Mark Oliver Movies
- 2009
- PG13
- Add 2012 to Queue
Disaster movie maven Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow) crafts this apocalyptic sci-fi thriller following the prophecy stated by the ancient Mayan calendar, which says that the world will come to an end on December 21, 2012. When a global cataclysm thrusts the world into chaos, divorced writer and father Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) joins the race to ensure that humankind is not completely wiped out. Chiwetel Ejiofor, Danny Glover, Amanda Peet, Thandie Newton, and Oliver Platt round out the cast of this end-of-the-world thriller co-scripted by the director and his 10,000 B.C. writer/composer, Harald Kloser. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Cusack, Amanda Peet, (more)
- 2005
- Add Candy Land: The Great Lollipop Adventure to QueueAdd Candy Land: The Great Lollipop Adventure to top of Queue
This animated adventure based on the Candy Land board game follows little Jib Gingerbread as he travels away from home for the first time on the day of the Sweet Celebration when all of Candy Land celebrates the new tasty candies that crop up that year. Lord Licorice, however, has plans to turn Candy Land into Licorice Land and the only one who can stop him is Jib. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jane Mortifee, Alberto Ghisi, (more)
- 1992
In the United States, government funding for the arts has never been popular among the more conservative members of Congress, and to populists it has an unappealing odor of elitism. Nonetheless, at one time the arts were held in sufficiently high esteem that the National Endowment for the Arts was created and funded. In the late '80s and early '90s, the efforts of avant-garde members of the art community to shock the sensibilities of the American mainstream succeeded beyond their wildest expectations. The resulting furor elicited frenzied and at times foolish-looking denunciations from the religious and social right, and vapid self-righteous posturings from the art community, who were unable to admit the possibility that the (publicly funded) excesses of artists like Andres Serrano and Robert Mapplethorpe, whatever their purely artistic merits, were damaging the cause of public funding for the arts, which relies on popular support or at the very least popular acceptance. This documentary gives the very conservative Rev. Donald Wildmon a chance to speak freely, along with responses from the pro-arts funding community by Christie Hefner (Hugh's daughter) and others. Other notable figures involved in the controversy whose views are aired include Senator Alfonse D'Amato and Jesse Helms. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
As prom gets underway and the dead come out to play, the only hope for saving the day is the mismatched couple that can't seem to agree on anything. As the Cosa High School Senior Prom draws near, the local teens are more preoccupied with getting laid and looking good on the big night. But while local teen Jimmy (Jared Kusnitz) seems completely unfazed by all the infectious enthusiasm that's spreading through the student body, his girlfriend Lindsey (Greyson Chadwick) has thrown herself into the teenage ritual and remains determined to have the perfect romantic evening. But it's kind of difficult to enjoy an intimate dance when your classmates are trying to eat your brains, and when the tux-clad teens begin turning blue and munching on flesh, Jimmy and Lindsey are forced to put their differences aside long enough to extinguish the zombie plague before it spreads beyond campus grounds. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jared Kusnitz, Greyson Chadwick, (more)
Forever interested in the kitsch built into past eras, director John Waters chooses the TV dance show craze of the early '60s for his playful focus in Hairspray. Ricki Lake plays Tracy Turnblad, just one of several alliteratively named characters coming of age in 1962 Baltimore, where "The Corny Collins Show" is the most popular American Bandstand-type program, watched by hundreds of young dreamers each day after school. Being chosen to dance on it is the ultimate status symbol and every young girl's dream, and Tracy improbably wins a featured spot when she infiltrates a dance contest and makes a better impression than her favored rival, the catty Amber von Tussle (Colleen Fitzpatrick). Always able to have fun, even when she's being mocked by the jealous popular girls, Tracy wins the affections of Amber's boyfriend and soon begins leading a movement to integrate the dance show, which has previously featured blacks only in a once-weekly theme night. She is arrested following a demonstration at a local theme park owned by Amber's father (Sonny Bono), who subscribes to the same theory of race relations as "The Corny Collins Show." Tracy's adventures are also filtered through her loving but eccentric parents (Divine and Jerry Stiller) and involve a humorous cultural clash with pot-smoking beatniks (Ric Ocasek and Pia Zadora). ~ Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ricki Lake, Michael St. Gerard, (more)
- 1985
This lively made-for-television comedy is set at a summer camp and chronicles the romantic misadventures of the staff. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1989
- R
- Add Sleepaway Camp 3: Teenage Wasteland to QueueAdd Sleepaway Camp 3: Teenage Wasteland to top of Queue
Angela (Pamela Springsteen), the murderous camp counselor of Sleepaway Camp 2, returns to the scene of her crimes in this no-frills installment. Assuming a camper's identity (after mowing her down with a Mack truck), Angela arrives at Camp Rolling Hills, which was purchased and renamed "New Horizons" after her last killing spree. Husband and wife entreprenurs Herman and Lily (Michael J. Pollard and Sandra Dorsey) have reopened it as an "experiment in sharing" to bring street-smart disadvantaged kids together with snobby rich brats. Splitting up into three groups of culturally mixed teens, they go off into the woods for a camping trip designed to break down barriers. Instead, Angela finds a myriad of reasons to off her fellow campers (thanks to their constant bad behavior), and gets the job done with axes, tent spikes, a lawnmower, and firecrackers up the nose. Even the presence of an off-duty police officer (Cliff Brand), who is familar with Angela's crimes, doesn't deter her from slaughtering everyone for the merest provocation. ~ Fred Beldin, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pamela Springsteen, Tracy Griffith, (more)
Set in the present day, director Terry Gilliam's fantastical morality tale follows the traveling show of the mysterious Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) -- a man who once won a bet with the Devil himself, and possesses the unique ability to guide the imagination of others. Many centuries ago, Dr. Parnassus won immortality in a bet that found the malevolent Mr. Nick (Tom Waits) coming up short. While few would be foolish enough to try their luck against the powers of darkness a second time, Dr. Parnassus did precisely that -- this time trading his mortality for youth on the understanding that his firstborn would become the property of Mr. Nick when the child reaches his or her 16th birthday. Flash-forward to the present day, and Dr. Parnassus' daughter, Valentina (Lily Cole), is about to celebrate her sweet sixteen. Dr. Parnassus is desperate to save his little girl from her fiery fate, and when Mr. Nick arrives to collect, the good doctor presents the Prince of Darkness with a wager too enticing to refuse: Dr. Parnassus and Mr. Nick will each compete to seduce five souls, with possession of Valentina going to whomever manages to complete the task first. As the competition begins to heat up, Dr. Parnassus promises his daughter's hand in marriage to any man who can help him successfully navigate the surreal obstacle course that lies ahead and finally help him undue the many mistakes of his past. While the sudden death of prominent Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus player Heath Ledger in January of 2008 left Gilliam and company scrambling to find a means of salvaging the film -- which was already well into principal photography at the time -- the cavalry soon arrived in the form of Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell, who each serve as alternate-dimension versions of the character originally set to be played by Ledger when the character crosses through a paranormal mirror. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Heath Ledger, Christopher Plummer, (more)
- 2007
- G
- Add Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale to QueueAdd Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale to top of Queue
The Christmas-themed animated Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale features the cartoon cat and mouse antagonizing each other while the rodent attempts to stage a holiday-themed extravaganza. The film utilizes Tchaikovsky's familiar music for The Nutcracker Suite. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- 2007
- PG13
- Add Tyler Perry's Daddy's Little Girls to QueueAdd Tyler Perry's Daddy's Little Girls to top of Queue
Diary of a Mad Black Woman mastermind Tyler Perry turns the familiar Cinderella tale on its head with this story concerning a successful female attorney who falls in love with a financially strapped mechanic. Monty (Idris Elba) is struggling mechanic and single father of three from a poor neighborhood. Upon learning that custody of his beloved daughters has been awarded to his morally bankrupt, drug-dealing ex-wife Jennifer (Tasha Smith), desperate Monty enlists the aid of beautiful Ivy league-educated lawyer Julia (Gabrielle Union) -- whom he recently met during his brief stint as a chauffeur -- in ensuring that his daughters remain with him in a stable and loving environment. Despite the vast social and economical differences that divide them, Monty and Julia soon begin to find themselves unexpectedly falling in love with one another as they work together to save Monty's daughters from a life of crime and corruption. Now, in order to reconcile their blossoming romance and overcome the forces that threaten to destroy the only thing that Monty holds dear, the concerned father and powerful lawyer will have to bridge the gap that divides them by coming together to prove that true love really does have the power to prevail. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gabrielle Union, Idris Elba, (more)
A true story of tragedy, hope, and resilience comes to the screen in this sports drama. Huntington, WV, is home to Marshall University, a school where college football is a way of life. Huntington is also a town that learned to deal with tragedy in the fall of 1970 when Marshall's "Thundering Herd" boarded an airliner to return home after a football game in North Carolina. The jet crashed into a hill due to bad weather, and 75 members of Marshall's football squad and athletic staff died that night. The accident dealt a crippling blow to the city of Huntington, as well as Marshall's faculty and student body, and university president Donald Dedmon (David Strathairn) considered abandoning the school's football program. But instead Coach Jack Lengyel (Matthew McConaughey) was recruited from Ohio's College of Wooster to rebuild Marshall's football program. Lengyel was not naïve about the task ahead of him, and working beside Red Dawson (Matthew Fox), an assistant coach who narrowly missed the doomed flight and was one of the program's only survivors, he came to understand his job was not just to put a team on the field, but help a college and a community heal their wounds from the tragic accident. Together Lengyel and Dawson turned a handful of rookies and second-string players into a competitive team who in 1971 showed the world what they could do in a legendary game against Marshall's rivals, Xavier University. Produced with the cooperation of Marshall University and filmed in part on their campus, We Are Marshall also stars Ian McShane, Anthony Mackie, and January Jones. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Matthew McConaughey, Matthew Fox, (more)
