Ken Pogue Movies
Supporting actor, onscreen from the '70s. ~ Rovi
- 1973
- G
A research facility becomes a death trap, and only an untested Navy vessel can save the day in this adventure drama. A team of scientists led by Hal Hamilton (Michael J. Reynolds) is studying marine life in an underwater research station called Sealab. Shortly before the Sealab crew are scheduled to return to the surface, a massive underwater earthquake strands them at the bottom of the ocean. Project director Dr. Andrews (Walter Pidgeon), who had often fought to support the Sealab project against funding coordinator Norton Shepherd (Ed McGibbon), knows that he must act quickly to save the lives of those on board; he recruits Cmdr. Adrian Blake (Ben Gazzara) to use his new experimental submarine to find the Sealab and rescue the crew. Joining Blake on his mission are veteran sailor "Mack" McKay (Ernest Borgnine), his assistant Bob Cousins (Donnelly Rhodes), and Leah Jansen (Yvette Mimieux), a respected scientist and Hamilton's bride-to-be. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ben Gazzara, Yvette Mimieux, (more)
- 1976
A stock broker overcomes ennui and finds new meaning in his life when he becomes a long-distance runner. His new obsession has a bad effect on his marriage, but fortunately that is only temporary. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- Starring:
- James Naughton, Lindsay Wagner, (more)
The Canadian "sleeper" The Silent Partner stars Elliott Gould as a teller, Miles Cullen, who figures out psycho Harry Reikle's (Christopher Plummer) scheme to rob his bank, several days ahead of time. Cullen providently squirrels away 50,000 dollars in a safety-deposit box before Reikle strikes. After the robbery, the papers report the amount of the bank's loss. Reikle realizes that there's 50,000 extra bucks floating around that he hasn't gotten his hands on. The soft-spoken but sadistic Reikle puts the screws on Cullen to fork over the dough -- but Cullen has lost the deposit-box key. Be forewarned: this one gets extremely brutal and bloody at times, with sudden bursts of graphic violence. Also featured is Susannah York as the fluctuating-loyalty heroine, and a very young and hairy John Candy. Future L.A. Confidential scribe Curtis Hanson loosely adapted the Danish novel Think of a Number, by Anders Bodelsen. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Elliott Gould, Christopher Plummer, (more)
- 1979
- PG
Adam (George Segal) is an English instructor at a U.S. college who hopes to win a professorship and tenure. Tricia (Glenda Jackson) is an English divorcee. They both wind up on a French ski slope at exactly the wrong time, and in the resulting collision, break one another's legs. While they are slinging ever-wittier insults at each other, they are also falling in love. They soon wed, with Tricia joining Adam back in the States. There, it becomes clear that Tricia was not cut out to be a dutiful, meek professor's wife. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- George Segal, Glenda Jackson, (more)
Made up to look like a septuagenarian, Henry Winkler plays Benedict Slade, a Scrooge-like miser living in a tiny New England town during the Depression. Slade goes Scrooge one further by repossessing items from a poor farm couple and an orphanage on Christmas eve. While reading a copy of Dickens' The Christmas Carol in his home, Slade is visited by his own set of Spirits Past, Present and Future, including his Hell-dwelling late business partner (Kenneth Pogue). Lensed in Canada, this made-for-TV film premiered the week before Christmas of 1979. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1980
- R
This drama is set in Montreal when in the mid-'50s a young woman is impregnated by a petty thief who is caught and given ten years in the slammer. In the meantime, the woman bears a son and marries another. The time passes quickly and the thief is eventually released. He immediately goes to her and this nearly destroys her marriage. Fortunately, he realizes that taking the woman away from her husband will only hurt his son and so backs off. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Jennifer Dale, Winston Rekert, (more)
- 1981
A Quaker family is terrified when the mother and daughters are taken hostage. ~ Rovi
- 1981
- PG
Based on a true story, this film follows the trials and tragedies that befall Walter Reamer (Tom Skerritt) and his wife, Olive (Ellen Burstyn), as they struggle to create a home and raise a family in the brutal Canadian frontier of 1919. ~ Iotis Erlewine, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ellen Burstyn, Tom Skerritt, (more)
- 1982
- PG
Francis Ford Coppola protégé Phillip Borsos directs this elegiac, low-key tale about real-life bandit Bill Miner that has become a classic of Canadian cinema. Having been released from jail in 1901 following a 33-year prison sentence for robbing stagecoaches, Bill Miner (Richard Farnsworth) finds himself living in a society that has completely changed from the one of his youth. He tries to put his life of crime behind him and settle down in Washington state with his sister, but the quiet life does not suit him. He feels restless but uncertain as to how to proceed next. The answer comes to him when he sees Edward S. Porter's The Great Train Robbery. Soon, Miner has slipped over the border into Canada and, along with his new partner, Shorty (Wayne Robson), robs the Canadian Pacific Railway Transcontinental Express. Later, while laying low after the crime in a remote corner of British Columbia, he meets the beautiful, strong-willed photographer Kate Flynn (Jackie Burroughs). In writing this script, Borsos reportedly made heavy use of contemporary court documents and testimonies. This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto Film Festival in honor of its 20th anniversary. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
- Starring:
- Richard Farnsworth, Jackie Burroughs, (more)
Christopher Walken plays a schoolteacher, Johnny Smith, who awakens from a five-year coma. He discovers that he has acquired the ability to foretell a person's future simply by touching his or her hand. After seeing several examples, Smith's doctor (Herbert Lom) becomes convinced that Smith can not only predict the future, but also has the power to change it. This ability is given its severest test when Smith shakes the hand of ruthless political candidate Greg Stillson (Martin Sheen) -- and suddenly has a flash-forward to a nuclear holocaust. The Dead Zone is not only one of the best-ever Stephen King adaptations, but also one of the most consistently successful (and least gory) efforts of director David Cronenberg. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Christopher Walken, Brooke Adams, (more)
- 1984
This epic story about a Louisiana plantation owner trying to hold on to her estate before, during, and after the American Civil War, a place ironically called "Bagatelle," rides on the illustrious fame of Tara and its more famous mistress in another Southern state. Virginia Tregan (Margot Kidder) comes back to Louisiana after finishing her schooling in France and is soon left without financial support when her father dies. Motivated by dire economic straits, she marries the owner of Bagatelle, but her real love turns out to be the steward (Ian Charleson). Husbands come and go while the steward remains in the background, and clichéd characters abound: a chamber-maid whose husband is tragically murdered for supporting the Abolitionists, an evil aristocrat who rapes and kills Tregan's daughter, and the matriarch herself. The original six hours of TV miniseries time was cut to a three-hour cinema format, but the downsizing in this Danielle Steele-type story also extends to the acting, cinematography, dialogue, and dramatic interest -- making it a bagatelle rather than a real gem. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Margot Kidder, Ian Charleson, (more)
- 1985
- G
The "magic" in One Magic Christmas is often (and surprisingly) of the "black" variety. Like Jimmy Stewart before her, worn-out wife and mother Mary Steenburgen wishes that she'd never been born. And like Stewart, Steenburgen is visited by a guardian angel, in this case the western-garbed Harry Dean Stanton. Instead of granting Steenburgen's wish, Stanton shows her what life would be like without Christmas--and that vision is as grim as anything you're ever likely to see in any Holiday film. Throughout the horrendous tragedies heaped upon Steenburgen, we are comforted in the knowledge that Stanton is working in concert with Steenburgen's young daughter. Steenburgen learns her lesson of course, but what a ride! ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Mary Steenburgen, Gary Basaraba, (more)
- 1985
Adapted from Mary-Lou Weisman's book Intensive Care, this made-for-television movie stars Liza Minnelli (in her first TV appearance) as a woman who must remain strong and contend with her son's muscular dystrophy and all the problems within the family that accompany the illness. ~ Kristie Hassen, Rovi
- Starring:
- Liza Minnelli, Jeffrey DeMunn, (more)
- 1985
In the first of a series of made-for-TV films shot two decades after the original Perry Mason television series ended in 1966, Mason (Raymond Burr), now an Appellate Court Judge, must step down from the bench in order to defend his longtime secretary Della Street (Barbara Hale) against murder charges. ~ Jason Ankeny, Rovi
Loretta Swit stars as a French nun in the made-for-television Miracle at Moreaux. The time is the early 1940s, at the height of the Nazi occupation of France. At the risk of her own life, Loretta shelters three Jewish children in her Catholic schoolroom. Things become even riskier when the three kids request permission to celebrate Hannukah. Miracle at Moreaux debuted December 2, 1985, as part of PBS's Wonderworks series. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
In this suspenseful thriller two strangers are suddenly thrown together in the strangest of circumstances when they witness a killing and a robbery and then find $5 million aboard a New York-bound train. Now they are forced to flee from the CIA, the Russians, and others while simultaneously trying to discover where the money came from and what to do with it. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Michael Sarrazin, Margot Kidder, (more)
- 1986
Suicide Murders was filmed for Canadian television in 1985. Saul Rubinek stars as a klutzy private eye in a small, peaceful village, where clients are virtually nonexistent. When several mysterious suicides occur in the village, Rubinek senses that there's dirty work afoot. He stumbles around town searching for clues, uncovering an intricate murder plot. The Suicide Murders made its below-the-border debut on America's Lifetime Cable Service in 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1986
Produced for the HBO Cable service, Act of Vengeance reenacts the 1969 murder of United Mine Workers leader Jock Yablonski. Yablonski (Charles Bronson) virtually writes his own death warrant when, after a "safe" mine collapses and 80 miners are killed, he rebels against the incumbent UMW boss Tony Boyle (Wilford Brimley) to campaign for presidency of the union. Boyle gets the word out that one less Yablonski in the world would be preferable. Yablonski is depicted as being fully aware of the danger he faces in challenging Boyle--and is supported in his decision by his courageous wife (Ellen Burstyn). Based on the book by Trevor Armbrister, Act of Vengeance premiered on April 20, 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1986
- PG13
This romance concerns the courtship between Brooks (Kiefer Sutherland), an erratic, brash rich kid who dresses in 1930s garb, and Anne (Vanessa Vaughan) a shy, deaf salesgirl. Brooks first notices Anne when he steals a mannequin from the sporting goods store where she works. The two later get together because Brooks decides to follow Anne home. Eventually, Brooks decides he has to learn sign language, and Anne provides the maladjusted young man with a relationship that is healthy. Along the way there are a few comical moments deriving from Brooks's manic behavior. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Kiefer Sutherland, Peter Spence, (more)
- 1986
A Canadian-Australian coproducton which originally aired over Australia's 7 Network, the six-hour miniseries Spearfield's Daughter stars Kim Braden as the title character. The daughter of a prominent and powerful Australian politician (Chris Wiggins), Cleo Spearfield (Kim Braden) incurs her father's wrath by becoming a reporter, with the Vietnam war as her "beat." When not dodging bullets and negotiating rice paddies, Cleo is wooed by two attractive gentemen, gonzo American journalist Tom Border (Steve Railsback) and Murdoch-like British publishing mogul Lord Jack Cruze (Christopher Plummer. Adapted by Jon Cleary from his own novel, Spearfield's Daughter was syndicated to the US beginning the week of May 25, 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1986
- PG13
An ex-convict turned sheriff's deputy must face his guilty conscience, which is obsessed with his identity change following a million-dollar heist. With a notoriously troubled production history, this Canadian picture was shot in 1979 and sat on the shelf for half a decade, until Orson Welles had died. In the credits, the name of the director -- Selig Usher -- is a pseudonym for both George McCowan and Zale Magder. ~ Rovi
- Starring:
- Orson Welles, Michael Murphy, (more)
- 1986
The Second Amendment of the Constitution forms the basis of this drama that follows the crusade of a lawyer to allow citizens to carry handguns. He launched his fight after his wife and daughter were killed during a robbery. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
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