Bill Dunn Movies

Set in the 1950s, Voyager concerns the travels of an American construction engineer (Sam Shepard) who is wandering throughout Europe, recounting his life story through a series of flashbacks while meeting a variety of new characters. At first, he meets a man whom he knew during his time as a student in Europe in the days before World War II. Shortly afterward, he meets a beautiful young German woman (Julie Delpy), whom he accompanies on a journey to her home in Athens, Greece. Voyager is a slowly-paced and well-performed with a surprising, tragic conclusion. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide

This drama looks into the life of French painter Paul Gauguin. Donald Sutherland plays Gauguin as he struggles through a few years in the 1890s in Montmartre after he has come back from his first stay in Tahiti. His new and radical painting style is not amenable to easy acceptance, as witnessed by August Strindberg's rejection of it here. The best segments of this film show the artist at work and talking with his friends, other less successful moments show him in amorous liaisons or in one case, in a fight sequence. Most of all, his dedication to his artistic vision as well as the depth of his personality are elements which maintain interest throughout, in a large part due to Sutherland's insightful portrayal of the artist. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this fantasy, spoken entirely in Gaelic and set in medieval Scotland, Derek McGuire evades assassins and joins the Hero clan. There he sleeps with an old woman who is magically transformed into a comely lass overnight. They become lovers. Trouble ensues when the clan leader desires her for himself. McGuire gives her up and the woman vanishes. Just before she goes, she puts a spell on him that makes him irresistible to any woman that sees him. The first one to look upon his face is the wife of the leader. She immediately falls hopelessly in love and the two end up escaping the clan together. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

"This is New York, Skyscraper Champion of the World...Where the Slickers and Know-It-Alls peddle gold bricks to each other...And where Truth, crushed to earth, rises again more phony than a glass eye..." With this jaundiced opening title, scripter Ben Hecht introduces his classic comedy Nothing Sacred. Fredric March plays Wally Cook, a hotshot reporter condemned to writing obituaries because of his unwitting complicity in a fraud. Anxious to get back in the good graces of his editor Oliver Stone (Walter Connolly), Cook pounces on the story of New England girl Hazel Flagg (Carole Lombard), who is reportedly dying from radiation poisoning. Actually, Hazel isn't dying at all; she's been misdiagnosed by Moscow's eternally drunk doctor (Charles Winninger). But when Cook offers to take her on an all-expenses-paid trip to New York in exchange for her exclusive story, it's too good an offer to pass up. Once in the Big Apple, Hazel is feted as a heroine by the novelty-seeking populac; she enjoys the adulation at first, but soon (and with the help of gallons of alcoholic beverages) suffers the pangs of conscience. She confesses her deception to Cook, who by now has fallen in love with her. Cook and Stone conspire to keep the public from discovering the truth, eventually dreaming up a phony suicide. Travelling incognito to avoid arrest, Wally and Hazel marry and go on a honeymoon, secure in the knowledge that New York City has forgotten all about her and moved on to their next fad. Brimming with witty, acerbic dialogue and hilarious bits of physical business, Nothing Sacred is among the best "screwball" comedies of the 1930s. The musical score by Oscar Levant both mocks and celebrates the George Gershwinesque musical style then in vogue. As an added bonus, the film is lensed in Technicolor (avoid those two-color reissue prints), allowing modern viewers to see what New York City looked liked back in 1937. Nothing Sacred was later adapted into a Broadway musical, Hazel Flagg, which in turn was filmed by Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis as Living It Up (1954), with Lewis in the Carole Lombard role. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide