Sandy Baron Movies

Jerry (Jerry Seinfeld) ends up with an extra 6,000 dollars when his parents sell their Cadillac. The folks hope Jerry will use the money to start a new career -- but Jerry's first move is to buy back the Caddie. Meanwhile, Elaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) is solicited for advice by Kramer (Michael Richards) when his girlfriend develops "the jimmy legs" after sex. And George (Jason Alexander) begins spending scads of money in anticipation of a huge inheritance. The "J. Peterman stock options" loom large over the action -- and the outcome -- of this episode. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Well off the beaten path in the New Jersey industrial wastelands sits the ramshackle Bayview Motel. Among the guests are Jimmy and Gene, two Ohio boys heading for New York City. An automobile breakdown forces them to stay at the Bayview. Later Lenny the owner sees to it that only two more guests are allowed to register before he turns on the "no vacancy" sign. They are two women from Trenton. Shelby is trying to escape her brutal lover, a gangster. The other is her innocent cousin Mary Ann. Shelby has a valuable ring and asks Lenny to pawn it for her. She and Mary Ann then check in and decide to stay until the money comes in. For some reason, Lenny does all he can to keep the four guests from leaving. Lenny is a very odd duck and spends much time playing the motel's lounge piano wearing a tacky old smoking jacket and pretending there is an audience. It soon becomes apparent that he has secrets and that they may somehow involve the guests, who have meanwhile coupled off and happily spend their time getting acquainted. Unfortunately Shelby's violent boy friend suddenly shows up with his uncle, a prominent gangster. The mobsters' appearance brings up some old and disturbing memories for Lenny. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

Lonely Hearts is a modern film noir in which a lonely woman meets and falls for a man whom she refuses to let go. Alma (Beverly D'Angelo) is a wallflower who lives with her mother and works at a Social Security office. In her desperation to make some sort of social life for herself, she answers a personal ad and meets Frank (Eric Roberts) with whom she falls in love. Frank turns out to be a con man and a swindler, but Alma is obsessed with him. She begins to help him by posing as his sister while he cons other women, until she and Frank are forced to flee when one of the victims hires a private detective. Beverly D'Angelo plays Alma with the perfect mixture of both predator and victim and director Andrew Lane understands and directs his actors well, making Lonely Hearts a very well-thought-out and executed thriller despite a somewhat languid pacing. ~ Linda Rasmussen, Rovi

TV reporter Monica Devries (Megan Gallagher) is the victim of a violent assault. Prosecuting the case, assistant D.A.'s Stone (Michael Moriarty) and Robinette (Richard Brooks) are faced with the possibility that insufficient evidence will allow the perpetrator to walk. This prompts detective Greevey (George Dzundza) and Logan (Chris Noth) to reopen another investigation which in curious fashion is closely linked to the case at hand. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Punk rock's first great embodiment of the motto "live fast and die young," Sid Vicious joined The Sex Pistols when they were already established as the most controversial rock band in British history; and it soon became apparent that he couldn't play his instrument, had a magnetic attraction to chaos, and possessed a dangerous thirst for booze, drugs, and violence. Sid & Nancy opens shortly after Sid (Gary Oldman) joined the band, when he meets an obnoxious American punk groupie named Nancy Spungen (Chloe Webb). Nancy claims that she can get drugs, and Sid naively gives her his money. Nancy doesn't show up with the goods, but when Sid runs into her a few days later, she has a tall tale about getting ripped off - and Sid sympathizes with her. Before long, Sid and Nancy have fallen in love, and while they argue with uncommon vehemence, they also depend completely on each other. When The Sex Pistols break up, Sid has few prospects and an increasingly voracious appetite for heroin, and Nancy's attempts to "manage" his career only hasten his downhill slide. Former Clash leader Joe Strummer wrote the film's theme song, "Love Kills," and The Pogues, The Circle Jerks, and Pray for Rain contributed to the soundtrack. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Predating the 1990s cycle of vampire-stripper films (From Dusk Till Dawn, Bordello of Blood, etc.) this cynical entry from director Richard Wenk concerns frat boys looking for a go-go girl to perform at their upcoming party. Wandering to the wrong side of town, the randy youths enter a seedy strip joint populated by vampires. Grace Jones is the nasty ringleader, Katrina, who acknowledges the film's debt to Hammer's Vampire Circus by performing an erotic dance painted in zebra-stripes. Among the heroes, co-star Robert Rusler is far more interesting than the bland lead (Chris Makepeace), while Gedde Watanabe manages to be both unfunny and offensive by turning in the most ridiculously stereotyped Asian performance since John Wayne assayed Genghis Khan in The Conqueror. This is the least of the comedic vampire films that came out in the mid-'80s, and although Billy Drago is menacing as the evil Snow and Greg Cannom's special effects are striking, Vamp remains unfunny and not frightening in the least. Famed female bodybuilder Lisa Lyon appears as a stripper named Cinnamon, and Dedee Pfeiffer, Hy Pyke, and Simmy Bow are among the recognizable supporting cast. ~ Robert Firsching, Rovi

A smaller, amusing comedy from writer/director Woody Allen, Broadway Danny Rose begins with a bunch of show business vets sitting around a table at New York's Carnegie Deli and reminiscing about the legendary titular character, a loser of an agent who would represent anyone, including blind xylophonists, piano-playing birds, and has-been crooners with drinking problems. Allen plays Rose as a befuddled, warm-hearted schlub who finally has a shot at getting somewhere when he signs washed-up lounge singer Lou Canova (Nick Apollo Forte) and nearly brings his career back to life. Danny gets him a date at the Waldorf, where Milton Berle is in the audience, looking for guests for his TV special. Canova has a complicated love life, juggling both a wife and a girlfriend. so he enlists Danny to take the girlfriend, Tina Vitale (Mia Farrow), to the concert. But Canova and Tina have a fight, she goes back to her Mafioso boyfriend, and Danny winds up getting chased halfway around New York and New Jersey by the Mob. And of course, once Canova gets his big break, he dumps Danny for another agent. Allen, Forte, and especially Farrow all do strong work with characters that could have easily become stereotypes, and the film has a lighter, warmer touch than the Allen films that preceded it (Stardust Memories and Zelig). ~ Don Kaye, Rovi

The made-for-TV Anatomy of a Seduction was originally telecast May 8, 1979. Susan Flannery plays a divorcee who assuages her loneliness by starting an affair with 20-year-old Jameson Parker. It so happens that Parker is the son of Flannery's best friend Rita Moreno, who doesn't take it well when she finds out what's going on. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Barry Sullivan heads the guest cast as Howard Jamison, the Hefneresque publisher of a nudie magazine. While holding a lavish party in his mansion, Jamison is shot and wounded by an unknown assailant. As luck would have it, among the guests are Ironside (Raymond Burr) and Ed (Don Galloway), who in time-honored "movie mystery" fashion inform the other partygoers that everyone is under suspicion and subject to interrogation. The roster of suspects is a colorful one indeed, ranging from Jamison's disgruntled "ex" to a punchdrunk prizefighter. Meanwhile, the would-be killer lurks somewhere in Jamison's garden, patiently awaiting a chance to finish the job. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Ohio businessman Jack Lemmon is offered a golden job opportunity; all he has to do is relocate himself and wife Sandy Dennis to New York City. What follows has led some critics to complain that playwright Neil Simon has written a "hate letter" to Manhattan. Within a 36 hour period, the couple (a) loses their airplane luggage; (b) are forced to travel from Boston to New York in a greasy old train; ( c ) can't get any sort of service because virtually everyone in Fun City is on strike; (d) are mugged twice, once while they're asleep; (e) are reduced to sleeping on Central Park benches in their day clothes.....and so it goes, until the shabby, disheveled Lemmon tells his prospective bosses off, and he and his wife head back to Ohio---- almost. Punctuated by Sandy Dennis' plaintive "Oh, my Gawwwwd", The Out of Towners tightens the screws and ups the ante on the classic "comedy of errors" formula. Filmed on location, the picture features a who's who of character actors (Milt Kamen, Anne Meara, Phil Bruns, Dolph Sweet, Richard Libertini, Paul Dooley, Robert Walden, Ron Carey etc. etc. etc.) When first shown on network television, the film was shorn of its closing punchline because of an eccentric censorship rule. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Together with Orson Welles' Citizen Kane and John Singleton's Boyz 'n the Hood, director Peter Bogdanovich's Targets is among the most impressive first features ever made. When Bogdanovich's cinematic mentor Roger Corman suggested that Bogdanovich might want to make his directorial debut, he offered to "donate" 20 minutes worth of footage of the Corman-directed The Terror and the services of Boris Karloff, who owed Corman two days' worth of work (at a cost of $22,000). Karloff became so caught up in the 29-year-old Bogdanovich's enthusiasm that he agreed to work an additional two days at a bare-minimum salary.

The script, by Bogdanovich and his then-wife, Polly Platt, was inspired by the 1966 shooting spree of Texas Tower sniper Charles Whitman. Karloff, as Byron Orlock, more or less plays himself: an aging horror star, consigned to low-budget drive-in fare. Unlike the workaholic Karloff, Orlock wants to retire from films, noting that his movies seem inconsequential in light of the real-life horrors occurring every day. As Bogdanovich, playing young-and-hungry director Sammy Michaels, desperately tries to convince Orlock to star in just one more picture, the film's attentions shift to Vietnam veteran Bobby Thompson (Tim O'Kelly). An otherwise amiable, normal-looking lad, Bobby seems to harbor an inordinate fascination with guns, particularly high-powered rifles. One bright and sunny morning, Bobby suddenly and unexpectedly shoots and kills his wife, his mother, and an unlucky delivery boy. He leaves behind a note confessing to these crimes, noting that, while he fully expects to be captured, many more will die before the day is over. From this point onward, the film switches from Bobby's day-long bloodbath (from the vantage point of an oil storage tank, calmly picking off passing freeway motorists) to Orlock's grumbling preparations to make a personal appearance at a local drive-in movie.

Inevitably, Bobby also shows up at the drive-in, hiding himself behind the huge screen and shooting down the patrons as they sit complacently in their cars, watching the latest Byron Orlock film (actually The Terror, in which Karloff also starred). Once the reality of the situation sets in, panic ensues, leading to the ultimate confrontation between the escaping Bobby and the bewildered Orlock. ("Is this what I was afraid of?" Orlock ruefully exclaims as Bobby cowers at his feet.) The tension never lets up throughout Targets' jam-packed 90 minutes. The film was virtually thrown away by its distributor, Paramount Pictures, which was uncertain about packaging a film about a sniper in the wake of the King and Kennedy assassinations. Only when it was reissued to college campuses and film societies did Targets begin building up its much-deserved reputation. Though Targets was not, technically, Boris Karloff's last film, it serves as a worthy valedictory for this cinematic giant. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi