Sally Phillips Movies

This WW II musical is set in Australia and chronicles the exploits of a nightclub singer and the young Marine who loves her. She works in a Quonset hut turned into a saloon and helps stage shows for battle-weary troops returning from the South Seas. After one performance she holds a small party in her apartment and there meets the Marine sergeant who has just sailed in from Guadalcanal. Although she is married and awaiting the return of her husband, who is also at war, he decides to pursue her. Later she learns that her husband has been killed. Soon after, the Marine confesses that he can no longer handle the violence and has gone AWOL. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Smack the Pony is a half hour all-girl sketch comedy series that first aired on the U.K.'s Channel 4 in March of 1999. This fast-paced irreverent show is the product of writer/actresses Sally Phillips, Doon MacKichan, Fiona Allen, and Sarah Alexander.Their sketches involved satire, spoofs, nonsense, and a feverish playfulness that is not often to be found on television. In 2000, the Bravo cable channel rebroadcast some of the episodes for viewers in the States. The last episode aired in January of 2003. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi

In modern-day London, three men and three women fall in and out of love and back again, to the Greek-chorus accompaniment of two cab drivers (Ian Hart and John Thomson), who engage in an ongoing conversation about sex. In one pairing, Eleanor (Olivia Williams), a sophisticated and slightly anal art restorer, is pitted against Frankie (Craig Ferguson), a smartly dressed divorcee who still shares a flat with his bitter ex-wife. The two meet one night at a salsa club, and a caustic attraction soon flourishes. Another pairing sees Mo (Jane Horrocks), a tough, love-'em-and-leave-'em Liverpuddlian, reunite with Eddie (Jimi Mistry), a clumsy bloke who was in love with Mo years before and now dreams of winning her back. Meanwhile, Jocelyn (Catherine McCormack), a young woman both neurotic and without self-esteem, finds unlikely happiness with the slovenly Fergus (David Morrissey), who bemoans the lack of love in his life. Born Romantic is the second feature of British writer/director David Kane, who made his feature debut with the similarly themed This Year's Love in 1999. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, Rovi

The classic Burt Reynolds football-behind-bars flick The Longest Yard crosses the pond and gets an appropriate British accent in the process in this rough-and-tumble mixture of sports and action-comedy. Danny Mehan (Vinnie Jones) was one of the biggest stars in British football (what Americans call soccer), until he was caught rigging a game during a championship tournament. In the wake of this scandal, Danny's career takes a nosedive and his life spins out of control, until he finally ends up in prison for three years on an assault and battery conviction. Danny discovers there are a number of football fans behind bars who still hate him for fixing the game, but Danny has one powerful fan in this prison. The warden (David Hemmings) is a devoted football supporter with a taste for gambling; he's been trying to assemble a semi-pro team comprised of the prison's guards, but Danny is just smart enough to know this would seal his fate with his fellow prisoners. Instead, he offers to put together a team of inmates, who can play practice games against the guards. A new inmate, Sykes (John Forgeham), gets wind of Danny's idea and arranges an exhibition match between Danny's new team and the guards, though Sykes' motivation is more than just good fun. A powerful bookie, Sykes lost a fortune on the game Danny threw, and expects betting to be heavy for this game. If Danny and his men win, Sykes could make back the fortune he lost, but if the guards come out ahead, Danny's goose is cooked. Can Danny turn a gang of losers, misfits, and violent psychopaths -- including muscle-bound lunatic Monk (Jason Statham), creepy but loyal Billy the Limpit (Danny Dyer), tough guy Massive (Vas Blackwood), pyromaniac Nitro (Robbie Gee), and enthusiastic but out-of-shape Raj (Omid Djalili) -- into a proper team with a fighting chance of winning? Mean Machine was produced by Matthew Vaughn, who was also behind Guy Ritchie's tough-but-stylish crime comedies Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. Star Vinnie Jones, by the way, enjoyed a career as a professional footballer in Great Britain before turning to acting. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Based on author Helen Fielding's sequel to Bridget Jones's Diary, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason picks up four weeks after the original film left off, with Bridget (Renée Zellweger) emotionally satisfied at long last with Mark Darcy (Colin Firth), her barrister boyfriend. Stability in Bridget's life, however, quickly becomes a contradiction in terms. Though Mark is openly supportive of Bridget's eccentricities -- and there are many -- she is nonetheless threatened by Mark's young, nubile intern, not to mention irked at finding out that he is, among other less desirable qualities in her eyes, a conservative voter. Complicating issues further is the reentrance of her ex-lover, Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant), whom Jones, perhaps mistakenly, thought she had finally gotten over. Before long, the situation escalates into another series of embarrassing circumstances for Bridget, who is faced once again with a crippling feeling of self-doubt and has only her diary and friends to combat it. ~ Tracie Cooper, Rovi