Troy Evans

When your dog, bird, or water-dwelling mammal disappears, who do you call? Ace Ventura (Jim Carrey) is a low-rent private eye who specializes in recovering lost animals, so when Snowflake, the Miami Dolphins' aquatic mascot, is kidnapped, team representative Melissa Robinson (Courtney Cox) puts Ace on the case. However, Snowflake isn't the only Miami Dolphin who has gone missing; several key members of the team also disappear, including quarterback Dan Marino (who plays himself), who is spirited away while filming a TV commercial. With the Super Bowl only two weeks away, will Ace be able to find Snowflake and the missing athletes in time to salvage the big game? Ace Ventura: Pet Detective was a surprise box office smash and catapulted manic comedian Jim Carrey to stardom. The supporting cast includes Sean Young as ill-tempered Lois Einhorn, Udo Kier as the sinister Ronald Camp, and rapper Tone Loc as Ace's detective pal Emilio (Loc also wrote and performed a song for the closing credits). ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A kickboxing cyborg security agent accidentally kills a corporate officer who was trying to rape a blonde employee in this sci-fi copy of Die Hard. The head of the corporation orders his security teams to kill both the cyborg and the employee to prevent word of the attempted rape from getting out. The cyborg and the victim must make their way out of the building with two teams of killer cyborgs after them. ~ Brian Gusse, All Movie Guide

The unbreakable bond forged between a troubled boy and a gorilla forms the basis of this family-oriented children's adventure. Fourteen-year old Rick has become quite rebellious since his father abandoned them. Margaret Heller, his mother, is a behavioral scientist who studies communication with gorillas. She is finding it increasingly difficult to communicate with the sullen, isolated Rick. The story opens just as Rick, who had stolen his mother's van for a joyride, is released from jail. To punish him, Margaret forces him to clean out the animal research lab. Rick is especially loathe to clean out the gorilla cage. In that cage is a gorilla adept at sign language, Katie, whom Rick immediately despises. In time, he and Katie begin conversing, and the two become friends. But then Katie's legal owner, the cruel Gus Charnley, reclaims her and forces her to perform caged up in a carnival act. The degradation of his friend is more than Rick can handle, so he frees her and together they hit the road. Mayhem and adventure ensues until the two end up in court where Katie makes a touching plea on their behalf. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

It's a dark day in the Matthews household when Eric (Will Friedle) is fired from the wilderness store owned by his father Alan (William Russ). Though assured that this decision was made to force him to stop holding himself back and to give college another try, the embittered Eric becomes a security guard instead. But a chance meeting with a brainy coworker named Ronny (Kris Iyer) convinces Eric that he's making a mistake--and a nocturnal visit to Mr. Feeny (William Daniels) confirms this. Meanwhile, the time has come for Cory (Ben Savage) and his friends to pick up their Number Two pencils, break open the seals, and take their SATs. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

