Mike Moroff Movies

This ambitious Disney movie uses a remarkable screenplay from Steven L. Bloom and Robert Rodat to tell a rollicking tale of America's transition from a close-to-the-land culture of mythic heroes to a corporate world of real estate tycoons. The strong theme about the decline of folk culture is expressed through a series of high octane adventures experienced by 12-year-old Daniel Hackett (Nick Stahl) at the dawn of the 20th century. Daniel's father, Jonas Hackett (Stephen Lang), runs a farm in a place called Paradise Valley, but his land is coveted by a greedy developer, J.P. Stiles (Scott Glenn). Daniel looks longingly at postcards of New York City while growing increasingly skeptical of his father's tales of legendary folk heroes. Then, through a series of incredible adventures, Daniel meets up with the legends that his father has spoken about -- cowboy Pecos Bill (Patrick Swayze), lumberjack Paul Bunyan (Oliver Platt), and finally, ex-slave and strongman John Henry (Roger Aaron Brown). Each of these heroes hooks up with Daniel and becomes involved in an increasingly bitter and boisterous fight against Stiles, whose plans to buy up land threaten the very strength of the folk heroes and the well-being of the common people. Pecos Bill has a horse named Widowmaker and can lasso a tornado. The giant Bunyan is accompanied by his famous blue ox, Babe. At one point, another legend, the cowgirl Calamity Jane (Catherine O'Hara), joins in the adventures. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide

James Coburn guest stars as Cyrus Ramsey, chief archaeologist of the National Museum of Mexico. Ramsey is among those under suspicion when a hotel owner suspected of dealing in stolen art is murdered. It seems that the dead man was found wearing the Mask of Montezuma, which had recently been pilfered from the museum. Need we add that Jessica (Angela Lansbury) is paying a visit to Mexico City at the time of the murder, and that she will take it upon herself to solve the mystery? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this detective yarn, an amiable investigator finds himself entangled with mobsters after he tries to help a woman who is apparently having a run of bad luck. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Hunter (Rick Hunter) and McCall (Stepfanie Kramer) are faced with an ethical dilemma while investigating the murder of Latino crime boss Max Santiago (Fred Asparagus). Early on, the detectives figure out that the killer was a prominent community leader, and are also able to determine the motive for the killing. Painfully aware of the ramifications of revealing this information, Hunter and McCall are on the verge of giving up the case--and quitting the force! Rudy Ramos joins the regular cast in the role of Reuben Garcia. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this entry in the long-running mystery series, Perry Mason begins representing a friend of Della's after he is accused of murdering an old madam who is also his wife. As the intrepid attorney investigates, he soon exposes a multi-million dollar banking fraud. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

A Kenya game preserve is being plundered by a poacher named Madrid (John Calvin), who is working hand in glove with illegal animal trader McKaydoo (John Calvin). When her brother is killed by the villains, attractive game warden Kamora Kaboko (Daphne Maxwell Reid) turns to the A-Team for help. Complications ensue when B.A. (Mr. T) falls in love with Kamora--and is so smitten that he almost overcomes his fear of monkeys! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the first episode of a two-part story, Daisy (Catherine Bach) and Jesse (Denver Pyle) are astonished--a not a little disgusted--when Luke (Tom Wopat) and Bo (John Schneider) accept an offer from Mary Beth Carver (Lydia Cornell) to return to the NASCAR circuit. After all, Mary Beth's promoter father J.J. Carver (Ramon Bieri) is a mob-connected crook, and the Duke boys had previously vowed never to work for him again. What no one but Luke, Bo and the viewer knows is that the boys are working undercover on behalf of some Federal agents, who hope to get the goods on Carver and put him away for life--assuming, of course, that the Dukes will live long enough to see this happen! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A cop teams up with the former head of a drug cartel to avenge the death of the woman he loved in this action-drama. Sean Vetter (Vin Diesel) and Demetrius Hicks (Larenz Tate) are a pair of DEA agents who think they've made the bust of a lifetime when they capture 'Memo' Lucero (Geno Silva), a multi-millionaire drug lord who controlled most of the narcotics traffic along the border of Mexico and the United States. However, with Lucero behind bars, a new and decidedly more dangerous underworld kingpin rises to take his place, and Diablo (Timothy Olyphant), also known as Hollywood Jack Slayton, soon proves to be even more dangerous than Lucero when he orders his gunmen to assassinate Vetter. While Vetter escapes unharmed, his wife is killed, and Vetter is thrown deep into despair. Now Vetter is obsessed with bringing Diablo to justice, and he's willing to do anything to bring him down -- even if it means teaming up with Lucero. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

In this action-horror flick from director Robert Rodriguez and screenwriter Quentin Tarantino, Tarantino stars with George Clooney as a pair of bad-to-the-bone brothers named Seth and Richie Gecko. After a string of robberies that left a river of blood in the Geckos' wake, the sadistic siblings head to Mexico to live the good life. To get over the border, they kidnap Jacob Fuller, a widowed preacher played by Harvey Keitel, and his two children, Kate (Juliette Lewis) and Scott (Ernest Liu). Once south of the border, the quintet park their RV at a rough-and-tumble trucker bar called The Titty Twister, where Seth and Richie are supposed to meet a local thug. After a couple of drinks, they realize that they're not in a typical bar, as the entire place begins to teem with vicious, blood-sucking vampires. With the odds stacked greatly against them, the Fullers and Geckos team together in hopes of defeating the creatures of the night. Makeup artist Tom Savini and blaxploitation star Fred Williamson appear as allies against the vampires, and Cheech Marin fills three different roles. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide

A more straightforward horror film than the darkly comic Return of the Living Dead Part II (1988), this third chapter in the "Living Dead" saga was directed by Brian Yuzna and is quite similar plot-wise to his earlier film, Bride of Re-Animator (1990). J. Trevor Edmond and Mindy Clarke star as Curt Reynolds and Julie Walker, a young couple in love. Curt's father is Col. John Reynolds (Kent McCord), a scientist working on a top-secret project at a nearby military compound. When Curt steals his dad's security pass and sneaks Julie into the base, they discover that the project involves bringing corpses back to life using the powerful gas Trioxin, responsible for events in the previous films. The military hopes to use the mindless, flesh-consuming zombies as weapons, but the experiment goes gruesomely awry. Later, Julie is killed in an accident on Curt's motorcycle and the grief-stricken boyfriend brings her to the base and exposes her to the gas. As she begins craving human flesh, Curt must try to keep her alive while also facing down a local street gang he's unintentionally crossed, as well as the soldiers seeking Julie, led by his father. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

Paul Verhoeven's American breakthrough film, Robocop, is an exceedingly violent blend of black comedy, science fiction, and crime thriller. Set in Detroit sometime in the near future, the film is about a policeman (Peter Weller) killed in the line of duty whom the department decides to resurrect as a half-human, half-robot supercop. The RoboCop is indestructible, and within a matter of weeks he has removed crime from the streets of Detroit. However, his human side is tortured by his past, and he wants revenge on the thugs who killed him. The film was later followed by two feature-length sequels and a live-action television series, neither of which were as successful as the original film. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide

Richard "Cheech" Marin, of Cheech & Chong fame, directed and starred in Born in East L.A.. Inspired by Marin's music-video parody of Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA", the film casts Cheech as an East Los Angeles repairman. While paying a visit to a sweatshop toy factory, Cheech is caught in the middle when the feds raid the place and cart off all the illegal alien workers. Since he's forgotten to bring his own i.d., Cheech is also shipped off to Mexico-where, having next to no knowledge of the Spanish tongue, he's virtually helpless. Desperate, he takes a job with crooked Tijuana saloon owner Daniel Stern-the first of many "make-do" jobs that he assumes to earn enough money to return home. Along the way, he falls in love with El Salvadorian girl Kamala Lopez, whose English is as fractured as Cheech's Spanish. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Al Pacino stars as Tony Montana, an exiled Cuban criminal who goes to work for Miami drug lord Robert Loggia. Montana rises to the top of Florida's crime chain, appropriating Loggia's cokehead mistress (Michelle Pfeiffer) in the process. Howard Hawks' "X Marks the Spot" motif in depicting the story line's many murders is dispensed with in the 1983 Scarface; instead, we are inundated with blood by the bucketful, especially in the now-infamous buzz saw scene. One carry-over from the original Scarface is Tony Montana's incestuous yearnings for his sister Gina (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio). The screenplay for the 1983 Scarface was written by Oliver Stone. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide