Stephen Lang Movies

This preposterous thriller stars Tom Berenger (Platoon) as Ernie Dewalt, a drug-addicted ex-cop with a catheter, and that isn't the worst of it. Ernie teaches creative writing at a small college where prominent professor Alex Laughton (Stephen Lang) has been blown apart with a shotgun while groping the frequently nude Jeri Kari Wuhrer in a car on Lover's Lane. Laughton's widow, Elizabeth (Valeria Golino) drags the reluctant Ernie out of retirement to clear her name, as she is the prime suspect. When he's not mainlining drugs or trading japes with investigating detective Robert Davi, Ernie is haunted by visions of Jeri, taunting him about his incompetence. It's not really Jeri, of course, and may even be the spirit of his former alcoholism, but the plot is so muddled that it's hard to tell. Ernie has a vision of himself snapping nude photos of Jeri and Laughton having sex in a field; Elizabeth is loudly whispered about in the local supermarket; and the ridiculous resolution will please no one. Bad film buffs should get a kick out of Ernie weeping to Elizabeth about his catheter, but other viewers should avoid this jaw-dropping stupidity at all costs. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide

This family adventure concerns Ryan (Ryan Slater), a ten-year-old boy who has traveled to China with his father, a scientist working with a wildlife preserve dedicated to the rescue and protection of giant pandas, who are quickly becoming an endangered species in their native land. However, the preserve is faced with a severe budget cut that would close them down unless they can produce a living panda cub. Ryan, his father Michael (Stephen Lang), and a local girl acting as translator (Huang Fei) set out in search of a baby panda. However, when they find one, the bear is being pursued by poachers. Ryan becomes separated from the rest of the group, and he alone must guide the young panda to the safety of the preserve, with the hunters hot on his trail and without the help of his father or their translator. The Amazing Panda Adventure was shot on location in Mainland China's Sichuan province. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

This ambitious Disney movie uses a remarkable screenplay from Steven L. Bloom and Robert Rodat to tell a rollicking tale of America's transition from a close-to-the-land culture of mythic heroes to a corporate world of real estate tycoons. The strong theme about the decline of folk culture is expressed through a series of high octane adventures experienced by 12-year-old Daniel Hackett (Nick Stahl) at the dawn of the 20th century. Daniel's father, Jonas Hackett (Stephen Lang), runs a farm in a place called Paradise Valley, but his land is coveted by a greedy developer, J.P. Stiles (Scott Glenn). Daniel looks longingly at postcards of New York City while growing increasingly skeptical of his father's tales of legendary folk heroes. Then, through a series of incredible adventures, Daniel meets up with the legends that his father has spoken about -- cowboy Pecos Bill (Patrick Swayze), lumberjack Paul Bunyan (Oliver Platt), and finally, ex-slave and strongman John Henry (Roger Aaron Brown). Each of these heroes hooks up with Daniel and becomes involved in an increasingly bitter and boisterous fight against Stiles, whose plans to buy up land threaten the very strength of the folk heroes and the well-being of the common people. Pecos Bill has a horse named Widowmaker and can lasso a tornado. The giant Bunyan is accompanied by his famous blue ox, Babe. At one point, another legend, the cowgirl Calamity Jane (Catherine O'Hara), joins in the adventures. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide

The odd relationship between a man, his wife, and his male pay-for-play lover is examined in the Canadian gay comedy. When Mary, a housewife, suspects her husband Matt is being unfaithful she hires a private eye to film his activities. Sure enough, Matt is recorded fooling around with Dick, a young male prostitute. Matt is in love with Dick and tells him so. Dick tells him to get out or face the consequences. Matt does not listen and instead stays there conversing with Marvette, Dick's bisexual junkie roommate. When Dick comes back he promptly beats Matt to a pulp. Matt returns to his wife. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A high-energy action adventure based on legend rather than historical fact finds Wyatt Earp (Kurt Russell) desiring to retire from law enforcement. With brothers Virgil (Sam Elliot) and Morgan (Bill Paxton), he arrives in Tombstone, Arizona intending to build his fortune. He discovers that long-time friend Doc Holliday (Val Kilmer) is there and that the town is run by a group of brutal outlaws called the Cowboys. Earp, frustrated with his laudanum-addicted wife, begins a romance with traveling stage actress Josephine Marcus (Dana Delany). Meanwhile, the Cowboys terrorize the citizens of Tombstone unchecked.

When the town marshal is killed by a Cowboy, Earp steps in to prevent a lynching by an angry mob. He also refuses to hand the killer over to his fellows, beginning the enmity between the Cowboys and the Earp brothers. Virgil, overcome with guilt at doing nothing to help the Tombstone citizens, accepts the position of town marshal. With Wyatt and Morgan as his deputies, and the help of Doc, Virgil attempts to arrest several Cowboys, resulting in the famous OK Corral shoot-out. The Cowboys take revenge by ambushing two of the brothers and injuring Virgil and killing Morgan. The Earps leave town, apparently cowed. Wyatt returns, wearing the badge of a U.S. marshal, vowing to destroy every last Cowboy. He hunts them mercilessly, until the leader, Johnny Ringo (Michael Biehn) challenges Wyatt to a duel. While not regarded as an artistic masterpiece, "Tombstone" is considered the best of director George P. Cosmatos' prolific films. The all-star cast (including Thomas Haden Church and Billy Bob Thornton in small roles) delivers solid performances. Both William A. Fraker's cinematography and Bruce Broughton's stirring musical score are expertly designed for dramatic effect. Blood is shown liberally in several key scenes, but seems intended to show that there is nothing glorious in Wyatt Earp's actions, only necessity. He and his deputies take on the symbolism of the horsemen of the apocalypse -- dispensing judgement, and the Biblical references form a symmetry at the beginning and end of the film.
~ Lucinda Ramsey, All Movie Guide

Based on a true story, this made-for-television drama chronicles a couple's downward spiral into drug addiction. Meredith Baxter stars as Mary Ann Guard, a nurse who gets romantically involved with heroin abuser Guy Grand (Stephen Lang). Guy turns Mary Ann onto drugs and her once-stable life is suddenly out of control, with Mary Ann stealing from her hospital in order to support their habit. Her family decides to get her clean and get Guy out of her life by checking her into rehab. Mary Ann's rough road isn't over though, and she has to decide for herself which life she wants to lead. ~ Bernadette McCallion, All Movie Guide

Action film director John Badham bites the hand that feeds him in this action movie spoof that features ribbing of pretty-boy Hollywood action stars by Michael J. Fox and a parody of colorful, hair-trigger James Woods types by the man himself. Woods plays New York homicide detective John Moss, who is within an inch of closing in on a serial killer who calls himself The Party Crasher (Stephen Lang) because his specialty is shooting his victims in the middle of discos. Chasing The Party Crasher after his latest victim has been dispatched, Moss finds himself hanging onto the door of a speeding truck with The Party Crasher at the wheel. When Moss is thrown off the truck and nearly killed, The Party Crasher escapes, and Moss is taken off the case. Moss is given a new assignment --to tag around with Hollywood action film star Nick Lang (Michael J. Fox), the popular hero of the "Smoking Gun" movies. Lang spotted Moss on a television news show and thinks he would be the ideal cop to study for adding authenticity to an up-coming police action picture. Posing as Moss's rookie partner, Lang follows Moss everywhere, proceeding to spoil his pursuit of The Party Crasher and interfering with Moss's burgeoning affair with his girlfriend Susan (Anabella Sciorra). ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Babe Ruth is a made-for-TV biopic about the titular baseball legend, here played by Stephen Lang. The film covers the events of Babe's life from his orphanage childhood to his retirement from baseball in 1935. Recounted are Babe's two marriages, the first to the benighted Helen Woodford (Yvonne Suhor) and the second to down-to-earth showgirl Claire Hodgson (Lisa Zane); Babe's frequent tiltings with Col. Ruppert (Donald Moffat), autocratic owner of the New York Yankees; Babe's periodic slumps and suspensions; his "wine, women, and more women" lifestyle; his unrealized dream of becoming a team manager; his record-breaking 60th home run in 1927; and his last-stand "three-homer" game for the Boston Braves in his valedictory 1935 season. Too rushed and surfacy to be totally successful, Babe Ruth is nonetheless closer to truth than the sentimentalized John Goodman feature film The Babe (1992), and infinitely superior to William Bendix's atrocious The Babe Ruth Story (1948). As a bonus, real-life baseball great Pete Rose shows up in a one-minute cameo as Ty Cobb. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Hubert Selby's controversial 1964 cult novel Last Exit To Brooklyn is adapted to the big screen by director Ulrich Edel in this drama. The story is set in the early 1950s in Red Hook, Brooklyn, a blighted waterfront town of boarded-up storefronts and striking factory workers. Harry Black (Stephen Lang), a machinist put in charge of the local union strike office, suddenly finds himself one of the most important men in town. But for all his sudden power, there's something disturbing Harry. He rejects his wife's caresses and discovers himself infatuated with a frail young man who calls himself Georgette (Alexis Arquette), who has a crush on well-muscled hood Vinnie (Peter Dobson). But Harry doesn't confront his problem head-on until he falls head-over-heels in love with Regina (Zette), a local transvestite. As the strike becomes more intense, Harry sinks deeper into an obsessive affair with Regina, using the strike fund to shower him/her with personal gifts. As Harry sinks into obsession, other characters float through the decaying streets. There's the attractive prostitute Tralala (Jennifer Jason Leigh) who falls in love with a sailor about to be shipped overseas. There is also an agreeable young man named Tommy (John Costelloe) who is beaten by his soon-to-be father-in-law Big Joe (Burt Young) for making his daughter Donna (Ricki Lake) pregnant. Everything comes to a tragic conclusion as the workers' strike escalates into a violent confrontation. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Astonishingly, gangster Ray Luca (Anthony John Denison) and his doltish henchman Paulie (John Santucci) have managed to survive the atom bomb explosion that ended season one of the serialized cop drama Crime Story. This allows the duo to resume their criminal activities, ever keeping one step ahead from relentless federal agent Mike Torello (Dennis Farina) and his men. Since the series is still taking place in the 1960s, chasing mobsters remains far easier than catching them, even when an overambitious Kefauver-like senator begins hauling in Luca's cronies to appear before the Organized Crime Commission. Meanwhile, Torello's private life is still in tatters, as proven when his ex-wife, Julie (Darlanne Fluegel), marries another man, played by David Soul -- then prevails upon Torello to rescue her husband from kidnappers merely for "old time's sake." Adding insult to injury so far as Torello is concerned, Luca is given immunity in exchange for his cooperation with the Crime Commission, and soon is back in Vegas pulling his old underhanded tricks. This compels one of Torello's strongest allies, liberal prosecutor David Abrams (Stephen Lang), to resign in disgust, leaving the "good guys" still another man short. Eventually, Luca overplays his hand and is hauled in on racketeering charges -- but manages to slip through Torello's fingers one more time, thanks to an unexpected incident in faraway Vietnam! It is not until the series' three-episode finale that Torello finally corners the fugitive Lucas in Mexico -- but though this is the end of the series, is it really the end of the Torello-Luca blood feud? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Former Starsky and Hutch star Paul Michael Glaser warmed the director's chair for Band of the Hand. The film zeroes in on five juvenile delinquents who are plucked from their various detention facilities and unceremoniously dumped in the wilds of the Everglades. The boys begin to panic until hardcase Vietnam veteran Stephen Lang arrives. Lang explains that they've been paroled in his custody, and that it is his task to teach them how to work as a team in order to survive. The logic of this plan is to whip the boys into an elite vigilante unit, then sic them on the various drug dealers of America. The film features early performances by Lauren Holly and Larry Fishburne and Bob Dylan can be heard singing the title song. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Season one of the serialized cop drama Crime Story begins in the Chicago of 1963, with Lt. Mike Torello (Dennis Farina) of the city's MCU (Major Crime Unit) deeply committed to bringing his longtime nemesis, youthful gangster Ray Luca (Anthony John Denison) to justice. The effort exacts a heavy toll on Torello's private life, destroying his marriage to his wife, Julie (Darlanne Fluegel), and not doing much good for his subsequent fling with Inga Thorson (Patricia Charbonneau). Meanwhile, the ruthlessly ambitious Luca seems to thrive on being pursued, gleefully eluding arrest at every turn and merrily mowing down anyone who threatens to impede his rise to the top of the mob. Along the way, Luca comes in contact with an impressive array of "celebrity" gangsters and lesser hoodlums. Midway through season one, Luca and his loyal but dim-bulbed henchman Paulie Taglia (John Santucci) leave Chicago to pursue new vistas in Las Vegas. To keep the hunt alive, Torello and his assistants all become Federal agents, a la "The Untouchables." Throughout the season, a number of future stars appear in guest roles, among them David Caruso, Michael Madsen, Ray Sharkey, Lorraine Bracco, and Julia Roberts. Season one concludes on an explosive cliffhanger, as Ray and Paulie try to escape across the Yucca Flats in Nevada -- just as an atom bomb test is about to begin! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide