Al Christy Movies
Character actor Al Christy started out in radio. He began his brief film career in In Cold Blood (1967). He did not make another film appearance until Stand Alone (1985). Christy also occasionally appeared on television, guest starring on such shows as Bonanza and Peter Gunn. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide- 1986
Based on a true story, the made-for-television Samaritan: The Mitch Snyder Story is the tale of a Washington, DC-based Vietnam veteran (Martin Sheen) who fights for America's homeless by staging hunger strikes and battling with various government agencies, eventually winning the attention of several city officials. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- 1980
German director Hans Noever shot this crime drama in the U.S. in English, an unusual achievement at this time. The setting is Jefferson City, Missouri, and Joseph Randolph (Martin West), a VIP in a fictional electronics company, has just gotten the sack. The company bigwigs insist it is simply because of downsizing, but Randolph is not buying it. Enraged, he gets a handgun (this is the U.S.) and shoots five managers to death. Then he turns himself in and is eventually put in a psychiatric hospital by the police. His family suffers a series of tragedies that leave only his daughter to wonder about why her father was committed to an institution. She joins with a visiting reporter from Chicago and another interested man, and all three start digging deeper into the company's history. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michel Piccoli, Martin West, (more)
Rob Reiner's romantic comedy When Harry Met Sally stars Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan as the title pair. The film opens with the two strangers, both newly graduated from the University of Chicago, share a car trip from Chicago to New York, where they are both going to make their way. During the trip, they discuss aspects of their characters and their lives, eventually deciding it is impossible for men and women to be "just friends." They arrive in New York and go their separate ways. They meet a few years later on an airplane and Harry reveals he is married. They meet again at a bookstore a few years after that where Harry reveals he is now divorced. From that point on, the two form a friendship. Eventually their closeness results in their respective best friends (played by Carrie Fisher and Bruno Kirby) meeting and falling in love with each other. At a New Year's Eve party Harry and Sally confront the complex tangle of emotions they feel for each other. The soundtrack consists primarily of Harry Connick Jr. crooning standards like "It Had to Be You." ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Billy Crystal, Meg Ryan, (more)
- 1985
- R
In an "urban cowboy" story, a father decides to take a stand against neighborhood gangsters even at risk to his life. After Louis Thibadeau (Charles Durning) witnesses a gangland-style execution he agrees to help the police nail and jail the murderers, knowing full well the gangsters will not idly sit back and allow him to testify. When a female lawyer friend (Pam Grier) runs across one of the hoodlums in a court case, she warns Louis that he doesn't stand a chance of collecting social security at the moment. Louis sends his children away for the duration and digs out his supply of weapons from his days as a Marine, waiting at home for the assault to come. Following more or less the same build-up as Straw Dogs, this is a milder version of the same theme. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charles Durning, Pam Grier, (more)
Richard Brooks wrote and directed this stark black-and-white (with brilliantly evocative cinematography by Conrad Hall) study of two drifters who murder a family, based on Truman Capote's non-fiction novel In Cold Blood. The film takes place in Holcomb, Kansas, where four members of the Herbert Clutter family are roused from their sleep and brutally murdered. The killers, Perry Smith (Robert Blake) and Dick Hickock (Scott Wilson), are two ex-cons who plan to rob the Clutters of $10,000 kept in a safe in their home. But Dick and Perry find no safe and no $10,000 and end up leaving the murder scene with only $43. The police, led by Alvin Dewey (John Forsythe) of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, try to track down the killers. Meanwhile, Dick and Perry take off to Mexico, where Perry has fantasies of prospecting for gold. But when his dreams of prospecting come to naught, Dick insists that they return to the United States. Confident that they have left no clues, they cash bad checks, and the police track them down in Las Vegas. During questioning, their alibis are broken when they are separated and tell conflicting stories. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Blake, Scott Wilson, (more)
Mr. and Mrs. Bridge (played by real-life "Mr. and Mrs." Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward) are well-to-do residents of Kansas City in the 1940s. So far as the Bridges are concerned, however, it's the 1920s, with Mr. Bridge treating his wife like property, regarding his grown children as if they're still adolescents, and habitually voting against that upstart Roosevelt. Though the underlying painfulness of such an archaic arrangement is never ignored, Mr. Bridges' obstinancy is for the most part amusing. The scene that seemed to please the audience most was the one in which Mr. Bridge orders Mrs. Bridge not to leave their table at their country club despite tornado warnings (they sit quietly in the deserted dining room while the building shakes and shudders). As for Mrs. Bridge, her "life" is totally defined by those around her--which in any other film would be a tragedy, but which here seems a logical extension of all that's gone before. Based on two separate novels by Evan S. Connell, Mr. & Mrs. Bridge is a rare excursion into Americana by the Ismail Merchant-James Ivory team. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, (more)
