Margot Kidder Movies

Filmmaker Rob Zombie returns to Haddonfield for this Dimension Films sequel that finds the murderous psychopath Michael Myers (once again played by Tyler Mane) out on the loose again. Zombie writes and directs, with Malek Akkad handling producing duties. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, All Movie Guide

Four mere mortals adapt the personas of their favorite superhero characters, and filmmaker Matt Ogens chronicles the lives and ambitions of this curious quartet in a documentary that explores the allure of fame on the sidewalks of Hollywood Boulevard. Being a superhero isn't as easy as it appears in the flickering light of a darkened theater, but sometimes on the Walk of Fame it feels that anything is possible. Joe McQueen's journey began when he sold his Super Nintendo for a bus ticket to Hollywood and assumed the identity of The Incredible Hulk. Meanwhile, much like the character of Bruce Wayne, Maxwell Allen struggles with anger issues while assuming the guise of Gotham crime-fighter Batman. Now far from her former days as a Midwest beauty queen, Jennifer Gehrt walks the city streets dressed as whip-wielding do-gooder Wonder Woman. Some days, it seems that Christopher Dennis' every thought is consumed by how the character of Superman, whose cape he dons on a daily basis, would react to the chaos of Tinseltown. From mere fascination to all-consuming obsession, each one of these everyday superheroes are forced balance their own identities with the personas of the characters they portray as they struggle to achieve fame in a town where heroes are cheap, and stars come priced at a dime a dozen. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Reconstructed using archival film and sound elements long thought to be extinct, this special cut of Superman II pieces together unseen footage shot by Richard Donner in order to present the most comprehensive version of what was to be the original cut of the blockbuster sequel. As initially planned, the first two films were to be filmed back-to-back using the same sets and actors to save on production costs. However, with a budget escalating out of control and Warner Bros. breathing down the producers' necks, the decision was made to drop any further filming on the sequel in order to finish the first movie and usher it into theaters. Of course, the first Superman was a wild success, so then it was just a matter of ramping up production again, though this time, Donner was not asked back. Instead, producers went with Richard Lester, who had served them well with his Three Musketeers films. Decisions were made to drop most of the key scenes that were already in the can, including all of the footage featuring Marlon Brando as Jor-El, the Man of Steel's father. After completion, the sequel found much success in theatrical and home-video box-office returns, though that didn't stop die-hard fans from speculating what Donner's cut would have looked like. Once the Internet was spawned, Warner Bros. saw interest grow more and more for this alternate version, even prompting the company to send cease and desist letters to individuals who had posted a re-edit of the film using deleted footage taken from an alternate TV version from the U.K. With the release of Superman Returns, the company saw this as a chance to finally deliver what people had wanted for years and enlisted Michael Thau to oversee the restoration process. Under the tutelage of Donner's notes, scripts, storyboards, and the director himself, the new version was delivered to home audiences in 2006, thereby not only giving people a look into what could have been, but giving a director an unprecedented chance to realize a vision long thought lost in the annals of movie history. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, All Movie Guide

Alison Eastwood, daughter of actor/director Clint Eastwood, stars in this made-for-TV nailbiter as Patricia Collins, a TV journalist who is summoned to the city morgue to look at the body of a young female murder victim. Patricia is shocked to discover that the dead girl is her exact double -- suggesting that she was killed in a case of mistaken identity by an unknown assailant. As the story progresses, it becomes clear that this disturbing incident is linked with the supposed death ten months earlier of Patricia's own father, whose body disappeared along with 200,000 dollars he had pulled out of the bank. And what has all this to do with a demented stalker who is plaguing Patricia via fax messages? Or, for that matter, with a shady fertility clinic, the specialty of which is in vitro fertilization of twins? From the "smart heroine isn't smart enough not to confront the villain alone" school of murder mysteries, Mary Higgins Clark's I'll Be Seeing You (based on a novel, as if there were any doubt) premiered December 19, 2004, on the PAX network. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Based upon Peter Biskind's book of the same name, this BBC-produced documentary traces the rise of a generation of Hollywood filmmakers who briefly changed the face of movies with a more personal approach that pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable onscreen. Influenced by such European directors as Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, and Federico Fellini, the movement kicked off in the mid-'60s with two films directed by Arthur Penn: Mickey One and Bonnie and Clyde. (The latter had been offered to both Godard and Truffaut before it wound up with producer/star Warren Beatty and Penn.) What really kicked it into gear was the unexpected success of Easy Rider, a biker-road movie that became that rare film phenomenon: acclaimed at the Cannes Film Festival and a huge commercial success. Film school graduates, the first generation brought up with movies as their main cultural reference, flooded the studios (whose own regimes were changing) with production chieftains such as Robert Evans of Paramount and David Picker at United Artists; they approved risky-looking projects and allowed relatively untested filmmakers like Francis Ford Coppola to take on heavyweight movies such as The Godfather or Hollywood newcomers like Britain's John Schlesinger to make quirky stories like Midnight Cowboy. Enriched by success with their TV show The Monkees, producer Bert Schneider and director Bob Rafelson formed a company that produced not only Easy Rider but seminal '70s films such as Five Easy Pieces and the Oscar-winning Vietnam War documentary Hearts and Minds. Another godfather to the new movement was producer Roger Corman, who gave early career opportunities to Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Peter Bogdanovich, and Jonathan Demme on low-budget projects that allowed them to learn their craft.

Two things brought this movement to an end: Some individual filmmakers' personal excesses (such disastrous flops as Dennis Hopper's follow-up to Easy Rider, appropriately titled The Last Movie, and Scorsese's New York, New York), and the studios growing fascination with special effects-driven B-movies. An outgrowth of two box-office and marketing juggernauts -- Jaws and Star Wars -- the resulting films became entertainments rather than personal statements of the directors. Narrated by William H. Macy, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls features vintage clips of Coppola, Scorsese, Beatty, George Lucas, Sam Peckinpah, Roman Polanski, Robert Altman, and Pauline Kael. It also includes original interview material with Penn; Corman; Bogdanovich; Hopper; Picker; writer/directors John Milius and Paul Schrader; actresses Karen Black, Cybill Shepherd, Margot Kidder, and Jennifer Salt (the latter two shared a house in Malibu, a social center for young filmmakers); actors Peter Fonda, Kris Kristofferson, and Richard Dreyfuss; producers Jerome Hellman, Michael Phillips, and Jonathan Taplin; editor Dede Allen; production designer Polly Platt; writers David Newman, Joan Tewksbury, Gloria Katz, and Willard Huyck; cinematographers Laszlo Kovacs and Vilmos Zsigmond; agent Mike Medavoy; and former production executive Peter Bart. Among the films discussed are Rosemary's Baby, The Wild Bunch, Mean Streets, American Graffiti, The Rain People, Midnight Cowboy, M*A*S*H, McCabe and Mrs. Miller, The Last Picture Show, Shampoo, Taxi Driver, and Raging Bull. (Three interviewees -- cinematographer Gordon Willis, critic Andrew Sarris, and writer-director Monte Hellman -- listed in the Variety review of this film, were not included in this version from a screening on Bravo.) ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide

Harvey Fierstein, Terrence McNally, and Paula Vogel each wrote episodes for this three-part made-for-cable drama which examines changing attitudes and issues facing the gay and lesbian community in the small town of Homer, Connecticut. Opening in the 1950s and leading up to the present day, Common Ground features Eric Stolz, Mimi Rogers, Jonathan Taylor Thomas, Margot Kidder, Edward Asner, Beau Bridges, Jason Priestley, and Steven Weber, as well as co-writer Fierstein. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A Canadian-U.S. co-production filmed in 1998, Someone is Watching stars Stefanie Powers as Michelle Dupree, who, with her adopted son, Cory (Mickey Toft), is painfully attempting to pick up the pieces after the pair has been terrorized by an intruder in their home. Hoping to start life anew in a different town, Michelle learns to her chagrin that she cannot entirely escape the traumas of her past, especially when she begins receiving threatening phone calls. Meanwhile, Cory has "adjusted" to the situation by inventing an imaginary friend, a monster residing in his closet. Before long, people start dying horribly -- including Bobby Culley (Martin Neufeld), the disturbed youth whom Michelle has suspected of making those crank calls. Can the killer actually be Cory's mythical "friend" -- or is something even more sinister occurring. Intended for theatrical play, Someone is Watching ended up on Canadian cable television before making its US debut over the Lifetime cable channel on January 10, 2000. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This fact-based TV movie begins in 1987, as high-school athlete Alex Kelly (Matthew Settle) awaits his trial for the rape of one girl and the intimidation of several others. Rather than face the justice system, Alex flees to Europe, where he spends virtually the next decade, with covert financial help from his family. Falling in love with a girl in Sweden, Alex builds a whole new life for himself. Ultimately, however, Interpol tracks Alex down, whereupon the story takes a dramatic new turn. Told from the point of view of Alex's female victim, the film does nothing to whitewash its protagonist, even though actor Settle manages to invest his character with a modicum of sympathy; plus, the viewer is left to ponder whether the fault lies entirely with Alex, or with his upbringing. First broadcast by CBS as Crime in Connecticut: The Return of Alex Kelly on March 16, 1999, the film has since been rerun on cable as The Return of Alex Kelly. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the opening episode of Touched by an Angel's fifth season, amiable Angel of Death Andrew (John Dye) promises a dying hospital patient to help restore the faith of someone else at death's door. The identity of that person can be found in a missing Bible, which Andrew searches for with the help of Monica (Roma Downey). At the same time, the angels must root out the well-meaning but misguided mortal who has been posing as the Angel of Death, providing false hope to a number of terminal patients. Without giving away the ending, it can be noted that among the episode's guest stars are such reliable performers as Chad Lowe, Margot Kidder and Carrie Snodgress. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Actress Margot Kidder hosts this program about what it's like to live with asthma and regularly face the possibility of dying suddenly when unable to breathe. The lives of several individuals who must face this challenge are profiled in Breathless: Living With Severe Asthma, including a speed skater, a girl in high school, and a mother who must work outside her own home. Emphasis is placed on seeing how these women are choosing to live their lives, despite the fact that they must constantly be on guard for environmental substances and events that could trigger a serious asthma attack. ~ Elizabeth Smith, All Movie Guide