The Outer Limits (1963–1965): Season 1, Episode 32 - The Forms of Things Unknown - full transcript

Two female friends poison a sadistic blackmailer, then while fleeing happen upon an isolated house containing a time machine. Kasha his lover, & Leonora the daughter of the blackmail target, fight to bury him before the idealistic inventor Tone is able to re-animate the murdered man, by tilting him back into the past.

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or sharpen it
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For the next hour,
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all that you see and hear.

You are about to participate
in a great adventure.

You are about to experience
the awe and mystery



which reaches from
the inner mind to...

Kassia.

Leonora.

Where's my drink?

Am I or am I not
going to get that drink?

Yes, Andre, you are.

Do you want to poison
yourself to death?

Kassia.

Leonora.
Come here, Leonora.

Come here, Leonora.

Give her the glass, Kassia.

Now... both of you
bring me my drink.

Kassia will pour.
Leonora will serve.

Come as you are.



In your fine stiletto heels.

Heh heh heh.

Heh heh heh heh heh.

Heh.

Kassia will pour,
and Leonora will serve.

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.

Aah!

Go put those things
back in the bar.

Then open the car trunk.

Take out the bags
and put 'em in the backseat.

Leave the trunk open.

He isn't dead.

He isn't dead!

He has to be.
That one leaf

could've murdered
a whole world of Andres.

Leonora, come here!

See for yourself.
He's dead.

All right.

You'll feel better
if you see for yourself.

He blinked.

Aah!

Leonora!

Leonora!

Get up.

We have to go.

No, I can't, Kassia.

You go with him.

Help him to do
what he intended to do.

Tell my father

I wouldn't debase him

by asking him to forgive me.

Your father will be
safe now, Leonora.

Andre is dead.

He blinked.

No, Leonora.

He could not
have blinked.

And I remember...

The position he was in.

My soul photographed it

just before
you closed the trunk.

So I remember.

His face was turned
the other way.

I moved it.

Just a moment ago.

To make sure
he wasn't alive.

And he wasn't?

No, Leonora.

He was not alive.

Aah!

Leonora!

Leonora!

Leonora!

Leonora!

Leonora!

Aah!

Leonora!

Oh!

Please!

Let me in!

Help me!

Please!

Please help me!

Let me in!

Please!

Please help me!

Do you want to tell
the world what we've done

and why we had to do it?

Our car broke down.
We were wondering

if we could
telephone a garage?

We have no telephone.

If you are wet,

come stand close
by the fire.

I wonder if others
can see your beauty

as I do.

Sometimes it seems

you have to be blind
to see beauty.

Where is it
coming from?

Ticks of time

from upstairs.

From a special room
upstairs.

It sounds...

Like a million
mad clocks.

My Mr. Hobart
tinkers with time.

Just as time has tinkered
with Mr. Hobart.

Who was it?

Who could it
have been?

No!

Aah!

Did you think
I was someone else?

Yes.

But she'd forgotten.

He's dead now.

"Such tricks have
strong imagination.

"But if it would but
apprehend some joy,

"it comprehends

"some bringer
of that joy.

"Or in the night,

"imagining some fear,

how easy is a bush
supposed a bear."

What are you doing
in this house?

I welcomed them in,
Mr. Hobart.

Could they leave
at once?

Or...

Will they spend
the night?

We'll go now.

We'll spend
the night.

We'll sleep here
on these sofas.

My name is Tone.

Please tell me your name.

My friend
is Leonora Edmond.

I'm Kassia Paine.

I'm sorry I frightened
you in the woods.

It was I.

You feel my hair.
It's still wet

from the rain.

Good night, Mr. Hobart.

Please do not need me

or needlessly disturb me.

I have a great deal
of work to do tonight...

Upstairs.

I feel...

As if I shouldn't
be here.

Why?

As if this house...

Has been waiting for me.

I'm afraid
I'll succumb to it.

Do you know why I didn't
leave him in the lake?

He would have floated
into someone's life.

Even in death, he'd find
a way to betray us.

This is the kind
of neighborhood

I was looking for...

A good neighborhood
for unmarked graves.

Where are you going?

I'm going to bury Andre.

How?

The fireplace tools.

And these.

No, no, I mean how?

Well, he isn't
in the trunk.

I saw as I ran by.
He wasn't there.

You didn't want
to see him,

so he wasn't there.

"Such tricks have
strong imagination."

Kassia...

My father could
never have submitted

to Andre's blackmail.

There would have been
a scandal,

and he would have
died of it.

But he'll be safe
from Andre now, won't he?

His world will be safe.

I can't help you bury Andre.

Nobody ever helps
a gravedigger.

No questions?

You're not the person
to ask them of.

Hobart, thinking: Leonora.

How did he die?

He was killed.

By you and Kassia Paine?

She begged Andre
to abandon his scheme,

begged him.

But he had those
heartbreaking letters

daddy had written
Kassia,

and he thought they
would be negotiable.

How was he killed?

She told me
to pick a leaf

off the Thanatos tree.

Thanatos means death.

How does one
get a poison leaf

into a blackmailer?

We put it into the shaker,

and we shook it.

Kassia poured...

I served...

And he drank.

I'll never forget his face.

He knew he'd drunk
something fatal,

and he went on smiling,

like a crushed clown.

I didn't think
he'd been drowned.

What did you say,
Mr. Hobart?

I've intruded
upon your reverie.

Forgive me.

I only came in to see
if you were comfortable.

Mr. Hobart?

Why do you keep
a useless clock?

Would you be very unhappy

if your murdered clown
came...

Suddenly back to life?

How could he?

All dead things
were once alive.

In the past.

In the past.

The past is gone.

Is it?

Suppose the past

and the present

are 2 separate time-cycles

coexisting,

coiling about us
concurrently.

Then all one
need do is...

Is cause a slight tilt.

Tilt it one way,

the present would
slide into the past.

Tilt it the other,

the past would tumble
into the present,

and with it
would come past things

as they were
before they died.

Yes, Miss Edmond,

it can be done.

It has been done.

For one fraction

of a fraction of a moment,

the cycles were tilted.

The past slid
into the present.

And I tumbled
back to life.

If I can make it happen
again, Miss Edmond,

and again

and again,

think of the...

The lost ones
I can bring back,

the great
and the dear lost ones.

I'm going
to show you my workshop

where it happened,

where it may
happen again.

Don't you want him
to be alive again?

Who?

Your clown.

Andre.

You're not a murderess,
Miss Edmond.

If you were,
you'd feel no guilt

at the...

At the simple,
expedient removal

of a clown
and a blackmailer.

Come.

See him live again.

The guilt will slip
out of your heart.

Aah!

Kassia!

Could someone
have dragged his body

down the stairs
and out of the house

without you or I
having seen or heard?

It's been
a noisy rain.

I saw Kassia Paine
leave.

With the tools.

I remember being
sadly amused

imagining her wonder

when she opened
the empty trunk.

I came in here then,

and I did not
hear her return

to fetch the body.

Nor did you, Colas.

No.

Nor did I.

You didn't take
the body away, Colas?

No.

I did not.

He tumbled back,

just as I did.

I told you, Colas.

I told you
it was no accident.

He was dead,
and now he's alive.

He's out there
somewhere...

Alive.

I better go and find him

and explain it
all to him.

Did you scream
my name?

Did you bury him,
Kassia?

I heard your scream.

Your fingernails
are clean.

I heard my friend
scream for me.

Why did she scream?

If you would listen
to an old blind man,

he would tell you

to leave this house
at once.

Why?

It is my house.

You mistook me
for a servant.

There is
so little difference

between a host
and a servant.

Mr. Hobart
has been my guest

for almost a year.

He stumbled
upon my house

in the dead of night,

just as you did.

He was in flight,

just as you were.

A blind man's house
is a good hiding place.

Was it Mr. Hobart?

You need not
fear Mr. Hobart.

It's the other who
is a danger to you,

the one who drank
your poison drink.

I told them.

About Andre?

No. How can you tell
anyone about Andre?

I told about
our murdering Andre.

Wouldn't it have
been wiser not to?

I didn't intend to.

Somehow...

They pushed
into my dream.

They hovered over me.

And I couldn't move on

until I'd answered
Mr. Hobart's questions.

Well, it doesn't
really matter.

Mr. Hobart may be able

to hypnotize an anxious,
susceptible girl,

but he is not
a policeman.

He can do more
than hypnotize, much more

and much worse.

He has found a way
to tilt time.

He can make the past

slide into the present.

He can bring back
the dead

as they were
before they died.

He has brought Andre back...

As he was
before we killed him.

Andre is dead, Leonora.

Dead and buried?

He wasn't in the trunk,
was he, Kassia?

He was in the trunk,
Leonora.

No, he wasn't!

He got out! He's alive!

Andre is alive!

Again!

I can hear him...

Walking around us

back and forth.

I've been listening,

and I've been hearing him.

Listen!

Now!

Leonora!

Listen!

I remember it
as if I had seen it.

He had screamed
in his delirium.

And I confess my own life
had been so bleak

and so undirected,

that I was
shamelessly happy

to hear even
a delirious scream.

His lifeless form
had been hanging there

for almost a week,

bound to
his time-tilting device

by rare, magnetic wires.

He had no food...

No water.

It was a cold time.

When he had died
for want

of more than
bodily sustenance,

I unfastened him

and carried him
to his bed.

Something had brought
him back to life?

His time-tilting device
had done it.

Somehow,

almost accidentally,

his genius had broken
the fixed laws

of the science of time.

His device had caused
the cycles

of time to tilt,

and he slid out
of the dead past

into the lively present.

Oh, thank you.

When did the rain stop?

Almost the moment
you came in out of it.

You can go now.

Quickly.

Yes.

Quickly.

Thank you
for your kindness

and for
your hospitality.

Kassia.

Stay here, Leonora.

Till morning.

I'll be finished
by then.

No, we will go now.

As we've been asked.

You can wait in the car

while I bury him.

He was brought back
to life.

Mr. Hobart?

Andre.

Refill, please.

Aah!

Aah!

Leonora...

Mr. Hobart?

Mr. Hobart!

Mr. Hobart?

Mr. Hobart!

Are you steady now, Colas?

Yes.

He said you were
run down by his car.

Are you hurt,
Mr. Hobart?

No.

I merely fell aside
as he sped away.

I was trying
to explain to him

how he'd been dead

and how I had
brought him back to life.

He was amused.

He wasn't
terribly interested.

Said he was itching
to find his young ladies.

Let me help you
to the house, Mr. Hobart.

That kind is best left
in the past, Colas,

in the dead, harmless quiet

of the past.

I'm sorry
I brought him back.

I was wrong
to bring him back.

You couldn't have known
he was a thing of such evil.

Help me up, Colas.

I'm going to undo
what my blindness has done.

I'm going to go
and kill him.

What did you put
in my drink, Kassia?

A leaf.

Of the Thanatos tree?

Yes.

No wonder
it killed me.

Why did you want
to kill me, Kassia?

Wasn't ours
a beautiful love affair?

Yes.

Until it became
a conspiracy.

Oh, sooner or later,

every love affair
becomes a conspiracy.

I had decided
I did not want

to hurt Leonora's father
after all.

Or Leonora.

They're touching,
and they're decent,

and they had
the artless courage

to become my friends.

But I brought
you together

for the sole purpose
of hurting them.

In the pocketbook,

where hurting
hurts most.

We won't
destroy him, Andre.

He destroyed
himself.

Oh...

You're a sleek sack
of sin, Kassia.

Men like
Leonora's father

should never
write letters

to girls like you.

It's self-destructive.

Self-destruction
is a luxury

which no man should
be permitted to enjoy...

Free of charge.

Why didn't you
stay dead?

Run, Leonora.

We must hurry!

It's spring
in England, Kassia.

Let's not Miss
a juicy, rich minute of it.

Andre, you have
such richness.

So many have
given you so much.

You don't need
an old man's wealth.

I have planes and boats...

And villas and jewels...

All the cacophonies
with which beggar boys

drown out the groan
of insecurity.

I am rich.

But I am noisy rich,
Kassia,

and I want
to be quiet rich.

You have to be
heir to that, Andre.

You can't be born
in the sewers

of a noisy world

and grow up to be
anything other

than a noisy,
sewer-minded man.

You have pierced
the heart

of my psychic disorder.

And now we
truly must go.

Leonora.

Leonora.

Perhaps she died.

Then our host will simply
have to bring her back to us.

Close the doors, Colas,

and lock them from without.

Please?

I'm sorry
I brought you back.

I was wrong
to bring you back.

Do you intend
to right your wrong?

Yes.

With that?

No.

With this,
I shall persuade you

to return to my workshop.

I'll try to slant
the cycles the other way.

I'll try to send him
back into the past.

I imagine hell will
be glad to take you back.

You're one of its own.

Would you be
willing to go back?

London bridge
is falling down

falling down,
falling down

we cannot
wait for Leonora.

The wind
is dirty, Colas.

Will you close
the door, please?

Colas.

You should've seen
that my time device

would become
an instrument of evil.

How could I have seen?

I am blind.

Blinds see
those dark things.

So many loved people
have died, Colas,

in my time
and before my time.

It seemed to me

all those endings
were untimely.

I worried about
what would become

of all the love left over.

And so I built
an antidote...

And allowed it
to resurrect an evil clown.

I am not the man
to tinker with time, Colas.

No man is that man.

That man is God.

Good-bye, Colas.

Where are you going,
Mr. Hobart?

I'm going back...

Into the past...

The dead, harmless quiet
of the past.

I thank God...

That kindness is blind.

Did you read it?

I wrote it when I was
very young.

It reads...

"Dearest father,

"do not be angry with me

"for leaving school.

"I am interested only
in experimenting

"with ways to bring
dead people back to life.

"I want to bring
mother back.

"Your loving son,

Tone."

Leonora!

Leonora, he's dead!

He's really dead!

Come and see, Leonora!

This time, he's dead!

Andre is dead, Leonora!

Andre is dead!

Will you destroy
the device

for me, Leonora,

after it has sent me
back into death?

Don't go. Stay!

Please, I need you!

Someone has to...

Has to break those wires

and smash those clocks.

Dangerous devices should
not be left lying around

when the devisor
has gone.

Aah!

He is dead, Leonora.

Andre is dead.

All of that evil
is finally dead.

Aah!

No, don't
destroy it yet!

After I've used it!

Oh, don't hurt it!

I need it!

To slide me back
into death.

Aah!

We now
return control

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until next week
at this same time,

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