Cheating on your wife while on a business trip gets you dropped off by a taxi in the rain on the wrong street - as it was for a plumbers convention, it was probably a form of pipe laying research, so was probably fine...
Moving along now, it also makes you more likely to be taken in from the chilly night by a local mortician.
"This ain't The Ambassador hotel asshole!"Inside the dim warmth of the un-named mortician - we'll call him 'Mort' - he invites an increasingly nervous Mr. Talmudge for a tour of his embalming facility. Mort has four new "clients", each one with it's own story. Engage flashback storytelling sequence..... now! I'll try to keep them brief.
"Dude, check this one out..." Case 1: Miss Sibiler. School teacher, child-hater.
Returning home from a day of hating children, she pops a roast in the oven. Hearing the door bell ring, she answers it to find nobody there. Back in the kitchen now, she realizes the radio she'd just switched on, was now off. Hmmm, strange.
In the shower with the radio back on, the old, "shadow over the shower curtain" trick startles her. There's nobody there, but the radio is again switched off. In a panic, she races back to the kitchen to find a knife and discovers the phone line has been cut and a door handle turning...
Kids! She's the victim of a childish prank! Man, she's pissed off. Hang on, there's a problem. The kids are big-tooth, drooling, zombified killers! And the house is crawling with them! Cause of death: Mauled by clowns.
Back to Mort and Talmudge with the intro to the next one...
Case 2: Mr Growski. Videographer, murderer.
This story takes place from the point-of-view of a video camera Growski has set up in the corner of his living room. Talking to the camera, he announces for the record that Julie is about to arrive, adding that she kind of good looking, but with not much going on up stairs.
Ding dong.... she arrives and meets Growski for the first time.
In order to show Julie a magic trick, Growski convinces her to slide out of her nylons - with his back turned, but in view of the camera. He walks her closer to the lens and tells her to shut her eyes. With an "Abracadabra!" and a quick strangulation, he magically makes her life disappear.
Some days later, Growski tells the camera that Carol is about to arrive. Will she suffer the same fate?
Yes.
Next is a high society type. Guess what happens. Knifed while on the phone?
Correct.
Returning to Mort and Talmudge again, we are now presented with one of Mort's favorites...
Case 3: The battle of wits.
Two of the world's top gumshoes, go head to head in a highly boring battle of one-up-manship.
An American detective - Toliver - who we meet first while solving the case of the hanging man in under five minutes. The second is McDowal, an inspector from Scotland Yard - who looked a bit like David Jason's 'Touch of Frost' character.
"Perfec'..."To cut a long story short. Captain America receives an anonymous note saying that there'd be a murder soon. McDowal asks if he can observe the investigation. It turns out that the McDowal was the note's author. Toliver wears bullets from McDowal's gun. Struggling from the floor, he reveals that he knew that McDowal was the killer, and via remote control, engages a James Bond-style knife from the back of the chair. Upon opening the now deceased McDowal's briefcase, he discovers a bomb with a five second timer and promptly becomes one with the wallpaper.
The opening of the last coffin lid transitions through to the last story...
Case 4: Dennis Cantwell.
Basically this guy gets a lesson in appreciating life a bit more. This one is more of a 'Saw' type of short film. Guy in a small featureless room being tormented by a wall of nails with only liquor to drink - bottles are rolled in to the room every now and then by an unknown supplier.
After the tenth bottle or so, the door opens to the street and Cantwell is let out looking like one of the tramps he so despises - and subsequently treated like one. "He eventually died", is the only explanation to his demise.
So there you go. Four coffins, four stories. All about people that could have been a bit nicer about things. Thinking this was the end of the film, the twist happened.
There was a final coffin with Talmudge's name on it! I got the sense that Mort was like Jigsaw from the 'Saw' movies. The puppet master behind the scenes. Talmudge was being taught a lesson about adultery by way of being shot in the alley behind the shop - by the husband of the woman he was knocking off.
Mort always gets his man.
One of the more fitting titles for this film was, 'The House of the Dead' - even that's a stretch - but I read somewhere that it was too similar to existing films around at the time. Why they chose 'Alien Zone' is a complete mystery. The zone Talmudge was in was pretty alien I suppose.
The other was, 'Last Stop on 13th Street.' Which I think is the coolest.
Gadgetry: With a name like 'Alien Zone' I though there might be. There isn't.
Favorite quote: Mort, when he says, "...The rain is a deceiver... a veil over reality"
Favorite bit: Miss Sibiler's over acting.
Bottom line: Four movies for the price of one. The mortician is more the glue that joins the four different stories together. At the beginning, I was sure the film was going to fall flat on it's face. It did a bit, but I liked a few of the flashback stories. All lessons about appreciating life without the ego. Not all that bad really.
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