Cloris Leachman Movies

An agoraphobic heroin addict seeks redemption by growing the rare and beautiful flower that will help him win the town's Garden of the Year contest in this off-beat black comedy featuring Rip Torn, Val Kilmer, Bruce Dern, and Cloris Leachman. Ethan Inglebrink (Ronnie Gene Blevins) lives in a homogeneous California town where nothing ever happens. A misfit clad in a powder-blue tux, he's convinced his poker buddies and surrogate moms Roe (Diane Ladd), Sandy (Leachman), and Lou Anne (Lin Shaye) that he's a diabetic, and his needles are for insulin rather than heroin. His next-door neighbor is his landlord and former high school football coach Trevor O'Hart (Torn), who wants nothing more than to kick Ethan out on the street. Complicating matters even further is that fact that Ethan's older brother Todd (Kilmer), the local sheriff, is convinced that his brother can only be saved by an act of God, and recruits the family priest (Peter Falk) to get the job done. Meanwhile, as the Garden of the Year competition draws near, Ethan becomes convinced that he can take the 10,000-dollar top prize and pay off his delinquent rent if he can just grow the perfect American Cowslip. Little does Ethan realize that salvation may lie not in the money he could win for growing a rare flower, but with the kind companionship and understanding offered by his 17-year-old neighbor Georgia (Hanna Hall), who longs to escape her abusive father (Dern). ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Acclaimed anime master Hayao Miyazaki returns for his ninth animated feature with Ponyo, which deals with a friendship between a five-year-old boy and a goldfish princess who yearns to be human. The daughter of the king of the ocean, Ponyo is no ordinary goldfish -- she has all the magic of the sea at her disposal. But when five-year-old Sosuke befriends the spunky little fish near the seaside home he shares with his mother and father, a special connection sparks between the two children, and Ponyo becomes determined to become human. Transforming into a little girl, Ponyo shows up at Sosuke's doorstep, delighted to make herself at home with her new land-dwelling family. But having a magical fish princess walking around on dry land begins setting the mystical balance of the world off kilter, and even though the innocent love Ponyo feels for her dear friend is strong, it will take some help from the greatest powers in the ocean to make things right again. ~ Jeremy Wheeler, Rovi

Some of the world's most-respected directors align forces to pay tribute to the city of the New York in this unconventional omnibus sister film to 2006's Paris, Je T'Aime. Broken into short segments, New York, I Love You is comprised of ten films, most choosing to take a down-to-earth approach to the stories of the countless lives lived in the city on a given day. The segments are as follows, chronologically:

Segment 1 -- Directed by Jiang Wen; written by Hu Hong and Meng Yao; starring Hayden Christensen, Andy Garcia, and Rachel Bilson.

Segment 2 -- Directed by Mira Nair; written by Suketu Mehta; starring Natalie Portman and Irfan Khan.

Segment 3 -- Written and directed by Shunji Iwai; adaptation by Israel Horovitz. Starring Orlando Bloom and Christina Ricci.

Segment 4 -- Directed by Yvan Attal; written by Olivier Lécot and Yvan Attal; starring Robin Wright Penn, Ethan Hawke, Maggie Q, and Chris Cooper.

Segment 5 -- Directed by Brett Ratner; written by Jeff Nathanson; starring Anton Yelchin, James Caan, Olivia Thirlby, and Blake Lively

Segment 6 -- Directed by Allen Hughes; written by Xan Cassavetes and Stephen Winter; starring Drea de Matteo and Bradley Cooper.

Segment 7 -- Directed by Shekhar Kapur; written by Anthony Minghella; starring Julie Christie, John Hurt, and Shia LaBeouf.

Segment 8 -- Written and directed by Natalie Portman; starring Taylor Geare, Carlos Acosta, and Jacinda Barrett.

Segment 9 -- Written and directed by Fatih Akin; starring Burt Young, Ugur Yucel, and Shu Qi.

Segment 10 -- Written and directed by Joshua Marston; starring Eli Wallach and Cloris Leachman.

Transitions in between segments -- Directed by Randall Balsmeyer; written by Israel Horovitz, James Strouse, and Hall Powell; starring Emilie Ohana, Eva Amurri, and Justin Bartha. ~ Michael Hastings, Rovi

As originally screened at the Tribeca Film Festival, at the Cannes Film Festival, and on Turner Classic Movies, the mammoth, epic-length documentary Brando chronicles in encyclopedic detail (and with a consistently reverent overtone) the life and career of the man widely regarded as the most formidable American actor of the 20th century - famous for not only reshaping, but reinventing the craft of film acting and teaching audiences how to view a motion picture performance. Divided into chronological, thematically-unified segments, the film first treats Marlon Brando's dysfunctional upbringing - his alcoholic mother, his abusive father, his stint at a military academy - before charting his acting tutelage at the behest of Stella Adler and his early cinematic and theatrical roles, including work for Elia Kazan, who famously made many aggressive (and unsuccessful) attempts to discipline the headstrong actor onscreen. Throughout this segment, many Hollywood A-list actors appear - among them, Al Pacino, Johnny Depp and Robert Duvall - expostulating at length on Brando's influence over their approaches to performance, and attempting with great effort to define the elusive style known as "method acting" that Brando helped to create. The second half of the documentary moves into Brando's career during the '70s, '80s and '90s, covering the production of The Godfather, the actor's noteworthy political activism, and his tumultuous personal life. Francis Ford Coppola, who of course teamed with Brando for the first Godfather installment and for Apocalypse Now, is noticeably absent from the proceedings. ~ Nathan Southern, Rovi

