Ricou Browning Movies

Inspired by the incredible true story of Winter, a dolphin who was rescued off the Florida coast after her tail became caught in a crab trap, this uplifting family-oriented adventure from director/co-screenwriter Charles Martin Smith details the unique bond between an injured dolphin and a young boy. When Winter loses her tail in a tragic accident, her young friend convinces the locals to build her a prosthetic replacement, inspiring hope and courage in handicapped people across the globe. Nathan Gamble, Morgan Freeman, Harry Connick Jr., Ashley Judd, and Kris Kristofferson star. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

US air force lieutenant Lisa Echhorn is determined to prove her mettle by taking a grueling escape-and-evasion course. Along with several other trainees, Echhorn is parachuted to a remote island where she is to be tracked down by the "enemy". Reluctantly teamed with major Tom Skerritt, who has been injured in the jump, Echhorn successfully reaches the "safe" goal she's been assigned, only to learn that she has been dragooned into a far more deadly training program than she'd expected. Put to work in a hard labor camp, Echhorn is subjected to various and sundry humiliations by master sadists Anthony Zerbe and Richard Roundtree. What started out as mere "war games" ends in dead seriousness as Echhorn is forced to face her tormentors alone. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This comedy was filmed in Miami and follows the exploits of three frustrated misanthropes who try to sue the city after their car hits a pothole and ends up totaled. Unfortunately, the city has protected itself with a little loophole. When legal means fail, the three try other methods. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Ricou Browning, the Olympic swimmer best known as the man inside the suit of The Creature from the Black Lagoon, directed this amazing bit of weirdness which could only have been a product of the cinematically insane 1970s. Richard Jaeckel stars as a Florida policeman tracking a gang of heroin dealers led by evil fatcat D'Angelo (Lloyd Bochner), who naturally has his hooks into everything, including the corrupt police captain (John Agar). There are drag queens, barroom brawls, shootouts, and the usual mayhem, but what makes this film particularly noteworthy is its central hitman, Lou. He has no legs and travels in a motorized wheelchair decked out with double-barreled shotguns. Lou is also strong enough that when he isn't blasting people with his killer wheelchair he can swing around on his arms and use his legless torso to bludgeon people into submission. Rance Howard plays Lou's trusty sidekick, and the film co-stars an African-American dwarf, accomplished stuntwoman Courtney Brown (who gets in a fairly flamboyant catfight), and Flipper's Luke Halpin, who was in the tawdry Mako: The Jaws of Death -- also starring Jaeckel -- at around the same time). Bizarre but oddly lovable, this is entertainingly loopy grindhouse trash emblematic of the days when Times Square showed the nation's strangest films at triple-feature theaters in which the audience was often more disturbing than the mayhem onscreen. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi

When irascible boss T.R. Hollister (Jim Backus) threatens to pull the plug on an underwater environmental living project, employee Fred Miller (Tony Randall) and his wife, Vivian (Janet Leigh), take their family down in the deep to live for 30 days. With all the modern conveniences of a home on land, the family even invites a rock & roll band to get down and record. Merv Griffin (himself) arranges an underwater interview for his television show while Mel Cheever (Ken Berry) schemes to get Fred's job back on dry land. Two of the Miller kids, Lorrie (Kay Cole) and Tommy (Gary Tigerman), join three others (Richard Dreyfuss, Roddy McDowall, and Lou Wagner) in the rock band. Friendly dolphins fend of shark attacks as the land sharks try to scuttle the underwater project in this family film. Music is provided by Jeff Barry. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Tony Rome (Frank Sinatra) is a Miami private detective who discovers a lady in cement while scuba diving. Rome is hired by Gronsky (Dan Blocker) to find out if the woman is his missing girlfriend. He interviews Kit Forrest (Raquel Welch), a boozy socialite who had seen the woman at a drunken party earlier. Tony is warned by Kit's neighbor Al Munger (Martin Gabel) to stay away from Kit. Tony discovers Al is a former rackets boss and suspects there is more to the story than Kit and Al are letting on. With the help of local Lieutenant Santini (Richard Conti), Tony contacts artist Arnie Sherwin (Richard Deacon), who helps identify the dead woman as Gronsky's girlfriend. The plot thickens when Gronsky admits that he and Al's son Paul (Steve Peck) were dipping into Al's fund of ill-gotten money. Tony eliminates Kit as a suspect as he tries to solve the crime in this murder mystery. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

A film crew arrives in Coral Key to shoot the underwater scenes for a horror movie. But the real monster turns out to be more of the green-eyed variety, when young Bud Ricks (Tommy Norden) becomes jealous -- the film cast includes a pretty young actress (Wende Wagner), who not only manages to infatuate Bud's older brother Sandy (Luke Halpin) but also Flipper, which leaves the boy feeling left out and very resentful. Between Bud's unhappiness, and the recklessness of the director (Jack Carr), a near-disaster takes place underwater, with potentially tragic consequences for the dolphin and several members of the film crew, including the "monster" (Ricou Browning). ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

The surprise hit of the summer of 1963, Flipper is a thoroughly captivating outdoor adventure from the Ivan Tors factory. Sandy Ricks (Luke Halpin), the young son of Florida fisherman Porter Ricks (Chuck Connors), nurses a wounded dolphin back to health. His father would prefer that Sandy allow the dolphin to return to its natural habitat, but Sandy has other ideas. After "Flipper" rescues Sandy from a shark, however, the boy grants the dolphin his freedom. Ideally suited for audiences of all ages, Flipper was fully deserving of its success; within a year, it had spawned a theatrical sequel and a long-running TV series, which, like the film, cast Suzy the Dolphin as the "hero" Flipper. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Universal Pictures introduced audiences to yet another classic movie monster with this superbly crafted film, originally presented in 3-D. The story involves the members of a fossil-hunting expedition down a dark tributary of the mist-shrouded Amazon, where they enter the domain of a prehistoric, amphibious "Gill Man" -- possibly the last of a species of fanged, clawed humanoids who may have evolved entirely underwater. Tranquilized, captured, and brought aboard, the creature still manages to revive and escape -- slaughtering several members of the team -- and abducts their sole female member (Julie Adams), spiriting her off to his mist-shrouded lair. This sparks the surviving crewmen to action -- particularly those who fancy carrying the girl off themselves. Director Jack Arnold makes excellent use of the tropical location, employing heavy mists and eerie jungle noises to create an atmosphere of nearly constant menace. The film's most effective element is certainly the monster itself, with his pulsating gills and fearsome webbed talons. The creature was played on land by stuntman Ben Chapman and underwater by champion swimmer Ricou Browning -- who was forced to hold his breath during long takes because the suit did not allow room for scuba gear. The end result was certainly worth the effort, proven in the famous scene where the Gill Man swims effortlessly beneath his female quarry in an eerie ballet -- a scene echoed much later by Steven Spielberg in the opening of Jaws. ~ Cavett Binion, Rovi