The first season of the new iteration of
Steven Spielberg’s 2020 reboot of his 1985 television series Amazing Stories comes to an end with the
season finale The Rift which circles
back somewhat by serving another time traveling story. Though the show already covered that ground
with the first episode, The Rift still
manages to be an exciting and fun effects-heavy entry touching on Spielberg’s E.T. and even leaves room for a
throwback to Close Encounters of the
Third Kind. While the third episode
of this new series remains my favorite, this was a solid way to close the door
on the first season by ending on a high note.
Directed by Mark Mylod (The Big White), The Rift
zeroes in on young stepmother Mary Ann (Kerry Bishé) who is traveling with her
stepson Elijah (Duncan Joiner) to see his aunt in Indiana after his father dies
in combat. Unbeknownst to the boy, Mary
Ann plans to leave him in the care of his aunt before abandoning him. Interrupting this plan is an inexplicable
event involving a WW2 fighter plane coming seemingly from out of nowhere before
crashing into a ditch nearby their vehicle.
Coming to the rescue of the pilot (Austin
Stowell) whose last memory consisted of a dogfight in the 1940s, the trio are
soon besieged by the military led by agent Bill Kaminski (Edward Burns) who
informs them of a time rift whose portal inadvertently transported the pilot to
modern day. Soon it becomes a race
against time to try and find a way to go back to his own time before the rift
closes and unintended consequences from the alteration of the spacetime
continuum affects mankind.
Easily the most saccharine offering in this
new series yet with familiar imagery harkening back to the filmmaker’s early
extraterrestrial movies as well as his own fixations on the Second World War, The Rift is by and large the most
overtly Spielberg influenced offering on the show yet. Mostly a showcase for Kerry Bishé who is
tasked with playing a troubled stepmom in over her head unsure of the right
decision to make regarding her stepson, it’s a difficult role which she more
than rises to the occasion for.
The
Rift calls
for old fashioned sentimentality and elements of the Spielberg thriller
including but not limited to that age old cliché of a character in hiding
disguising himself in another person’s clothing. Raiders
of the Lost Ark, anyone? Though
clearly treading on familiar ground, the last episode of the new Amazing Stories is a welcome dose of
Spielberg comfort food which can be trying for some but highly enjoyable for
longtime fans of the director. Yes it’s
clichéd and isn’t the first time we’ve seen this kind of story from Spielberg
yet it works for what it is anyway. For
my money I’ve really enjoyed this reboot series and am most definitely looking
forward to what comes next!
--Andrew Kotwicki
