Robert Culp Movies

This talky but ultimately satisfying made-for-TV sci-fi/thriller stars Robert Culp and Eli Wallach as Drs. Jones and Enari, a bickering pair of scientists dispatched to a remote arctic research station to study the behavior patterns in a colony of monkeys after members of the previous research team die mysteriously. Soon, the quarreling scientific rivals discover that the monkeys are not the only ones being observed -- and that the humans have become the subjects of a far more diabolical experiment. Though the plot's ultimate punchline may not seem as clever as planned, the twisted teleplay from Christopher Knopf packs a fair share of surprises and is superior to the usual TV horror fare. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

The stars of the witty TV series I Spy were reunited for this downbeat crime thriller, which takes a much darker and more violent look at the lives of two detectives for hire. Al Hickey (Bill Cosby) and Frank Boggs (Robert Culp) are a pair of private eyes who are approached by an attorney to find his girlfriend, who has gone missing. Their investigation leads them to a large sum of money from a Pittsburgh bank robbery. It seems that the woman in question has married the leader of a leftist radical group, which is now trying to find a buyer for the tainted money. An attempt to recover both the money and the girl goes awry when Hickey and Boggs infiltrate a meeting with the radicals; the girl slips away and takes the burgled cash with her. Adding to the disaster, the meeting tips off the identity of the detectives to mobsters dealing with the radicals, and the gangsters execute Hickey's wife in an effort to keep him away from their activities. Hickey and Boggs also features Rosalind Cash, Michael Moriarity, Vincent Gardenia, Isabel Sanford, and James Woods. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

It's hard to discern the filmmakers' true point of view on Hannie Caulder. On one hand, you've got the heavily somber story of Raquel Welch's efforts to exact vengeance on the men who raped her and killed her husband. On the other hand, you've got the leisurely-paced, lightly amusing sequences in which saddle-tramp Robert Culp tries to teach Welch how to be a gunslinger in her own right. And on the third hand (and who's got one of those?), you are offered the goofy Three-Stooges-like antics of the principle villains: Ernest Borgnine, Strother Martin and Jack Elam. This British-financed western features one-time sexpot Diana Dors as a zoftic madam and an uncredited Stephen Boyd as an ineffectual preacher. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A mid-life crisis takes a strange turn in this horror movie. The terror begins when a city couple decide to escape the hub-bub and crime and start new lives in the husband's great-grandfather's mansion located in the isolated North Woods. They are not there long before the wife finds herself tempted by a dashing ghost. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

"Consider the possibilities," read the ads for Paul Mazursky's 1969 satirical comedy about what happens when the sexual revolution hits affluent bourgeois life. After a weekend of "beautiful" emotional honesty at an Esalen-type retreat, married wannabe hipsters Bob (Robert Culp) and Carol (Natalie Wood) return to their well-heeled Los Angeles life determined to apply the principles of free love and complete openness to their marriage. To the respective curiosity and repulsion of their married best friends, Ted (Elliott Gould) and Alice (Dyan Cannon), Bob and Carol have affairs that they happily reveal to everyone. Inspired by all that openness during the quartet's trip to Vegas, Ted admits an affair of his own, provoking the outraged Alice to demand that this new ethos be taken to its obvious conclusion: a mate-sharing foursome. Once they're bedded down and ready to go, however, they start to have second thoughts. Without sacrificing authenticity for comedy, first-time director Mazursky and co-writer/producer Larry Tucker delve into the confusion of the Eisenhower generation when faced with the temptations of the counterculture. Too old to be hippies and too young to be fogies, the would-be California swingers sincerely attempt to try on the lifestyle, but it never looks quite right. A then-controversial example of the New Permissiveness both onscreen and off, Bob & Carol debuted at the New York Film Festival to great praise, particularly for Gould and Cannon. Whether they wanted to laugh at their elders' faux looseness or see what their peers might be doing, audiences turned Bob & Carol into a substantial hit, and its observations about marriage and sex remain humorously sharp even if the encounter group jargon is past its vogue. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide

France Nuyen (aka Mrs. Robert Culp) returns to I Spy as Sam-Than McLean, a role she created in the first-season episode "The Tiger." Now an American secret agent, Sam-Than proves to be a security risk when she apparently becomes the mistress of Soviet-aligned dictator General Vera (Ricardo Montalban. Assigned to find out if Sam-Than has defected to the Russians-and to kill her if this proves to be true-Kelly struggles to forget the fact that he and the girl had once been in love. Scripted by series star Robert Culp and location-filmed in Madrid, "Magic Mirror" originally aired on March 15, 1967. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The Movie Maker relates the last days of an old-fashioned Hollywood mogul. Mike Kirsch (Rod Steiger) built his studio from nothing in the 1920s; now, four decades later, he is on the way out, the victim of a corporate takeover. We follow Kirsch as he exercises his waning authority on a temperamental movie star (Sharon Farrell), browbeats his alcoholic wife (Anna Lee), rebellious daughter (Sally Kellerman) and longtime yes-man associate (James Dunn), and vainly attempts to push through an outdated pet movie project. Finally he is wrenched off his throne by a former assistant (Robert Culp), who is now in cahoots with the conglomerate buying the studio. Kirsch is left alone to weep in his projection room as one of his past hits plays upon the screen. The Movie Maker was originally a one-hour drama titled "A Slow Fade to Black," written by Rod Serling and telecast in 1963 on The Bob Hope Chrysler Theatre. To pad the running time to two hours, Universal filmed a series of badly written and acted flashback sequences set in the 1920s, with Michael Pataki delivering an overbaked Rod Steiger imitation as young Mike Kirsch. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Robert Culp doubled as writer and star of the I Spy episode "The Tiger." This time around, agents Kelly and Scotty must rescue famed American medical missionary Dr. Owen McLean (Lew Ayres) from a Southeast jungle. But McLeon refuses to leave with agents unless they save his daughter Sam-Than (France Nuyen, who later became Mrs. Robert Culp), currently held prisoner in a bamboo cage by Chinese guerillas. In an added complication, Kelly begins to fall in love with Sam-Than, leading Scotty to wonder if his partner's effectiveness as a spy is at an end. "The Tiger" originally aired on January 5, 1966. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Outspoken American Olympic star Elroy Browne (Ivan Dixon) has defected to China. Although the U.S. government would sooner wash their hands of the troublesome Browne, it is forced to go through the motions of persuading him to return to America. Agents Kelly and Scott are given the assignment to retrieve Browne -- but the Chinese are holding the trump card in the form of beautiful African princess Amara (Cicely Tyson). Written by series star Robert Culp, "So Long Patrick Henry" was telecast as the premiere episode of I Spy on September 15, 1965, though it was actually the third episode to be filmed. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Don Siegal directed this made-for-TV remake of the western drama Ride The Pink Horse, in which Robert Culp stars as Harry Pace, who has set out to avenge the violent death of a good friend. Pace's search leads him to New Orleans during the Mardi Gras celebration, where he meets a beautiful woman, Lois Seeger (Vera Miles). Pace's infatuation with Seeger leads him into a dangerous conflict with her husband, Arnie Seeger (Edmund O'Brien), a ruthless political power broker. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Ivan Tors, the man who made dolphins and grizzlies lovable with Flipper and Gentle Ben respectively, tries to make the magic happen for a different species in Rhino! Robert Culp and Harry Guardino play hunters without bullets, armed only with tranquilizer guns to defend themselves from African wildlife. Culp and Guardino's mission is to locate the rare white Rhino, then herd them out of harm's way to save them from extinction. Complications ensue when zoologist Culp is tricked by the avaricious Guardino, who really wants the rhinos for their horns and pelts. Filmed on location in South Africa. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Richard Bellero (Martin Landau) is a brilliant but frustrated scientist, forever failing to find approval from his wealthy, pacifist-oriented father Richard Sr. (Neil Hamilton), even when he develops a practical high-energy laser. Much to the displeasure of his ambitious wife Judith (Sally Kellerman), he has been told by his father that he is being passed over for chairmanship of the family-founded corporation. By accident, however, Richard's laser device draws in an alien being (John Hoyt) who, among other attributes, possesses an invisible force-shield. Judith sees this shield as something that would earn her husband the respect of his father and the world, and the chairmanship of his father's corporation, if he could claim it as his discovery. With help from her servant Mrs. Dame (Chita Rivera), she shoots the alien and takes the control device, a button attached by a vein to the being's body, and activates the shield for her father-in-law; the shield is, indeed, impenetrable, but Judith finds she is unable to deactivate it. With her air running out, it becomes apparent that nothing, including her husband's laser, can get her free. Her father-in-law finds the alien's body, but is killed by Mrs. Dame, an act that stirs the alien -- who is barely alive -- just long enough to rescue Judith. Now freed, she starts to move across the room but is blocked by a barrier that only she sees -- she has gone insane. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Playwright Norman Krasna adapted his hit Broadway sex farce for the screen under the direction of Peter Tewksbury. Adam Tyler (Cliff Robertson) is an airline pilot who rents a pricey Manhattan apartment and has the weekend off. His prim sister Eileen (Jane Fonda), shows up to visit, complaining that her fiancée Russ (Robert Culp), is pressuring her to have premarital sex, threatening to break up their engagement if she doesn't comply. Adam tells his sister that she is right to resist, that men want to marry women who are virgins, then he leaves with plans to meet his lover, Mona Harris (Jo Morrow), in another city. Left alone, Eileen finds women's lingerie in her brother's closet and realizes that he has a double standard. She leaves, upset. While on a bus, she meets a man named Mike (Rod Taylor). They spend the day sightseeing, fall in love, and return to the apartment after a rainstorm drenches their clothes. Russ and Adam later arrive at the apartment at different intervals. Russ mistakenly believes that Eileen has cheated on him, so he storms out, leaving Eileen with her new love and Adam with plans to marry Jo. Jim Backus has a minor role as a flight dispatcher. Musician Peter Nero, who scored the film, appears in a cameo. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide