Edward J. Lasko Movies

The Angels are undercover at the Tropicana while they continue investigating a series of suspicious deaths blamed on the casino owner. ~ Sarah Block, All Movie Guide

The friends and family of young Aura Lee Benton (Melissa Greene) are shocked when the girl dies from a heroin overdose--especially since they know full well that Aura Lee never did drugs. Jim (James Garner) is hired by the dead girl's coworker Sara Butler (a pre-Bionic Woman Lindsay Wagner) to uncover the truth behind the tragedy. The detective methodically follows the trail of clues to a powerful senator (Robert Webber)--who promptly commits suicide, sending Jim right back to Square One! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Though it barely received big-city release (it lay on the shelf for nearly two years before it received any sort of release), The Petty Story did quite well on a regional basis. As indicated by the title, this is the story of the Petty family of stock-car racing fame. Richard Petty, who won over 200 races before his 1993 retirement, stars as himself, while Darren McGavin provides acting relief as Petty's father Lee. The film pulls no punches in charting the turbulent relationship between father and son. For those not interested in domestic melodrama, the film is chock-full of great racing scenes. Also appearing in The Petty Story are Kathie Browne (Mrs. Darren McGavin),Noah Beery Jr. (who went through most of the same paces in Big Fauss and Little Halsey), Lynne Marta and L.Q. Jones. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

An African-American educator sets out to find a young man who has fallen to the wrong side of the law before the police catch up with him in this crime drama. Billy and Frank are a pair of teenage shoplifters working Brother John, a fence working with an army of small-time thieves in the Los Angeles area. Billy and Frank are trying to steal some tape recorders from an audio shop when they're caught by the owner, who has a gun. The shopkeeper accidentally shoots himself during a scuffle with the kids; Lt. Summers (James B. Sikking) is a police detective heading up a stakeout on the shop, and when the shoplifters try to get away, Frank is shot by police. Billy takes him to the apartment of his sister Cooper (Gwenn Mitchell), an upscale prostitute, and Boots Turner (Terry Carter), a college literature professor who is Cooper's next-door neighbor and a longtime friend, is drawn into the chase. As Billy tries to escape from the police, who are now preparing to charge him with homicide after the death of the shopkeeper, Boots tries to find Billy before the cops do, convinced the young man is telling the truth when he says he's innocent of murder. Featuring an original score by Johnny Pate, Bother On The Run was also released under the titles Man On The Run and Boots Turner; on home video, it was billed as a sequel to the movie Black Force (aka Force: IV), even though the two films have nothing at all in common. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In this exciting episode of The Mod Squad, Linc and Pete go undercover and join a gang of young street thugs who rob warehouses with the help of a few crooked cops. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide

In this exciting episode of The Mod Squad, the team investigates a murder at a bus station by going under cover, each member of the trio taking a different bus in search of the culprit. ~ Cammila Albertson, All Movie Guide

The title character is a benign 7-foot-tall grizzly bear (perhaps all grizzlies are benign, but we're not about to get close enough to find out). Little Clint Howard befriends the bear, naming the beast Ben. Clint's wildlife-officer dad Dennis Weaver and mom Vera Miles have some trouble adjusting to the boy's new pet, but all ends happily after a lengthy sojourn in the Everglades. The best scenes involve ex-Bowery-Boy Huntz Hall, here playing a grizzled old swamp tramp. The upshot of Gentle Giant's success was the TV series Gentle Ben, which also starred Howard and Weaver and which ran from 1967 through 1969. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide