Barney Cheng Movies
The third entry in Tom Cruise's Mission: Impossible film series involves super Impossible Mission Forces (IMF) agent Ethan Hunt (Cruise) being forced back into the field just when he was planning on marrying his girlfriend, Julia (Michelle Monaghan). The agency asks Hunt to save an operative (Keri Russell) he trained after weapons dealer Owen Davian (Philip Seymour Hoffman) kidnaps her. With the help of his field team -- played by Ving Rhames, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, and Maggie Q -- Hunt achieves his goal, but becomes involved in a web of double-crosses that leave him wondering if he can trust his superiors (Billy Crudup and Laurence Fishburne). Eventually Davian threatens Julia's life in order to get away with his evil plan. Simon Pegg appears as an IMF tech expert. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, (more)
- 2004
An actress tries to sort out her life while those around her are busy doing the same in this independent comedy drama. Nina (Eleanor Hutchins) enjoyed a few years of minor celebrity when she joined the cast of a popular soap opera while still a teenager, but seven years later, after devoting most of her time to traveling the world on a budget, she decides it's time to get back to work when her bank account is nearly empty and her fan club has been reduced to a single member. Stuck in Rhode Island and needing a place to stay, Nina moves in with Jim (Barney Cheng), a librarian who is having some problems with his girlfriend, Carla (Alison Folland). While Nina struggles to get both her career and her love life back in gear, her best friend, Sheila (Reena Shah), is having problems of her own with her boyfriend, a flighty Frenchman (Pierre Mignard). Stay Until Tomorrow was screened in competition at the 2004 Avignon Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eleanor Hutchins
A couple risks their lives in the name of all things fabulous in this comedy of errors, set against the backdrop of West Hollywood's annual Halloween Parade. Wasabi Tuna's title refers to the ho-hum sushi costumes that boyfriends Harvey (Barney Cheng) and Evan (Jason London) have dreamed up for themselves and their friends to wear to the big bash. But when their sassy pall Emme (Alanna Ubach) offers up another suggestion -- that they dress as hardcore East L.A. gangstas -- the couple jumps at the chance. However, when the boutiques on Rodeo Drive don't yield the authentic ghetto fashions they need, the friends hit the streets to beg, steal, or borrow what it takes to "look the part," and end up the unwitting carriers of an illegal cache of gang weaponry. Co-starring Antonio Sabato Jr., SNL funnyman Tim Meadows, and reality-TV widow Anna Nicole Smith (playing herself), Wasabi Tuna received a limited West Coast release in the spring of 2004. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Antonio Sabato, Jr., Jason London, (more)
A down-on-his luck auteur gets one more chance at the big time -- provided his neuroses don't swallow him whole -- in Woody Allen's 33rd feature release, Hollywood Ending. Allen plays Val Waxman, a one-time cinematic genius who's resorted to taking advertisement work to pay the bills for himself and his airhead live-in girlfriend, Lori (Debra Messing). Val finds his luck is about to change, however, when he receives the script for The City Never Sleeps, a period noir set against the backdrop of 1940s New York City. It seems his ex-wife, Ellie (Tea Leoni), now an executive at Galaxy Pictures, has been pulling for him to direct the picture, claiming he's the only man who can do justice to the script. She even manages to convince her boyfriend, Hal (Treat Williams), Galaxy's high-powered studio head, to take a chance on Val's "unique vision." Just when the cameras are ready to roll, however, Val finds that unique vision in jeopardy -- literally -- as he's struck with a psychosomatic case of blindness. When physicians and psychiatrists fail to cure him, Val contrives a scheme to forge ahead with the picture, for fear of blowing his one last chance at greatness. Hollywood Ending co-stars George Hamilton and Mark Rydell. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Woody Allen, Téa Leoni, (more)
