Jacob Smith Movies

Homer's sprawling tale of love and war in ancient Greece comes to the screen in all its grandeur in this epic-scale adventure. In 1193 B.C., Paris, Prince of Troy (Orlando Bloom), has fallen in love; however, the beautiful woman who has beguiled him is Helen, Queen of Sparta (Diane Kruger), who is wed to King Menelaus (Brendan Gleeson). While Helen is hardly immune to Paris' charms, this doesn't blunt Menelaus' fury when Paris steals her away from him. Menelaus' brother Agamemnon (Brian Cox), the power-hungry king of the Mycenaeans, is eager to expand his empire through Troy to the lands of the Aegean Sea, and he uses Paris' romantic slight against Menelaus as an excuse to wage an all-out war against the great walled city. Priam, King of Troy (Peter O'Toole), summons his armies, led by Prince Hector (Eric Bana), to meet the onslaught of Agamemnon's forces, but while the great city has yet to yield in a battle, Agamemnon has a formidable ally -- Achilles (Brad Pitt), a mighty and seemingly unstoppable warrior whose presence could tip the scales in Agamemnon's favor. Sean Bean, Julie Christie, Saffron Burrows, and Rose Byrne highlight the film's supporting cast. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

In this supernatural thriller, Kevin Costner plays Joe Darrow, a physician mourning the death of his wife Emily (Susannah Thompson) in a bus accident in South America, where she was providing medical outreach. Wracked by grief, Joe works extra shifts at the hospital to take his mind off the tragedy, but the intense workload triggers his short temper and some careless mistakes. His officious boss (Joe Morton) forces Joe to take time off, but Joe feels obligated to check in on his wife's pediatric patients, fulfilling a promise he made before she left. Visiting the ward, Joe starts to believe that Emily is using the near-death experiences of her terminal patients to communicate with him, through images the children report seeing in their dreams, and symbols they are inexplicably compelled to draw. While the children see Joe as a kindred spirit, the hospital staff worries about how these interactions are agitating them. At home, Joe begins finding other ethereal evidence of his wife's attempt to contact him from beyond the grave, some of it featuring the image of a dragonfly, which was the shape of the birthmark on her shoulder. His friends and a caring neighbor (Kathy Bates) worry that Joe is losing his marbles, especially as his quest becomes more frantic, putting his job in jeopardy. ~ Derek Armstrong, Rovi

A paroled hitman turns up murdered. The detectives have every reason to believe that the victim had been hired by wealthy widow Lorraine Cobin (Cathy Gentile-Moriarty) to kill an unwanted relative. Once the case goes to trial, the D.A.'s office is presented with seemingly irrefutable proof that they've been barking up the wrong tree. The viewer is advised to pay close attention to this episode until the very last scene. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

At long, long last, 30-year-old Charlie Salinger (Matthew Fox), legal guardian of his four younger siblings, has tied the matrimonial knot with his erstwhile sweetheart Kirsten Bennett (Paula Devicq), who had come into the lives of the Salingers when she was hired as nanny for the younger children during Season One of Party of Five. By the time that the series' sixth and final season has run its course, Charlie and Kirsten will have become parents. Alas, the relationship between Charlie's 21-year-old brother Bailey (Scott Wolf) and his live-in girlfriend Sarah Reeves is a thing of the past--principally because actress Jennifer Love Hewitt) has transferred her characterization of Sarah to the spinoff series Time of Your Life. Nor is this the end of Bailey's woes; having hired his late dad's former partner Joe Magnus (Tom Mason) to manage the family's San Francisco restaurant, Bailey has his trust betrayed when Joe embezzles the profits and plunges the establishment into financial ruin. With all these setbacks, Bailey returns to his drinking habit--big time! In another development, 20-year-old Julia Salinger (Neve Campbell) is studying for a literary career at CalArts, while her marriage to Griffin (Jeremy London) further disintegrates. Suddenly, Julia's high school sweetheart Justin Thompson (Michael Goorjian), who hasn't been seen since Season Three, returns to San Francisco, reeling from an unhappy marriage of his own. Inevitably, Julia and Justin rediscover one another, and the old romantic spark roars back into flame. Elsewhere, Bailey's lifelong buddy Will (Scott McCorkle), who'd once gone steady with the departed Sarah, lands a good job in sports management; and the redoubtable Daphne Jablonski (Jennifer Aspen), the mother of Charlie's daughter Natalie, finds work at a strip club--and also finds time to begin an affair with Julia's hubby Griffin; and 16-year-old Claudia Salinger (Lacey Chabert) is able to graduate from high school a year early and fulfill her life's dream of enrolling at Julliard. As the series winds down, Bailey sells the family restaurant to finance Charlie's purchase of his own furniture business, and at the same time goes "cold turkey" and re-enrolls in college. And perhaps inevitably, Charlie decides that it is time to move his family out of their familiar lodgings and into more economical digs, thereby setting up the opportunity for extended flashbacks to the Salinger's fondest memories of the past six years. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Season Five of Party of Five marks the fifth birthday of Owen Salinger, youngest member of the orphaned Salinger clan. Having been previously played by twin infants Brandon Porter and Taylor Porter, Owen is now portrayed by a single child actor, Jacob Smith--and, unfortunately, has also been revealed to have a learning disability. Elsewhere in the San Francisco-based Salinger household, 29-year-old Charlie Salinger (Matthew Fox), legal guardian of his younger siblings, is left to raise his baby daughter Diana alone when his irresponsible girlfriend Daphne (Jennifer Aspen) takes a powder. Charlie and his 20-year-old brother Bailey (Scott Wolf) later engage in a nasty custody battle over little Owen, but eventually Charlie allows Owen to live with Bailey and his girl friend Sarah (Jennifer Love Hewitt). Meanwhile, although 19-year-old Julia Salinger (Neve Campbell) is still the wife of Griffin Holbrook (Jeremy London), she enters into an affair with Ned Grayson (Scott Bairstow), the violent-tempered boyfriend of Julia's Stanford roommate Maggie (Heather McComb). And musically gifted 15-year-old Claudia Salinger (Lacey Chabert) is busily cooking up strategies to break out of boarding school and return home. As the season draws to a close, Charlie moves in with his former fiancée Kirsten (Paula Devicq), whose marriage to Dr. Paul Thomas (Tim Dekay) is on the rocks; and, balking at the notion of marrying her live-in boyfriend Bailey, Sarah prepares to leave for New York. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi