Cheap The Twilight Zone: Long Distance Call/ I Sing The Body Electric (Video) (Ida Lupino, Alvin Ganzer, Richard Donner, Allen Reisner, John Rich, William F. Claxton, Ralph Nelson, Bernard Girard, David Greene, Don Medford) Price

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Customer Reviews of The Twilight Zone: Long Distance Call/ I Sing The Body Electric

Wanting To Love and Be Loved
I SING THE BODY ELECTRIC was Ray Bradbury's sole contribution to the "Twilight Zone." One of the more subtle episodes, this story is strong on characterization and reaches out on an emotional level rather than to any notion of scientific curiosity of the introduction of a robot grandmother, beautifully played by Josephine Hutchinson, into a family (including Veronica Cartwright). This is a very good episode and is one of my favorites. LONG DISTANCE CALL written by Charles Beaumont and William Idelson is one of the six episodes recorded directly to videotape instead of being photographed on film. The story concerns a little boy played by Billy Mumy who communicates with his dead grandmother over his toy phone. It examines our attachment to those we love and what emotional price we sometimes must pay for that love.

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A pair of Grandmothers from the Twilight Zone
The two "Twilight Zone" episodes offered up on this tape certainly have something in common, namely a pair of quite unusual grandmothers. Billy Mumy makes his first appearance on the Zone in "Long Distance Call," written by William Idelson and Charles Beaumont. Billy gets a toy telephone for his birthday from Grandma Bayles (Lili Darvas), who promptly gets ill and dies. Sad for a while, Billy suddenly spends all his time on the toy telephone, claiming Grandma is on the other end. When Billy tries to kill himself because the voice on the phone told him to, his father (Philip Abbott) grabs the phone and begs his dead mother to let Billy stay in the land of the living. Josephine Hutchinson plays a kinder, gentler but android Grandmother in "I Sing the Body Electric," written by Ray Bradbury from his short story. David White plays a widower who buys Grandma to take care of his three children and the focus of the story is on Anne (Veronica Cartwright), who refuses to accept the substitute for her dead mother. Hutchinson's performance is on target from start to finish. I think these are both above average Zone episodes, especially the first one, which I consider one of the most chilling episodes. So you are certainly getting diverse opinions offered up on this one!

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Not the best collection
Don't get me wrong, the Twilight Zone is fantastic, but the episodes contained on this particular volume are hard to enjoy for some people. The first episode, "Long Distance Call", stars little Billy Mumy as a young boy (appropriately named "Billy") who finds a way to communicate with his dead grandmother on a toy telephone. At first, it sounds like he's just pretending, but when Billy tries to commit suicide, it seems this may be for real, and maybe his grandma is trying to take Billy away to the great beyond. This episode is powerful, but drips in sentimentality (not something I enjoy in a TZ episode) About average; may satisfy some. But the second episode, "I Sing the Body Electric" is TERRIBLE. It's about a family who orders a mechanical "Grandmother" to their specifications, but one girl named Anne (played by Veronica Cartwright) rejects her. This episode is not worth seeing. The story is lousy, The episode is too sentimental, and the acting is poor. All in all, this volume of the Twilght Zone Collection is not as good as others, so buyer, beware.