"The Forms of Things Unknown," written by Joseph Stefano; directed by Gerd Oswald; an episode of the series "The Outer Limits" first airing May 4, 1961 via ABC; the basis for an unsold series "The Unknown"; Leslie Stevens, executive producer; Louis Morheim, associate producer and story consultant; M. B. Paul, optical effects unit; music by Dominic Frontiere; production manager Robert K. Justman; Elaine Michea, production coordinator; photographed under the direction of Conrad Hall; art direction by Jack Poplin; edited by Tony Di Marco; Richard K. Brockway, supervising film editor; special effects by Harry Redmond, Jr.
The Cast: Vera Miles as Kassia Paine; Barbara Rush as Leonora Edmond; Scott Marlowe as Andre; Sir Cedric Harkwicke as Colas; David McCallum as Hobart Tone.
"The Outer Limits" remains the Rolls-Royce of television science fiction, conceived and first produced in the highly intellectual Kennedy administration Renaissance of the early 1960s, and "The Forms of Things Unknown" is its existential masterpiece. The teleplay owes much of its quality to the inspiration of the French "nouvelle vogue" of such directors as Jean-Luc Godard and Alain Resnais, the latter of whose inversion-in-time enigma of 1961, "Last Year in Marienbad," "The Forms" resembles.
A speeding Rolls makes its way across the backroads of Southeastern France, some forty-five miles (a signpost later informs us) from Aix-les-Baines. The car's passengers are the jet-setters Andre (Scott Marlowe), lithe, handsome, the very spirit of breathless youth; his obvious lover, the satin-skinned Kassia Paine (Vera Miles), and the nervous aristocratic beauty Leonora Edmond (Barbara Rush), whose very glance forebodes a malignant design.
We later learn that Andre had intended to blackmail Leonora's father's mistress, and by way of the Londoner's amorous letters to her, extract from her a particularly large sum of money. Kassia, however, has tired of the scheme, having felt a kinship with both Leonora and her father, and now Kassia, with the assistance of Leonora, intends to murder Andre. The car stops, as Andre feels ripe for a swim. He wades into a pond, awaiting a drink from Kassia and Leonora. "Now," he mockingly orders, "both of you bring me my drink. Kassia will pour and Leonora will serve. Come as you are, in your fine Stiletto heels. And then we'll go to London, and pay a dark call on Leonora's rich and respected father. And when we have extorted him, we'll leave London, not very respected, but very rich." But Kassia has surreptitiously mixed Andre's liquor with a leaf from the deadly Thanatos (meaning death) tree. Andre drinks, and only moments later, succumbs. His body is placed into the trunk of the car and the women drive away.
The scene now switches to a stormy evening. Suddenly the trunk door rises--visible from the rear-view mirror--and Leonora screams "He isn't dead!" Kassia stops the car and calmly answers "He has to be dead--that one leaf could have murdered a whole world of Andres." Kassia gets out of the car and inspects the trunk, where she finds the obviously lifeless body of Andre. Leonora, however, is not re-assured and runs in horror into the storm, Kassia in pursuit, until they arrive at a desolate mansion. They are received by the blind English-speaking Colas (Sir Cedric Hardwicke), who invites them in. Both women proceed to the drawing room fireplace to warm themselves, but immediately take into account the omnipresent sound of wildly ticking clocks coming from a room above.
In the drawing room, an old style chronometer is focused upon. The visitors are asked to spend the night, which the women accept, allowing Kassia time to bury the body of Andre. Leonora, now trance-like before the chronometer, is asked by the returning Hobart Tone (David McCallum) of her past, and she imparts to him of the murder of Andre. Tone tells her he is capable of bringing Andre back to life by use of his "time-tilting" machine. "All things were alive once--in the past," he explains, for "I tumbled back to life," revealing that he too had been dead and resurrected by use of the device. Colas reveals that Tone had been found "bound on his time-tilting device," and that it was Colas who had nurtured him back. Tone does indeed resurrect Andre, and Andre soon appears at the front door, extending out his liquor glass and greeting Kassia with the words "Refill, please?" Leonora runs off, but Kassia fearlessly confronts Andre, who notwithstanding what has transpired, fully intends to continue with his extortion plans.
It is then that Tone realizes he has erred, and hopes to return the nefarious Andre, as well as himself, to the "dead harmless quiet of the past." On the grounds outside, Andre attempts to run over the fleeing Kassia, but crashes the Rolls over a ledge instead, and dies--finally. Inside, Tone inquires of Leonora whether she will grant him the favor of "destroying my device, after it has sent us back, into death." She reluctantly follows him to the time-transportation room, enters first, and attempts to hold him back. He forces the door open, however, and, advancing to the suspended wires of the time apparatus, positions himself properly--and vanishes.
This final act of sacrifice is witnessed by the newly returned Kassia as well as by Colas. The camera focuses now only on the central clock's swaying pendulum, while the music of Dominic Frontiere rises to an appropriately pulsating coda. With brilliant, convoluted camera angles and eerie lighting, "The Forms of Things Unknown" must be seen to be believed. Its quality is such that it shattered the form of bizarre teleplays before it, finding meaning in that without form whatsoever.
Below: Jet setters Leonora Edmond (Barbara Rush) and Kassia Paine (Vera Miles) prepare to serve the evil incarnate Andre (Scott Marlowe) a poisoned liquor, from which he does indeed die--at least initially--in Joseph Stefano's most stylized teleplay "The Forms of Things Unknown," an episode of the ABC classic "The Outer Limits" airing May 4, 1964, and the basis for a never-launched series "The Unknown." Obviously much influenced by European filmmakers of the period, the teleplay was directed by the ever innovative Gerd Oswald and photographed with great flair by Conrad Hall, who would go on to twice collect Oscars for his cinematography, for his period sepia lensing of 1969's "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," and for his torn rose petals motif underlying the framing of 1999's "American Beauty."
Below, left: the dead and resurrected scientist Hobart Tone (David McCallum) who has learned to alter time, acquaints himself with visitors Kassia and Leonora, while the blind house proprietor Colas (Sir Cedric Hardwicke) remains fully immersed in the conversation; right: Colas, Kassia, and Leonora witness in subdued horror as Tone prepares to return himself to the dead past.
Below: David McCallum was well in his element as the enigmatic Hobart Tone, who before returning to his own "dead past," would ponder the ethical alternatives concerning the return of the likewise once dead and resurrected Andre, observing Tone's explanation of teleportation paths in the scene at right. McCallum would emerge an international television star the following season by way of his characterization of Russian-born "United Network Command for Law and Enforcement" or "U.N.C.L.E." agent Illya Kyriakin in NBC's "The Man from U.N.C.L.E," and who yet remains an active prime-time player in the ongoing role of forensic analyst Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard in the USA Network's "NCIS," yet another abbreviated agency, this one standing for "Naval Criminal Investigative Service."
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"Demon with a Glass Hand," written by Harlan Ellison; directed by Byron Haskin; an episode of the ABC classic "The Outer Limits" first airing on October 17, 1964; associate and story consultant, Seeleg Lester; associate producer Sam White; music by Harry Lubin; production coordinator Elaine Michea; production manager Claude Binyon, Jr.; photographed under the direction of Kenneth Peach; art direction by Jack Poplin; Richard K. Brockway, supervising film editor; special effects by Pat Dinga
The Cast: Robert Culp as Trent; Arline Martel as Consuelo Biros; Abraham Sofaer as Arch; Rex Holman as Battle; Steve Harris as Breech; Robert Fortier as Bridge
Perhaps Harlan Ellison's most celebrated teleplay, justly awarded a science fiction HUGO, opens with the voice-over which tells of "the eternal man . . . the one who never dies . . . historically known as Gilgamesh, a man who has never tasted death, a hero who strides through the centuries." Viewers are then quickly introduced to Trent (Robert Culp), who soliloquizes "I was born ten days ago, a full grown man. . . . I woke on a street of this city; I don't know who I am or where I've been or where I'm going. . . . They tried to kill me. . . . I managed to escape them. . . . My hand told me what to do." The "glass hand" referred to, bereft of three of its components in the form of fingers, is now activated. It relates to Trent, in a voice patterned after Trent's own, that his directive is to "stay alive. . . . Destiny is in your hand."
He is informed that his alien pursuers, who have come from a future millennium and teleported back through a "time mirror," can be best disarmed by removing from them the medallions hanging prominently from their necks which would in effect send them back forward through time, and by destroying the mirror itself. He is further instructed to seek out the aliens who possess the remaining components or "fingers," as only the entire glass hand when assembled can answer why indeed humanity's destiny was entrusted to him.
Having cornered one such alien, Trent learns that his pursuers are from the planet Kaiba, and, in the form of humans, have travelled back through time in search of Trent's glass hand which they were told has "all knowledge." The Kaiban then remarks "you're the last man on Earth of the future; you're the last hope of the Earth." Trent learns further that the location of the time mirror is somewhere within the Dixon Office Building. Trent then disposes of the alien by pulling from him the neck medallion which accordingly "sends him up" through time. Activating the glass hand once again, he discovers that the Kaiban were able to conquer Earth within a month, but that before human life could be destroyed, "without explanation, every man, woman and child of the Earth vanished. You were the only one left, Mr. Trent." In hot pursuit of the remaining "finger lobes," he stealthily makes his way to the seemingly abandoned Dixon building where not long inside he hears an ominous alien voice proclaim "I want the seventy billion future Earth men, and you know where they are!"
This begins an elaborate chase and exchange of gun volley culminating with Trent finding his way into an office of ladies' apparel, where he renders a Kaiban unconscious. Witnessing this, the proprietor, Consuelo Biros (Arline Martel), cowers before him, but he quickly pacifies her, entreating her to come to his aid. He demonstrates to her the fact that what is unconscious before her is indeed alien by pulling off the medallion, after which the body vanishes. He explains to her that a "force bubble" has been set up by the aliens to prevent him from leaving the building. Convinced now that her own destiny lies with his prevailing, and disarmed by his persuasiveness (she later confesses her love for him), she reveals to him a hidden exit.
But the tandem has not traveled far before Trent acknowledges that he is overpowered by the aliens. Again he solicits the counsel of the glass hand, which simply states "let them kill you." And indeed he is gunned down in a barrage of fire after which a Kaiban pronounces him "dead, very dead." Consuelo now mourns his apparent passing, but her prayers that he be restored to life are soon "answered" by the glass hand, which instructs her to apply a moist cloth to Trent's brow and carotid artery. To her astonishment, he is resuscitated. From the glass hand which Trent and Consuelo now believe also has remarkable curative powers, it is disclosed that the aliens have a threefold purpose in securing the hand. The Kaiban are seeking the knowledge not merely of "where the people of Earth are hiding," but also of the means by which they can exist in the current time and be safely teleported forward into their own time.
With Consuelo's help Trent secures the remaining "fingers," as well as locating and destroying the "time mirror." The glass hand is thus restored, and Trent is finally imparted the knowledge he has been long seeking. "Your people knew they could not defeat the Kaiban," the hand explains, "but they had a terrible weapon: a radioactive plague with a half-life of ninety-nine years." But as the plague would effectively eliminate intelligent life, there had to be a method of removing all survivors of the planet."
The hand expatiates "the population of the Earth, seventy billion people, were turned into electrical impulses and stored on a thin strand of copper alloy wire." Trent is later instructed to bend back the three middle fingers of the hand. Suddenly the area of his thorax is aglow as the hand continues: "All of them went into the wire and the wire went into you." Trent, therefore, is not a human with a computerized glass hand but rather "a robot . . . the guardian of the human race." Trent reaches out to Consuelo, but she recoils from him, and walks silently away.
Trent is now left to ponder his fate, as the voice-over concludes: "Like the eternal man of Babylonian legend, like Gilgamesh, one thousand plus two hundred years stretches before Trent--without love, without friendship, alone, neither man nor machine, waiting--waiting for the day he will be called to free the humans who gave him mobility, movement, but not life."
With a marvelous use of the camera by Kenneth Peach, whose lenses convey stark images against saturnine office stairs and corridors, and an almost thrilling musical score by Harry Lubin, employing glissando piano, "Demon with a Glass Hand" represents the apex of television science fiction. Actor Robert Culp is altogether splendid, utilizing his most stentorian diction (Culp first utilized this inflection to create a "Big Brother" narrator in the 1954 CBS "Westinghouse Presents Studio One" live adaptation of George Orwell's "1984"; probably his first important work for the television medium) for the hand that speaks back to him. But it is Harlan Ellison's infectious youthful genius from which all else that is stunning about the teleplay emantes. Though spawning numerous imitators, such as the Arnold Schwarzenegger "Terminator" series, none can match the fecundity of early Ellison.
Below: Robert Culp is altogether splendid as the "guardian of the human race," in the gifted Harlan Ellison's much celebrated and often imitated HUGO-winning work for the ABC classic "The Outer Limits." Trent, not in fact a human with a computerized glass hand, but rather an entire robot, whom Ellison poetically describes as "neither man nor machine, waiting for the day he will be called to free the humans who gave him mobility, movement, but not life."
Below: Trent, "neither man nor machine," yet possesses the human element of longing for his crucial partner (Arline Martel as Consuelo Biros) in the restoration of the population of the planet Earth. Still, Consuelo recoils from him when she too learns that he is not human in flesh. The multi-talented Culp, whose simultaneous work as actor, writer, and director, was perhaps never more on grand display than in the NBC 1965-1968 espionage series "I Spy," has remained prolific in cinema and on television, with a more recent comic turn as Deborah Barone's father in the long-running and since much syndicated "Everybody Loves Raymond."
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NOTE: Larry James Gianakos will be discussing dozens of vintage television dramas, resurrected from the "Golden Age" and beyond, eventually at a Barnes and Noble bookstore near you. He also will be personally signing and inscribing any copies of the liner notes he authored for the 52-page collectible booklet accompanying Koch Vision's "Studio One Anthology," the first in a series of DVD sets made under the aegis of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences' Archive of American Television. Mr. Gianakos next appears on May 9, 2009, at the Barnes and Noble bookstore in Royal Oak, Michigan, 500 South Main Street, 48067; telephone: (248) 336-9490. Come join him, and share your own special resurrected memories on the best of American television!
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