Nick Roth Movies

A young man is thrown into the center of the political and social tumult of the late '60s in this drama. It's 1968, and Ben Sweet (Nick Roth) is 18 years old and has just received his 1A draft classification. Ben does not want to go to Vietnam, and his father Sy (Henry Winkler) is understanding, though he believes Ben does have a responsibility to his country. As a compromise, Ben enrolls at the University of California in Berkeley, where he majors in economics but also hopes to indulge his interest in writing. Ben hasn't been in Berkeley long before his horizons are broadened by his childhood friend Mishkin (Sebastian Tillinger), who introduces him to marijuana and LSD, and Sadie (Laura Jordan), a classmate who takes him to bed for the first time. As Ben begins reconsidering the middle-class values he was raised with, he starts indulging his passion for playing guitar and joins a rock band with keyboard player Buddy (Wade Allain-Marcus) and drummer Blue (Tom Morello). Ben's political viewpoints also begin evolving when he meets campus radical Henry Wolf (Jake Newton), who believes a Marxist revolution is necessary in the United States -- and who steals Sadie away from him. On the rebound, Ben falls for Alice (Sarah Carter), the pretty blonde daughter of the college dean, but she bristles at his embrace of the counterculture as Ben becomes more deeply involved in music and politics. Ben's desire to write blossoms when he takes a class with Professor Hawkins (Bonnie Bedelia), a bohemian writing instructor who encourages him to explore his poetic side, but Ben's family are not entirely happy with the changes in his lifestyle. Nick Roth wrote and sang his own songs for Berkeley; he's also the son of director Bobby Roth. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Based on the autobiographical book by novelist Beverly Lowry, the made-for-TV Crossed Over chronicles the unlikely friendship between Lowry and one of America's most notorious death-row inmates. Consumed by grief after the hit-and-run death of her 18-year-old son Peter (Nick Roth), Beverly Lowry (played by Diane Keaton, who also executive-produced the film) is unable to overcome her depression, despite the tender ministrations of her supportive husband Ethan (Maury Chaykin). But when a psychic informs her that her son's death was caused by a woman, Beverly obsessively begins researching the lives of other women who'd taken lives. The trail of information leads her to the infamous Karla Faye Tucker (Jennifer Jason Leigh), slated to become the first white woman executed for murder in Texas in 135 years. Although the film necessarily telescopes the facts (the actual relationship between Lowry and Tucker spanned nearly a decade), the film successfully details how Beverly's friendship with the doomed Karla enabled both women to expunge the demons within their respective souls. Filmed in Toronto, Crossed Over was originally aired by CBS on March 3, 2002. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi