Catherine Kellner Movies

A woman struggles to win back the son she lost when she divorced her husband in a gritty drama that marks the directorial debut of actor Chris Eigeman. Kailey (Famke Janssen) is a woman who makes her living playing high-stakes poker and hustling pool, a trade she learned from her longtime friend Quinn (Rip Torn). Kailey's rough-and-tumble life drove a wedge between her and her husband, David (Matt Ross), and when they split up he won custody of their son, Gulley (Jaymie Dornan). However, while David was seemingly the sober and respectable one in their relationship, in truth he's a heavy drinker whose life is controlled by his wealthy, bullying mother, Abigail (Lois Smith). Gulley is unhappy living with David, and unbeknown to his father the boy has been corresponding with Kailey as they plan to start a new life together in Canada. However, Kailey is unable to get legitimate papers for herself and her son, so she heads to New York City to raise the 50,000 dollars she'll need to get passports on the black market. Turn the River also stars Marin Hinkle, John Juback, and Terry Kinney. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A working vacation takes two former lovers into a strange and dangerous place in this offbeat independent thriller. Margaret (Catherine Kellner) is a photographer who has landed an assignment with the federal government to document toxic waste sights along the U.S.-Canadian border. With a long drive ahead of her, Margaret decides she'd like some company, so she asks her former boyfriend Jay (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), who doesn't have much else to do, to tag along. Any hopes Jay held for a reconciliation are dashed when Margaret reveals she's engaged to be married, but that soon proves to be the least of his worries. After driving for a few hours, Jay and Margaret keep getting lost and seem to be going in circles, but no matter how far they drive, their gas gauge never changes. As the landscape becomes more puzzling, so do the people they encounter, who seem at once emotionally distant and menacing. But where have argaret and Jay ended up -- and is there any way they can get out? Road was the first feature film from writer and director Leslie McCleave. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Cultural conflicts threaten to derail the relationship between a determined youth counselor and her headstrong young charge in this drama from Girls Town director Jim McKay. Despite being labeled a delinquent by the child welfare system, African-American inner-city youth Angel (Jonan Everett) is in reality just a troubled teen attempting to survive in his harsh surroundings. When Angel is kicked out of his home on the heels of a heated argument with his father, Angel's pregnant, thirtysomething counselor, Nicole (Rachel Griffiths), warmly accepts the troubled boy into her home until the birth of her baby. As Angel begins to drift back into the self-defeating patterns that led to the rift with his father and Nicole ponders the effect that childbirth will have on her identity, the pair's already fragile relationship threatens to crumble amidst these weighty issues. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

At the time of its release, this lavish period war drama from hyperkinetic director Michael Bay became the most expensive motion picture ever green-lighted by a studio. Ben Affleck stars as Rafe McCawley, a military pilot stationed under Jimmy Doolittle (Alec Baldwin) in New Jersey, along with his best friend from childhood, Danny Walker (Josh Hartnett). Rafe is chomping at the bit to get involved in World War II, but America has not entered the conflict, so he is forced to fight on loan to the Royal Air Force in Britain, leaving behind his beautiful girlfriend Evelyn (Kate Beckinsale). After Rafe goes overseas, both Danny and Evelyn are transferred to the naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, where word arrives that Rafe has been killed in action. A grief-stricken Evelyn and Danny become romantically attached, a situation that becomes a lit powder keg when Rafe suddenly reappears, having survived his ordeal in the European war. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor puts the romantic triangle on hold, as the best friends are ordered to undertake a top-secret and highly dangerous retaliatory mission to bomb Tokyo, once again under the command of Doolittle. Although the trio of leads are entirely fictional, Cuba Gooding Jr., Tom Sizemore, and Jon Voight (as FDR) co-star in the roles of real-life historical figures. Pearl Harbor is based on a script by Randall Wallace, writer of Braveheart (1995) and The Man in the Iron Mask (1998). Taking a page from the production history of James Cameron's Titanic (1997), many of the actors and filmmakers involved with Pearl Harbor deferred their usual salaries until the film "broke even" at the box office. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

Taking home both the audience prize for Best Director as well as the critics' prize for Best Film, writer-director Hilary Birmingham was the toast of the 2000 L.A. Independent Film Festival with this slice-of-life drama about a pair of motherless young men and their relationships with women. Tully Jr. (Anson Mount) and Earl (Glenn Fitzgerald) live on their father's Nebraska ranch, proud and independent to a fault. While the shy, reclusive Earl spends his free time watching movies, the cockier Tully works his way through a succession of short-term affairs and an off-again, on-again relationship with April (Catherine Kellner), a stripper in town. When their childhood friend Ella (Julianne Nicholson) returns to town to start a veterinary practice, however, Tully falls for her -- although the townsfolk have their doubts that he could ever commit to one woman. Birmingham based her film on a short story by author Tom McNeal; before Tully, the director cut her teeth producing PBS documentaries. Tully would go on to show at festivals in Toronto, Canada, and Melbourne, Australia. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide

Playwright and character actor Tom Gilroy made his feature directorial debut with this dialogue-driven character study set against the backdrop of the changing seasons. Liev Schreiber plays Paul, a short-fused ex-con who finds unlikely comfort, stability, and camaraderie when he takes an odd job in park maintenance. On his first day, he's teamed with Murph (Ned Beatty), a groundskeeping veteran who manages to defuse an outburst between Paul and their snide supervisor (Campbell Scott). Paul sticks with the job, and, as the months pass, he and Murph work their way through events both mundane and monumental, all the while sharing their hopes, regrets, and ambitions. Shot in sequence over a one-year period, Spring Forward received a third-place mention for best first feature at the 1999 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide

Writer-director Aaron Harnick debuts with this quirky romantic comedy set in New York. Jordan (Ben Shenkman) works in his father's upscale liquor shop. Over the years, he has honed both his wine-tasting skills and a deep fear of commitment. One day, he goes on a blind date with Sarah (Arija Bareikis), a television casting director. Before he knows it, he is engaged to her, and she is introducing him to her parents. Meanwhile, Jordan's childhood buddies are themselves starting to settle down, especially Brad (Thomas McCarthy), who is marrying Sarah's friend Lauren (Catherine Kellner). As the wedding plans plod along, Jordan's panic mounts. This film was screened at the 1999 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

East meets West in the changing landscape of Beijing on the cusp of the 21st century in this romantic comedy-drama. Leah Quinn (Catherine Kellner) is an American in her early 20s who has decided to spend some time in China. While studying weiqi, she becomes romantically involved with her teacher, Sun Zhan (Geng Li), a self-styled hipster by night who, during the day, hosts a tacky television program. Meanwhile, Richard Kao (David Wu) is a young American of Chinese heritage who is visiting the country for the first time. He's brought with him the ashes of his grandfather, who wanted them to be scattered in the Chinese village of his birth. As he acquaints himself with the family he's never known, Richard gains a new appreciation for his cultural heritage -- and becomes infatuated with a neighborhood girl, Lin Qing (Shiang-chyi Chen). Restless was the first ever American-Chinese co-production, and marked the first feature for writer/director Jule Gilfillan. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Rosewood is the true story of an almost unknown incident in a small Florida town, (fictionalized, but faithful to the known facts, as documented in a 1994 report by the Florida Legislature). The town was inhabited almost entirely by quiet, "middle-class" African- Americans (most of them home and land owners and better off than average at the time.) On New Year's day, 1923, the town was wiped off the face of the earth by angry whites from a neighboring community. Based on palpably false testimony by a single white woman against one "Black" stranger, many of the men of Rosewood were hunted down and lynched, or shot, or burned. The rest of the town's residents fled into the swamps and never returned. At the time, official reports stated that two to six people from the black community were slain. Neither the perpetrators nor the victims spoke of the incident again, which was promptly forgotten until 1983 when a reporter stumbled across the old story and began investigating. Interviews with surviving victims indicated that the previous reports were wrong; in reality, between 70 and 250 people were killed in Rosewood during the four-day attack.

The film is a human story, about human envy, greed and lust, about the totally insane psychology of a mob, but also about the courage and decency of common folks facing an unbelievable onslaught of evil. The courage of the black residents is self evident, and the decency on the part of a few white neighbors is reluctant, until they realize that they can't live with themselves if they don't help the woman and children to escape. The most notable black heroes are Sylvester (Don Cheadle) -- a music teacher and the best-educated man in town -- and Mann (Ving Rhames) -- a stranger on horseback with Samson-like strength who becomes the focus of white hatred and black resistance. The penny-pinching, adulterous town grocer John Wright (John Voight), one of the few white residents, also plays a key role in saving lives, but before he does, he must resolve painful racial issues and make a difficult personal choice. Eventually, though, he sees enough of the mob's evil to know what he must do, and with the help of the reluctant owner-operators of the Gainesville railway, he does it. John Singleton's powerful epic film does not present a "comfortable" view of the circumstances of this grim, little-known page from American history. ~ Michael P. Rogers, All Movie Guide

Containing romance, sex, and political musing spiced with generous amounts of black comedy, this non-narrative goulash from Yvonne Ranier looks at the lives, loves and concerns of post-menopausal lesbians living in conservative America. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A beautiful artist is blinded by an attacker after witnessing a murder. Andrew Stevens is a widowed cop assigned to protect her from the mob and a corrupt police captain. ~ All Movie Guide