Spiro N. Taraviras' Buzz documents the life of celebrated screenwriter A.I. Bezzerides. The film charts his life from his parents fleeing from Turkey in order to avoid prejudice against Armenians, though his meeting and friendship with William Saroyan, and his memories of working on such memorable projects as They Live By Night and Kiss Me Deadly, and Thieves' Highway. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

An ordinary teenager finds out he's not so ordinary after all in this comedy-adventure. Will Stronghold (Michael Angarano) has his share of anxieties about starting high school, but once he arrives on campus, he discovers he's attending Sky High, a special learning facility for the children of superheroes. Will realizes his father is actually super-human crime fighter Captain Stronghold (Kurt Russell), while his mom is fellow champion Josie Jetstream (Kelly Preston). However, in Will's first few days at school, Coach Boomer (Bruce Campbell) is unable to discover any superior abilities in him, meaning that instead of joining the school's budding heroes, he's been relegated to the ranks of the lowly sidekicks. In time, Will discovers he happens to have super strength after all, but will he learn to hone his new gifts in time to fend off the bullies at school, get the girl of his dreams, and save his folks from a longtime nemesis? Sky High also features Lynda Carter, Dave Foley, and Kevin McDonald. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A battle between real estate moguls and environmental activists takes an unexpected turn into affairs of the heart in this satiric update of Henry James' The Bostonians. Gavin Ransom (Noah Wyle) is a successful real estate developer who has made a tidy fortune putting up gated communities filled with expensive suburban homes all over California. Ransom intends to put up another such development in the as-yet-untouched hillsides of Northern California's Marin County, and, just as he's expected, a number of folks living nearby are objecting to the project, including his sister Olive (Illeana Douglas), an environmental activist who has sided with longtime resident Eileen Boatwright (Cloris Leachman) and progressive lawyer Sybil (Jane Lynch) against the development. Olive and her compatriots get some unexpected support when Zoe Tripp (Kate Mara), a modern folk singer and the daughter of old-school Marin County hippies (Keith Carradine and Valerie Perrine), takes an interest in their protests and begins singing out against Gavin's proposal with guitar in hand. Gavin unexpectedly finds himself growing powerfully infatuated with Zoe, and Olive, a long-closeted lesbian, is equally taken with her; consequently, as the siblings battle against building several dozen cookie-cutter mansions, they also wage a private war for the affections of the young songstress. The Californians was directed by Jonathan Parker, who when not busy with film projects is himself a California real estate developer. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A Hispanic woman and her young daughter are thrown into the middle of a well-to-do but remarkably dysfunctional family in this comedy drama from writer and director James L. Brooks. Flor (Paz Vega) is a single mother who has struggled to support her daughter Cristina (Shelbie Bruce) working as a domestic in Mexico. Hoping to give her daughter greater financial security, Flor packs up their belongings and moves the family to California, but Flor refuses to surrender her Latino identity and opts not to learn English; meanwhile, Cristina quickly learns to speak the language fluently. Flor lands a high-paying job working as a housekeeper for Deborah Clasky (Téa Leoni); Deborah doesn't speak a word of Spanish, but this is hardly the most curious thing about their working relationship. A deeply troubled neurotic who has spent time in a mental hospital, Deborah is at once obsessed with her duties as a wife and mother and utterly clueless to her family's needs, and when she learns that Flor has a daughter, she insists that the girl move in with the Claskys. Flor, however, isn't so sure she wants Deborah Americanizing Cristina, especially when Deborah begins doting on the girl at the expense of her relationship with her own daughter, Bernice (Sarah Steele). Deborah's husband, John (Adam Sandler), is an oasis of loving calm and understanding in the midst of his chaotic family, and Flor becomes attracted to this man who shows no signs of the arrogant machismo she's accustomed to. But John's career as a chef is turned upside down when The New York Times gives his restaurant a four-star review, suddenly turning his small eatery into the "in" spot in Los Angeles. Meanwhile, Flor reaches the end of her patience when Deborah enrolls Cristina into an exclusive private school which Flor is certain will turn her into a typical American child and drive a wedge between Cristina and her mother. Spanglish also stars Cloris Leachman as Deborah's sharp-tongued mother. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Rob Reiner directs Luke Wilson and Kate Hudson in Alex & Emma, a romantic comedy about an author and his secretary. Gangsters will kill Alex (Wilson) in 30 days if he doesn't pay back his gambling debts. The only way he can do that is to finish his new novel. He hires sassy court stenographer Emma (Hudson) to transcribe his dictation. The film intercuts between the two of them writing the story, and the story within the story. Hudson plays three roles in the film, and Wilson plays two. Sophie Marceau and David Paymer round out the cast. The premise is (very) loosely based on a series of events that befell Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

Three years after her controversial ABC sitcom left the airwaves, comedian Ellen DeGeneres is back on another network. In The Ellen Show, the eponymous star plays an attractive gay woman named Ellen Richmond. When her once-thriving dot.com company goes belly-up, Ellen skedaddles from New York and returns to her Norman Rockwell-style home town, moving in with her eternally judgmental mother Dot (Cloris Leachman) and her unlucky-in-love sister Catherine (Emily Rutherfurd). After a brief period of unemployment, Ellen goes to work as a guidance counselor at her former high school, under the aegis of her old principal Mr. Munn (Martin Mull). Here she works side by side with her one-time prom date Rusty (Jim Gaffigan), who still has a crush on her, notwithstanding Ellen's radically altered lifestyle. Originally packaged by Mike Ovitz's ATG Productions, Ellen was taken over by CBS when the Ovitz enterprise died on the vine. Slated to be shown on Fridays, the series finally debuted on Monday, September 24, 2001, where it failed to make a dent in the ratings despite the strong lead-in from Everybody Loves Raymond . ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi