Chris O'Donnell Movies

Winnetka, Illinois native Chris O'Donnell was planning to study for a career in finance when he was spotted by a talent agent, who was so taken by the young man's natural star quality that he advised him not to take acting lessons. After a handful of roles in such films as Men Don't Leave (1989) and Fried Green Tomatoes (1991), O'Donnell made the quantum leap to A-list performer in the 1992 film Scent of a Woman, in which he played the high school-age companion and general factotum to a blind, ornery retired military officer (Al Pacino). "Hunk hearthrob" status came O'Donnell's way with his appearance as D'Artagnan in the 1993 filmization of The Three Musketeers and 1994's Circle of Friends, in which he played an innocent young Irish lad dealing with burgeoning hormones and Catholic values in the 1950s. With 1995's Batman Forever, O'Donnell's star ascended into blockbuster heaven with his high-octane performance as Robin, the Boy Wonder; he reprised the role two years later, this time playing opposite George Clooney in Batman & Robin (1997). Subsequently turning away from action roles, O'Donnell could next be seen as a bumbling, small-town policeman in Robert Altman's Cookie's Fortune (1999). That same year, he starred as the title character in The Bachelor, a commitment-phobe who must find a woman to marry in twenty-four hours so he can inherit a large fortune. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
1995  
PG13  
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Director Joel Schumacher inherited the Batman franchise from Tim Burton and began steering it in the campier direction of the Sixties television show with this third installment. First-time Batman/Bruce Wayne (Val Kilmer), in his only outing as the Caped Crusader, is effectively brooding as he ponders strange dreams about his parents' death and escapes his own near-demise at the hands of Two-Face (Tommy Lee Jones), a former district attorney driven insane and turned into a master criminal when a gangster throws acid in his face. Meanwhile, as sexy psychologist Chase Meridian (Nicole Kidman) tries to analyze and seduce both Bruce Wayne and Batman, Wayne Enterprises employee Edward Nygma (Jim Carrey) reacts badly to getting fired, using his self-invented mind-energy device to transform into the super-intelligent Riddler. The Riddler teams up with Two-Face to bring down Batman and drain the minds of Gotham City residents with his device, while Batman gets some much-needed help in the form of circus performer Dick Grayson (Chris O'Donnell), out for vengeance after being orphaned by Two-Face. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Val KilmerTommy Lee Jones, (more)
1995  
PG13  
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Set in 1957, this romantic coming-of-age story follows three childhood friends from a small town in Ireland as they head to Dublin to attend Trinity College. Nan (Saffron Burrows), a year older than her friends and already in her second year at Trinity, is ambitious, romantic, and just a bit reckless. She hopes to win the hand of Simon (Colin Firth), an older Protestant land-owner who would help her rise up the social and economic ladder. Eve (Geraldine O'Rawe), a bit more pragmatic and cautious, finds herself falling for a boy named Aidan (Aidan Gillen). Bernadette (Minnie Driver), called "Benny" by her friends and family, comes from strict parents who won't allow her to live on campus, forcing her to commute back and forth from classes every day. Bennie's father, a haberdasher, has always expected that his daughter, a bit plainer and plumper than her friends, will marry his shop's manager, an odd duck named Sean (Alan Cumming). But at Trinity, Bennie discovers that she fancies a tall, good-looking rugby player named Jack (Chris O'Donnell), and to the surprise of Bennie and everyone else, it turns out that Jack fancies her as well. Circle of Friends gave Minnie Driver her breakthrough film role after her initial success as a television actress in Britain. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Chris O'DonnellMinnie Driver, (more)
1994  
 
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Blue Sky was the last film directed by Tony Richardson (Tom Jones) before his death in 1991 and one of the last releases from once-thriving Orion Films, whose bankruptcy kept the picture on the shelf for several years. It also features two career-high performances by Tommy Lee Jones and Jessica Lange, who won the Best Actress Oscar for this role, as Hank and Carly Marshall, a military couple whose marriage unravels under the pressure of his job and her mental instability. Hank is an Army captain at odds with his superiors over the wisdom of nuclear testing. Carly is a free spirit spiralling into a dangerous depression after the family's move from Hawaii to a nowhere base in Alabama alarms the couple's older daughter (Amy Locane) and sends Carly into an affair with the base commander (Powers Boothe). ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Jessica LangeTommy Lee Jones, (more)
1993  
PG  
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This comedy-adventure is one of several adaptations of Alexadre Dumas' (pere) classic novel. Provincial swordsman D'Artagnan (Chris O'Donnell) travels to Paris to follow in his father's footsteps and become a king's guard, a musketeer. Meanwhile, the evil royal advisor Cardinal Richelieu (Tim Curry), with the help of one-eyed Captain Rochefort (Michael Wincott), has disbanded the King's bodyguards in his devious attempt to usurp the power of the King (Hugh O'Conor) and rule France. Three of the musketeers, Athos (Kiefer Sutherland), Porthos (Oliver Platt), and Aramis (Charlie Sheen), escape and partner with D'Artagnan in an attempt to thwart the Cardinal and his minions, who also include the duplicitous Milady de Winter (Rebecca DeMornay). ~ Lisa Kropiewnicki, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Charlie SheenKiefer Sutherland, (more)
1992  
R  
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Driven by an extravagant, tour-de-force performance by Al Pacino, Scent of a Woman is the story of Frank Slade (Pacino), a blind, retired army colonel who hires Charlie Simms (Chris O'Donnell), a poor college student on the verge of expulsion, to take care of him over Thanksgiving weekend. At the beginning of the weekend, Frank takes Charlie to New York, where he reveals to the student that he intends to visit his family, have a few terrific meals, sleep with a beautiful woman and, finally, commit suicide. The film follows the mis-matched pair over the course of the weekend, as they learn about life through their series of adventures. Though the story is a little contrived and predictable, it pulls all the right strings, thanks to O'Donnell's sympathetic supporting role and Pacino's powerful lead performance, for which he won his first Academy Award. Scent of a Woman is based on the 1975 Italian film Profumo Di Donna. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Al PacinoChris O'Donnell, (more)
1992  
PG13  
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An assemblage of young Hollywood actors poised for stardom marked this tale of anti-Semitism at a 1950s prep school. Brendan Fraser stars as David Greene, a working-class Jewish quarterback from Scranton, Pennsylvania, who is offered a senior year scholarship to a prestigious New England academy. It's David's ticket to an Ivy League education and a way out of his Rust Belt hometown, but there's one condition: the school's elders ask him to be discreet about his religion. At first willing to do so, David struggles with his silence about his faith as his popularity grows. David strikes up a friendship with his roommate Chris Reece (Chris O'Donnell) and a possible romance with Sally Wheeler (Amy Locane), a student at a nearby girls' school. When jealous classmate Charlie Dillon (Matt Damon) learns David's secret at an alumni party, he exposes the school's new gridiron hero, and David faces the full force of religious intolerance from the prejudiced WASP institution. Also featuring early performances from Ben Affleck, Anthony Rapp, and Cole Hauser, School Ties was loosely based on the real-life experiences of producer Dick Wolf, creator of TV's popular series Law & Order. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Brendan FraserMatt Damon, (more)
1991  
PG13  
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A woman learns the value of friendship as she hears the story of two women and how their friendship shaped their lives in this warm comedy-drama. Evelyn Couch (Kathy Bates) is an emotionally repressed housewife with a habit of drowning her sorrows in candy bars. Her husband Ed (Gailard Sartain) barely acknowledges her existence, and while he visits his aunt at a nursing home every week, Evelyn is not permitted to come into the room because the old women doesn't like her. One week, while waiting out Ed's visit, Evelyn meets Ninny Threadgoode (Jessica Tandy), a frail but feisty old woman who lives at the same nursing home and loves to tell stories. Over the span of several weeks, she spins a whopper about one of her relatives, Idgie (Mary Stuart Masterson). Back in the 1920s, Idgie was a sweet but fiercely independent woman with her own way of doing things who ran the town diner in Whistle Stop, Alabama. Idgie was very close to her brother Buddy (Chris O'Donnell), and when he died, she wouldn't talk to anyone except Buddy's girl, Ruth Jamison (Mary-Louise Parker). Idgie gave Ruth a job at the cafe after she left her abusive husband, Frank Bennett (Nick Searcy). Between her habit of standing up for herself, standing up to Frank, and serving food to Black people out the back of the diner, Idgie raised the ire of the less tolerant citizens of Whistle Stop, and when Frank mysteriously disappeared, many locals suspected that Idgie, Ruth, and their friends may have been responsible. Evelyn finds herself looking forward to her weekly visits with Ninny, and is inspired by her story to take a new pride in herself and assert her independence from Ed. Fried Green Tomatoes was based on the novel Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by actress-turned-author Fannie Flagg, who makes a cameo appearance as the leader of a self-help group. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Kathy BatesJessica Tandy, (more)
1989  
PG13  
Weighed down by her late husband's debts, widow Beth Macauley (Jessica Lange) is compelled to sell her home and move to a less costly locale. She relocates in Baltimore with her resentful sons Chris (Chris O'Donnell) and Matt (Charlie Korsmo) and takes a job at a ramshackle gourmet food store managed by Lisa Coleman (Kathy Bates). Men Don't Leave offers in Beth an extremely vulnerable, easily discouraged person who can't seem to get a grip on her reduced circumstances. Even so, she and her sons eventually pull themselves together, despite many side trips with Wrong Lovers and False Friends. Some of the film's best moments involve Joan Cusack, playing a mixed-up nurse with whom Chris falls in love. Representing the comeback of director Paul Brickman after a seven-year gap, Men Don't Leave is a slightly more upbeat American version of the French film La Vie Continue. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Jessica LangeChris O'Donnell, (more)
1987  
 
This quaintly romantic low-budget vampire film from notorious Troma Studios involves the plight of a naive country girl (Rachel Gordon) whose first venture into the Big Apple leads to degradation and humiliation at the hands of heartless city slickers. Her destiny changes radically when she falls into the arms of charming hundred-year-old vampire Robespierre (Brendan Hickey), who is instantly smitten. Learning of the abuse she has suffered, Robespierre seeks bloody retribution on the louts responsible. Though slow-moving at times, this film benefits from a fairly involving story and a few twists unique to the vampire genre, and is remarkably tasteful in comparison to Troma Studios' typical gross-out product. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

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Starring:
Rachel GoldenBrendan Hickey, (more)

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