Edward Anhalt Movies

A TV mini-series, this is a visually pleasant movie about the life of Russia's colorful ruler, from childhood on. Big name cast is wasted on small roles, however. ~ Tana Hobart, Rovi

Covering some 15 years, The Right Stuff recounts the formation of America's space program, concentrating on the original Mercury astronauts. Scott Glenn plays Alan Shepard, the first American in space; Fred Ward is Gus Grissom, the benighted astronaut for whom nothing works out as planned; and Ed Harris is John Glenn, the straight-arrow "boy scout" of the bunch who was the first American to orbit the earth. The remaining four Mercury boys are Deke Slayton (Scott Paulin), Scott Carpenter (Charles Frank), Wally Schirra (Lance Henriksen) and Gordon Cooper (Dennis Quaid). Wolfe's original book related in straightforward fashion the dangers and frustrations facing the astronauts (including Glenn's oft-repeated complaint that it's hard to be confident when you know that the missile you're sitting on has been built by the lowest bidder), the various personal crises involving their families (Glenn's wife Annie, a stutterer, dreads being interviewed on television, while Grissom's wife Betty, angered that her husband is not regarded as a hero because his mission was a failure, bitterly declares "I want my parade!"), and the schism between the squeaky-clean public image of the Mercury pilots and their sometimes raunchy earthbound shenanigans. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The 1981 TV version of Madame X was the seventh filmization of the old war-horse play by Alexandre Bisson. This time around, Tuesday Weld (replacing Susan Blakely) plays the poor woman (an airline stewardess in this version) who marries "outside her class" (hubby is a Presidential candidate). She is disgraced, gives up her baby to her wealthy in-laws, and sinks into a life of degradation. 25 years later the woman is accused of murder, and is defended in court by her own grown-up offspring. Adaptor Edward Anhalt makes a few feeble stabs at updating the story, adding drug abuse to the woman's descent into prostitution. Also, her child is now a girl instead of a boy, rabbeting a tentative feminist angle in the proceedings. Other than that, the 1981 Madame X has even less to offer than the lavish but empty 1966 Lana Turner version--except for an offbeat appearance by comedian Jerry Stiller as a slimy blackmailer. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The original British version of Escape to Athena ran 125 minutes; American prints were judiciously cut to 101 minutes, emphasizing the action content and neutralizing the duller dialogue sequences. Roger Moore stars as Major Otto Hecht, an anti-Nazi German who presides over a World War II POW camp. The prisoners, played by such diverse types as Elliott Gould, David Niven, and Sonny Bono, plan an escape with a group of Greek partisans (headed by Telly Savalas). It's not that the POWs are dissatisfied with life behind barbed wire -- it's just that they've been coerced into rescuing valuable art treasures from the Nazis, and there's a possibility of turning a profit! ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The made-for-TV Fatal Chase stars Lee Van Cleef as taciturn U.S. marshal Ike Scanlon. Designed as the pilot for a weekly series, the film finds Scanlon escorting a mob witness (Tony Musante) to a federal trial. Since the witness is a hit man, there are plenty of people both inside and outside the Mob who'd like to see him dead. Featured in the cast are Fatal Chase's producer/writer Edward Anhalt and director Jack Starrett. Originally telecast as Nowhere to Hide on January 5, 1977, Fatal Chase has also been released as Scanlon. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Adapted for the screen by Edward Anhalt from the play by John Osborne, Luther stars Stacy Keach as religious leader and "heretic" Martin Luther. In minimalist fashion, the film traces Luther's disillusionment with the Catholic Church, and his eventual spearheading of the Reformation movement. Over the course of the film, Keach ages from an ingenuous seminarian to a disgruntled, middle-aged firebrand. Director Guy Green does little to cinematize the material, instead favoring a theatrical approach and thus allowing the rich dialogue to be better appreciated. Luther was a production of the American Film Theatre. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Years before Kevin Costner danced with wolves, Robert Redford headed to the mountains to escape civilization in Sydney Pollack's wilderness western. Around 1850, ex-soldier Johnson (Redford) decides that he would rather live alone as a mountain man in Colorado than deal with society's constraints. After a series of setbacks, he meets grizzled mountain veteran Bear Claws (Will Geer), who teaches him how to survive. Jeremiah strives to live as peaceably as possible in the rugged environment, trading with the native Crow tribe, adopting a boy (Josh Albee) after his family is massacred, and even marrying the daughter (Delle Bolton) of a Flathead chief in order to avoid confrontation. He settles into a mountain home with his family, but the U.S. cavalry, complete with a puritanical Reverend, interrupt the idyll to compel Jeremiah to lead them over the mountains and through a Crow burial ground to rescue white settlers. After the Crow kill his family in retaliation, Jeremiah's frenzied moment of payback precipitates a long-running vendetta, turning him into a legendary Indian killer at the expense of his original ideals, on the way to a final moment of grace. Spectacularly shot on location in Utah, the film captures both the appeal and the challenge of the landscape that Jeremiah chooses over civilization. With an unglamorous performance by Redford and a story that questioned white colonialism while mythologizing the man of nature, Jeremiah Johnson appealed to its 1972 audience and became one of the biggest hits of the year. Wavering between heroicizing Jeremiah for surviving and damning him for killing, Jeremiah Johnson took its place among the Vietnam-era cycle of critical westerns, like Arthur Penn's Little Big Man (1970) and Robert Altman's McCabe and Mrs. Miller (1971), that condemned civilization for corrupting the wilderness and preventing individuals from going pacifistically native. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi

The Boston Strangler adopts the split-screen technique then in vogue (see also The Thomas Crown Affair) to relate the true story of self-confessed mass murderer Albert DeSalvo. Adapted by Edward Anhalt from the book by Gerold Frank, the film covers the years 1962 to 1964, during which time a dozen women were raped and murdered in the Boston area. State-appointed officer John Bottomly (Henry Fonda) arrests as many known sex offenders as he can get his hands on in hopes of finding a clue as to the Boston Strangler's identity. As these things often happen, the police come across the necessary evidence through pure luck. Well-played by Tony Curtis (whose makeup is startling), DeSalvo himself does not appear until an hour into the film. When caught, the schizophrenic DeSalvo insists that he knows nothing of the murders. Under interrogation and hypnosis, his homicidal impulses are exposed. Meticulously cast, The Boston Strangler offers excellent vignettes by Sally Kellerman as the Strangler's only surviving victim and by Hurd Hatfield as an erudite sex pervert. When Boston Strangler was first shown on TV in 1974, a voice-over coda was added, noting that Albert DeSalvo was stabbed to death in prison on November 26, 1973, and that many experts were convinced that he was not the killer but that his confessions were the product of a delusional mind. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

John Sturges directed this sequel to his Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, which is more of a melancholy character study than an action Western. The Edward Anhalt screenplay (based on Douglas D. Martin's Tombstone's Epitaph) traces Wyatt Earp's (James Garner) moral decline from a lawman with high ideals to a mean-spirited vigilante bent on personal revenge. Ironically, Doc Holliday (Jason Robards), an admitted lawless gambler, reacts to Earp's vengeful turnabout by becoming the moral force that Earp has rejected. When Earp's brothers are killed by goons employed by Ike Clanton (Robert Ryan), Earp becomes obsessed with vengeance and organizes a posse to track down the killers. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

Alarms start flashing all the way from California to Washington when Station 3, a top-secret, ultra-high-security research facility, is broken into -- and a group of flasks containing two deadly viruses, one of them (nicknamed "The Satan Bug") possibly unstoppable, are stolen. Counter-intelligence specialist Lee Barrett (George Maharis) is called in to work with the regular security and intelligence personnel in determining who has the deadly substances, and why. Working with him is Ann (Anne Francis), an old flame and the daughter of the man (Dana Andrews) handling this on behalf of Washington -- working against them are a pair of psychopaths (Frank Sutton, Ed Asner) reporting to a mysterious financier, Charles Reynolds Ainsley, who has an agenda he's keeping secret for now. And the sidelines are populated by a group of flustered scientists (Richard Basehart, Simon Oakland, Harold Gould) and administrators (John Larkin, John Anderson), one of whom knows a lot more than he's telling about why the Satan Bug was stolen. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

In this romantic comedy, Bill Austin (Van Johnson) is an unsuccessful writer who lives in a forlorn New York tenement while his wife Bertie (Janet Leigh) earns an income for both of them. Their lives change dramatically when Bill's first novel becomes a best-seller. Bill persuades Bertie to quit her job and move to a grand house in an upscale suburb. Leaving his wife alone most of the time, Bill begins working long hours on Broadway adapting his novel for the theater, and he spends increasing amounts of time with his attractive agent, Lucinda Ford (Martha Hyer). Bertie suspects the worst and begins courting an actor, Gar Aldrich (Jeremy Slate). ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

One of Elvis Presley's biggest moneymakers, Girls Girls Girls casts ol' swivel-hips as a tuna-boat fisherman working out of Hawaii. Elvis chases after all the wrong girls, while ignoring the girls who genuinely care for him. Here, as Ross Carpenter, Presley has two main love interests: sexy vocalist Robin (Stella Stevens and heiress Laurel (Laurel Goodwin), who pretends to be poor so as not to wound Ross's pride. When rude 'n' crude Wesley Johnson (Jeremy Slate), who owns Ross's boat, makes a play for Laurel, Ross punches him out. He loses his boat, but it hardly matters since he and Laurel have found true love. Songs crucial to the action are the title tune, "Return to Sender," and "Song of the Shrimp." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Rachel Cade (Angie Dickinson), a dedicated American nurse working in the Belgian Congo, meets administrator Henri Derode (Peter Finch) during a native fertility dance. Guess what he tries to do? He doesn't, though, because Rachel falls in love with handsome downed RAF pilot Paul Wilton (Roger Moore). As Paul's wounds heal in the jungle hospital, he and Rachel manage to find quality time together. After he leaves, a pregnant Rachel turns to the previously rejected Henri for aid and comfort. After an hour or so of further melodramatic complications (including a native uprising), Rachel realizes that it was Henri she loved all along. A standard-issue soap opera from the Warner Bros. factory, The Sins of Rachel Cade was unobtrusively directed by the ubiquitous Gordon M. Douglas. Edward Anhalt adapted the screenplay from a novel by Charles E. Mercer. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi