The Twilight Zone logo from the 1960s. (Photo Source: National Library Service)
Wikipedia describes each episode of The Twilight Zone as: “a standalone story in which characters often find themselves dealing with often unusual or disturbing events, an experience described as entering The Twilight Zone.” While each episode concludes with a surprise sending and/or a moral, great pleasure can be derived from the “disturbing events” or flirting with the paranormal which is at the heart of the series. Like much of The Twilight Zone oeuvre “The 16 Millimeter Shrine” is also about wish fulfillment of a most desperate kind.
In this episode, aging former movie queen Barbara Jean Trenton (Ida Lupino) is becoming detached from reality. Living as a recluse she spends the majority of her time watching reruns of her films from the glory days of the 1930s. However, it’s gotten beyond the point of just reminiscing about the past. She sits in a darkened room of her mansion imbibing cocktails from morning till night, avoiding nourishment and sleep. This no doubt contributes to her deteriorating emotional state. The housekeeper is also very concerned about Barbara Jean’s condition and expresses this concern to her agent Danny Weiss (Martin Balsam).
He wants to help revive her career as much as possible so she will forget about her increasingly morbid obsession with past achievements and youth. Unfortunately, the meeting he arranges between her and her former studio boss from all those years ago does not go well — to phrase it politely. Apparently, they had never gotten on well in the past when Barbara Jean was still a big star. As happens so much in life (and particularly the realm of show business) intervening years between old adversaries have not been kind. Ego clashes, insecurities neurosis, and narcissism take center stage which poisons the well of cooperation and understanding.
She refuses to accept a smaller character role in a new film mainly because this would result in reduced eminence for her. Aging and the relentless onward march of time punishes all of us cruelly – sooner or later. That’s exactly what fascinates me so much about this episode and what Barbara Jean finds impossible to cope with. We can only move forward to eventual oblivion which is a very unpleasant prospect to contemplate. After all, none of us is completely sure of what comes next after our earthly presence ends. No matter how well our lives might go personally and professionally, nobody remains on top of anything forever. Decline is always on the horizon. “The 16 Millimeter Shrine” is glaringly potent in this respect.
Show business personalities are especially vulnerable to encroaching age and fading careers. It’s hardly surprising that a profession so focused on good looks, youthful vibrancy, and make-believe can often result in them retreating to the past, focusing on previous laurels. Although not a performer, I find it easy to relate to this mindset. Being the neurotic person that I am, fearing old age and death I feel empathy for the Barbara Jean character although at the same time her conceit is somewhat cringe worthy to watch. This is particularly telling late in the episode when her agent sets up a meeting with one of her former romantic costars, Jerry Herndan (Jerome Cowan) from when they made two popular films together.
Herndan was the only one who was still alive or hadn’t moved away over the years. After Barbara Jean reluctantly agrees to meeting Herndan at her home, it’s unforgettable how deeply the shock and disappointment registers in her reaction to how much he had aged between 1934 and 1959. It wasn’t just the physical changes he had undergone that were so disconcerting. She also could not fathom that he was now running a chain of supermarkets outside of Chicago. The perceived loss of glamour and that the charmed lifestyle of being a movie star was over for him was too much for her to handle. Unlike her, he was able to accept that circumstances had changed and moved on.
In a way, “The Sixteen Millimeter Shrine” is a bit comical though. For being the one so obsessed with age and losing beauty, Barbara Jean scarcely appears to have aged much at all. There is little change in her appearance when comparing her watching herself in old films from the 1930s to her present day incarnation. So, this makes the story a bit absurd and not entirely convincing in that respect. On another note, though, I’ve always thought that the ability of humans to put voice and pictures on film has an otherworldly quality to it, and also is part of another dimension. It’s ironic that while humans are mortal – film can live forever if properly cared for. Looking at images on unprocessed film also has a ghostly, spooky element to it and that always comes to mind when I watch Twilight Zone episodes and especially this one.
In any event, whether we like it or not life cannot be the script of a movie or tv show. In the end there are no edits, redos, or rewrites. Once, a few months before her untimely death Marilyn Monroe, one of the biggest stars ever stated: “in the end gravity gets us all.” That sentiment ties in well with “The Sixteen Millimeter Shrine” but what becomes of Barbara Jean is what makes The Twilight Zone such memorable programming and I won’t spoil that here for anyone that hasn’t watched it yet!
