Julie Delpy

Ingenue Julie Delpy does triple duty as writer, director, and star of this romantic comedy. French photographer Marion (Delpy) and American interior designer Jack (Adam Goldberg) are returning from a vacation in Venice. Despite the fact that it was supposed to be the ultimate romantic getaway, disagreements and misunderstandings seemed to drive them farther apart rather than bringing them closer together. Before they return to the United States, Marion and Jack have a quick two-day stop in Paris to visit Marion's parents and pick up the cat that they had been pet-setting for their daughter. Unfortunately for Jack, Paris proves to be quite a culture shock. Not only are Marion's parents a pair of eccentric former "revolutionaries" who make no qualms about having knock-down-drag-out arguments regardless of who's present, but they also appear to have a particular distaste for Americans. Add to this the fact that Marion's friends hold nothing back when it comes to discussing their sexual lives, seem fixated on food rituals, and that Marion seems to run into former lovers on every street corner, and Jack quickly begins to suspect that he doesn't know his girlfriend half as well as he thought he did when they were living the simple life back in New York. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Director Lasse Hallström offers a brisk account of the scam that shook the literary community with this semi-comic biographical drama starring Richard Gere as the man who sold a fraudulent biography of Howard Hughes to publishing giant McGraw Hill. The year was 1971; the Vietnam War was raging and protestors filled the streets. Clifford Irving (Gere) was a struggling author with bold ambitions, and the determination needed to see them through. When Irving's attempt to sell his latest novel to McGraw Hill via his in-house publisher, Andrea Tate (Hope Davis), falls through at the last minute, the frustrated author loudly proclaims that his next novel will be "the book of the century." Upon returning to his wife Edith's (Marcia Gay Harden) makeshift studio, the humiliated author catches a glimpse of eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes on a magazine cover. Later, almost jokingly, Irving and his best friend Dick Suskind (Alfred Molina) begin to fantasize about a scenario in which the author convinces his publishers that he has been personally selected by Hughes to pen the billionaire's memoirs. The revenge fantasy becomes a complicated reality, however, when Irving and Suskind approach skeptical McGraw Hill heavy Shelton Fisher (Stanley Tucci) with a series of forged letters presumably written by Hughes himself and offering unwavering support for the project. His credibility continually questioned as the ante is upped at every turn, Irving is forced to maintain the increasingly difficult charade as he strong-arms McGraw Hill to pay "Hughes" an unheard-of one million dollars for the rights to his life story, acquires a the illegally procured documents that will provide the foundation for the book, and works around the clock to meet his publisher's deadline. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Kevin Connor directs William Hurt, Donald Sutherland, and Julie Delpy in this adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. The film follows the storyline of the book closely. Dr. Victor Frankenstein creates a man from the parts of different corpses, and the creature turns out to be superior to his creator in many ways -- but the creation turns on the creator when the world is unable to recognize the creation's humanity. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

Tyler Briggs (Michael Vartan) returns home for his mother's funeral only to encounter the redneck side of the family -- his estranged father Gus (Marshall Bell), his two drug-addled, burned-out half-brothers, and their shady friend Teddy (Denis Leary). Sniffing money, Gus wants to reestablish contact with his son, whom he abandoned with his mother 20 years previous, but Tyler wants nothing to do with him or the useless brothers. Tyler settles into a small coastal California town, where he meets the lovely Sandy (Kari Wuhrer) and her brother Jack (Norman Reedus). But Gus and the gang turn up, and Sandy becomes the victim of an attempted rape by Tyler's dimwitted scuzzbucket brothers. That doesn't sit well with Jack and his friends, and soon it's the townies against the career criminals, who happen to be better armed. ~ Buzz McClain, All Movie Guide

Originally scheduled for September 27, 2001, this ER episode was moved back to October 4 due to network coverage of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Weaver (Laura Innes) heads to Doc Magoo's on personal business and fails to answer her pager when Chen (Ming-Na) and Malucchi (Erik Palladino) need her. An off-duty Carter (Anthony Edwards) deals with victims of a rock-concert stampede, tries to rectify a fatal error made by Chen and Malucchi in Weaver's absence, and injures his back. Weaver fires Chen for her error. Benton (Eriq La Salle) learns that the mother of his son, Reese (Matthew Watkins), has been killed in an accident. Vondie Curtis-Hall, who guest starred as a transvestite in an earlier ER episode, here replaces Victor Williams in the recurring role of Roger, the man who claims to be the true biological father of Reese. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

An unusually heavy rainstorm brings a inordinate amount of "traffic" into the ER. Outside the doors of the hospital, Weaver (Laura Innes) and a nervous, inexperienced Gallant (Sharif Atkins) risk electrocution from downed power lines to save a pregnant woman and her unborn baby. Inside, Greene (Anthony Edwards) treats a young boy whose brother was swept into a river. Carter's (Noah Wyle) grandmother, brought into the ER after sustaining injuries in a hit-and-run, begins hallucinating. Nicole (Julie Delpy), the troubled young girl befriended by Kovac (Goran Visnjic), may be stealing personal items from the staff. And Benton (Eriq La Salle) gets some disturbing news about his son, Reese (Matthew Watkins). Lisa Vidal makes her first series appearance as feisty firefighter Sandy Lopez. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This episode marks the final regular ER appearances of Eriq La Salle and Michael Michele. After resorting to desperate measures to retain custody of his son, Reese (Matthew Watkins), Peter Benton (La Salle) realizes that he must make a choice between the boy and his overloaded ER schedule. He opts to take a less demanding job at a clinic in the Chicago suburbs, where his current love, Cleo Finch (Michele), is already working. In other developments, a boy accidentally shot by his mom on Christmas Eve is a cause of great concern amongst the ER staffers; Abby (Maura Tierney) sees Nicole (Julie Delpy) where she didn't expect to see her; the relationship between Weaver (Laura Innes) and Lopez (Lisa Vidal) enters a new phase; and Carter (Noah Wyle) receives startling but not unexpected news about his parents. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Sharif Atkins joins the series as Michael Gallant, a new medical student assigned to Carter (Noah Wyle). While making the rounds with Gallant, Carter learns to his chagrin that his grandmother (Frances Sternhagen) is now a "high-risk" patient who may die at any moment; he also helps Lewis (Sherry Stringfield) treat another med student who has been cutting herself. Elsewhere, a mall security guard is driven to desperate measures after accidentally injuring a skateboarder; Elizabeth (Alex Kingston) tries to determine the identity of the person responsible for euthanizing four of her patients in post-op; and, claiming to be Reese's (Matthew Watkins) biological father, Roger (Vondie Curtis-Hall) demands custody of the boy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Richard Linklater returned to the semi-improvised approach and philosophical themes of his debut feature Slacker while embracing a new and groundbreaking visual technology in his sixth feature film, Waking Life. Linklater and cameraman Tommy Pallotta shot the film on location in Austin, TX, using digital video equipment. Linklater and digital animator Bob Sabiston then used newly developed computer software to transform the images through a process called "interpolated rotoscoping"; the result merges the naturalism of live action with a stylized look that resembles a cartoon or a painting in motion. Waking Life's flexible, non-narrative approach follows a young man (Wiley Wiggins) who arrives in Austin and hitches a ride with a stranger, who engages him in a conversation about rarely considered facets of existentialism. As the visitor drifts through the city, he encounters a variety of people and finds himself absorbing their views on art, philosophy, society, and numerous other issues of contemporary life. Linklater's cast is dotted with well-known actors (Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, Adam Goldberg, Nicky Katt) and pop-culture notables (filmmaker Steven Soderbergh, Martin Scorsese associate Steven Prince, comic Louis Black), alongside a large number of relatively little-known players. Waking Life received its world premiere at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival; Linklater's next film, Tape, was also screened at the same festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The private life of celebrated author and philosopher Ayn Rand takes center stage in this film produced for the Showtime cable network. In 1951, Ayn Rand (Helen Mirren) is a best-selling author and celebrated thinker when she meets Nathaniel Branden (Eric Stoltz) and his friend Barbara (Julie Delpy), two college students who admire her writing and ideas. Rand takes the students under her wing, but before long her mentoring becomes less benevolent and more abusive. She badgers Barbara and Nathaniel, who were never more than close friends, into marrying, and while Nathaniel responds well to Rand's tutelage, Barbara begins to shrink from Rand's lack of compassion, which Rand sees as weakness. Things become more uncomfortable when, after Barbara and Nathaniel join Ayn and her often-ignored husband Frank O'Connor (Peter Fonda) on a vacation, Ayn and Nathaniel demand "permission" to have an affair, which they feel is dictated by the importance of their work. Based on Barbara Branden's autobiography about her years with Rand, The Passion Of Ayn Rand was premiered at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide