Marilyn O'Connor Movies
- 2003
Tired of being given nothing but "fluff" pieces, Rebecca Chandler (Jennie Garth), a reporter for the Indianapolis Sentinel, demands to write a story with some teeth in it. Unfortunately, her dyspeptic editor Bob Bolton (Victor Raider-Wexler) doesn't see things Rebecca's way, thus he dispatches the reluctant newshound to Hamden, Indiana, there to cover a sappy human-interest story about a mysterious "Secret Santa" who each Christmas bestows money and necessities upon a selected needy person. Not only does Rebecca hate the assignment, but she hates Hamden--especially since she was originally slated to have gone on a Hawaiian honeymoon with her ex-boyfriend. Thus, our heroine is hardly full of the Christmas spirit when she arrives in Hamden and is forced by the holiday tourist crunch to take a room in a nursing home where a fellow named Russell (Charlie Robinson), who has already managed to get on Rebecca's bad side, is the main helper-outer. Inevitably, Rebecca's cold heart is warmed up, not only by the looney but likeable Russell, but also by an unusually perceptive nursing-home resident named Miss Ruth (played by the great Barbara Billingsley). However, Rebecca still has a story to file, and she thinks that she has zeroed in on the elusive "Secret Santa", fingering local millionaire John Martin Carter (Steven Eckholt) as the most likely suspect. But even if Carter is the man in question, the townsfolk aren't about to help Rebecca expose their unknown benefactor--it seems that over the years they've come to believe in the Secret Santa, and they're not about to shatter their own illusions for the sake of a cheap headline! Adapted for television by Beth Polson and Robert Tate Miller from their own novel, Secret Santa first aired December 14, 2003, on NBC. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 2001
Originally scheduled for September 27, 2001, this ER episode was moved back to October 4 due to network coverage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Weaver (Laura Innes) heads to Doc Magoo's on personal business and fails to answer her pager when Chen (Ming-Na) and Malucchi (Erik Palladino) need her. An off-duty Carter (Anthony Edwards) deals with victims of a rock-concert stampede, tries to rectify a fatal error made by Chen and Malucchi in Weaver's absence, and injures his back. Weaver fires Chen for her error. Benton (Eriq La Salle) learns that the mother of his son, Reese (Matthew Watkins), has been killed in an accident. Vondie Curtis-Hall, who guest starred as a transvestite in an earlier ER episode, here replaces Victor Williams in the recurring role of Roger, the man who claims to be the true biological father of Reese. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1997
Leave it to the Frasier gang to take a perfectly enjoyable holiday like Christmas and cast a pall of misery over the proceedings. Specifically, Frasier (Kelsey Grammer), Daphne (Jane Leeves), Niles (David Hyde Pierce), and Roz (Peri Gilpin) show up separately at the offices of their favorite masseur (Albert Macklin), relating horrible recent Yuletide memories as they receive their respective rubdowns. Particularly amusing (at least for the viewer) are Niles' traumatic misadventures in a stalled elevator. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1986
- PG
In this Road Warrior clone, an aging trucker spends his retirement mining an old cobalt mine with the assistance of his devoted grandson. A good friend lures the trucker out of retirement by offering him a quarter of a million dollars to drive some plutonium from Nevada to a high-security operation in Arizona. He begins his trek in a high-tech rig unaware that terrorist are waiting to ambush him and his deadly cargo. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Forrest Tucker, John Ireland, (more)
In this slightly muddled crime drama, a young man, Kelly (Doug Wilson), comes back to Los Angeles once he learns his brother has been murdered, and then he has to fight off suspicion by the police. Suspicion is natural in his case because he is a reformed thief. Kelly's luck could not be worse. He is beaten up by the gangster responsible for his brother's murder and his own mother turns him in to the cops. Even though his girlfriend Jill (Jeanne Baird) stands by him, the future looks anything but rosy as the police continue tallying him up as a loser. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jeanne Baird, Marilyn O'Connor, (more)
