John Patrick Amedori

Debuting August 21, 2006, the hour-long Fox network series Vanished was a serialized drama in the tradition of 24 and Prison Break, this time with a bit of the "procedural" genre (à la Without a Trace) thrown in. Things got under way when Sara Collins (Joanne Kelly), the wife of prominent Georgia senator Jeffrey Collins (John Allen Nelson), abruptly disappeared during a fundraising dinner, the apparent victim of a kidnapping. Assigned to locate -- and, possibly rescue -- Mrs. Collins were FBI agents Graham Kelton (Gale Harold) and Lin Mei (Ming-Na). While Lin approached her job with a cynical sense of humor and an abundance of energy, Kelton was morose and taciturn, still blaming himself for the horrible death of a youthful kidnap victim which occurred right before his eyes. As the plot thickened, it became obvious that the two agents had more than a common, everyday abduction on their hands: the number-one suspect was killed off at the very start of the series; the trail was strewn with bizarre, contradictory clues and DaVinci Code-like cryptic messages; and finally, not only had Sara Collins mysteriously vanished on previous occasions, there was every indication that she wasn't really Sara Collins at all. Clearly, the missing Mrs. Collins was but a cog in the wheel of a larger conspiracy, in which (naturally) no one could be completely trusted. Other characters included Rebecca Gayheart as an unusually ubiquitous investigative reporter and Eddie Cibrian as Kelton and Mei's enigmatic FBI superior. Vanished was created by Josh Berman of CSI fame. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The sensationalistic murder of diet guru Dr. Herman Tarnower is explored in this stylized take on the tabloid cover story from first-time director Phyllis Nagy. As the inventor of the popular "Scarsdale Diet," Dr. Herman Tarnower (Ben Kingsley) became an overnight success during the peak of the early '80s diet craze. Despite the popularity of the Dr. Tarnower's revolutionary "lose one pound per day" diet, the womanizing ways of the Casanova cardiologist would soon come to a brutal end at the hands of his jealous, prescription drug-addicted lover Jean Harris (Annette Bening). Driven to despair after their 14-year romance failed to result in marriage and enraged by Dr. Tarnower's shameless status as a ladies' man, Harris confronts her former lover in one violent, final act of desperation. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

The Darwinian plight of a small Arizona town's youthful but aimless population leads to a series of strange confrontations in Lansdown director Tom Zuber's slacker-themed slice of life. While trim-and-tidy outward appearances give Little Athens the illusion of calm tranquility, a look at the life of the post-high school populace struggling to make ends meet betrays first impressions. Over the course of 24 hours, a revealing look at the population of Little Athens reveals a paranoid EMS worker named Heather (Erica Leerhsen), whose suspicions that her boyfriend is cheating drive her to drastic measures; a debt-ridden pizza delivery buy named Jimmy (John Patrick Amedori), who has turned to dealing drugs as a means of restoring his financial stability; an STD-infested teen whose boyfriend is itching for revenge; and a pair of pool-cleaning roommates (DJ Qualls and Jorge Garcia) whose fledgling business doesn't turn enough coin to cover the rent. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Writer and director Cameron Crowe's experiences as a teenage rock journalist -- he was a regular contributor to Rolling Stone while still in high school -- inspired this coming-of-age story about a 15-year-old boy hitting the road with an up-and-coming rock band in the early 1970s. Elaine Miller (Frances McDormand) is a bright, loving, but strict single parent whose distrust of rock music and fears about drug use have helped to drive a wedge between herself and her two children, Anita (Zooey Deschanel) and William (Patrick Fugit). Anita rebels by dropping out of school and becoming a stewardess, but William makes something of his love of rock & roll by writing album reviews for a local underground newspaper. William's work attracts the attention of Lester Bangs (Philip Seymour Hoffman), editor of renegade rock magazine Creem, who takes William under his wing and gives him his first professional writing assignment -- covering a Black Sabbath concert. While William is unable to score an interview with the headliners, the opening act, Stillwater, are more than happy to chat with a reporter, even if he's still too young to drive, and William's piece on the group in Creem gains him a new admirer in Ben Fong-Torres (Terry Chen), an editor at Rolling Stone. Torres offers William an assignment for a 3,000-word cover story on Stillwater, and over the objections of his mother (whose parting words are "Don't use drugs!"), and after some stern advice from Bangs (who says under no circumstances should he become friends with a band he's covering), Williams joins Stillwater on tour, where he becomes friendly with guitarist Russell Hammond (Billy Crudup) and singer Jeff Bebe (Jason Lee). William also becomes enamored of Penny Lane (Kate Hudson), a groupie traveling with the band who is no older than William, but is deeply involved with Russell. Lester Bangs and Ben Fong-Torres, incidentally, were real-life rock writers Crowe worked with closely during his days as a journalist. Almost Famous' original score was composed by Nancy Wilson of Heart (who is also Crowe's wife).
~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide