By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO – “Time Enough at Last,” one of my favorite Twilight Zone episodes, starred Burgess Meredith as a bank clerk who wanted nothing more than time to read. He was down in the bank vault doing just that when the world ended for all those aboveground. After he recovered from the shock, he made his way to the New York City Library and in anticipation of having “time enough at last” to read, he sorted books into different stacks, intellectually drooling over his supposed good fortune. But then, tragedy struck: he smashed his eye glasses.
In a way, the Reed Morano movie I Think We’re Alone Now starring Peter Dinklage and Elle Fanning seems is an ode to that famous Twilight Zone episode. Dinklage plays Del, an order-obsessed library employee who continues at his job sorting and shelving books even after the apocalypse has left him as the only living human in town. He goes from house to house, where he retrieves library books that are overdue as well as books owned by the deceased former occupants of the homes which the library needs for its collection.
As part of his mission to “clean” the town, Del wraps the decaying bodies he finds into sheets and blankets, transports them to a field where he has dug graves with a skip loader, and buries them unceremoniously. He spray paints an X on the street in front of each home he has cleaned. Sometimes, he removes from the houses, family photographs which he places into file folders kept in his office at the library.
The library is situated on a lake where the fish have survived. As part of his regular routine, Del fishes for his dinner. He also helps himself to bottles of wine and to unexpired groceries at the local supermarket. His life, alone, has taken on a familiar routine, one with which Del is quite satisfied.
And then, Grace portrayed by Elle Fanning appears. Ordinarily, they might not have been attracted to each other. She is a beautiful, tall, slender blonde. He is an intense-looking little person, coming barely up to her chest. He does not notice an unusual lattice work of scars on the back of her neck. Naturally reserved, Del does not at first welcome Grace into his life. He may have been alone, but he wasn’t lonely. However, she is persistent, and eventually they develop a platonic partnership “cleaning” the town and attempting to restore a sense of order from the chaos.
Grace, however, is not from around the part of the country where Del lives. He thinks they are the last survivors of the human race, but she knows better.
This is a movie with very sparing dialogue. It is carried along by its cinematography and by the suspense the audience feels over whether this seemingly mismatched couple will decide to re-populate the planet. However, outside forces abruptly intrude upon their relationship.
How this absorbing drama turns out will become apparent to viewers when the movie comes to theaters across the country on September 21.
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com