Fairuza Balk Movies

Stefanie Powers does double duty as twin sisters in the two-part TV movie Deceptions. Stefanie #1 is a glamorous globetrotter; Stefanie #2 is a drab New Jersey housewife. On a whim, the two siblings exchange identities, leading to a dizzying series of unexpected complications. Filmed on location in England and Italy, Deceptions is too thin to be stretched over two days (it was originally telecast May 27 and 28, 1985), but Stefanie Powers can make anything work. The film is based on a novel by Judith Michaels (the joint pen name for Judith Barnard and Michael Fain); it was adapted for television by Oscar-winning writer/director Melville Shavelson, who also shared directorial responsibilities with Robert Chenault. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Local bullies find themselves the recipients of a Christmas miracle when they perform in the Christmas pageant. ~ Kristie Hassen, Rovi

Originally shown in two parts, this massive TV movie adaptation of C. David Heymann's biography stars Farrah Fawcett as Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton. With two failed marriages to her credit, 29-year-old Barbara marries film idol Cary Grant (James Read), the first man who loves her for herself and not her millions. This alliance goes the way of all of Barbara's romances; there will be four more marriages, the last when Ms. Hutton is 50-years-old. Shutting herself away in her Tangiers mansion, Barbara begins her long descent into the world of booze and drugs. Poor Little Rich Girl: The Barbara Hutton Story merely skims the surface of its subject's stormy life, but Farrah Fawcett's performance commands the audience's attention throughout the film's daunting 240 minutes. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The third adaptation of Choderlos de Laclos' classic novel Les Liasons Dangereuses, Milos Forman's Valmont was released one year after Stephen Frears' more famous version of the de Laclos original, Dangerous Liaisons. The plot remains the same: two debauched, depraved 18th century French aristocrats, the Vicomte de Valmont (Colin Firth) and the Marquise de Merteuil (Annette Bening), conspire to destroy several innocent lives, just for the fun of it. But whereas Stephen Frears concentrated on the machinations of the marquise, Forman, per his film's title, devotes most of his screen space to Valmont (played in the Frears version by John Malkovich). In fact, Forman's film concludes with Valmont's conscience-stricken renunciation of his past sins, and his duel to the death, rather than de Meurteil's well-deserved comeuppance. Forman has chosen to set the story back some 50 years, de-emphasizing the opulence that was vital to Frears' vision; he has also utilized a younger cast. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this drama, based on a true story, a New York educator has an affair with a manipulative peer and subsequently finds himself implicated in his wife's murder. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

In this drama, a town finds itself unable to keep its shameful secret any longer when a meddlesome female lawyer roars into town aboard her motorcycle and begins encouraging a rape victim to press charges. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

In this quirky drama a trio involved in a self-contained world revolving around a remote tollbooth in the Florida Keys. Jack, an aspiring policeman, works in the tollbooth. There he dreams of his new career and of starting a new life in Miami with his high school sweetie Doris. She works at the Gator Gas fuel depot down the road. She daydreams about her estranged father Leon and takes care of her mother Lillian who suffers from chronic depression. When not caring for her mom, Doris sees Dash, a bait salesman. Leon suddenly returns. A new toll collector, Vic, comes to the booth. He is a suspicious character and soon the state police are carefully watching him. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

In the mode of Quentin Tarantino, this film, directed by Gary Fleder from a script by Scott Rosenberg, concerns itself with hip, smart gangsters. The film is set in Denver, and the title comes from a Warren Zevon song. A retired, good-hearted gangster named Jimmy the Saint (Andy Garcia) runs a company that videotapes dying people giving life advice to their children and grandchildren, to be delivered when they come of age. Jimmy's former crime boss, The Man with the Plan (Christopher Walken), summons him. The Man is wheelchair-bound and doesn't have long to live; he explains that Jimmy owes him a favor and must perform one final job. It involves frightening the boyfriend of the ex-girlfriend of Bernard (Michael Nicolosi), the son of The Man, who has been so shaken by the girl's rejection of him that he has been fondling schoolyard children. Jimmy rounds up his old gang -- including Pieces (Christopher Lloyd), a porno theater projectionist; Franchise (William Forsythe), an ex-biker with a trailer-trash family to support; Critical Bill (Treat Williams), a psychotic, trigger-happy ex-con; and Easy Wind (Bill Nunn), an exterminator. Pieces and Bill pose as cops as part of the needlessly elaborate plan, which misfires badly. The Man, enraged, gives Jimmy 48 hours to leave town, and he orders his comrades wiped out, hiring the notorious hitman Mr. Shhh (Steve Buscemi) to track them down. But Jimmy can't seem to get the others to leave town, and despite The Man's decree, Jimmy is also reluctant to leave, because he's become romantically entangled with Dagney (Gabrielle Anwar). Jack Warden's character serves as a kind of Greek chorus who comments from time to time on the unfolding action. ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

On a remote tropical island, Dr. Moreau has appointed himself ruler over a menagerie of genetic mutants fashioned in his gene-splicing chamber of horrors. The products of his misguided attempt to create a more "pure" human species, the man-beasts worship Moreau as their god and "father" and live by his code of law -- a code rigidly enforced by radio-operated implants in their bodies capable of inflicting pain and death. Into this surreal nightmare arrives UN negotiator Edward Douglas (David Thewlis), the sole survivor of an airplane crash. Douglas is brought ashore on Moreau's island -- against his better judgment -- by the doctor's insane, drug-addled assistant, Montgomery (Val Kilmer), and eventually becomes a prisoner. Horrified by the doctor's monstrous experiments and afraid for his own life, Douglas seeks the aid of Moreau's lovely daughter, Aissa (Fairuza Balk), in escaping the island, but is foiled at every turn by Montgomery and his armed man-beast lackeys. Eventually, the creatures discover the existence of their electronic implants and remove them, providing the opportunity for an armed rebellion -- but eventual regression into their original animal state causes their revolt to collapse into anarchy. ~ Cavett Binion, Rovi

In this noir-influenced road movie, Jake (Robert Forster) is a criminal psychiatrist who has come to the conclusion that our lives are dictated primarily by chance, and has given himself over to this notion by making most of his decision by the flip of a coin. Sandra (Amanda Plummer) is a neurotic woman on her way to pick up her younger sister, a teenage delinquent named Alice (Fairuza Balk) when she's run off the road and left stranded by a madman named Santini (David Thewlis). When Jake happens by and Sandra asks him for help, Sandra is lucky at first: she wins the coin toss, and he elects to help her rather than kill her. When they have to make a stop, Sandra sees Santini's car parked by the side of the road; Santini catches Sandra as she tries to rip off some money that he's stashed in the car, and though she gets away, Santini isn't done with her yet. Director Paul Chart probably didn't have much trouble securing Amanda Plummer for the role of Alice: Chart and Plummer were married in 1994. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Tony Kaye made his feature directorial debut with this dramatic exploration into the roots of race hatred in America. In a shocking opening scene, teen Danny Vinyard (Edward Furlong) races to tell his older brother, neo-Nazi Derek (Edward Norton), about the young blacks breaking into his car in front of the house, whereupon Derek gets his gun and with no forethought shoots the youths in their tracks. Tried and convicted, Derek is sent away for three years in prison, where he acquires a different outlook as he contrasts white-power prisoners with black Lamont (Guy Torry), his prison laundry co-worker and eventual pal. Meanwhile, Danny, with a shaved head and a rebellious attitude, seems destined to follow in his big brother's footsteps. After Danny writes a favorable review of Hitler's Mein Kampf, black high-school principal Sweeney (Avery Brooks) puts Danny in his private "American History X" course and assigns him to do a paper about his older brother, who was a former student of Sweeney's. This serves to introduce flashbacks, with the film backtracking to illustrate Danny's account of Derek's life prior to the night of the shooting. Monochrome sequences of Derek leading a Venice, California gang are intercut with color footage of the mature Derek ending his past neo-Nazi associations and attempting to detour Danny away from the group led by white supremacist, Cameron (Stacy Keach), who once influenced Derek. Director Tony Kaye, with a background in TV commercials and music videos, filmed in L.A. beach communities. Rated R "for graphic brutal violence including rape, pervasive language, strong sexuality and nudity." ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

As with his previous films, comedian Adam Sandler and writing partner Tim Herlihy have conceived a simple premise, character, and title, and peppered their creation with visual sight gags. The story concerns Bobby Boucher, a Louisiana-born-and-bred kid living in the swamps with his overbearing, alligator-eating mom (Kathy Bates). Bobby is a water boy for the local college football team, and a damn good one, even good at turning a deaf ear at the ridicule he gets from the players and coach (Jerry Reed). But when Bobby is fired from his job, he is forced to continue his water management skills at the rival college, a losing team with a washed-up coach (Happy Days' "The Fonz," Henry Winkler). It's here that the coach teaches Bobby to channel his anger, and he makes a surprising discovery. The water boy can tackle like no one he's ever seen. Forced to keep his football talents from his mom, Bobby soon joins the college as a student and learns that there's more to life than alligator stew. He even falls for a perky ex-con (Fairuza Balk) who teaches Bobby about the birds and the bees. As Bobby leads his team toward victory, they get an invitation to play in the annual Bourbon bowl against his old college rivals. Bobby must choose between the love of his ailing mother and the glory of the final game -- or maybe there's a way he can get both. ~ Arthur Borman, Rovi

Writer and director Cameron Crowe's experiences as a teenage rock journalist -- he was a regular contributor to Rolling Stone while still in high school -- inspired this coming-of-age story about a 15-year-old boy hitting the road with an up-and-coming rock band in the early 1970s. Elaine Miller (Frances McDormand) is a bright, loving, but strict single parent whose distrust of rock music and fears about drug use have helped to drive a wedge between herself and her two children, Anita (Zooey Deschanel) and William (Patrick Fugit). Anita rebels by dropping out of school and becoming a stewardess, but William makes something of his love of rock & roll by writing album reviews for a local underground newspaper. William's work attracts the attention of Lester Bangs (Philip Seymour Hoffman), editor of renegade rock magazine Creem, who takes William under his wing and gives him his first professional writing assignment -- covering a Black Sabbath concert. While William is unable to score an interview with the headliners, the opening act, Stillwater, are more than happy to chat with a reporter, even if he's still too young to drive, and William's piece on the group in Creem gains him a new admirer in Ben Fong-Torres (Terry Chen), an editor at Rolling Stone. Torres offers William an assignment for a 3,000-word cover story on Stillwater, and over the objections of his mother (whose parting words are "Don't use drugs!"), and after some stern advice from Bangs (who says under no circumstances should he become friends with a band he's covering), Williams joins Stillwater on tour, where he becomes friendly with guitarist Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup) and singer Jeff Bebe (Jason Lee). William also becomes enamored of Penny Lane (Kate Hudson), a groupie traveling with the band who is no older than William, but is deeply involved with Russell. Lester Bangs and Ben Fong-Torres, incidentally, were real-life rock writers Crowe worked with closely during his days as a journalist. Almost Famous' original score was composed by Nancy Wilson of Heart (who is also Crowe's wife).
~ Mark Deming, Rovi