Charles Knapp

Writer/director Adam Rifkin's The Dark Backward is set in a dark, grimy, garbage-strewn urban netherworld, where a company named "Blump's" apparently owns everything. Marty Malt (Judd Nelson of The Breakfast Club) is an unhappy garbageman who moonlights as an atrociously unfunny standup comic. His best friend and fellow trash collector, Gus (Bill Paxton), is the only one who laughs at his jokes, and his sincerity is questionable. The obnoxiously exuberant Gus plays an accordion, which he always carries with him. Marty is seeing Rosarita (Lara Flynn Boyle), a waitress, but she doesn't seem too interested in him, either. One day, Gus convinces a talent agent, Jackie Chrome (Las Vegas circuit staple Wayne Newton), to check out Marty's act. Jackie isn't impressed. Marty's luck seems to take a turn for the worse when a large lump starts growing on his back. He goes to a quack doctor (James Caan), who calls him a wimp and puts a Band-Aid on the lump. The lump continues to grow, eventually becoming a full-sized arm. While Gus uses Marty's newfound freakishness to impress his obese girlfriends, a horrified Rosarita breaks up with Marty, and he gets fired from the club where he does his act. Marty is despondent until Gus brings him to see Jackie, who, it turns out, has always dreamed of finding a real three-armed comic. Re-christened "Desi the Three-Armed Wonder Comic," and with Gus now providing musical accompaniment, Marty gets a fresh start on his career. The Dark Backward received devastating reviews upon its initial release, but has since developed a minor cult following. The film also stars Rob Lowe and King Moody, who was the original Ronald McDonald. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide

Hunter (Fred Dryer) is reunited with his Vietnam-war buddy Randall Fain (Dirk Blocker), who is awaiting the arrival of his Oriental mail-order bride Rose Chin (Clare Nono). Unfortunately, the girl has been kidnapped by minions of the drug-smuggling ring with which she is peripherally involved. The case takes a unexpected twist when the crooked marriage broker who brought Rose to America is murdered--leaving Hunter with nary a lead to work with! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Based on the popular television series created by Rod Serling, this film of horror and the supernatural tells four separate stories--each by a different director: John Landis, Steven Spielberg, Joe Dante and George Miller. In one, a bigot is taught a lesson when he is transported to experience the lives of three different victims of prejudice and intolerance. Another takes a trip to an old-age home where the arrival of a special man turns some of the residents into youthful people once again. In the third, a woman befriends a timid young child who turns out to be a maniacal brat with bizarre powers. The final segment shows how a man with an aversion to flying has a rough time when he panics and then sees a strange creature on the wing outside his window seat. ~ Kristie Hassen, All Movie Guide

Gary Coleman stars as the title character, the bratty son of wealthy parents, who is kidnapped by a pair of bumbling crooks. The experience winds up teaching the pampered boy the realities of childhood. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide

This "prequel" to the Newman/Redford vehicle Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was written by TV sitcom veteran Allan Burns and stars Tom Berenger as Butch and William Katt as Sundance. The film, per its title, traces the formative days of Butch and Sundance's careers as soft-hearted western outlaws, and their creation of the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang. There's no Etta Place this time around; the fictional heroine, named Mary, is played by Jill Eikenberry. Only Jeff Corey, as Sheriff Ray Bledsoe, repeats his role from the original film. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Claude Lelouch's Another Man, Another Chance is set in 1870. Fleeing from the Franco-Prussian war, Jeanne (Genevieve Bujold) and boyfriend Francis (Francis Huster) escape to the American west. Their course does not run smooth, and soon Jeanne is left alone to care for her baby. Meanwhile, American veterinaran Jimmy (James Caan), an absolute stranger to Bujold, endures his share of woes, not least of which is the rape and murder of his wife by desperadoes. Inevitably, Caan and Bujold meet and fall in love. Having already suffered the death of Huster, Jeanne tries to dissuade Jimmy from his single-minded pursuit of his wife's murderers. This character conflict determines the outcome of the film's final scenes. Another Man, Another Chance was distributed in the US by United Artists. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A handsome lawyer begins a passionate affair with an extraordinarily beautiful woman, not realizing that she is a paid assassin out to fulfill a contract with his name on it. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

"You may think you know what you're dealing with, but believe me, you don't," warns water baron Noah Cross (John Huston), when smooth cop-turned-private eye J.J. "Jake" Gittes (Jack Nicholson) starts nosing around Cross's water diversion scheme. That proves to be the ominous lesson of Chinatown, Roman Polanski's critically lauded 1974 revision of 1940s film noir detective movies. In 1930s Los Angeles, "matrimonial work" specialist Gittes is hired by Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) to tail her husband, Water Department engineer Hollis Mulwray (Darrell Zwerling). Gittes photographs him in the company of a young blonde and figures the case is closed, only to discover that the real Mrs. Mulwray had nothing to do with hiring Gittes in the first place. When Hollis turns up dead, Gittes decides to investigate further, encountering a shady old-age home, corrupt bureaucrats, angry orange farmers, and a nostril-slicing thug (Polanski) along the way. By the time he confronts Cross, Evelyn's father and Mulwray's former business partner, Jake thinks he knows everything, but an even more sordid truth awaits him. When circumstances force Jake to return to his old beat in Chinatown, he realizes just how impotent he is against the wealthy, depraved Cross. "Forget it, Jake," his old partner tells him. "It's Chinatown." Reworking the somber underpinnings of detective noir along more pessimistic lines, Polanski and screenwriter Robert Towne convey a '70s-inflected critique of capitalist and bureaucratic malevolence in a carefully detailed period piece harkening back to the genre's roots in the 1930s and '40s. Gittes always has a smart comeback like Humphrey Bogart's Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, but the corruption Gittes finds is too deep for one man to stop. Other noir revisions, such as Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye (1973) and Arthur Penn's Night Moves (1975), also centered on the detective's inefficacy in an uncertain '70s world, but Chinatown's period sheen renders this dilemma at once contemporary and timeless, pointing to larger implications about the effects of corporate rapaciousness on individuals. Polanski and Towne clashed over Chinatown's ending; Polanski won the fight, but Towne won the Oscar for Best Screenplay. Chinatown was nominated for ten other Oscars, including Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costumes, and Score. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide

Cliff Robertson wrote, produced, directed and acted the lead in this film about a rodeo performer. The rodeo footage in this film was shot at actual rodeo competitions. Rodeo rider J.W. Coop (Robertson) has just spent ten years in jail for passing bad checks. He comes out and discovers that everything except his crazy mother (Geraldine Page) has changed. Riders don't compete in all-around events anymore, but fly all over the country in private planes to compete in the same event in several rodeos a day. Furthermore, the sexual liberation movement has changed the way women relate to men. He is nonplused to discover a hippyish woman (Cristina Ferrare) who wants a no-strings relationship with him. The idea of health food catches him by surprise, too. Coop wants and needs to win a national rodeo championship, despite all the new challenges he faces. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide