Captain James T Kirk (William Shatner):
Risk is part of the game. You want to sit in that chair?
— Rick Berman
Tag: psychology
When you came to worship me, who asked you to parade through my courts with all your ceremony?
… I want no more of your pious meetings.
— New Living Translation
Spoiler alert: While it’s hard to imagine that the torture scene in Casino Royale is much of a surprise to anyone, that’s what we’re talking about here. So, stop reading here if that sort of discussion might spoil anything for you.
For the rest of us— I wanted to let you know that the words, “Don’t Le Chiffre me” have already crossed my lips since seeing the latest James Bond 007 film feature yesterday. It’s a guy thing, calling someone on what is, I admit, usually a mere verbal jibe.
Nothing physical, let alone below-the-belt. Thank God!
To be “La Chiffred” (pronounced “la-sheef-ed”) connotes the even greater context conveyed through the Casino Royale torture scene. La Chiffre is an opponent who cheats to get the upper hand. He attacks only after his henchmen have secured position on his behalf. Then, with no sense of boundaries, come his low blows, so to speak.
James Bond 007, secure in his masculinity and unyielding to such an unworthy opponent, mocks Le Chiffre.*
This is the the fullest message conveyed when labeling your experience at the hand of an adversary has La Chiffred. For the perpetrator, clearly a moniker of shame.
Application:
It can unmask behavior, call it to account, suggesting the question, “You’ve crossed a line. Do you really want to go there?” Or, more harshly, “You’ve already passed the point of no return: Stop before your friends see you scratching around in a way that’s more humiliating to you than anyone else.”
When you see La Chiffred appear in context elsewhere, remember that you read about it here, first.
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* An oversimplification I reserve the right to address later, elsewhere; necessary here to keep this article on topic.
Many parents try so hard to boost ‘self-esteem’ that they forget where it comes from. We feel good about ourselves when we’re effective in the world. Help your son acquire the skills and knowledge he needs to succeed ….
An inflated sense of self-worth without underlying abilities is useless, if not dangerous.
Life can radically change in a matter of seconds. Consequences ripple beyond our wildest anticipation.
What if you could stop that moment and study it?
That’s the premise of this exceptional episode of The Outer Limits. Earth is being monitored by subtly-placed operatives from a highly intelligent, advanced race of Martians. It’s been a quiet job for our man in the field, “Diemos,” who’s blended-in among us by passing himself off as a nondescript pawn shop proprietor.
But now he’s been ordered to give complete cooperation to a superior from Mars, “Inspector Phobos.” A “controlled experiment” has been authorized to help Mars understand the motives, nature, and consequences of murder.
Not a big deal in and of itself.
But what if it led to something more serious?
So we’re going to take a close look. “Martian Computer Control Probability Division” has projected with 99% certainty that one of these will occur just four blocks from Diemos’ storefront.
The setup for “Controlled Experiment” is at once creative, charming, and straightforward. The science fiction fan will be appeased, yet those who might otherwise avoid the genre are at no risk of getting lost or bored with the gadgetry of it. A suitcase-sized “Miniaturized Temporal Condenser” serves as the touchstone device for capturing real-life events a’la present day VCR. No antennae or silly makeup for these alien visitors here either, respecting the audience’s ability to accept the setup without going over the top.
Initial finding? The motive for this murder is jealousy, and the fatal shot is fired by a drop-dead gorgeous blond staked out in a hotel lobby awaiting arrival of her philandering boyfriend via elevator.
He steps out. Words are exchanged.
Bang!
Dead.
Can that be all there is to it?
The richness of this story is in the characters, their emotions and their growth. Diemos exhibits authentic deference to his superior that rings true of just about any organizational hierarchy. Timeless.
Yet there’s something else here, too. A warmth and genuine desire to bridge the culture gaps between his home planet of Mars and the people of Earth, in a personal way, for Phobos. Before leaving the pawn shop, Diemos introduces Inspector Phobos to Earth indulgences of coffee and cigarettes. The latter with a pitch so enthusiastic that borders on needing a Surgeon General’s Warning.
Further into the plot, there’s a bit in the hotel lobby where Diemos softly corrects Phobos on a local idiosyncrasy — and his superior thanks him. True respect in a way you seldom see among the Dilbert-style bosses of the real world, struggling to impersonate behavior they took notes on during last weeks “team” training.
Humor dialogue is spot-on as well; no laugh track, and never gratuitous. Here’s how the plot is advanced through a question regarding the role played by others in the hotel lobby vis-à-vis the murder.
“Ah, yes,” Diemos answers in perfect deadpan. “They’re ‘innocent bystanders.’ It’s a tradition. Each one tells a different version of what happened.”
Later, as Phobos’ confusion mounts at the senselessness of murder, he and Diemos follow the boyfriend backward in time — up the elevator and back to the lips of another woman.
Passionate one moment, dead the next?
This makes no sense to the inspector.
“The only scientific law that applies to kissing and shooting is the principle of uncertainty,” muses Diemos.
As special effects go, the Miniaturized Temporal Condenser can be a bit over the top with its screeching, bright lights; acting, too, is in some scenes a bit over the top. But if your inner-nitpicker can be quelled, I would argue that the impact fundamentally shows the effort and seriousness involved in manipulating time under any circumstances.
So it’s not Rod Taylor in The Time Machine or Doc Brown in his DeLorean?
Nope. Nor does it have to be.
The bigger risk in a plot like this is getting through buildup to the final act without failing to deliver. We studied murder, motive, and means, but something’s gotta pay us off for having invested the time in this.
No worries. The Outer Limits shines throughout its “Controlled Experiment.” Twice. I won’t spoil the ending, but I will leave you with one of the two questions that sets it up.
What if you could make it so the murder never happened?
- Overall grade: A
- Engaging look at motives, assumptions, and actions — with a strong and clever “What if?” finish.
Production
The Outer Limits, “Controlled Experiment (1963), Leslie Stevens. Written and directed by Leslie Stevens. Starring Barry Morse (Inspector Phobos), Carroll O’Connor (Diemos), and Grace Lee Whitney.
JR Ewing (Larry Hagman):
I’m sorry, Daddy. I let you down. I just flat gave up.
Back there at that swamp — you were gone. It was all over. Didn’t seem like there was anything worth going on for for me.
And I almost forgot—.
You left us something; you left us the company. You built Ewing Oil from the ground up. And whatever it took — you did it for Ewing Oil. And I’m gonna do the same. I’m gonna pass it on bigger and stronger to my son.
I’m back, Daddy.
And nobody’s gonna take Ewing Oil away from me, or my son, or his son.
“I swear to you: By God, I’m gonna make you proud’a me.
— Leonard Katzman, Dallas
Love of bustle is not industry.
The king had two sons — one an optimist, the other a pessimist. The king gave the pessimist everything he desired, and he gave the optimist a room full of horse manure.
The pessimist was despondent because he no longer had anything to look forward to. The optimist was as happy as he could be. ‘With all this manure,’ he said, ‘there must be a pony in here somewhere.’
Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life.
The Martian troops, moreover, had no control over where there ships were to land. Their ships were controlled by fully automatic pilot-navigators, and these electronic devices were set by technicians on Mars so as to make the ships land at particular points on Earth, regardless of who awful the military situation might be down there.
The only controls available to those on board were two push-buttons on the center post of the cabin — one labeled on and one labeled off. The on button simply started the flight from Mars. The off button was connected to nothing. It was installed at the insistence of Martian mental-health experts, who said that human beings were always happier with machinery they thought they could turn off.
— The Sirens of Titan