Linda Hart Movies

Stella Stevens guest stars as Irene Danbury, New York City's oldest and most notorious madam. When Irene is brought into Night Court for prosecution, Harry (Harry Anderson) must decide whether or not to enter into evidence her diary--which lists the names of virtually every political higher-up in the city! Meanwhile, the sensitive Bull (Richard Bull) is aghast to learn of a family Thanksgiving ritual favored by court clerk Mac (Charlie Robinson). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Bette Midler stars as Stella Claire, a working class, fun-loving barmaid in northern New York State. A brief affair with handsome Stephen Dallas (Stephen Collins) produces a daughter, Jenny (Trini Alvarado), who Stella insists upon raising alone, despite Dallas' marriage offer. As the years pass, Stella and Jenny are a happy pair. Stella gives up bartending to sell cosmetics, supported by her friend Ed (John Goodman), a bartender developing a crush on her and a problem with alcohol. Dallas has stayed involved with his beloved daughter from afar and is now a urologist in New York City, engaged to a book editor (Marsha Mason). As Jenny reaches adulthood, Stella becomes aware that life with her father would provide her daughter with opportunities that she'd never have otherwise, so she devises a painful, self-sacrificing scheme to drive Jenny from the nest. Although functional as a tearjerker, many of the themes in Stella simply don't make as much sense in a modern age of healthy, fractured families, muting the drama of the tale's earlier versions, specifically Stella Dallas (1937). ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

Clint Eastwood, hot off of his Academy Award win for Unforgiven, directed this small character study, appearing in the guise of a cops-and-robbers action picture. The film takes place during the fall of 1963. Eight-year old Phillip Perry (T.J. Lowther), the son of a devout Jehovah's Witness mother, is staying home while all the other children are out trick-or-treating. But then prison escapee Butch Haynes (Kevin Costner) appears in his kitchen. Needing a hostage to aid him in his escape from jail, he grabs Phillip. Phillip curiously looks up to Butch and willingly accompanies him. Butch gets rid of his fellow escapee after he tries to molest the child, and Butch and Phillip take to the Texas highway, on the run from the cops. The cop in pursuit in this instance is Police Chief Red Garnett (Clint Eastwood), riding in his sleek Populux Airglide trailer -- his "mobile command headquarters." On the road with Garnett is Sally Gerber (Laura Dern), a pushy pre-feminist criminologist, along with a creepy federal agent who is an expert sharpshooter. Butch is not particularly anxious to make it to the Texas borderline, and neither is Garnett in any particular hurry to catch Butch. As Butch and Phillip form a father-son attachment, the paths of Butch and Garnett gradually come together, in time for a final confrontation, after which Garnett confesses, "I don't know nothing. I don't know a damn thing." ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Newly promoted to "caseworker", apprentice angel Monica (Roma Downey) tackles her first assignment in this premiere episode of Touched by an Angel. The wheels starts rolling, so to speak, on a bus, where passenger David Morrow (T.J. Lowther) tells Monica that his mom and sister died in a car accident, and that his policeman father Nick (Mark Matcelf) wants to hire a nanny to look after the family. Monica shows up for the job, only to learn from Angel of Death Adam (Charles Rocket) that Nick has lied to David: his sister died of crib death, and his still-living mom has deserted to family. In her zeal to set things right in the Morrow household, Monica makes the first of many celestial mistakes by bringing home a woman (Wendy Phillips) whom she believes to be David's mom--but who is actually a fugitive from justice in desperate need of a hideout! Also featuring Della Reese as Monica's heavenly supervisor Tess, this inaugural episode is based on an unaired pilot, which boasted a slightly different cast. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A gangster is looking to get away from crooked deals and double-crossing people but ends up in the movie business anyway in this comic crime story. Chili Palmer (John Travolta) is a Miami-based loan collector for the mob trying to collect a gambling debt. His assignment takes him to Hollywood to collect money from Harry Zimm (Gene Hackman), a mildly sleazy producer of low-budget horror movies. Although Chili intends to hurt Harry if necessary, he takes a certain liking to him and an even keener interest in Karen (Rene Russo), Harry's girlfriend, whom Chili recognizes from Harry's grade-B monster epics. It seems Harry has a script that he feels is Academy Award material, and he could get the project off the ground if he could get the right actor for the lead -- say, the well-respected but egocentric (and diminutive) Martin Weir (Danny DeVito). Chili thinks he has a feel for the movie business and decides to see what he can do to persuade Weir to get behind the project. Chili soon finds himself hip deep in the film industry, which at least puts him in contact with a higher grade of scumbags than he's used to. But Chili isn't the only criminal Harry's been dealing with; he's been obtaining financing from Bo Catlett (Delroy Lindo), a drug dealer with a highly uncertain temperament. An intelligently constructed crime story and a hilarious look at the absurdities of the film business, Get Shorty was based on the novel of the same name by Elmore Leonard; Leonard based Chili on a real-life former gangster of his acquaintance, though Chili's model never worked in Hollywood. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

With suspense in the De Palma tradition, this thriller from Michael Steinberg (Bodies, Rest & Motion) hinges on the killer of cheating Karen Christianson (Chelsea Field), survived by her husband Ben (William R. Moses), troubled teen daughter Ellie (Julia Stiles), and little sister Inger (Vanessa Zima). At the gated tract-house community where they live, homicide detective Boland (Michael Parks) keeps his eye on a variety of suspects -- prissy Mrs. Potter (Linda Hart), womanizing Lawson Smith (Patrick Muldoon of Starship Troopers); and au pair Lena (Swedish actress Louise Myrback in her film debut). Shown at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

Comedy and drama take turns in this period piece based on a novel by Mark Childress. Peejoe (Lucas Black), short for Peter Joseph, lives in a small Alabama town in 1965, at the height of the Civil Rights movement. He becomes involved with a group of black students protesting the town's racially segregated municipal swimming pool, leading to a protest that explodes into deadly violence. But Peejoe has gotten a crash course in standing your ground and following your own path from his free-spirited Aunt Lucille (Melanie Griffith), who has killed her abusive husband and is headed for Hollywood, where she's convinced that television stardom awaits her. Crazy in Alabama marked the directorial debut of actor Antonio Banderas; his supporting cast includes Cathy Moriarty, Elizabeth Perkins, Rod Steiger, Fannie Flagg, and Meat Loaf Aday. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Hotshot marketing executive Andy Caspar (Adam Garcia) gives up his steady job to join a high-tech research and development center where he's teamed with three misfits, including socially-unacceptable Darrell (Jake Busey), to create a far-fetched and highly unlikely product -- a 99-dollar desktop computer. The company wants them to fail, but they succeed against all odds and come up with a PC that doesn't use a monitor or keyboard (it's holographic, and all of the memory is stored on an Internet server). A greedy competitor, Francis (Enrico Colantoni), sabotages their project and steals their idea as his own. Meanwhile, Andy's relationship with lovely neighbor Alisa (Rosario Dawson) hits the skids. Can Andy get the PC -- and the girl -- back? ~ Buzz McClain, All Movie Guide