While postman Cliff (John Ratzenberger) is ill at home, Norm (George Wendt) helps out his pal by taking over Cliff's route. As a result, Norm is arrested for impersonating a postal employee. Cliff, of course, could clear up the problem in a minute -- but when a cop shows up at Cheers to get the facts, Cliff pretends that he's never heard of Norm. Meanwhile, dainty Diane (Shelley Long) is coerced into fixing a ventilation duct. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Made for television, Broken Badge originally aired as The Rape of Richard Beck. Richard Crenna plays Beck, a hard-bitten cop who has little patience for female rape victims. Then he himself is sexually assaulted by two assailants. Crenna's excellent performance notwithstanding, the teleplay by James G. Hirsch is a bit simplistic, drawn up along the lines of the old bromide "a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged" Meredith Baxter Birney is seen all too briefly as a rape counsellor. The Rape of Richard Beck premiered on May 27, 1985, as an "ABC Theatre" presentation. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The plot of this action film begins in 1996, with Los Angeles in a violence-crazed conflagration. One of the LAPD's most notorious cops, John Spartan (Sylvester Stallone), known as "the demolition man," is in hot pursuit of blonde-haired psychopath Simon Phoenix (Wesley Snipes), who is so nasty he even kills sometimes just because he feels cranky. John captures Simon, but not before Simon kills innocent hostages. John is blamed for the deaths of the hostages, and both he and Simon are cryogenically frozen to remove their brand of ultra-violence from a society that is simply just too violent. The film shifts to the future world of 2032, where Los Angeles has become a megalopolis called San Angeles. There is no poverty, Arnold Schwarzenegger was (at one time) president of the United States, and Taco Bell is the sole survivor of the Franchise Wars. Into this peaceful and bland society, Simon is summarily defrosted by reigning benevolent dictator Dr. Cocteau (Nigel Hawthorne) to have Simon murder Edgar Friendly (Denis Leary), the leader of a group of underground rebels. But Cocteau bites off more than he can chew when the melted-down Simon proceeds to go on a murder-and-looting spree. Reluctantly, Cocteau defrosts John to hunt down his old adversary. As John adjusts to self-driving cars and having sex wearing helmets, he pairs up with Lenina Huxley (Sandra Bullock), a bored cop with a nostalgic fascination for 20th-century culture. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Don Cheadle makes his first series appearance as Paul Nathan, an overaged med student who chose to enter school only after being diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. During his first shift, Nathan plunges in to help the other staffers treat the victims of a Halloween party fire -- whereupon his colleagues notice that he doesn't react all that well to intense pressure. In other developments, Corday (Alex Kingston) and Romano (Paul McCrane) battle over a patient who may be facing an amputation; despite her recent erratic behavior, Weaver (Laura Innes) tries to save a baby who was all but killed in a home birth gone awry; and the romance between Chuny (Laura Ceron) and Kovac (Goran Visnjic) is sabotaged by his insatiable addiction to sex. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Elizabeth (Alex Kingston) lashes out at Rachel (Hallee Hirsh) for nearly causing baby Ella's death. Greene (Anthony Edwards) worries that his brain tumor has returned. Carter's (Noah Wyle) mother (Mary McDonnell) continues "coping" with the long-ago death of her other son, Bobby, by living her life vicariously through a young leukemia patient. Lewis (Sherry Stringfield) is forced to hold down the ER fort virtually by herself when a bag of bad bagels causes the other staffers to suffer from food poisoning. And Abby (Maura Tierney) is attacked and beaten by her neighbor Brian (Matthew Settle) for offering support to Brian's abused wife. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Alan Young guest stars as Archie Mellonston, a nursing-home patient who raises a ruckus in the ER when he flashes back to a traumatic incident during the Korean War. Other developments: blacklisted throughout Chicago by the vengeful Romano (Paul McCrane), the unemployed Benton (Eriq La Salle) is saddled with additional problems courtesy of his pugnacious nephew Jesse (Andrew McFarlane); Greene (Anthony Edwards) treats a beauty contestant who was injured in a freak "cosmetic" accident; and Chen (Ming-Na) takes care of a terminal patient whose mother is in a state of denial. All this, plus a shoot-out in the ER -- and a mugging in which Kovac (Goran Visnjic) ends up killing his attacker. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Season nine of ER begins ten minutes after season eight left off, with the County General ER still in lockdown in the face of a possible smallpox epidemic. Though most of the patients and staffers have been evacuated, a handful are quarantined at the ER for two weeks, among them Carter (Noah Wyle), Abby (Maura Tierney), Chen (Ming-Na), and Pratt (Mekhi Phifer), now a full-fledged series regular. In the midst of the chaos and confusion, Carter and Abby have managed to find the opportunity to lock lips, thereby inaugurating a whole new phase in their relationship. Meanwhile, on the roof of the hospital, Romano (Paul McCrane) throws another temper tantrum, with disastrous consequences when, in mid-rant, he backs into the tail rotor of a helicopter. And in faraway London, the newly widowed Elizabeth Corday (Alex Kingston) has joined her father's business -- but may now be too "Americanized" for her family's tastes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

It has been two months since the smallpox lockdown at County General. The Emergency Room is now swamped with patients due to the wholesale closings of many other ERs in Cook County. Likewise, there is huge influx of new med students, among them the outspoken Erin Harkins (Leslie Bibb), who is tired of waiting for her first orientation. Elsewhere, Corday (Alex Kingston) has returned to Chicago, only to be immediately unnerved by the bizarre behavior of Weaver (Laura Innes). Romano's (Paul McCrane) severed arm has been re-attached, but he's not out of danger yet. And Pratt (Mekhi Phifer) performs what amounts to a medical miracle. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Told in reverse chronology, this episode details the 24 hours leading to the disastrous misdiagnosis that may spell the end of Kovac's (Goran Visnjic) medical career. The whole story stems from a Christmas party at the home of Dr. Susan Lewis (Sherry Stringfield), where an apparently inebriated Kovac makes a play for med student Erin Harkins (Leslie Bibb). Things come to a head in a car accident which leaves one passenger seriously injured and another with apparently irreversible brain damage. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide