Brian Benben Movies

A burnt-out cop demoted to working the "weird calls" desk finally finds a mystery worth solving in director John Landis' gore-drenched entry into Showtime's Masters of Horror series. Detective Dwight Faraday (Brian Benben) is a troubled cop who has been relegated to desk duty following a tragic accident that resulted in the death of his previous partner. When Detective Faraday learns that a number of local men have been brutally slaughtered by massive blunt-force trauma apparently delivered in the midst of sexual arousal, he seeks out the comely Native American woman (Cinthia Moura) with whom each of the unfortunate victims was last seen. Now, as results of the autopsies reveal that each of the corpses was viciously trampled by what the doctors and morticians believe to be hooves, Detective Faraday is forced to consider that the murderer may not be as human after all, but a vengeful seductress of legend who is said to scour the land by night in search of amorous victims. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Based on the novel by Larry Baker, this bittersweet comedy-drama focuses on Hubert T. Lee (Brian Benben), an eccentric man with big dreams, who, along with his wife Edna (Elizabeth McGovern) and adopted children Louise Janine (Olivia Oguma) and Abraham Jacob (Christopher Larkin), relocates to Northern Florida in the mid-'60s. When Hubert is able to make a good deal on a large piece of land, he gets a brainstorm and opens the world's largest drive-in movie theater, which he sets out to promote with a variety of increasingly bizarre publicity stunts. However, Hubert's brash demeanor and the festive atmosphere of the drive-in rubs his neighbor Turner Knight (William Hurt) the wrong way; Knight not only lives next door to the Lee family, he runs the formerly quiet funeral home across the street from the drive-in. Produced for television, The Flamingo Rising was first aired as part of the acclaimed anthology series The Hallmark Hall of Fame. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The docudrama Conspiracy: The Trial of the Chicago 8, relates the story of the trial that resulted from the riots that broke out in Chicago during the 1968 Democratic Convention. The majority of the dialogue has been taken directly from court records and archival footage. Michael Lembeck plays the boisterous prankster Abbie Hoffman, who was certainly the most entertaining of the defendants. The main victim of his pranks is Judge Hoffman (David Opatoshu), whose stoic attitude is constantly challenged by the outrageous behavior of the defendants. The cast includes Barry Miller as Jerry Rubin, Robert Carradine as Rennie Davis, Robert Loggia as defense attorney William Hunstler, and other famous politically active actors like Peter Boyle and Martin Sheen. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

Originally telecast February 12, 1981, Gangster Chronicles was the three-hour opener for the subsequent miniseries. This first installment is a sort of Young Tommy Guns, with youthful, charismatic actors playing some of the more odious criminals of the 20th century. Joe Penny portrays Bugsy Siegel, Michael Nouri essays Lucky Luciano, and Brian Benben plays a fictional composite of several mobsters (here named "Michael Lasker"). The project was three years in production (so say the ads), and was dedicated to the proposition that Crime Does Not Pay (also say the ads). While the miniseries covered nearly four decades, the opener takes us from 1907 to the Prohibition era of the 1920s. After its initial run, the entire Gangster Chronicles saga was boiled down to 121 minutes and released to videocassette as Gangster Wars. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Widely touted as NBC's answer to The Sopranos, the six-episode series Kingpin also drew heavily from the British mini-series Traffik. The nominal protagonist in this seamy, violent tale of a Mexican drug-trading family was Yancey Arias as Miguel Cadena, the Stanford-educated heir apparent to the Cardena criminal dynasty. Together with his icy, coke-addicted wife, Marlene (Sheryl Lee), Miguel coolly guided the destinies of his worldwide family business, eliminating enemies, friends, and loved ones alike to maintain his empire. Others in the cast included Bobby Cannavale as Miguel's vicious "enforcer" brother, Chato; Ruben Carbajal as Miguel and Marlene's disillusioned eight-year-old son, Joey; Angela Alvarado Rosa as relentless DEA agent Delia Flores; Brian Benben as the Cardenas' personal plastic surgeon, Dr. Heywood Klein; and Shay Roundtree as Texas-born torpedo Junie Gatling, who acted as a sounding board for the other characters. Among the creative contributors to the series was Allen Coulter, who direct several episodes of The Sopranos. Originally slated for a March 2003 debut, Kingpin was moved up to February 2, 2003 to take advantage of a traditional network "sweeps week." ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The directorial debut of Glenn Gordon Caron, the creator of the television series Moonlighting (1985-89), this intense, gritty drama was received as one of the best-ever cinematic treatments of substance abuse. Michael Keaton stars as Daryl Poynter, a hustling, successful Philadelphia real estate agent who has become addicted to cocaine. He's already got problems, including nearly a $100,000 embezzled from his employer and lost on the stock market, when he wakes up one morning with a young woman dead in his bed from a coke overdose. His company is asking questions about the missing funds, and the dead girl's father is plastering his neighborhood with posters accusing Daryl of being a murderer, so he decides to hide out in an anonymous drug treatment program. There, however, Daryl runs into tough-minded counselor and former addict Craig (Morgan Freeman), who has heard all of Daryl's lies and tricks before. Daryl also finds romance with an abused fellow addict, Charlie Standers (Kathy Baker), and understanding with his Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor (M. Emmet Walsh). ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide