Peter J. Thompson Movies
- 1983
Malibu is a two-part, four-hour adaptation of William Murray's best-selling novel. William Atherton and Susan Dey play a green-as-grass married couple from Milwaukee who take a vacation in Malibu. Amidst the elite and their million-dollar beach houses, Atherton starts up an affair with divorcee Valerie Perrine, while Dey fends off the attentions of TV star Steve Forrest before succumbing to the charms of tennis pro Chad Everett. Other Southern California satyrs and nymphs wandering in and out of Malibu include James Coburn, Eva Marie Saint, Ann Jillian, Kim Novak, Richard Mulligan, and (who else?) George Hamilton. The multiple story lines all come to a head during a climactic tennis match. Malibu is trash, true, but it's trash cultivated from the highest-quality refuse heaps. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1979
Quincy (Jack Klugman) is a member of the medical/legal team investigating the crash of an airliner which occurred some 40 miles away from LAX. All 121 passengers and crew members were killed, and Quincy and his staff must perform autopsies on all of them. During this grim assignment, Quincy discovers that one of the victims was travelling under an assumed name--and that this may somehow be linked to the doctor's discovery that the plane was carrying a highly combustible freight. The challenge now is to find out why the dead man was posing as someone else, while simultaneously convincing the airline to cease transporting dangerous fuels. George Gaynes, onetime Broadway musical headliner and future stalwart of the popular Police Academy films, appears as a chemical-company executive. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1979
Having solved many a crime in the past, Quincy finds himself in the uneviable position of being accused of criminal behavior. The family of 21-year-old kidney donor Jack Murphy insist that Quincy declared the man dead prematurely in order to harvest his organs. In his efforts to clear his name, Quincy butts heads with sleazy, ambulance-chasing malpractice attorney Raymond Morrison (Granville Van Dusen), who will go to any lengths to win a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the entire LA Coroner's Office. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1979
After football player Joe Ramsey (Lee Paul) dies of a brain aneuryism, Quincy (Jack Klugman) performs an autopsy and finds that the man was suffering from a drug-resistent strain of gonnorhea. In his efforts to trace the source of the disease, Quincy orders a round-up of the city's prostitutes--and when one of the hookers turns up murdered, it seems that the feisty medical examiner has stumbled onto a widespread conspiracy and coverup. This episode can be regarded as a seminal example of the "AIDS dramas" which proliferated on television during the next two decades (though of course AIDS had not yet been identified as an international epidemic). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1978
At the height of a four-day torrential downpour, a mudslide unearths a body in a mountaintop cemetary. Peforming lab tests on the corpse, Quincy (Jack Klugman) discovers that the death may have been due to typhoid--and that this body and several others were buried illegally. In his frantic efforts to determine the truth behind this mystery, and to avoid a widespread epidemic, Quincy once again runs up against the brick wall of bureaucracy (to say nothing of that old municipal ritual popularly known as "C.Y.A.") ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1975
Lewis Flander and Carol Hawkins star in the hectic British farce Not Now Comrade. Flander plays a Russian ballet dancer who decides to defect. Unable to reach the British embassy, Flander hides out with London stripteaser Hawkins. There's an abundance of female flesh in this one, a fact that necessitated numerous snips in the TV version that made the UHF rounds in the 1980s. Watch for Not Now Comrade codirector Ray Cooney and veteran British funster Roy Kinnear in cameo roles. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
With minimalist production values and little dialog, this romantic fantasy takes place on the barren Isle of Jersey where a troubled wife has come to sort out the tumult of her life. She encounters a lighthouse-keeper there and they quickly become lovers. Together they flee to Scotland. One day they are making love on a beach when the lighthouse keeper dies. Things don't get better when he returns from the dead to haunt her. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1973
The British TV sitcom Father Dear Father originally ran from 1968 through 1973. Veteran farceur Patrick Cargill starred as a divorced father with two nubile daughters. Complications ensued when the girls moved into the flat just below Cargill's. You may recognize this property as the basis for the 1980s Ted Knight series Too Close For Comfort. This feature-film version of Father Dear Father merely rehashes plot devices from the series; neither of the property's original writers, Brian Cooke and John Mortimer (of Rumpole of the Bailey fame) seem to have been involved in the movie adaptation. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1972
This theatrically-released feature represents a spinoff of the popular British television series of the same name, which screened on ITV to enthusiastic audience response from 1970 to 1971. The narrative concerns Walter Bingley (Wilfred Pickles) and Ada Bingley (Irene Handl), a middle-aged couple preparing to celebrate their first wedding anniversary, sans the knowledge that their loved ones are currently preparing a surprise party for them. The day starts to go awry when Arthur (Arthur English), one of Walter's colleagues, nearly ruins the surprise; the couple then lapse into a never ending series of catastrophes, including a quarrel over a blonde wig, Walter's discovery that he's lost the money for Ada's present, an accident that finds Walter being struck down by an automobile, and much more. ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Irene Handl, Wilfred Pickles, (more)
- 1972
Based upon the play by August Strindberg, Miss Julie is concerned with the torturous relationship between the aristocratic title character and Jean (Donal McCann), a mere servant of her father's house. As the play opens, most of the servants are outside celebrating midsummer's eve with dancing, singing, and laughter. Christine (Heather Canning), a cook, is waiting for Jean to arrive so that they may join the revelers, but the imperious Miss Julie (Helen Mirren) comes between them and uses her power and status to change their plans. Julie delights in humiliating Jean, treating him with disdain and mocking his dreams; she even goes so far as ask that he kiss her shoe. Because she is technically his employer, Jean cannot directly express his anger, but he does begin playing a manipulative game of his own that results in an exchange of secrets. They disappear into a secluded room of the house, and when they re-emerge, Jean has gained the upper hand, and they find themselves in an untenable situation which they must still somehow resolve. ~ Craig Butler, All Movie Guide
