Luke Halpin Movies
Lanky, blonde actor Luke Halpin is best remembered for playing responsible older brother Sandy Ricks in the popular 1960s outdoor adventure series Flipper. In the first Flipper movie, his character Sandy was, next to Suzy (the dolphin who played Flipper), the lead character. So it was early on in the 1964 series, but gradually Halpin's role was reduced in favor of expanding the role of his younger brother, Bud (Tommy Norden). Halpin made his acting debut playing a small role in the 1960 live-action version of Peter Pan. Following the demise of Flipper, Halpin's career became sporadic and his roles much smaller. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
In this adventure drama for the family, based on the popular TV series of the mid-'60s, Sandy Ricks (Elijah Wood) is a moody teenager from Chicago who is not dealing well with the recent divorce of his parents. In the hope that a change of scenery will do him good, Sandy is sent to spend the summer with his Uncle Porter (Paul Hogan), an aging hippie and fisherman who lives on Coral Key, an island off the coast of Florida. The sun and sand do little to improve Sandy's outlook on life, even after he meets Kim (Jessica Wesson), a pretty girl who lives nearby, but he becomes sunnier when he encounters Flipper, a friendly dolphin, while boating with Porter. When Sandy helps save Flipper from a pack of bloodthirsty charter-boat fishermen, led by the mean-spirited Dirk Moran (Jonathan Banks), the dolphin becomes the boy's loyal companion (at least when Sandy is close to the water). But Sandy soon discovers that Dirk is dumping toxic waste into the waters of Coral Key, and with the help of Cathy (Chelsea Field), a friend of Porter's with a background in marine biology, Sandy and Porter try to gather enough evidence so that Sheriff Buck Cowan (Isaac Hayes) will be able to put Dirk behind bars. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Elijah Wood, Paul Hogan, (more)
- 1992
- PG
John Goodman's full-throttle performance as a William Castle-inspired schlockmeister propels Joe Dante's delightful and charming comedy Matinee. The film takes place during the fall 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, a time when America's innocence began to crumble. Goodman plays film producer Lawrence Woolsey, who is in Key West to premiere his latest horror epic, "Mant," the story of a man who turns into a giant insect ("Half Man! ... Half Ant! ... All Terror!"). He's busy rigging the local movie theater with all manner of gimmicks, such as Atomo-Vision and Rumble-Rama, and stationing a buxom nurse -- played by Woolsey's girlfriend and leading lady Ruth (Cathy Moriarty) -- in the lobby to assist potential heart attack victims. Amidst all the hubbub, a quartet of local teenagers gear up for the big premiere: Gene (Simon Fenton), a Navy brat whose father is on alert for the duration of the crisis; Stan (Omri Katz), Gene's friend who has a furious crush on Sherry (Kellie Martin); and Sandra (Lisa Jakub), the daughter of two beatnik free-thinkers. As the premiere of "Mant" gets closer and Soviet-U.S. tensions increase, the four teenagers' problems and desires also mount to the boiling point. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Goodman, Cathy Moriarty, (more)
In this slasher film, Lauren Tewes stars as a TV anchorwoman whose deaf, dumb and blind teen sister (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is the next target of a killer. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lauren Tewes, Jennifer Jason Leigh, (more)
- 1980
A virtual remake of Roger Corman's drive-in classic Attack of the Crab Monsters, this Florida-lensed cheapie is more than just a throwback to low-budget monster movies of the 1950s -- it's a throwback in every sense of the word. The claw-wielding killer crustaceans here are the product of a nuclear plant accident off the Florida coast, which causes crabs used in a nearby growth-research experiment to bulk up to the size of sport-utility vehicles. Strangely, there's only one mega-crab on display, and even that one's not visible until the film's climax. In the meantime, we're treated to dull scenes of the clawed critters scampering around in search of human meals. Star Robert Lansing had already garnered a bit of experience battling giant mutated animals in similarly ridiculous movies such as Empire of the Ants. Also released as Night of the Claw. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
- 1980
- PG
This comedy was filmed in Miami and follows the exploits of three frustrated misanthropes who try to sue the city after their car hits a pothole and ends up totaled. Unfortunately, the city has protected itself with a little loophole. When legal means fail, the three try other methods. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gabe Kaplan, Alex Karras, (more)
- 1979
- PG
In this comedy a trio of undercover government cops in Miami decide that it would be a good idea to open a bogus fencing operation so they can trap criminals. When the crooks find out, trouble ensues and the fun begins. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dom DeLuise, Jerry Reed, (more)
This horror film concerns a shipwrecked yachting party. Rose (Brooke Adams) and her fellow yacht-mates, including the captain (John Carradine) run aground on an island when they hit an odd-looking freighter. Once beached, they meet up with an aging SS Commander (Peter Cushing) who had been in charge of a crew of zombies. This is not meant as a comment on the quality of the men under him, they were "real" zombies. Since the zombies were taken from the ranks of murderers and other miscreants, they were not activated and the SS Commander sunk them with his submarine. Now they are rising up from the depths to create mayhem among the stranded members of the yachting party. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Cushing, Brooke Adams, (more)
- 1976
Vietnam vet Richard Jaeckel sets out to aid his shark friends when he discovers they're being exploited by aquarium owners in this film, also known as Mako: The Jaws of Death. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Jaeckel, Jennifer Bishop, (more)
- 1975
Ricou Browning, the Olympic swimmer best known as the man inside the suit of The Creature from the Black Lagoon, directed this amazing bit of weirdness which could only have been a product of the cinematically insane 1970s. Richard Jaeckel stars as a Florida policeman tracking a gang of heroin dealers led by evil fatcat D'Angelo (Lloyd Bochner), who naturally has his hooks into everything, including the corrupt police captain (John Agar). There are drag queens, barroom brawls, shootouts, and the usual mayhem, but what makes this film particularly noteworthy is its central hitman, Lou. He has no legs and travels in a motorized wheelchair decked out with double-barreled shotguns. Lou is also strong enough that when he isn't blasting people with his killer wheelchair he can swing around on his arms and use his legless torso to bludgeon people into submission. Rance Howard plays Lou's trusty sidekick, and the film co-stars an African-American dwarf, accomplished stuntwoman Courtney Brown (who gets in a fairly flamboyant catfight), and Flipper's Luke Halpin, who was in the tawdry Mako: The Jaws of Death -- also starring Jaeckel -- at around the same time). Bizarre but oddly lovable, this is entertainingly loopy grindhouse trash emblematic of the days when Times Square showed the nation's strangest films at triple-feature theaters in which the audience was often more disturbing than the mayhem onscreen. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- 1969
- G
- Add If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium to QueueAdd If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium to top of Queue
A mid-1960s TV documentary special (and a New Yorker cartoon before that) was the inspiration for If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium. The film is a likeable satire of "packaged" European tours, where the nonplused tourists are expected to rush from one landmark to another in a breathless 18 days. Ian McShane stars as the amorous tour guide, with Suzanne Pleshette as the American department store buyer he falls for; their romance ends when Pleshette decides that the supposedly worldly McShane is too immature for her. An all-star cast, including Murray Hamilton, Peggy Cass, Pamela Britton, Marty Ingels, John Cassavetes and Vittorio De Sica, pops up in comic cameo roles. Our favorite bit: an American and German tourist, simultaneously regaling their respective wives with wildly divergent accounts of the same wartime confrontation. If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium was reworked in 1987 as a made-for-TV movie, cleverly title If It's Tuesday, It Still Must be Belgium. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Suzanne Pleshette, Ian McShane, (more)
A shipwreck leaves an anthropologist and his family stranded on an island populated by mutant beasts. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- 1966
Whenever MGM had to hastily fulfill a European theatrical commitment in the 1960s, it was common practice to select a popular MGM TV series, then cobble together a "feature film" from several episodes. The weekly program most often retooled in this fashion was The Man From UNCLE, which yielded such ersatz features as One Spy too Many and The Helicopter Spies. Flipper's Odyssey was comprised of three half-hour installments from the Flipper TV series, which ran on NBC from 1964 through 1968. Brian Kelly, Luke Halpin and Tommy Norden represented the human element, while the lion's share (or dolphin's share) of the scenes were devoted to hyperintelligent swimming mammal Flipper. The episodes included herein find our finny friend coming to the aid of an underwater photographer, a fisherman's dog, and the dolphin's ever-foolhardy young "masters". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1965
A film crew arrives in Coral Key to shoot the underwater scenes for a horror movie. But the real monster turns out to be more of the green-eyed variety, when young Bud Ricks (Tommy Norden) becomes jealous -- the film cast includes a pretty young actress (Wende Wagner), who not only manages to infatuate Bud's older brother Sandy (Luke Halpin) but also Flipper, which leaves the boy feeling left out and very resentful. Between Bud's unhappiness, and the recklessness of the director (Jack Carr), a near-disaster takes place underwater, with potentially tragic consequences for the dolphin and several members of the film crew, including the "monster" (Ricou Browning). ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
This 1964 sequel to the 1963 box-office hit Flipper is unnecessarily melodramatic at times, but at least it isn't a cookie-cutter imitation of the original. Suzy the Dolphin returns to the "male" role of the superintelligent Flipper, while Luke Halpin reprises the role of Sandy Ricks. This time, Flipper rescues a British family in the Bahamas, who are being held for ransom. Brian Kelly takes over from the first film's Chuck Connors as Ranger Porter Ricks, a role he'd continue to play in the long-running (1964-67) Flipper TV series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Luke Halpin, Pamela Franklin, (more)
The surprise hit of the summer of 1963, Flipper is a thoroughly captivating outdoor adventure from the Ivan Tors factory. Sandy Ricks (Luke Halpin), the young son of Florida fisherman Porter Ricks (Chuck Connors), nurses a wounded dolphin back to health. His father would prefer that Sandy allow the dolphin to return to its natural habitat, but Sandy has other ideas. After "Flipper" rescues Sandy from a shark, however, the boy grants the dolphin his freedom. Ideally suited for audiences of all ages, Flipper was fully deserving of its success; within a year, it had spawned a theatrical sequel and a long-running TV series, which, like the film, cast Suzy the Dolphin as the "hero" Flipper. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Chuck Connors, Luke Halpin, (more)
- 1960
Mary Martin originally starred in the Jules Styne/Carolyn Leigh/Comden & Green musical version of James M. Barrie's Peter Pan on Broadway in 1953. On March 7, 1955, Peter Pan was restaged for television, live and in color, on NBC's Producer's Showcase. The telecast was so popular that it was repeated, again live, the following year. Blessedly, Mary Martin returned to commit Peter Pan to videotape in 1960; this version was first telecast on December 8 of that year. Forty-seven years old at the time, Martin is utterly enchanting as Peter Pan, the little boy who won't grow up and who whisks Wendy Darling (Maureen Bailey) and her brothers Michael (Kent Fletcher) and John (Joey Trent) out of their London nursery and off to Never Never Land: "First star to the left, then straight on till morning." Song highlights include "I've Gotta Crow," "I'm Flying," "I Won't Grow Up," "Neverland," "Ugg-a-Wugg" and "Hook's Waltz." As with the Broadway version, the staging and choreography was in the more than capable hands of Jerome Robbins. Cyril Ritchard shamelessly hams it up as the wicked Captain Hook, and also doubles as the more benign Mr. Darling. Both Martin and Ritchard re-created their Broadway roles, as did Sondra Lee as the incongruously blonde Indian princess Tiger Lily. Martin's daughter Heller Halliday also appears in the minor role of Liza the maid, while the whole wonderful package is narrated by Lynn Fontanne. Repeated several times into the 1970s, this full-color version of Peter Pan was put into mothballs for several years, then retelecast (complete with the old NBC Peacock logo) in 1989. For this return engagement, the play was edited to accommodate extra commercials; happily, the complete version of the 1960 Peter Pan is now available on videocassette. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1958
Adapted by Sally Benson (Meet Me in St. Louis) from the novel by Mary Mapes Dodge, this dazzling musical version of Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates) stars 1950s Hollywood heartthrob Tab Hunter in the title role (as Hans, not the Skates). Living in a small Dutch village, Hans yearns to compete in an upcoming ice-skating competition, for a grand prize of 500 guilders and a gleaming new pair of silver skates. Also, all poor Hans and his sister Trinka (Ellie Sommers) have to their name is two pair of crude wooden skates. Making matters worse, the Brinker family has been living in poverty ever since Hans' father (Ralph Roberts lost his mind while trying to save the local population from a burst dyke. But though Hans is certain that things will never get better, his erstwhile sweetheart, the wealthy Rychie Van Gleck (Peggy King), has faith in both Hans and his future. While the songs in this production, written by Hugh Martin, are rather unremarkable and a bit silly at times (notably the production number "Clop, Clop, Clop", wherein the chorus does a dance in wooden shoes), Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates" is redeemed by a talented supporting cast, including Basil Rathbone (complete with German accent) as the crusty-but-lovable Dr. Boekman, opera diva Jarmila Novotna as Hans' mother, and Olympic skating champ Dick Button as Rychie's brother Peter (in fact, it is Button who steals the show with some astonishing figure skating). Originally telecast live and in color, this 90-minute extravaganza was presented as a Hallmark Hall of Fame special. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tab Hunter, Peggy King, (more)
