Tim Hawkins Movies
- 1992
- PG13
Once-hot singing star Cyndi Lauper heads the cast of the Florida-based thriller Off and Running. Lauper plays a minor TV actress, Cyd Morse, who works nights as an underwater dancer at a posh Miami Beach hotel. While pitching woo with her boyfriend (José Pérez), Cyd is startled by the arrival of two hoods, who murder her man and prepare to do same to her. With a vital piece of evidence in her hot little hand, our heroine bolts her hotel room and runs off into the night. She enlists the reluctant aid of golfer Jack Cornett (David Keith), who tries to keep her from getting "iced" before she can reach the authorities. And guess what, kids? Cyd and Jack fall in love. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Cyndi Lauper, David Keith, (more)
- 1955
The title tells all in this seventh entry in Universal's "Ma and Pa Kettle" series. This time around, Ma (Marjorie Main) and Pa (Percy Kilbride) take their brood to Hawaii, where Pa is to take over management of his cousin's fruit processing operation. The villains are a group of rival businessmen who kidnap Pa and spirit him off to a remote island. Before long, however, it's the bad guys who need rescuing. Some of the funnier scenes involve Ma and Pa's Hawaiian counterparts, played by Hilo Hattie and Charley Lung. With this entry, Percy Kilbride bade adieu to the role of Pa Kettle, leaving Marjorie Main to carry on alone in the remaining two series installments. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Marjorie Main, Percy Kilbride, (more)
Lin McAdam (James Stewart) and his friend High-Spade (Millard Mitchell) arrive in Dodge City for a shooting contest, in which the prize is a perfectly manufactured Winchester repeating rifle, referred to as "One of a Thousand" -- a gun so fine that Winchester won't sell it. Lin runs across Dutch Henry Brown (Stephen McNally) in a saloon and the two would kill each other right there but for the fact that town marshal Wyatt Earp (Will Geer) has everyone's guns. Lin wins the rifle in an extraordinary marksmanship match-up with Brown, but the latter steals the prize from him and sets out across the desert. Thus begins a battle of wits and nerves, and a pursuit to the death. The roots and raw psychological dimensions of that chase are only exposed gradually, across a story arc that includes references to Custer's Last Stand, run-ins with marauding Indians, a heroic stand with a a shady but well-intentioned grifter (Charles Drake), and a meeting with murderous sociopath named Waco Johnny Dean (Dan Duryea), plus a romantic encounter with a young, golden-hearted frontier woman (Shelley Winters). All of these story lines eventually get drawn together neatly and gracefully by director Anthony Mann, who balances the violence of the events with a lyrical, almost poetic visual language. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi
- Starring:
- James Stewart, Shelley Winters, (more)
- 1949
In this drama, an embittered widow, a former concert singer, can't help but blame Lassie for her son's death. Needing help with her chores, she hires an orphan from the local home. At first she remains aloof towards the charming lad who quickly bonds with the collie dog, but as time passes she can't help but develop feelings for the boy. Later Lassie redeems herself when she saves the boy from a terrible fire in the orphanage. After that, the widow suddenly realizes that she does indeed love the boy and adopts him and puts Lassie back in her good graces. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Jeanette MacDonald, Lloyd Nolan, (more)
- 1949
Though one might have expected friction between MGM's resident "nice lady" Greer Garson and Warner Bros. notorious "bad boy" Errol Flynn, the two got along splendidly during the filming of That Forsyte Woman. Based loosely on The Man of Property, book one of John Galsworthy's Forsyte Saga, the film casts Garson as Irene Forsyte, the independently-minded wife of tradition-bound Victorian "man of property" Soames Forsyte (Flynn). Rebelling against her husband's repressed nature and preoccupation with material possessions, Irene falls in love with unconventional architect Philip Bossiney (Robert Young). When he proves to be too free-spirited even for her, Irene moves on to the Forsyte clan's black sheep, Young Jolyon (Walter Pidgeon). Soames makes a belated attempt to win his wife back, but once again proves incapable of warmth, compassion or understanding. The casting-against-type of Garson and Flynn was fascinating, even when the film itself dragged (Flynn in fact was slated to play either Bossiney or Young Jolyon, but insisted upon taking the less characteristic role of Soames). That Forstye Woman was lavishly photographed in color on MGM's standing "British" sets. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Errol Flynn, Greer Garson, (more)
- 1948
All of his life, Danny Hawkins (Dane Clark) has been taunted and mistreated by most of the people around him, enduring innumerable beatings and other humiliations as a boy because his father was a murderer who died on the gallows. He finds it not much better as an adult, living with his aunt in the small Virginia town of Woodville -- especially when he is contending for the attentions of young schoolteacher Gilly Johnson (Gail Russell) with his boyhood tormentor Jerry Sykes (Lloyd Bridges), whose bullying and arrogance are made worse (and more galling) by the fact that he's the son of the town banker (and its richest man). Sykes picks a fight with Danny and loses for the first time, but he dies in the process. Knowing how the town thinks of him because of his father, Danny tries to hide the body. But for all of his bitterness over how he's been treated, he can't truly escape the feelings of guilt over what he's done -- nor can he escape his fear of what people will probably think. For a time, his new romance with Gilly distracts him, but he's unable to put it out of his mind for long, especially when he's forced to join his good friend Mose (Rex Ingram) on a raccoon hunt that takes them right to the pond where the body is hidden. Soon the sheriff (Allyn Joslyn) is investigating, and he can't help but confer with the one man in town whose judgment he respects nearly as much as his own -- Danny. And when Danny's deaf-mute friend, Billy (Harry Morgan), unknowingly uncovers a key piece of evidence, Danny is pushed almost to the breaking point. He's driven by his own instincts to run away, and invite almost certain capture or death, but Gilly and the sheriff see this as a chance for Danny not only to free himself of the torment over what he's done but from the past that has haunted him and blighted his life -- if only they can reach him and make him understand. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi
- Starring:
- Dane Clark, Gail Russell, (more)
Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) returns home after a few years of knocking around the country following his divorce from good-time girl Anna (Yvonne De Carlo). Getting his old job back driving an armored car, and not even convincing himself that he's making a new start, he also wants his old wife back. When he finds Anna, he quickly learns that she is involved with gangster Slim Dundee (Dan Duryea). Nonetheless, they carry on a clandestine affair, with Steve foolishly believing that Anna will return to him. Even after she marries Slim, Steve, with her encouragement, masochistically clings to this doomed obsession. So when Slim catches them together, Steve ad libs plans for an armored car robbery that includes Slim. The two rivals form an uneasy and untrusting collaboration, but Steve and Anna plan to double cross Slim. However, the title of Robert Siodmak's film noir gem is, not incidentally, Criss Cross. ~ Steve Press, Rovi
- Starring:
- Burt Lancaster, Yvonne De Carlo, (more)
- 1946
Previously filmed in 1926 and 1934, George Kelly's venerable stage comedy The Show-Off was dusted off as a Red Skelton vehicle in 1946. Skelton is well cast as Aubrey Piper, an inveterate braggart who sorely annoys the family of his wife Amy (Marilyn Maxwell). All talk but no action, Piper gets Amy's family involved in one foredoomed get-rich-quick scheme after another. Through a fluke, the show-off actually makes good towards the end, but though he realizes that he could never have done so without his wife's help he insists upon blowing his own horn well past the fadeout and "end" credits. Only Skelton's inherent likeability saves Aubrey Piper from being a thoroughly obnoxious blowhard. Featured in the cast of The Show-Off is Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, who is given surprisingly little to do. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Leon Ames, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, (more)
- 1944
Moss Hart's hit Broadway play Winged Victory was brought to the screen in 1944, with most of its original cast intact. The story, concerning regular Joes from all walks of life joining the Army Air Force, is secondary to such theatrical setpieces as a camp show wherein several virile Hollywood leading men cavort about in drag. As a break from the all-male atmosphere, Hart adds a scene in which several wives and sweethearts discuss their fighting men; among these ladies is 23-year-old Judy Holliday. Reflecting the fact that most of the cast was actually serving in the Armed Forces at the time of filming, many of the actors are billed with their rank included: Pvt. Lon McAllister, Sgt. Edmond O'Brien, Cpl. Lee J. Cobb, and so on. While the patriotic elements of Winged Victory have faded in the intervening five decades, the film is worth a glance for its heady cast lineup of celebrities-to-be, including Peter Lynd Hayes, Red Buttons, Barry Nelson, and future director Martin Ritt. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Mark Daniels, Lon McCallister, (more)
