped while the two German officers take pot shots at him standing along the narrow ledge. Bill falls from the ledge and lands on soft ground, now in the rural
South during the
Jim Crow era, where a group of
Ku Klux Klan members see him as a Black man whom they are about to
lynch. Bill, scared and confused, vehemently tries to tell them that he is White, but to no avail. After kicking one Klansman against the burning cross and setting him on fire, Bill breaks free and tries to escape (while still hampered by his bullet wound). He dives into a nearby pond and resurfaces in a jungle of Vietnam during the
Vietnam War, being fired at by American soldiers who see him as a member of the
Viet Cong. One of the soldiers throws a grenade at Bill. Instead of killing him, the grenade launches him into occupied Europe again. There he is captured by the SS officers and put into an enclosed
railroad freight car, along with Jewish prisoners bound for a concentration camp. Bill sees the bar with his friends standing outside, looking for him. He screams for help, but they cannot see or hear him or the train as it pulls away.
Cast •
Vic Morrow – Bill Connor •
Doug McGrath – Larry •
Charles Hallahan – Ray • Rainer Peets and
Kai Wulff – German Officers •
Steven Williams – Bar Patron • Joseph Hieu and
Al Leong – Vietnamese Men •
Stephen Bishop – Charming G.I. •
Thomas Byrd, Vincent J. Isaac, Bill Taylor and William S. Taylor – G.I.s •
Edward Donno, Michael Milgrom,
Tom Willett and
John Larroquette – Ku Klux Klan Members •
Annette Claudier – French Mother
"Kick the Can" • directed by
Steven Spielberg • screenplay by
George Clayton Johnson,
Richard Matheson and
Melissa Mathison (credited as Josh Rogan), from a screen story by Johnson An old man named Mr. Bloom has just moved into Sunnyvale Retirement Home. He listens to the other elders reminisce about the joys they experienced in their youth. Bloom insists that being elderly should not, and need not, prevent them from enjoying life. He invites them to join him, later that night, for a game of
kick the can. All agree; however, a grumpy man named Leo Conroy who is fairly skeptical in his outlook on life objects to this, saying that they cannot engage in physical activity because they are all elderly and not children anymore. While Mr. Conroy sleeps, Mr. Bloom gathers the rest of the residents outside and plays the game, during which they are transformed into childhood versions of themselves. They are ecstatic to be young again, engaging in activities they enjoyed long ago, but their thoughts soon turn to practical matters such as where they will spend the night, since they will no longer be welcomed in the retirement home and their families will not recognize them. They ask to be their true age again and Mr. Bloom grants their wish, satisfied that, as with himself, their minds will remain young. Conroy wakes up and notices that one resident, Mr. Agee, has opted to remain young. Conroy asks for Agee to take him along but Agee tells him that such a thing is impossible. Conroy finally realizes that he does not have to stop enjoying life because of his old age. The next morning, Mr. Bloom finds Conroy happily kicking a can around the yard; Bloom breaks the
fourth wall to assure the audience that "He'll get it." Bloom then departs from Sunnyvale for another retirement home, in order to spread his good-natured magic among other senior citizens.
Cast •
Scatman Crothers – Mr. Bloom •
Bill Quinn – Leo Conroy •
Martin Garner – Mr. Weinstein • Scott Nemes – Young Mr. Weinstein •
Selma Diamond – Mrs. Weinstein • Tanya Fenmore – Young Mrs. Weinstein •
Helen Shaw – Mrs. Dempsey • Laura Mooney – Young Mrs. Dempsey •
Murray Matheson – Mr. Agee • Evan Richards – Young Mr. Agee •
Peter Brocco – Mr. Mute • Christopher Eisenmann – Young Mr. Mute •
Priscilla Pointer – Miss Cox • Richard Swingler – Mr. Gray Panther • Alan Haufrect – Mr. Conroy's Son • Cheryl Socher – Mr. Conroy's Daughter-in-Law •
Elsa Raven – Nurse No. 2
"It's a Good Life" • directed by
Joe Dante • screenplay by Richard Matheson, from a short story by
Jerome Bixby Mild-mannered school teacher Helen Foley, traveling to a new job, visits a rural bar for directions. While talking to the owner, she witnesses a young boy, Anthony, being harassed by a local trying to watch a boxing match. Helen comes to the boy's defense. As Helen leaves the bar, she backs into Anthony with her car in the parking lot, damaging his bicycle. Helen offers Anthony a ride home. When Helen arrives with Anthony at home, she meets his family: his parents, Uncle Walt, and sister Ethel. Anthony's family are excessively welcoming. Anthony starts to show Helen around the house, while the family rifles through Helen's purse and coat. There is a television set in every room showing cartoons. She comes to the room of another sister, Sara. Helen calls out to the girl, who is in a wheelchair and watching television, and gets no response. Anthony explains that Sara had been in an accident. Helen is not able to see that the girl has no mouth. Anthony announces that it is time for dinner, which consists of
ice cream,
candy apples,
potato chips and
hamburgers topped with
peanut butter. Confused at first at the family's unconventional diet, Helen thinks that this is a birthday dinner for Anthony. Ethel complains at the prospect of
another birthday; Anthony glares at her and her plate flies out of her hands. Helen attempts to leave but Anthony urges Helen to stay and see Uncle Walt's "hat trick". A top hat appears on top of the television set. Uncle Walt is very nervous about what could be in the hat but he pulls out an ordinary rabbit. Anthony insists on an encore and a large, monstrous rabbit springs from the hat. As Helen attempts to flee, she spills the contents of her purse and Anthony finds a note inside stating "Help us! Anthony is a monster!" When the family points the finger at Ethel, she reveals to Helen that they are not Anthony's real relatives. Anthony brought them to his house to be his surrogate family after he killed his parents and presumably he is doing the same with Helen. In punishment for writing the note, Anthony sends Ethel into the television set where she is pursued and eaten by a cartoon
dragon. Helen attempts to escape, only to have the door blocked by a giant eye. Anthony vents his frustration at everyone being afraid of him, summoning another cartoonish monster out of the television. When Helen tells him to "wish it away", he makes the entire house disappear, taking himself and Helen outside the physical plane of existence. Anthony says that he sent his "family" back where they came from, since they did not want to be with him. He cannot understand why everyone is unhappy with him, since he believes he provided for their every possible desire. Helen offers to be Anthony's teacher and student and to help him find new, even greater uses for his power. Satisfied that she will never "abandon" him, and having at last foreseen the true end results of his reign of terror, Anthony welcomes Helen's offer and magically brings back her car. As they drive through a barren landscape, meadows filled with bright flowers spring up alongside the road in the pair's wake.
Cast •
Kathleen Quinlan – Helen Foley • Jeremy Licht – Anthony •
Kevin McCarthy – Uncle Walt •
Patricia Barry – Mother •
William Schallert – Father •
Nancy Cartwright – Ethel •
Dick Miller – Walter Paisley •
Cherie Currie – Sara •
Bill Mumy – Tim • Jeffrey Bannister – Charlie
"Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" • directed by
George Miller • written by Richard Matheson While flying through a violent thunderstorm, airline passenger John Valentine is in a lavatory trying to recover from a
panic attack due to a fear of flying. The
flight attendants coax Valentine from the lavatory and back to his seat. He is repeatedly assured by the flight attendants that everything is going to be all right, but his nerves and antics disturb the surrounding passengers. Valentine notices a hideous
gremlin on the wing of the plane and spirals into another severe panic. He watches as the creature wreaks havoc on the wing, throwing debris into one of the plane's
turbofan engines and causing a
flameout. Valentine finally snaps and attempts to break the window with an oxygen canister but is wrestled to the ground by another passenger, a
sky marshal. Valentine then takes the marshal's revolver, shoots out the window (causing a breach in the
pressurized cabin), and begins firing at the gremlin. This catches the attention of the gremlin, who rushes up to Valentine and bites the gun in half. After they notice that the plane is landing, the gremlin grabs Valentine's face, then simply scolds him for spoiling its fun by wagging its finger in his face. The creature leaps into the sky and flies away as the airplane begins its emergency landing. On the ground, the police, crew and passengers discuss the incident, writing off Valentine as insane. However, the aircraft maintenance crew arrives and finds the damage to the plane's engines complete with claw marks, while a delirious and incoherent Valentine is wrapped up in a straitjacket and carried off in an ambulance. The ambulance driver is the car passenger from the prologue. The driver turns to Valentine and says "Heard you had a big scare up there, huh? Wanna see something
really scary?"
Cast •
John Lithgow – John Valentine •
Abbe Lane – Senior Flight Attendant •
Donna Dixon – Junior Flight Attendant •
John Dennis Johnston – Co-Pilot •
Larry Cedar – Gremlin • Charles Knapp –
Sky Marshal •
Christina Nigra – Little Girl •
Eduard Franz – Old Man •
Jeffrey Weissman – Young Man ==Production==