Adam Baldwin Movies

This quietly compelling film explores the hardships and anxieties of high school with intelligence, sensitivity, warmth and humor. Chris Makepeace stars as a shy, bookish student who has recently moved to Chicago and begun a new school. There he finds himself the target of a group of punks led by Matt Dillon (ideally cast as the weasel-like bully), who threaten him each day to turn over his lunch money for protection...or else. When he stands up to them, he nearly loses his dental work before being saved by Ricky Lindemann (Adam Baldwin), a hulking loner rumored to have murdered his own brother. Makepeace offers the boy a job as his bodyguard, and the two become unlikely friends -- that is, until the ousted bullies find a champion of their own who challenges Lindemann. When Lindemann refuses to fight back, he disappears into reclusion, and the bullying begins anew, worse than ever. Makepeace then learns the truth about Lindemann's past: he did indeed kill his brother, but the death was an accident while the two young boys were playing with a gun, and Lindemann lives tortured by guilt as a result. Just when things seem at their worst, the bodyguard returns to face his nemesis as Makepeace and Dillon square off in the final showdown of good versus evil. The real strength of the film is its handling of the relationships between its characters, particularly between Makepeace and Baldwin, and Makepeace and his family (Martin Mull and Ruth Gordon). My Bodyguard is light but thoughtful entertainment with a Rocky theme that's suitable for the entire family. ~ Jeremy Beday, All Movie Guide

In this casual, uninvolved comedy running on a low-octane script, a scruffy taxi company is about to be wiped out when its owner Harold (Max Gail) exhorts his cabbies to do what they can to help save the company -- and what they can do turns out to be a surprise to everyone concerned. Saving the day (and the film) are the likeable, eccentric drivers, introduced by means of a new trainee (Adam Baldwin) who rides around with each in turn. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Hadley Hickman (Griffin O'Neal), a bucolic teenager from the Rural South, moves with his family to Southern California. Enrolled in a snobbish prep school, Hadley is victimized and ostracized by his too-cool classmates. To prove his worth, our hero takes up wrestling, and before long he's the school champ, thanks to the input of coach Ball (William Devane), a washed-up alcoholic who finds redemption through Hadley's example. Yes, it's Rocky Goes to Prep School. Shallow and predictable, the film's sole redeeming factor is the warm rapport between stars Griffin O'Neal and William Devane. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Originally done for an after school special this story is about two kids traveling back in time to solve a mystery about a relative. ~ All Movie Guide

Street gang member Jeff (Adam Baldwin) leaves the organization, seeking out a quieter existence. Meanwhile, gang leader Cinco (Danny De La Paz) and his minions have taken over the local high school, dispensing drugs with impunity. When Cinco is arrested, a rumor spreads that he's been sold out by Jeff. In the ensuing hostilities, Jeff's girlfriend (Deborah Foreman) is beaten and bloodied. A showdown is inevitable, and, per the film's title, it takes place just after the last school bell has rung. Filmed in 1984, 3:15 - The Moment of Truth wasn't released until 1986. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Timothy Williams plays a top high-schooler: Straight As, star athlete, the works. When he's arrested in a street drug bust, it becomes public knowledge that the boy has had a homosexual experience with an older man. In an instant, he is harassed by his classmates, who circulate a petition demanding his expulsion. The boy is also shunned by his aggressively macho father Tony Lo Bianco. The worst aspect of the "scandal" is the fact that the boy himself has no idea whether he's really gay or not. Made for TV, Welcome Home, Bobby raises several issues that its fair-to-middling screenplay is unable to satisfactorily handle. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The independently produced Chocolate War marked actor Keith Gordon's directorial debut. Adapted from the popular novel by Robert Cormier (I Am the Cheese), it functions as a political allegory set in a curricular context, in the same vein as Rene Daalder's Massacre at Central High (1976). In War, Ilan Mitchell-Smith plays Jerry, a new enrollee at the exclusive Catholic prep school St. Trinity. He attempts to fit in by joining the football team, but immediately runs head-first into Brother Leon (John Glover), a ruthless academician striving for a promotion to headmaster, and The Vigils, a underground student gang that wields a massive amount of power within the school. The abusive Leon attempts to goad as many students as possible into selling chocolates for the school fundraiser, but Vigil leader Archie (Wally Ward) has Jerry publicly refuse to sell any for ten days, as one of the annual 'hazing' rituals that the Vigils dole out to freshman enrollees. Jerry agrees, which turns him into a rebel hero among his fellow students, but he then extends his refusal beyond the week-and-a-half limit imposed by Archie, which puts him head-to-head with both Leon and the Vigils. However, instead of turning into an underdog story at that point, The Chocolate War remains realistic and cynical.

~ Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide

When his brother is murdered, a policeman is caught between his devotion to the law and his family's desire for revenge in this action drama. Patrick Swayze plays Truman Gates, who left his backwoods Appalachian home for life as a Chicago police officer. When his brother is killed by a gangster, Truman is determined to seek legal retribution. His older brother Briar (Liam Neeson) has different ideas, however, and travels to the city to seek old-fashioned vigilante justice. Truman must now choose between his family's belief in mountain justice and the duties of his job. Though the film is not particularly action-packed, director John Irvin does provide the expected gunplay and macho confrontations. However, despite a surprisingly distinguished cast (also including Helen Hunt and Michael J. Pollard), little distinguishes the film from numerous other revenge stories with a similar outline. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

The directorial debut of producer Irwin Winkler, Guilty by Suspicion is a sobering account of one movie executive's woes in dealing with the political fallout from the McCarthy Era Hollywood blacklist. Robert De Niro stars as David Merrill, a film director in the 1950s whose obsession with his burgeoning career has estranged him from his wife Ruth (Annette Bening) and their son. When he returns from a trip to Paris, Merrill is surprised when told by his boss, Darryl F. Zanuck (Ben Piazza) that he's been summoned to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee, which is investigating Communist ties to Hollywood. Although Merrill once attended a meeting years before, he's not a Communist, and he refuses to help the committee wreck the career of his friend Bunny Baxter (George Wendt). Merrill becomes blacklisted, unable to find work even in menial positions or under assumed names as the editor of a B-movie or the director of a low-budget Western. Reconciled with his family, Merrill caves in and agrees to testify, but as he prepares to "name names," his conscience plagues him. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

The two-part TV movie Cruel Doubt was based on a true story, as elucidated in book form by Joe McGinniss. In part one, aired May 17, 1992, Wealthy North Carolinian Blythe Danner discovers that her own son Matt McGrath was involved in a robbery-assault in their home, in which her husband was killed. The story was resolved in part two, which debuted May 19, 1992. As the courtroom trial wears on, flashbacks reveal the extent of McGrath's involvement in the crime, as well as the depths of his mental illness. And for a brief period, there's a slim possibility that the evidence is all wrong, and that McGrath is innocent. The boy's sister is played by Gwyneth Paltrow, real-life daughter of Blythe Danner. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Marc Rocco's gritty drama Where the Day Takes You stars Dermot Mulroney as King, a street-smart hustler who acts as a father figure to a motley collection of young runaways. Among the people in his sphere are the young self-destructive drug addict Greg (Sean Astin), self-hating gay prostitute Little J (Balthazar Getty), and newcomer Heather (Lara Flynn Boyle). The film is structured as a series of flashbacks triggered by King's conversations with a prison psychologist (Laura San Giacomo). Included in the impressive cast are such soon-to-be-famous names as Will Smith and Ricki Lake, and the already established Kyle MacLachlan, Christian Slater, and Alyssa Milano. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

In this jungle adventure, based on a Jules Verne novel, Spunky Minha, was born and raised in the Amazon jungle on her father's hemp plantation. After she agrees to marry Dr. Manuel Valdez, they decide to hold the wedding in Brazil so his sickly mother can be there. Unfortunately, the girl's father hestitates to make the long, dangerous journey downstream because years before he was convicted for a crime and was sentenced to die. Though innocent, he does not want to face Brazilian justice and so changed his name and created his own jungle world on the plantation. Despite all this, he decides he will be there at the wedding. They set off on a great raft and during the journey face many dangers including deadly natives, snakes, piranhas, gators, fierce storms and a greedy bounty hunter who wants to blackmail Juan. The extortionist knows that Juan is innocent and carries with him proof, but this does not stop him from demanding that Juan pay him a fortune and hand over his lovely daughter. When Juan refuses, the bounty hunter makes good his threat, leaving his daughter and the doctor to somehow prove her father's innocence. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Three stalwarts of straight-to-cable productions -- Tia Carrere, C. Thomas Howell, and Adam Baldwin -- team up for this erotic thriller set in an appropriately exotic Mexican resort. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide