Arnold Margolin Movies

This sexy farce stars Dan Aykroyd and Rosie O'Donnell as Fred Lavery and Sheila Kingston, a pair of cynical detectives investigating the disappearance of a key witness in a diamond-smuggling case. The case leads them to a Club Med-styled S&M resort where dog collars and cat o' nine tails abound; further complicating matters, the smugglers end up on the island as well. The missing witness, photographer Elliot Slater (Paul Mercurio), takes a job as a bondage boy, and he falls in love with the resort manager, Mistress Lisa (Dana Delany. Adapted from Anne Rice's novel of the same name. ~ Jeremy Beday, All Movie Guide

Mike (Kirk Cameron) is currently fascinated by a snooty, artsy-craftsy girl named Juliet Van Druten (April Lerman). So anxious is he to impress Juliet that he lies about his family, fabricating stories about their various "artistic" pursuits. But things don't reach the crisis stage until Mike chooses to go on a date with Juliet rather than join the other Seavers in a bowling match against their neighbors, the Koosnans. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Advertised as a "return" to the spirit of the old Spencer Tracy/Katharine Hepburn films (not all of which were that spirited--try watching Keeper of the Flame sometime), the made-for-TV Good Sport is essentially a reworking of 1941's Woman of the Year. Ralph Waite plays a gritty sports columnist who enters reluctantly into the world of "haute courte" fashions to do a story on an ex-athlete turned clothes designer. He meets Lee Remick, an elegant fashion designer, and it's oil-and-water time for the next twenty minutes or so. Waite and Remick become friends, vowing to keep things strictly platonic. It doesn't take a PhD to ascertain what will happen next. For another slant on the premise of A Good Sport, catch the superior 1957 Gregory Peck/Lauren Bacall vehicle Designing Woman. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this comedy, a group of randy young interns turn City Hospital upside down with their romantic liaisons and their blunders. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide

In this light-weight Disney family fare, Dean Jones plays Johnny Baxter, who -- along with his wife Sue (Nancy Olsen) and his two kids, Chris (Kathleen Cody) and Richard (Johnny Whitaker) -- decides to leave the New York City rat-race for the clean air and easy living of the Colorado ski country. Baxter has inherited a decaying Gothic mansion and, with the love of his family and a little bit of money, he converts the old house into a popular ski lodge. While preparing his lodge for the tourists and ski bums, Baxter has to deal with a few plumbing problems, a scheming banker (Keenan Wynn), and a grizzled old miner (Harry Morgan). In typical Disney fashion, the plot culminates in a wild, slapstick snowmobile race. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Jerry Paris's Star Spangled Girl (1971), based on Neil Simon's play (a notorious Broadway flop), never made much of an impression in theaters, which is understandable with a cheap, overlit television look to most of it and Davy Jones singing the song "Girl" over the main titles (which got a lot more visibility from its use in the Brady Bunch episode in which Marsha has to get the singer to appear at her school), it looked too much like a small-screen production blown up; it was dated from the first frame of its opening credits. Tony Roberts and Todd Susman play Andy Hobart and Norman Cornell, a pair of self-styled political radicals living in California, beating the system by stealing as much as they can from neighborhood shops and conning the rest out of anyone around, all for the greater goal of keeping their underground newspaper alive and kicking. Their lifestyle is a cross between the ideas in Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book and Max Bialystock's dalliances in The Producers. Into their midst moves a transplant from rural Florida, Amy Cooper (Sandy Duncan) (who was called Sophie Rauschmeyer in the play), a perky aspiring Olympic swimmer and old-fashioned, patriotic Southern girl, and as corn-fed a hick as you found in movies in 1971 without a cynical bone in her body. Norman, a hopelessly neurotic and sexually dysfunctional writer, falls in love with her almost instantly upon encountering her; not, mind you, based on her personality or even her looks, but her smell. Andy is, at first, oblivious to her charms and content to maintain his relationship with their libidinous landlady (Elizabeth Allen, totally wasted here), paying their rent with all-night barhopping and trysts involving skydiving. At some point, however, Amy decides she has to have Andy (based on his smell...), and he feels the same way. Andy and Norman end up -- Odd Couple-style -- in conflict over their differing approaches to life; the Odd Couple allusions are further amplified by Roberts' remarkable resemblance to Walter Matthau in his manner and delivery of dialogue. The story is resolved as unconvincingly as it's played. It's also a sign of just how unfunny the play was in that the funniest moment in the movie is new to the screenplay and comes just a minute after the opening credits with a gag referring to a certain John Schlesinger movie from 1969. It's not much of a gag, but it's funnier than anything in the main body of the movie, which otherwise plays like a terminally extended version of a Love American Style episode. The original Broadway production, incidentally, starred Richard Benjamin, Anthony Perkins, and Connie Stevens. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide

Weekend gardener Aunt Bee cultivates a magnificent hybrid rose that she hopes will win the annual flower show-a contest perenially won by her friendly rival Clara. But Opie dashes Bee's hopes when he accidentally destroys the rose while playing football in the backyard. In the end, it is up to Clara to do The Right Thing. Written by Jim Parker and Arnold Margolin, "Only a Rose" made its TV network bow on December 5, 1966. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Once again, the hillbilly Darling family storms into Mayberry. With a fortune in hand-nearly three hundred dollars, cash!-Briscoe Darling (Denver Pyle) has come to town looking for brides for his goonish sons. Acting upon an old mountain superstition, the boys all choose the first woman they see walking down the street-who turns out be Andy's sweetheart Helen. Written by Jim Parker and Arnold Margolin, "The Darling Fortune" was originally telecast on October 17, 1966. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide