Margot Kidder Movies

When an elderly lesbian couple refuses to sell their home to a powerful developer their house is covered in homophobic vandalism, but is this apparent hate crime motivated by genuine distain for gay culture or simple corporate greed? All the homeowners in the neighborhood have agreed to sell except for a committed lesbian couple with no interest in money nor intentions of moving. A local investigator suspects that the attack is simply a way of convincing the couple to bend to big business, and as he delves further into the case he comes to terms with his feelings for an old boyfriend. Inspired by the strength of the lesbian couple he is working for, the investigator finally learns how to love again. Chad Allen, Margot Kidder, and Gabrielle Rose star. ~ Jason Buchanan, 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

Ten-year-old Nikki Best (Kyley Statham) is a beautiful, intelligent and precocious child. She also suffers from Rett Syndrome, a rare neurological disorder which prohibits her from speaking more than a few words without assistance. Unable or unwilling to understand Nikki's ailment, the doctors and the school authorities are willing to write her off as just another mentally handicapped youngster. But Nikki's courageous mother, Terri (Jessica Steen), is not about to let this happen, embarking on a fierce and ferocious campaign to fight for her daughter's basic rights. In the end, both mother and daughter must put up a united front against the powers that be in order to face the most daunting challenge of Nikki's young life. Based on a true story, Society's Child made its Canadian TV debut over the CBC network on February 2, 2002, and was subsequently aired in the U.S. by the Lifetime cable channel on November 21 of that same year. ~ Hal Erickson, 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

Award-winning soundman Ron Judkins makes his directorial debut in this drama about family ties and how they can unravel. Vera (Rachel Leigh Cook) is a young woman with little in the way of ambitions or goals who still lives with her parents, Clyde and Laura (Stuart Margolin and Margot Kidder), in a remote city in Montana. One day Sam (Ryan Alosio) arrives in town, claiming to be interviewing prospective employees for a discount store soon to be built in town. However, it quickly becomes obvious that Sam is telling a tale, and we discover the real reason he's in town. A man Sam once knew who just died in prison gave him a letter, saying he fathered a daughter named Vera, who was given away shortly after her birth to a man named Clyde. When Clyde and Laura admit they are not Vera's birth parents, Vera and Sam head out in search of Vera's biological mother. The Hi-Line was shown in competition at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, 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

In this Canadian film, overweight piano prodigy Junior Brown (Martin Villafana) searches for a piano because his goofy mother (Lynn Whitfield) severed the strings on the family piano. Since paranoid Miss Peebs (Margot Kidder), his piano teacher, won't let him finger her keyboard, he has to run scales on her dining room table. Fortunately, Junior has a friend -- troubled Buddy Clark (Rainbow Sun Francks) who lost his family in a fire when he was a young child. Buddy goes out with a teen runaway (Sarah Polley), and he helps eccentric school janitor Mr. Pool (Clark Johnson) construct a model of the solar system in the school basement. Junior's frustrations mount as his quest continues. Music includes Chopin's "Prelude No. 4". Shown at the 1997 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

The deep bond formed between a troubled nephew and his simple uncle, whose character is reminiscent of Lenny from Of Mice and Men, is the focus of this Canadian melodrama set during the Depression in rural Ontario. Nine-year old Verlin will not talk, or cannot talk. His concerned and overprotective mother takes him to a doctor. She is angry at her husband Ferris whom she believes is indifferent to her boy's plight. When Ferris's child-like brother Henry comes to visit, the boy's life begins to change. Henry spends time with boy and teaches him about life. The two befriend Mabel, a retired, town prostitute with physical disabilities. The three outcasts become very close as they encounter obstacles to their friendship. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

When a jury frees a killer, the woman who testified against him fears for her life. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide