Howard Bilerman Movies

Part high-tech spy thriller and part psychological study, Eye of the Beholder was Ewan McGregor's first feature film following his mainstream breakthrough performance in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. The Eye (Ewan McGregor) is an agent of the British Secret Service, equipped with the latest in high-tech crime fighting gadgetry and assisted by his indefatigable collegue, Hilary (k.d. lang). The Eye's latest assignment is a surveillance project; the son of a well-known politician has been spending a great deal of money on someone, and they would like to know who and why. A little sleuthing reveals that the mysterious person taking the cash is a woman named Joanna (Ashley Judd), but the trail gets much stickier when the Eye witnesses Joanna pulling a knife and killing the politician's son. Normally, he'd take the shortcut to putting her behind bars, but some time ago he lost contact with his daughter when his wife left him; Joanna reminds the Eye of his daughter, and he's too fascinated with her to bring her to justice. The Eye now follows Joanna obsessively, and discovers that she's also involved with a blind man (Patrick Bergin) and has a history of emotional instability from being abandoned by her father at a young age. Eye of the Beholder was directed by Stephan Elliott, best known for the comedy The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A boy learning the lessons of the Torah wonders if they can be used to avenge an attack on his best friend in this drama based on the novel by Pete Hamill. Michael (Peter Tambakis) is an 11-year-old boy growing up in an Irish Catholic neighborhood in Brooklyn in 1947. While looking for a place to get out of the weather in the midst of a freak snowstorm, Michael meets Judah Hirsch (Stephen Rea), a rabbi from Czechoslovakia, and the two become unlikely friends. Judah fascinates Michael with tales from Jewish folklore, and Michael gives Judah a crash course in the finer points of baseball. But not everyone in Michael's neighborhood is as open-minded as he is, and Judah is attacked by a gang of anti-Semitic toughs. As Judah's life lies in the balance, Michael wonders if Judah's tales of magic and mysticism might hold a key to getting justice for his friend. Snow in August also features Lolita Davidovich as Michael's mother. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi