Robert P. Cohen Movies

A privileged, free-spirited young girl tries to adapt to life in a strict boarding school in this charming, critically acclaimed children's fantasy. Adapting a novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett, also the author of The Secret Garden, the film shifts the story's setting to World War I. 10 year-old Sara Crewe (Liesel Matthews) has been left in a respected New York City boarding school while her British father heads overseas to fight. Filled with wild stories and a playful attitude, the unconventional Sara becomes popular amongst her classmates but quickly comes into conflict with the harsh headmistress, Miss Minchin (Eleanor Bron), who attempts to quash the child's individuality. The young girl's situation takes a serious turn for the worse when she unexpectedly receives word of her father's death, and, suddenly impoverished, is forced into life as a servant. Treated as a lesser class of person by her former companions, Sara instead befriends her fellow servants and turns to the power of imagination in order to maintain hope for the future. In addition to changing the story's setting, screenwriters Richard LaGravenese and Elizabeth Chandler add a layer of Indian mythology to the tale, allowing director Alfonso Cuaron the chance to punctuate the riches-to-rags fable with a series of lush, imaginative fantasy sequences. Though A Little Princess had difficulty attracting audiences during its initial run, its visual splendor and touching storytelling were praised by many critics, several of whom proclaimed the film one of the best family-oriented productions of its time. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi

Polish bureaucrat Jozef Burski (Donald Sutherland) all but loses his reason for living when he is "downsized" by his government. Reduced to non-person status, Burski reaches out to his friends for moral support, but they turn their backs on him. Worse still, he doesn't know why he's been targeted for this emotional abuse; every time he tries to find out, something calamitous happens. The emotional strain takes its biggest toll on Burski's wife Mira (Anne Archer), who ends up in a state asylum. Suddenly, Burski's exile is lifted: it's all been a test of his loyalty to his homeland. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

While working as a publicist, an average guy (Robby Benson) meets a girl (Karla DeVito, Robby's real-life wife), ends up marrying her and has a child (Lyric Benson, Robby's real daughter). Problems soon arise as the harried husband and father begins to crack under the pressure. ~ John Bush, Rovi

When porn-star Roxy Du Jour (Sally Kellerman) dies with her clothes off while filming her latest project, Saint Peter (Al Waxman) informs her she must do a good deed before she is allowed to pass through the gates of heaven. Roxy's ghost is sent back to Earth to be the patron saint of sex to Rudy (Patrick Dempsey), the dorky virginal teenager who longs for his first sexual encounter. Roxy gives Rudy several tips that only serve to further frustrate Rudy. He has his eye on The Love Goddess (Shannon Tweed) while turning down the continual advances of Wendy (Isabelle Mejias). Kellerman's performance is the only bright light in this insipid sex comedy. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

There have been almost enough Meatballs to make a plate of spaghetti, but this entry about a decisive boxing match between two youth camps is basically inedible without Bill Murray to add the necessary zest, as he did in the original Meatballs. "The Flash" (John Mengatti) is out on probation but has to serve time at Camp Sasquatch as a counselor-in-training (!) as a part of the probation terms. There, he meets the super-innocent Cheryl (Kim Richards), adding interest to his job, but none of the characters in Camp Sasquatch or its rival Camp Patton add much interest to the film. Hershey (Hamilton Camp) is the one-dimensional fascist who runs the militaristic Camp Patton and sure enough, his aide-de-camp is a closet gay (John Larroquette). (Paul Reubens) of Pee Wee Herman fame is a minor player, Richard Mulligan is Giddy (an apt name for his character) and when these oddballs are combined with a strange- looking alien and the final boxing match that will save Camp Sasquatch if only The Flash can win, the pastiche is somewhat hard to digest. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Sam Cooper (Steve Gutenberg) is an attaché in the U.S. State Department when, on the day before his wedding, a dying scientist hands him a formula that induces invisibility, and Sam finds himself fleeing with the maid of honor to escape both Russian and U.S. agents. Hotly pursued by everyone, Sam has to use the formula on himself, inviting a series of minor disasters. The very decision to make a movie about an invisible man in 3-D should have warned of trouble ahead. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Here, the dope-smoking duo are working on an ice-cream truck, and their specially treated confections are more than just a hit for the kids. Nice Dreams is the third in the series. ~ John Bush, Rovi

Director John Landis put himself on the map with this low-budget, fabulously successful comedy, which made a then-astounding 62 million dollars and started a slew of careers for its cast in the process. National Lampoon's Animal House is set in 1962 on the campus of Faber College in Faber, PA. The first glimpse we get of the campus is the statue of its founder Emil Faber, on the base of which is inscribed the motto, "Knowledge Is Good." Incoming freshmen Larry "Pinto" Kroger (Tom Hulce) and Kent "Flounder" Dorfman (Stephen Furst) find themselves rejected by the pretentious Omega fraternity, and instead pledge to Delta House. The Deltas are a motley fraternity of rejects and maladjusted undergraduates (some approaching their late twenties) whose main goal -- seemingly accomplished in part by their mere presence on campus -- is disrupting the staid, peaceful, rigidly orthodox, and totally hypocritical social order of the school, as represented by the Omegas and the college's dean, Vernon Wormer (John Vernon). Dean Wormer decides that this is the year he's going to get the Deltas expelled and their chapter decertified; he places the fraternity on "double secret probation" and, with help from Omega president Greg Marmalard (James Daughton) and hard-nosed member Doug Neidermeyer (Mark Metcalf), starts looking for any pretext on which to bring the members of the Delta fraternity up on charges.

The Deltas, oblivious to the danger they're in, are having a great time, steeped in irreverence, mild debauchery, and occasional drunkenness, led by seniors Otter (Tim Matheson), Hoover (James Widdoes), D-Day (Bruce McGill), Boon (Peter Riegert), and pledge master John "Bluto" Blutarsky (John Belushi). They're given enough rope to hang themselves, but even then manage to get into comical misadventures on a road trip (where they arrange an assignation with a group of young ladies from Emily Dickinson University). Finally, they are thrown out of school, and, as a result, stripped of their student deferments (and, thus, eligible for the draft). They decide to commit one last, utterly senseless (and screamingly funny) slapstick act of rebellion, making a shambles of the university's annual homecoming parade, and, in the process, getting revenge on the dean, the Omegas, and everyone else who has ever gone against them. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi