Andre Philippe Movies
Paul Mazursky directed this comedy, which blends a broad satire of the film industry with a thoughtful tale of a middle-aged man looking back on his life's failures. Harry Stone (Danny Aiello) is a film director who desperately needs a hit -- so desperately that he gets talked into directing an inane sci-fi film about a group of farm kids (led by Ally Sheedy) who grow an enormous pickle that they turn into a spaceship, allowing them to visit the planet Cleveland (ruled by Little Richard and his right hand man, Griffin Dunne) where everyone eats nothing but meat. Convinced that the film will flop, Harry is in a state of panic as he returns to New York with his Parisian girlfriend Francoise (Clotilde Courau), a mere 20 years his junior, and visits his ex-wife Ellen (Dyan Cannon); his mother Yetta (Shelley Winters); and his son Gregory (Chris Penn). Meanwhile Harry flashes back on his childhood and the film he could have made of it, and pitches his dream film (a historical epic about the life of Montezuma) to studio executives, who instead want him to make a movie kids can relate to. The Pickle was filmed in 1991, but only received a token theatrical release two years later. Actually, the sci-fi story with Little Richard as the undisputed ruler of Cleveland looks like it might have been an ideal vehicle for Edward D. Wood Jr.. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Danny Aiello, Dyan Cannon, (more)
Woody Allen and Bette Midler star as a well-heeled couple who spend their 16th wedding anniversary at the mall shopping for a party that they're throwing that night. In the course of the shopping afternoon, they watch their marriage hit the rocks as serious problems develop when the guy admits to an earlier infidelity, and an out-and-out argument develops. ~ All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bette Midler, Woody Allen, (more)
Down and Out in Beverly Hills is an updated remake of the 1932 Jean Renoir film Boudu Saved From Drowning. Philandering businessman Dave Whiteman (Richard Dreyfuss) rescues scraggly tramp Jerry Baskin (Nick Nolte) from drowning himself in Dave's swimming pool. Much against his will, Jerry is invited to enjoy the hospitality of Dave, his social-climbing wife, Barbara (Bette Midler), and their sexually ambivalent son, Max (Evan Richards). The hapless hobo bonds only with the family dog, Matisse, which fascinates Barbara to the point that she's willing to share her bed (and a few other things) with him. Dave is twice cuckolded when Jerry makes out with the maid (Elizabeth Peña), with whom he has been carrying on a torrid -- and noisy -- affair. He plans to wreak revenge on the tramp, but several plot twists result in Dave and Jerry becoming bosom companions. Little Richard appears as the family's easily irritated next-door neighbor. Down and Out in Beverly Hills was the R-rated film that compelled Disney to create its adult-oriented Touchstone Films division. The property was later cleaned up for TV consumption and converted into a short-lived Fox-network sitcom. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nick Nolte, Richard Dreyfuss, (more)
- 1981
After making a mysterious nocturnal helicopter flight, T.C. (Roger E. Mosley) is arrested on charges of smuggling a person into the country and transporting drugs. Magnum (Tom Selleck)is determined to clear T.C.'s name--even though T.C. himself throws up several roadblocks by refusing to explain or justify his actions. The key to solving the mystery is a certain Joey Santino (Vincent Caristi), whose long-standing friendship with T.C. may result in disaster for both men. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Goodbye Norma Jean purports to be a biography of the early years of Norma Jean Baker (Misty Rowe), who would later attain fame in Hollywood as the blonde sex goddess Marilyn Monroe. The film begins in 1941 as Norma Jean is brutally raped by a highway patrolman who stopped her for speeding. After winning a local beauty pageant, Norma Jean continues to experience a succession of low-life sexual encounters that pave the way to Hollywood stardom. The ironic take of the film is that Norma Jean's series of degrading sexual experiences caused her to dislike sex throughout her life while, ironically, attesting to her sensual allure in Hollywood films. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Misty Rowe, Terrence Locke, (more)
In Paul Mazursky's rueful character drama, 57-year-old Art Carney plays Harry, a 70-plus Manhattan widower who loses his tiny apartment to the wrecking ball. Accompanied by his pet, an aged cat named Tonto, Harry sets out on an odyssey to Los Angeles. During his journey, he finds a kindred spirit in a youthful hitchhiker (Melanie Mayron), who eventually finds happiness with Harry's grandson (Joshua Mostel). Harry makes stops at the homes of his grown children (Philip Bruns, Ellen Burstyn, and Larry Hagman), but each visit is more disappointing than the last; he also touches base with an old flame (Geraldine Fitzgerald), who has slipped into senility. By the time he arrives in L.A., Harry has become dispirited by his desultory visits with friends and family, but he eventually realizes that each new day can be a beginning rather than an end. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Art Carney, Ellen Burstyn, (more)
- 1974
Robert Clouse, director of Enter the Dragon, returned with this blaxploitation actioner starring Jim Kelly as an instructor at a martial-arts school in the Watts section of Los Angeles. Teaming with former Bond girl Gloria Hendry, Kelly saves the school and Hendry's dad (Scatman Crothers) from the Mob. Eric Laneuville, Malik Carter, and Love Boat bartender Ted Lange are also onhand. Kelly was one of the subgenre's most popular heroes at the time, starring in films like Black Terminator and Black Eliminator by the score. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jim Kelly, Gloria Hendry, (more)
- 1973
I Love a Mystery was a campy TV revival of Phillips Lord's old radio series. The three adventure-loving heroes are Jack, Doc and Reggie (Les Crane, David Hartman and Hagan Beggs), insurance investigators hired to tackle a mystery at a remote island mansion. Ida Lupino plays a domineering matriarch whose billionaire husband is missing, and who seems to know more than she's letting on. The mystery's ingredients include the eerie nocturnal sound of a crying baby and a series of related murders and kidnappings. The heroes are occasionally distracted from their work by Lupino's nubile daughters Faith, Hope and Charity (Karen Jensen, Deanna Lund and Melodie Johnson). The script for I Love a Mystery was based on Philips Lord's classic radio serial "The Thing That Cries in the Night," but there's nothing classic or even remotely entertaining about the derisive, patronizing treatment of the source material herein. This made-for-TV "busted pilot" gathered dust for seven years before its 1973 premiere, and not without just cause. A further note: Though Don Knotts is advertised as one of the "stars," he shows up to sputter one miserable line at the end of the film! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
In this "guilty pleasure" outing by B-budget director Denis Sanders (Shock Treatment), William Smith plays an FBI man investigating reports of a coven of "bee-girls" -- women who have taken on the characteristics of bees, and who kill men upon making love. A cute device throughout the film allows us to see the action from a bee's-eye view. The script, by no less than Nicholas Meyer, pokes gentle fun at the conventions of the cheapo-horror genre without ever stooping to cheap parody. Invasion of the Bee Girls was also released as Graveyard Tramps. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- William Smith, Claudia Jennings, (more)
- 1970
- R
Made on the heels of Paul Mazursky's Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, this cinematic experiment is one of the director's more personal films. With a big tip-'o-the-hat to Fellini's 8 1/2 (to make sure no one misses the references to the film, Federico Fellini appears in a cameo), Alex in Wonderland centers on a young director (Donald Sutherland) who feels compelled to follow his recent box-office hit with another blockbuster. While mulling over this dilemma, the director's mind wanders to his past, his present, and probable future. One of the film's memorable sequences involves a restaging of the Vietnam War in downtown Hollywood. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Donald Sutherland, Ellen Burstyn, (more)
"Consider the possibilities," read the ads for Paul Mazursky's 1969 satirical comedy about what happens when the sexual revolution hits affluent bourgeois life. After a weekend of "beautiful" emotional honesty at an Esalen-type retreat, married wannabe hipsters Bob (Robert Culp) and Carol (Natalie Wood) return to their well-heeled Los Angeles life determined to apply the principles of free love and complete openness to their marriage. To the respective curiosity and repulsion of their married best friends, Ted (Elliott Gould) and Alice (Dyan Cannon), Bob and Carol have affairs that they happily reveal to everyone. Inspired by all that openness during the quartet's trip to Vegas, Ted admits an affair of his own, provoking the outraged Alice to demand that this new ethos be taken to its obvious conclusion: a mate-sharing foursome. Once they're bedded down and ready to go, however, they start to have second thoughts. Without sacrificing authenticity for comedy, first-time director Mazursky and co-writer/producer Larry Tucker delve into the confusion of the Eisenhower generation when faced with the temptations of the counterculture. Too old to be hippies and too young to be fogies, the would-be California swingers sincerely attempt to try on the lifestyle, but it never looks quite right. A then-controversial example of the New Permissiveness both onscreen and off, Bob & Carol debuted at the New York Film Festival to great praise, particularly for Gould and Cannon. Whether they wanted to laugh at their elders' faux looseness or see what their peers might be doing, audiences turned Bob & Carol into a substantial hit, and its observations about marriage and sex remain humorously sharp even if the encounter group jargon is past its vogue. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Natalie Wood, Robert Culp, (more)
- 1968
Breaking from tradition, Bonanza offered two first-run episodes amidst the usual sea of reruns in the summer of 1968. The first of these, "A Severe Case of Matrimony", aired on July 7, 1968. Susan Strasberg plays Rosalita, a fiery gypsy girl who aspires to a career in opera-and never mind that she can't carry a tune in a washbucket. Willing to marry one of the Cartwrights to finance her singing career, Rosalita fabricates a story of relentless abuse at the hands of her father Anselmo (J. Carroll Naish). Also in the cast are Andre Philippe as Paco and Lili Valenty as Dolores. Written by Michael Fessnier, this episode went into production under the title "A Slight Case of Matrimony." ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lorne Greene, Michael Landon, (more)
- 1967
A Victor Canning novel was the launching pad for this consummately produced TV spy movie. Alex Cord is an American secret agent reluctantly employed by British secret service for a life and death mission. Teamed with the beauteous Shirley Eaton (the "golden girl" of Goldfinger), Cord is expected to locate the head of an international blackmail ring. The villain is known only by the code name "Scorpio," which could under the circumstances be a masculine or feminine monicker. Produced and directed by Richard Thorpe, The Scorpio Letters was given an overseas theatrical run after its American TV debut. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1966
With Saunders (Vic Morrow) otherwise occupied, the estimable Pvt. Kirby (Jack Hogan) assumes temporary command of the squad--and not surprisingly, he lets his newly-acquired authority go to his head. Things take a dramatic turn when Kirby and the men are stranded in enemy territory. . .and worse, the radio is dead, preventing him from contacting Saunders for advice. Faced with the responsibility of being a genuine leader for the first time in his life, Kirby worries that he isn't equal to the task. It falls to Doc (Conlan Carter) to help Kirby overcome his terror and shepherd the squad to safety. This is the final episode of Combat's fourth season. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1966
Hoping to stir up publicity, the Monkees agree to stage a phony kidnapping, with themselves as the victims. Unfortunately, the snatch has been masterminded by Nick Trump (Andre Phillippe), the crooked manager of a rival rock group -- and the two thugs (Vic Tayback and Louis Quinn) Trump has hired aren't kidding around. Songs: "Let's Dance On" and "(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone". Written by Dave Evans, "Your Friendly Neighborhood Kidnappers" was originally telecast on October 3, 1966. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1965
When a wealthy man is found shot to death on a luxury liner, the ship's captain places Roger York (Skip Young), the victim's millionaire stepson, under arrest. But despite his suspicious behavior, is York the guilty party--and indeed, has a murder actually been committed? Investigating the case, FBI agent Rhodes (Stephen Brooks) must also confront a few of his own personal demons. Douglas Henderson appears in this episode as Special Agent Bryan Durant, a role later taken over on a recurring basis by Dean Harens. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1963
When he is unexpectedly reunited with his wife Amelia (Peggy Ann Garner), an Army nurse, Cpl. Andy March (Jeremy Slate) begs Saunders (Vic Morrow) to give him a 48-hour pass. Unfortunately, military bureaucracy prohibits Andy from his long-awaited conjugal visit. But that isn't the worst of it: Amelia is secretly carrying on a torrid affair with Army doctor Lew Anders (William Windom). The drama intensifies when, while replacing the temporarily incapacitated Pvt. Kirby (Jack Hogan), March is seriously wounded--and Dr. Anders must perform an emergency operation. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
