Joss Ackland Movies

Elements of the original Italian fairy tale, Pinocchio can still be found in this modern and loose adaptation which was filmed in Texas, Louisiana, and Tuscany. In a mythical, unnamed country, Brando is a tough old banking magnate who discovers upon his despised brother suicide that he has a son. Excited about the prospect of an heir. The son, known as "Pinocchio," works as an orderly at a nursing home. He was raised in this place, and though not intelligent, Pinocchio is a hard worker. Brando, excited at finally having an heir, removes his son from the home and takes him into his fast-paced, luxury filled world. Upon meeting the other aging bankers in Brando's world, Pinocchio has trouble adjusting. The company psychiatrist examines Pinocchio and determines that he will probably never adapt. This prompts Pinocchio to run away. While in flight, he meets hard-bitten, streetwise Lucy, who saw a murder and now is a suspect. They run together and encounter a variety of shady characters that parallel those in the original story. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

This lush French melodrama set in post World War I Europe was filmed on location in remote areas of the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The film is set in October 1918 and follows the return of Giorgino, a French lieutenant, as he searches a strange and spooky village for the retarded children he looked after before the war. The children have mysteriously disappeared and the only suspect is an enigmatic, but beautiful redhead. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A psychotic estranged wife attempts to sabotage her husband's new romance by turning her children against his lover in this thriller. Jude (Jamie Lee Curtis) had abandoned her husband Robert (Peter Gallagher) and their three sons several years earlier. Unfortunately, now that Robert has filed for divorce after falling in love with Callie (Joanne Whalley-Kilmer), the sweet-natured assistant principal at his son's school, Jude is back for revenge. At first she merely tries to convince the children that Callie is an intruder on the rightful family, but the psychotic Jude's actions soon turn dangerous, as she attempts to frame the educator for assault. Things become particularly sticky when she tries to win over her 12-year-old son Kes (Luke Edwards), involving him in a potentially deadly scheme. Director Yves Simoneau borrows from numerous other stalker dramas and attempts to ratchet the action to a feverish pitch in the conclusion, but Jude's behavior remains unbelievable, and most critics found Mother's Boys an unconvincing, often over-the-top psychodrama. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

The murder of a millionaire has unexpectedly humorous results in this farcical comedy. When Phoebe (Sean Young) and Julian (Richard Lewis), two Americans on a tour of Europe, discover a lost dachshund, they learn that a $5,000 reward has been posted for the dog's return. Phoebe and Julian head to Monte Carlo to return the pet and claim the money, but they find that the dog's owner has been murdered -- and suddenly, they're suspects in the killing. As hapless detective Inspector Bonnard (Giancarlo Giannini) investigates the crime (imagining that the maid and butler must somehow be involved), he grills several other American tourists he believes are likely suspects, including gambling addict Augie Morosco (John Candy) and loud-mouthed suburbanites Neil and Marilyn Schwary (James Belushi and Cybil Shepherd). George Hamilton appears as an unusually opportunistic gigolo; former SCTV star Eugene Levy directed. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

This fill-in-the-blanks children's comedy from Disney was such a success that it spawned a number of fill-in-the-blanks sequels -- along with a real-life professional hockey team. The basic story -- outcast coach handles a team of outcast kids and turns them from losers into winners -- has been told in a number of films, including Wildcats, The Bad News Bears, Hoosiers, and Youngblood. Here the sport is hockey. Emilio Estevez is Gordon Bombay, a high-powered lawyer haunted by an incident from his past: while playing pee-wee league hockey as a child, young Gordon missed a crucial shot in the state finals game, invoking the wrath of his coach, Mr. Reilly (Lane Smith). When Gordon is arrested for drunk driving, the judge orders him to take a leave of absence and coach a hockey team of misfit kids. At first, Gordon treats the coaching job with contempt. But when his team loses to a team led by his old coach Reilly, the fire under Gordon is lit. Inspired, he leads his team on a mission to succeed. The team begins to win games and soon they are ready to face Reilly's team for the big championship game. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Four countries--Great Britain, Belgium, Italy and Luxembourg--were in on the financing of 1991's Sherlock Holmes: Incident at Victoria Falls. At first glance, Christopher Lee seems too old to play Conan Doyle's master detective, but the script allows for this by having the story takes place on the eve of Holmes' retirement. As Dr. Watson, Patrick McNee returns to the "comic relief" mode established in the 1940s by Nigel Bruce, albeit with less empty-headedness than was customary with Bruce. The plot concerns the safe passage of a valuable South African diamond, and the multitude of robberies, recoveries and major and minor intrigues the transpire before the denouement at the titular falls. To establish time and place, King Edward VI (Joss Ackland) and Teddy Roosevelt (Claude Akins) make brief appearances. When originally presented on European television, Incident at Victoria Falls was a four-hour miniseries, with Jenny Seagrove appearing in a sizeable role. For its American syndicated-TV bow in 1992, the film was somewhat clumsily chopped down to two hours, and Seagrove's part was eliminated (though her name still appears in the opening and closing credits). Incident at Victoria Falls is strongest in its elegant ambience and attention to detail; it is least successful in its ham-handed comic interludes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey find the two obtuse pals battling The Grim Reaper, God, robots, great philosophical questions, and girls -- although not necessarily in that order. In this loose parody of the Terminator movies, directed by Peter Hewitt, the ultimate has happened -- at Bill and Ted University of the future, for many years now the people of the world have been "excellent to each other." But fed-up with Bill and Ted's peaceful world and even more fed up with heavy metal, the evil De Nomolos (Joss Ackland) decides to do something about it. De Nomolos creates a cyborg Bill and Ted, who travel back in time to kill the original Bill and Ted, win the Battle of the Bands and pave the way for the hellish reign of De Nomolos. In the past of 1990, Bill (Alex Winter) and Ted (Keanu Reeves) are immediately dispatched by the time-traveling cyborgs. And while the cyborgs Bill and Ted make time with the real Bill and Ted's girls (Sarah Trigger and Annette Azcuy) and prepare to take the real Bill and Ted's place in the Battle of the Bands, Bill and Ted are forced to deal with Hell ("Just like an Iron Maiden album cover"), the Grim Reaper (William Sadler), and God himself. When Bill and Ted are asked the secret of the universe, they get it right and as a reward a pair of Martians construct a set of "good" Bill and Ted robots to go head-to-head with the "bad" Bill and Ted robots at the Battle of the Bands. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

When first telecast in Britain in 1991, Ashenden consisted of four hour-long episodes. When the production was shown over America's A&E cable service on June 7 and 8, 1993, the four episodes were combined into two, with a brace of stories offered in each 2-hour dollop. In A&E's second installment of Ashenden (see entry 123760 for details on the first), our hero, a British playwright-cum-WWI secret agent, travels to Russia with an American businessman (Rene Auberjonois) on the eve of the Bolshevik revolution. He then becomes fed up with the whole espionage business upon meeting an American war widow in Italy. Alex Jennings is starred as Ashenden, a thinly disguised version of Somerset Maugham himself. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In assembling the 1990 TV-movie version of Jekyll and Hyde, writer/director David Wickes recycled many of the elements of his 1988 adaptation of Jack the Ripper--including props, costumes, sets, and star Michael Caine. Caine goes through the standard motions as kindly Henry Jekyll, who dabbles where Men Must Not and unleashes his beastly alter ego Mr. Hyde. Anything new here? Well, the character of Dr. Lanyon, Jekyll's best friend in the original Robert Louis Stevenson story, has been rewritten as his worst enemy. Joss Ackland plays the vitriolic Lanyon, while Cheryl Ladd shows up as a newly fabricated love interest. Jekyll and Hyde has some neat makeup transformations, but otherwise is just the same old cloak 'n' fang jazz seen in so many earlier incarnations of the venerable Stevenson yarn. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The first of several films based on Tom Clancy's "Jack Ryan" technothrillers, Hunt for Red October stars Alec Baldwin as eccentric CIA analyst Ryan and Sean Connery as Soviet submarine commander Marko Ramius. Ramius sets the plot in motion when he murders his political adviser, burns his orders, and steers his sub Red October towards American waters, hoping to defect. The CIA, aware that the Red October was about to embark on an evasive mission to demonstrate its ability to avoid detection and fire its nuclear missiles upon U.S. installations, believes that Ramius is insane, and that he plans to start World War III. To cover their own behinds, the Russians back up the CIA's suspicion. Only Jack Ryan believes that Ramius' mission is not as apocalyptic as it seems -- and it is Ryan who is assigned to infiltrate the Red October to prove his theory. The sort of film that in an earlier era would have been called a "thinking man's thriller," The Hunt for Red October ushered in a new series of Hollywood-produced post-Cold War adventure films, including 1995's Crimson Tide. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide