Judy White Movies
Danny DeVito steps behind the camera for this darkly funny satire that combines elements of Barney and Friends with the real-life Pee-Wee Herman scandal while recalling the director's previously twisted black comedies Throw Momma From the Train (1987) and The War of the Roses (1989). Robin Williams stars as Randolph Smiley, a popular children's show host known professionally as "Rainbow Randolph." Dismissed from his beloved job when he's caught taking payola, Randolph becomes increasingly mentally unhinged and the target of his delusional revenge fantasies is Sheldon Mopes (Edward Norton), otherwise known as Smoochy, the fuchsia rhino character that has replaced him and soared to national popularity. Randolph soon learns that his ex-girlfriend and network executive Nora Wells (Catherine Keener) is sleeping with Sheldon, so he sets out to kill Smoochy, egged on by an unexpected ally: corporate president Marion Frank Stokes (Jon Stewart), who should be profiting from Smoochy's rise to fame, except for the fact that he and his cronies are unable to control the idealistic Sheldon's on-air agenda. Death to Smoochy (2002) co-stars Harvey Fierstein, Vincent Shiavelli, and Michael Rispoli. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- 1997
- PG13
Based on Rescuers: Portraits of Moral Courage in the Holocaust, a book by Gay Block and Malka Drucker, this made-for-cable drama was intended as the first of a trilogy inspired by the same literary source. The film is divided into two segments, both set in Europe during WWII. Scripted by Ernest Kinoy, "Mamusha" stars Elizabeth Perkins as a Polish-Catholic nanny who saves her orphaned Jewish charge by literally hiding the child in plain sight, posing as the child's mother. And "The Woman on the Bicycle," adapted by Susan Nanus, features Sela Ward and Fritz Weaver in the story of a fearless French resistance fighter who smuggles secret papers for the Allies while going about her daily cheese deliveries (this same character was fictionalized in the 1963 theatrical epic The Longest Day). Executive-produced by Barbra Streisand and directed by Peter Bogdanovich, Rescuers: Stories of Courage -- Two Women made its Showtime cable debut on October 5, 1997. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Elizabeth Perkins, Sela Ward, (more)
