The Gift (The Twilight Zone)

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“The Gift”
The Twilight Zone episode

Scene from "The Gift"
Episode no. Season 3
Episode 97
Written by Rod Serling (Based on his original script "I Shot an Arrow Into the Air".)
Directed by Allen H. Miner
Guest stars Geoffrey Horne : Williams
Nico Minardos : Doctor
Edmund Vargas : Pedro
Cliff Osmond : Manuelo
Paul Mazursky : Officer
Vladimir Sokoloff : Guitarist
Vito Scotti : Rudolpho
Carmen D'Antonio : Woman #1
Henry Corden : Sanchez
Lea Marmer : Woman #2
Joe Perry : Man #1
David Fresco : Man #2
Featured music Laurindo Almeida
Production no. 4830
Original airdate April 27, 1962
Episode chronology
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"The Trade-Ins" "The Dummy"
List of Twilight Zone episodes

"The Gift" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.

Contents

[edit] Opening narration

“ The place is Mexico, just across the Texas border, a mountain village held back in time by its remoteness and suddenly intruded upon by the twentieth century. And this is Pedro, nine years old, a lonely, rootless little boy, who will soon make the acquaintance of a traveller from a distant place. We are at present forty miles from the Rio Grande, but any place and all places can be--the Twilight Zone. ”

[edit] Synopsis

A humanoid alien crash-lands outside a mountain village just across the Texas-Mexico border. He accidentally kills a police officer and is wounded by another. When he reaches a village bar, he collapses. A sympathetic doctor operates on him, removing two bullets from his chest.

The alien (who refers to himself as "Mr. Williams") becomes friends with Pedro, an orphan whose job is to clean the bar. Pedro receives a gift from Williams, who tells Pedro that he will explain it later.

Meanwhile, the bartender notifies the army about Williams' location. Williams attempts to escape, but soldiers and villagers corner him. He tells Pedro to show the gift, but it is taken from him and set on fire, and Williams is shot and killed. The doctor picks up the remains of the gift from the fire. He reads it aloud: "Greetings to the people of Earth: We come.... in peace. We bring you this gift. The following chemical formula is.... a vaccine against all forms of cancer..."

The rest is burned away. As the doctor states, "We have not just killed a man; we have killed a dream."

[edit] Closing narration

“ Madiero, Mexico, the present. The subject: fear. The cure: a little more faith. An Rx off a shelf--in the Twilight Zone. ”

[edit] Allusions

 This article or section may contain original research or unverified claims.
Please improve the article by adding references. See the talk page for details. (September 2007)

There are definite references and allusions peppered through the episode in reference to Christ, where the alien is a supposed picture of Christ. Pedro and the alien speak of God and how He sent Christ down onto the world once. When the doctor finds out that the bartender has alerted the army of the alien's presence, he claims that at the bartender's baptism, they improperly named him and should have called him "Judas." After the claim, the bartender continues to count his coined money, a probable reference to Judas selling out Jesus for thirty pieces of silver. Also, the alien's vaccine book to cure cancer could be seen as a parallel to Christ coming to cure spiritual death.

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