Vic Armstrong Movies

Exiled to Earth after his arrogance fans the flames of an ancient conflict, The Mighty Thor (Chris Hemsworth) of Asgard discovers the meaning of humility when a powerful old foe dispatches a destructive force to crush humanity. Only when the banished prince has defeated an opponent capable of crushing him in battle will he learn what it takes to be a true leader. Anthony Hopkins, Natalie Portman, Stellan Skarsgård, and Tadanobu Asano co-star in a comic-book adventure from acclaimed director Kenneth Branagh. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

A nation whose dreams of freedom have been crushed meet their rivals on a different field of battle in this drama inspired by a true story. In 1956, Karcsi Szabo (Ivan Fenyo) was a star athlete at the University of Budapest and had been named captain of the national water polo team than would represent Hungary in the Olympics held that summer in Australia. However, many of Szabo's countrymen had more on their minds; Hungary had fallen under the oppressive rule of the Soviet Union, and a growing number of Hungarians were demanding independence. One day, Szabo and his friend Tibi (Sándor Csányi) witness a demonstration led by Viki Falk (Kata Dobó) demanding an end to Soviet rule in Hungary. While initially Szabo is more attracted to Falk's beauty than her message, through his attempts to woo her he is awakened to the need for revolution; however, an uprising by the people is crushed by the Soviet war machine, and matters become worse for the Hungarian people. When Szabo and his teammates discover that Hungary will be competing against the U.S.S.R. in the men's Water Polo tournament at the upcoming Olympics, they see an opportunity for a symbolic victory over their oppressors . . . if they will be allowed to leave to country to compete. Szabadsag Szerelem (aka Children of Glory) was based on the true story of Hungary's 1956 water polo victory over the Soviet Union in what has been described as the most violent match in the history of the sport; the documentary Freedom's Fury offers a factual perspective on the same event. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

The third entry in Tom Cruise's Mission: Impossible film series involves super Impossible Mission Forces (IMF) agent Ethan Hunt (Cruise) being forced back into the field just when he was planning on marrying his girlfriend, Julia (Michelle Monaghan). The agency asks Hunt to save an operative (Keri Russell) he trained after weapons dealer Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman) kidnaps her. With the help of his field team -- played by Ving Rhames, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, and Maggie Q -- Hunt achieves his goal, but becomes involved in a web of double-crosses that leave him wondering if he can trust his superiors (Billy Crudup and Laurence Fishburne). Eventually Davian threatens Julia's life in order to get away with his evil plan. Simon Pegg appears as an IMF tech expert. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

An ordinary man has to protect his children against alien invaders in this science fiction thriller, freely adapted from the classic story by H.G. Wells. Ray Ferrier (Tom Cruise) is a dockworker living in New Jersey, divorced from his first wife Mary Ann (Miranda Otto) and estranged from his two children Rachel and Robbie (Dakota Fanning and Justin Chatwin), of whom he has custody on weekends. On one such visitation, looking after the kids becomes a little more difficult when, after a series of strange lighting storms hit his neighborhood, Ray discovers that a fleet of death-ray robotic spaceships have emerged nearby, part of the first wave of an all-out alien invasion of the Earth. Transporting his children from New York to Boston in an attempt to find safety at Mary Ann's parents' house, Ray must learn to become the protector and provider he never was in marriage. Also starring Tim Robbins, War of the Worlds was directed by Steven Spielberg, who had been planning the project for years, but set it aside until a wave of "alien invasion" films (led by Independence Day) had run its course. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Gavin O'Connor directs the sports drama Miracle, based on the true story of the 1980 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid. Kurt Russell stars as hockey coach Herb Brooks, who assembles a U.S. team of underdogs. No one thinks they can make it, as they are up against the previously undefeated Soviet hockey team. Despite the odds, Brooks leads the U.S. team to victory. As the 1980 Winter Olympics happen to coincide with the Cold War, the event is interpreted as patriotic. Also starring Eddie Cahill and Patricia Clarkson, Miracle was distributed by Walt Disney Pictures. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

Based on the comic book miniseries by Alan Moore, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen takes place in an alternate universe where the characters of several literary classics exist in reality. As if that weren't enough, they've been assembled together in 1900 by Queen Victoria as a team of evil-fighting heroes. Among them are Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery) from H. Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines; Mina Harker (Peta Wilson) from Bram Stoker's Dracula; Tom Sawyer (Shane West) from several works by Mark Twain; Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend) from Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray; Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah) from Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea; The Invisible Man (Tony Curran) from H.G. Wells book of the same name; and several others. Working together, the odd assortment of characters must combine their powers to defeat a mysterious villain and save the world from certain destruction. Directed by Stephen Norrington (Blade), The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen also stars Jason Flemyng, Tom Goodman-Hill, and David Hemmings. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi

The violent rise of gangland power in New York City at a time of massive political corruption and the city's evolution into a cultural melting pot set the stage for this lavish historical epic, which director Martin Scorsese finally brought to the screen almost 30 years after he first began to plan the project. In 1846, as waves of Irish immigrants poured into the New York neighborhood of Five Points, a number of citizens of British and Dutch heritage who were born in the United States began making an open display of their resentment toward the new arrivals. William Cutting (Daniel Day-Lewis), better known as "Bill the Butcher" for his deadly skill with a knife, bands his fellow "Native Americans" into a gang to take on the Irish immigrants; the immigrants in turn form a gang of their own, "The Dead Rabbits," organized by Priest Vallon (Liam Neeson). After an especially bloody clash between the Natives and the Rabbits leaves Vallon dead, his son goes missing; the boy ends up in a brutal reform school before returning to the Five Points in 1862 as Amsterdam (Leonardo DiCaprio). Now a strapping adult who has learned how to fight, Amsterdam has come to seek vengeance against Bill the Butcher, whose underworld control of the Five Points through violence and intimidation dovetails with the open corruption of New York politician "Boss" Tweed (Jim Broadbent). Amsterdam gradually penetrates Bill the Butcher's inner circle, and he soon becomes his trusted assistant. Amsterdam also finds himself falling for Jenny Everdeane (Cameron Diaz), a beautiful but street-smart thief who was once involved with Bill. Amsterdam is learning a great deal from Bill, but before he can turn the tables on the man who killed his father, Amsterdam's true identity is exposed, even though he has concealed it from nearly everyone, including Jenny. Gangs Of New York was the first film in two years from actor Leonardo DiCaprio; ironically, it was at one time scheduled to open on the same day as Catch Me if You Can, the Steven Spielberg project that DiCaprio began filming immediately after Gangs wrapped. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Louis de Bernières' best-selling novel of love during wartime is brought to the screen in this story that blends comedy, action, and romance. In 1940, war rages throughout Europe, but the fighting has yet to arrive on the Greek island of Cephallonia, where life continues to follow its own slow, deliberate path until word arrives that Italian troops have invaded neighboring Albania. A wave of anti-Axis patriotism sweeps the island, and Mandras (Christian Bale), a local fisherman, is one of a handful of men who volunteer for the army, leaving behind his aging mother (Irene Papas) and the woman he loves, Pelagia (Penélope Cruz), the daughter of the island's physician, Dr. Iannis (John Hurt). The timing of Mandras and his compatriots proves less than fortuitous, as Italian troops invade Greece in their absence, but the remaining leaders of the island issue an ultimatum -- the people of Cephallonia will surrender, but only to a ranking German officer. Since none of the available German officers can speak a word of Greek, an Italian soldier fluent in the language, Capt. Antonio Corelli (Nicholas Cage), is sent in to serve as translator. Corelli stays on with the Greek occupation forces, and he soon finds himself falling in love with beautiful Pelagia, who believes that Mandras was killed in the fighting in Albania. But as romance slowly blooms between the Italian soldier and the Greek girl, Mandras and a handful of surviving soldiers have joined a guerilla resistance faction, and they join up with Allied forces in a bid to retake Greece; soon, Pelagia must choose between the two men she loves, as the Greeks battle both the Italian occupation troops and German soldiers who have been sent in to replace them. Captain Corelli's Mandolin was directed by John Madden; the project originally began shooting with Roger Michell, but Michell was forced to resign from the film after he suffered a heart attack. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

The Marquis de Sade was a man who liked to stir up trouble, at a time when his native France was in a state of tremendous political turmoil, and this historical drama examines how much controversy he could cause even under repressive circumstances. In the aftermath of the French Revolution, the Marquis de Sade (Geoffrey Rush) manages to narrowly escape execution during the Reign of Terror, and instead is sentenced to the Charenton Asylum for the Insane. Coulmier (Joaquin Phoenix), the priest who heads the asylum, is sympathetic to the political machinations that have put the Marquis in his care, and allows him not only to write what he pleases, but to stage theater pieces using the other patients as actors. Royer-Collard (Michael Caine), a tyrannical doctor overseeing the mental institutions of Napoleonic France, is as outraged as the emperor when he reads Justine, a scabrous volume the Marquis penned while an inmate at Charenton, and he demands that de Sade be stopped. But Royer-Collard soon learns that stopping the Marquis from writing is not so simple; when de Sade's quills and ink are taken from him, he uses wine and even his own blood to write his stories. When these options are no longer available, he dictates his work with the help of Madeline (Kate Winslet), a laundry girl working at the asylum, who is fascinated by the notorious de Sade, though she declines his frequent requests to satisfy his notorious sexual appetites. Based on the play by Doug Wright (who also penned the screenplay), Quills was directed by Philip Kaufman, who previously documented the line between eroticism and literature in Henry and June and The Unbearable Lightness of Being. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

After a long career playing good guys, Sean Connery gets to have some fun playing a crook for a change in the romantic crime thriller Entrapment -- and he even gets to break the law with the lovely Catherine Zeta-Jones. When a priceless Rembrandt painting is stolen from a New York skyscraper in a daring and technically sophisticated robbery, ace insurance investigator Virginia "Gin" Baker (Catherine Zeta-Jones) begins looking into the matter and is soon convinced it's the work of master art thief Robert "Mac" MacDougal (Sean Connery). Gin thinks the best way to get the goods on Mac (and perhaps recover the painting) is to work her way inside his operation, so she locates him in London and, posing as a fellow art thief, offers to work as his partner. While Mac is smart enough to not accept an offer like that from just anyone, most thieves don't look as good as Gin does in a leotard, and she soon proves an able assistant in a shakedown robbery where they pinch a rare Chinese mask from a British museum. After this success, Mac agrees to join forces with Gin for what is literally the heist of the millenium -- as Midnight rolls around in Kuala Lumpur on December 31, 1999, the security computers in a major multinational banking facility will be breached for a split second as the computers roll over to a new program for Y2K. Is that long enough for Gin and Mac to nab $8 billion in bank transfers? Is 14 days long enough to prepare for a robbery of this scale? And will Mac and Gin's professional relationship pave the way for some capers in the bedroom? In addition to playing the male lead, Sean Connery also co-produced this film; the supporting cast includes Ving Rhames and Maury Chaykin. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Director Paul Verhoeven (Showgirls, Total Recall) reunited many from his 1987 Robocop team for this $100-million science fiction adventure, adapted from Robert A. Heinlein's 1959 novel, originally serialized in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (October-November, 1959). After graduation, Johnny Rico (Casper Van Dien) volunteers for the Mobile Infantry to do his Federal service -- but also to win over his girlfriend, Carmen Ibanez (Denise Richards), who has signed with the Fleet Academy to become a starship pilot. Johnny joins other boot-camp recruits -- Dizzy Flores (Dina Meyer), who has had a crush on Johnny since school, and Ace Levy (Jake Busey). Ace and Johnny become pals, and Johnny's abilities earn him the squad leader position. A training accident occurs on Johnny's watch, and he is about to resign when Earth is attacked by alien insects intent on eradicating all human life. Johnny's home, Buenos Aires, is no longer on the map. Horrified, he chooses to stay on and fight to destroy the insect threat. The Mobile Infantry travels to the planet Klendathu to battle the warrior bugs, a ruthless enemy with only one goal -- survival of their species no matter what. In the initial encounter, some 100,000 lives are lost. At a distant fort, Johnny's unit discovers that the bugs drain brains to acquire knowledge. Soon they are overwhelmed by an advancing arthropod army of immense proportions, attacking both in space and on the planet surface. The notion of human extinction becomes a possibility. For this $100-million production, some 300 artists and technicians combined models and miniatures with CGI effects to fashion a variety of creatures -- from breeder bugs to armored tanker bugs. The film employed hundreds of extras and has over 500 visual effects shots. Filming began 4/29/96 in California (LA and Long Beach, where Cal State's pyramid gym was used for the Jumpball game), New York, South Dakota, Wyoming (Casper, Hell's Half Acre), and Utah (an abandoned Wendover airstrip where the Enola Gay WWII bomber crew trained). At an abandoned airfield in Fountain Valley, California, an elaborate set was constructed to resemble a military boot camp of the future -- complete with an array of pup tents, gull-winged spaceships, hurdle obstacle course, and training facility buildings. Cinematography by Jost Vacano (Showgirls). Licensed products include Lewis Galoob Inc. toys. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

Presidential advisor Bobby Bishop (Charlie Sheen) is hunted by an unknown assailant in this political thriller. With the help of Chief-of-Staff Jake Conrad (Donald Sutherland) and the newspaper journalist Amanda (Linda Hamilton), he uncovers an assassination plot to kill the President and his most trusted advisors. Bobby battles forces in the government he has sworn to uphold, as his every move is monitored by high-tech surveillance cameras. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Geena Davis stars in this adventure saga as the most swashbuckling female pirate to ever lay waste to the seven seas. Morgan Adams (Davis) is the daughter of a pirate who has followed in her father's footsteps. When he dies, he passes along his ship, a crew of bandits, and one third of a treasure map (which happens to be tattooed on his skull). Morgan is eager to search out the rest of the map and retrieve the riches, but the fragment she holds is in Latin. Morgan then buys a well-educated slave, William Shaw (Matthew Modine), who can read the ancient language and already has a taste for the criminal life. However, Morgan and William are not long into their search when they discover that someone else is following the same trail for the rest of the treasure map: Dawg Brown (Frank Langella), Morgan's uncle and as black-hearted a scurvy dog as ever boarded a ship. As Morgan and Dawg battle each other over the fragments of the map, a British journalist (Maury Chaykin) covers their feud for the penny press. William Shaw was originally to have been played by Michael Douglas, who dropped out in the early stages of this troubled production. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi