Paul Ryder Movies

This digital-video biopic uses the life of journalist, record mogul and club owner Tony Wilson to frame the story of the Manchester, England, music scene from the heyday of punk through the late-'80s "Madchester" era. As the founder of staunchly independent Factory Records, Wilson (Steve Coogan) shepherded the careers of doomed post-punk combo Joy Division, synth-pop superstars New Order and hedonistic louts the Happy Mondays. Along the way, he helped bring rave culture to Britain under the aegis of the legendary Hacienda nightclub. 24 Hour Party People follows Wilson from his conversion to punk at a seminal Sex Pistols concert through the suicide of Joy Division singer Ian Curtis, the overwhelming success of New Order and the eventual dissolution of the Factory empire thanks to bad business decisions, underworld ties and the hedonistic excess of the Happy Mondays. Directed by Michael Winterbottom and written by frequent collaborator Frank Cottrell Boyce, 24 Hour Party People features cameos from a large number of Manchester music luminaries. The supporting cast includes Shirley Henderson and John Simm, both of whom appeared in Winterbottom's Wonderland, while the film's title comes from a Happy Mondays song. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi

In this crime drama, a band of robbers hire a Yankee safecracker but he is captured and arrested by Scotland Yard before he gets there. The robbers then free him from prison. They do not realize that the inmate is really a decoy. They take him to the home of a married couple. After the wife kills her husband she tries to frame the decoy who escapes and ends up hiding in someone else's home. There he calls the head robber. He later cracks the save and retrieves secret government plans. The head robber then plans to kill the safecracker and take off with the murderous wife. Fortunately, the Yard intervenes and the decoy reveals himself. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

At a laboratory outside of a small village in the south of England, physicist Dr. Laird (Alec Mango), assisted by American scientist Gilbert Graham (Forrest Tucker), is performing a series of advanced experiments with magnetic fields -- dangerous experiments, using massive amounts of power in equipment which isn't designed to carry the load. An accident injures one of his assistants, and a request for a replacement to the Ministry of Defense brings Brigadier Cartwright (Windham Goldie) down to investigate, accompanied by a replacement for the injured man -- a woman computer expert, Michele Dupont (Gaby Andre), who helps to solve Laird's power problem, but not the larger risks inherent in his experiments. Cartwright is impressed when an interrupted experiment transforms several pieces of steel not in the test chamber into useless lumps of powder -- his report convinced the Deputy Defense Minister (Geoffrey Chater) to make Laird's project a top priority, and he sends a full security team, led by counter-espionage expert Jimmy Murray (Hugh Latimer), down to cover the laboratory. But it soon becomes clear that enemy agents are the least of the dangers manifesting themselves around Laird's project -- the hyper-magnetic fields that he has generated have been affecting the ionosphere, causing unnatural weather patterns, threatening ships at sea hundreds of miles away, and also weakening the magnetic layer that shields the surface of the earth from cosmic rays. The sudden burst of radiation from deep space causes brain damage in one man that turns him into into a homicidal maniac -- but it has also affected the insect life in the area, causing it to mutate. In the midst of this growing threat to the safety of the world, a mysterious Mr. Smith (Martin Benson) arrives in the village -- he's a well-spoken man with amazingly little knowledge of ordinary life, but a lot of awareness about magnetic fields and the work that Dr. Laird is doing. Murray is positive that he's a spy, but Gil and Michele decide that there's a lot less danger from him than from Dr. Laird, who has vowed to continue regardless of the risks. And even with Smith's warning, and Gil's and Michele's best efforts to alert the authorities and stop Laird, the forest adjacent to the town is soon swarming with gigantic beetles and other monsters. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi