Brent Anderson Movies

"Ordinary people, extraordinary ideas" were celebrated in this half-hour PBS series. The producers scoured the country and came up with a group of "normal" people who, individually or working in teams, developed a total of fourteen intriguing and workable inventions. Among these were a new cement-mixing device, a straight-line drywall cutting tool, a combination purse/diaper bag/bassinette, a toy paper shredder in the shape of a dog, and a new word game called "Befudioum" (based on popular American idioms). The series traced the development of invention from preliminary sketches to final store-shelf sale, perfectly illustrating the motto of the "original" Edison that genius is 10 percent inspiration, 90 percent perspiration. Packaged by Bouncing Brain Productions, Everyday Edisons was first made available to local PBS outlets on April 28, 2007. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Wishbone, the terrier with a nose for books, stars in this feature-length story in which he daydreams himself into O'Henry's "Hearts of the West" stories for fun and adventure in the American West's pioneer days. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

It's Reversal of Fortune meets Jerry Springer in this made-for-TV miniseries, which concerns the true-life tale of a Texas oil magnate on trial for conspiring to murder his brassy ex-wife -- and for very successfully doing away with her lover and daughter. Texas Justice stars Peter Strauss as Cullen Davis, a millionaire businessman who falls in love with the tempestuous, lower-class Priscilla (Heather Locklear), a young woman with a checkered past and a temper to match. When their relationship goes sour, Cullen's jealousy flares up and he does the unthinkable -- but in the courtroom, he attempts to clear his name with the help of the grandstanding, high-powered attorney Richard Haynes (Dennis Farina). ~ Michael Hastings, Rovi

"They didn't kill me; I was dead already," is the statement uttered by Dexter Cornell (Dennis Quaid), an English professor at the University of Texas at Austin who has been poisoned by a slow-acting toxin and who has twenty-four hours to track down his killers before he ceases to exist. Remade from the 1949 Rudolph Mate thriller by Annabel Jankel and Rocky Morton, the co-directors jazz up the old luridness with slap-up doggishness that boosts the intensity-level higher than it deserves to go. Cornell is a burned-out novelist trying to hold on to tenure at the university while seeing his marriage collapse around him. As if that weren't enough, he is receiving amorous come-ons from smart, young student Sydney Fuller (Meg Ryan) and being badgered by another student, Nick Lang (Robert Knepper), to read his brilliant first novel. Not long after Dex demurs to Nick to read his novel, Nick is killed in a fall. Only then does Dex find out that Nick has been having an affair with his wife. Things keep going from bad to worse when, after an all-night drinking binge, Dex discovers that he has been slipped a poison that will kill him within 24 hours. Teaming up with the adoring Sydney, Dex tries to track down the person who poisoned him while dodging the cops, since he happens to be a prime murder suspect. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi