Rider Strong Movies
Best known to Gen-Y'ers as Shawn Hunter, the resident high-school heartthrob and best friend of teen Cory Matthews (Ben Savage) on the ABC Friday-night sitcom Boy Meets World (1993-2000), Rider Strong was born in San Francisco and entered show business with a portrayal of Gavroche in a local stage production of Les Miserables. He first moved into television work at age 12 as the son of Julie Andrews on the star's eponymous sitcom, Julie (1992), then landed guest-star bits on such programs as Evening Shade, Empty Nest, Davis Rules, and Going Places. World, of course, represented Strong's career breakthrough and secured a major fan base for him (particularly among teenage girls). As the series neared closure in the late '90s, Strong branched out into film roles -- first with a small part in the sentimental Billy Crystal comedy My Giant (1998), then as a horror star in such opuses as Cabin Fever (2002), Borderland (2007), and Cabin Fever 2 (2008). ~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide- 1993
- R
In this suspense thriller, a woman wonders if she can trust her memory when her father returns from prison a very different man from the violent psychopath she remembers. Karen (Amy Irving) is a single mother who twenty years ago delivered the testimony that put her father Frank (Donald Sutherland) behind bars for the murder of her mother. While Karen has no doubts that Frank is guilty of the crime, the years have clouded her memory a bit and she doesn't recall all the events with complete clarity. Now that Frank has been released, he's returned to Karen's neighborhood and is going out of his way to ingratiate himself with Pete (Rider Strong), her son, and Dan (Christopher McDonald), her boyfriend. A furious Karen confronts Frank, but she discovers a father who is not the ogre she sent to prison but a calm, charming, well-spoken gentleman who seems to bear her no ill will. They discuss the death of Karen's mother and Frank begins to convince her that it was all a terrible accident. Frank begins to work his way back into Karen's life as he gradually cuts her off from her circle of friends; when Dan dies under mysterious circumstances, Karen thinks nothing of it, but Sheriff Calhoun (Graham Greene) wonders if Frank might have something to do with the crime. Benefit of the Doubt marked the feature debut for producer Jonathan Heap. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Donald Sutherland, Amy Irving, (more)
