Jerry Giles Movies

When a pudgy, bespectacled seven-year-old, Olive (Abigail Breslin), voices her desire to take home the coveted Little Miss Sunshine crown at an upcoming beauty pageant, her wildly dysfunctional family sets out on an interstate road trip to ensure her a clear shot at realizing her dreams in former music video directorial team Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris' quirky feature debut, starring Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, and Toni Collette. Despite early career success as an outspoken motivational speaker, family patriarch Richard (Kinnear) continues to cling to his "Refuse to Lose" philosophy, much to the chagrin of his increasingly annoyed spouse, Sheryl (Collette). Add into the mix a Nietzsche-reading teenage son (Paul Dano) who has taken a vow of silence until he finds his fate as a fighter pilot; a horny, heroin-happy grandfather (Alan Arkin) with a penchant for creative profanity; and a suicidal genius (Carell) and Proust scholar still reeling about losing both his male lover and his MacArthur Foundation genius grant -- and the stage is set for a road trip in which sanity is sure to take the back seat. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Despite their estrangement from Angel (David Boreanaz), Cordelia (Charisma Carpenter), Wesley (Alexis Denisof), and Gunn (J. August Richards) work on the same case as their boss. It seems a ring of renegade zombie cops is cracking down on street crime -- and even innocent street people -- using methods more than a little reminiscent of the real-life Rodney King case. Cordy and the boys learn of this from one of Gunn's old crew, who don't hide their displeasure that Gunn seems to have forsaken them to work with Angel Investigations. As Gunn and company team up with homeless-shelter manager Anne Steele (Julia Lee) (see "Blood Money") to protect her young charges from the violent pigs, Angel also becomes aware of the brutality. He works behind the scenes with Detective Kate Lockley (Elisabeth Rohm) to determine the source of the undead law-enforcement officials, eventually locating a police captain with a taste for voodoo and an obsession with law and order at any cost. After mortally wounding Wesley with a handgun, the zombies close in on the gang and the kids they're protecting. But just in time, Angel manages to undo the police captain's spell, stopping the cop monsters in their tracks. Angel has saved his former co-workers, and they don't even know it. Originally broadcast February 13, 2001, on the WB network, "The Thin Dead Line" marked season two, episode 14 of the supernatural comedy drama. In a brief subplot at the start of the episode, a woman named Francine Sharp (Marie Chambers) turns to Cordy and the gang for help removing a demonic third eye that has sprouted on the back of her daughter's head. This case will resurface in the next two episodes, "Reprise" and "Epiphany." ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide