Guy Raymond Movies

First telecast November 4, 1996, this Deep Space Nine episode was a harkback to the classic 1967 Star Trek installment "The Trouble with Tribbles." Charlie Brill, a holdover from the original episode, reprises his role as renegade Klingon agent Arne Darvin, who sets the plot in motion by hurtling the Defiant and its crew some 105 years into the past. Upon getting their bearings, the crew finds themselves on board the original Enterprise, where they come face to face with James T. Kirk, not to mention thousands and thousands of those pesky and prolific Tribbles, one of which has been booby-trapped. "Trials and Tribble-ations" was scripted by Ronald D. Moore and Rene Echevarria from a story by Ira Steven Behr and Hans Beimler. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In still another "crossover" episode, the Clampetts are reunited with two of the cast members from Petticoat Junction. While paying a visit to Hooterville, Jed goes into the airplane-transport business with pilot Steve Elliot (Mike Minor). Along for the ride is good old Jethro who, still under the spell of Air Force hero Lance "Jetstream" Bradford, has purchased the uniform of a USAF general and is all ready to soar into the wild blue yonder. Linda Kaye Henning appears in her Petticoat Junction role as Betty Jo Bradley Elliot. "Buzz Bodine, Boy General" was originally broadcast on December 31, 1969. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This routine western finds Union Colonel John Henry Thomas (John Wayne) and company attacking Confederate soldiers lead by Colonel James Langdon (Rock Hudson). After a crushing defeat, Langdon torches his plantation rather than have it fall into enemy hands. A group of Southerners accept the invitation of Emperor Maximilian to join them, and Langdon heads off with a wagon train of settlers to a new land. Thomas with his adopted Indian son Blue Boy (Roman Gabriel) bring a herd of 3,000 horses across the Rio Grand for sale. The two factions meet at a Fourth of July party and relive the war through a drunken brawl. When Mexican General Rojas (Tony Aguilar) holds the Southerners hostage, Thomas orders the herd to stampede into the General's camp as ransom payment for their former enemies. Merlin Olsen plays the blacksmith Little George. Both Gabriel and Olsen were pro-football all-stars for the Los Angeles Rams. Olsen continued his acting and sports announcing after his gridiron days were over. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

James Stewart and Dean Martin are atypically cast as outlaws in Bandolero! The film begins as Dee Bishop (Martin) and his gang are about to be hanged. The Scripture-spouting executioner turns out to be Dee's brother Mace (Stewart), who helps the desperadoes escape. They are pursued by a sheriff (George Kennedy), whose lady friend (Raquel Welch) has the hots for Dee. The brothers try to go straight, but before they can make up their mind they find themselves surrounded by Mexican bandidos and are forced to team up with the sheriff to fight them off. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Just because The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming was vastly overrated by contemporary critics does not make it any less amusing. The story gets under way when a Soviet submarine accidently gets lodged in a sandbar on the coast of a New England town. In his feature film debut, Alan Arkin plays the sub's second-in-command, who is ordered by commander Theodore Bikel to free up the sub and skeedaddle before an international incident erupts. Hoping to secure a power boat to tug the sub out to sea, Arkin and his men call upon vacationing TV writer Carl Reiner, passing themselves off as Norwegians. When this ruse fails, Arkin is reluctantly compelled to force Reiner at gunpoint to fetch his motorboat, while gentle-natured Russian sailor John Philip Law is left behind to guard Reiner's wife Eva Marie Saint and pretty neighbor girl Andrea Dromm (yes, love blooms). The plot thickens when the locals, notably bullnecked sheriff Brian Keith and superpatriot Paul Ford, spread the word that the Russians have "invaded" their little community. Several slapstick complications later, the Russians and the locals face each other down in the center of the village, weapons at the ready. Fortunately, World War 3 is averted when the Russians and the villagers band together to rescue young Johnny Whittaker from falling to his doom. Enormously popular upon its first release, The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming still works on a slick sitcom level. The film was based on a novel by Nathaniel Benchley, the son of humorist Robert Benchley and the father of Jaws author Peter Benchley. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This Elvis Presley vehicle is close to a lemon, even for his die-hard fans. Elvis is Mike Edwards, a pilot of a small plane who has a faithful sidekick, Danny (Gary Lockewood), and a penchant for singing. The story, such as it is, takes place in-between a total of ten different songs, the most memorable being "One Broken Heart for Sale". Mike is tough on the outside but he is willing to take up a good cause when he finds Sue Lin (Vicky Tiu) temporarily abandoned at the Seattle Worlds Fair. Aside from Sue Lin, he also finds an attractive nurse who is not abandoned but might still need attention. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

This Stephen Sondheim/Jules Styne/Arthur Laurents musical comedy Gypsy had been a Broadway smash with Ethel Merman in the lead. Based on the autobiography of striptease artist Gypsy Rose Lee, it centers on the antics of Mama Rose (here played by Rosalind Russell), the Stage Mother from Hell who prods and pushes her daughters June and Louise into a vaudeville career. Rose pins most of her hopes for fame on older daughter June (billed as "Dainty June"), while little Louise reluctantly goes along for the ride. Karl Malden plays the girls' agent, who falls in love with Rose but is ultimately turned off by her ruthless ambition. When June escapes the act to get married, Rose puts the unwilling Louise in the star spot, but vaudeville is dying and soon the only booking they can get is in a cheap burlesque house. The strippers take Louise under their wing and advise her that "You've gotta have a gimmick" to survive on the bump-and-grind circuit. The nervous Louise rises to stardom as stripper Gypsy Rose Lee, whose "gimmick" is to adopt a self-mocking attitude and to put on pseudo-sophisticated airs. Rose resents Gypsy's rise to the top, but a bravura eight-minute musical soliloquy reveals that Rose had forced her daughters on the stage because she wanted to live out her own dreams of stardom. Louise--aka Gypsy--is played by Diane Pace as a girl and by Natalie Wood as an adult; June (better known as June Havoc) is portrayal by Suzanne Cupito (later billed as Morgan Brittany) as a little girl and Ann Jillian as an adolescent. Most of the best songs, including "Let Me Entertain You," "Small World," and "Everything's Coming Up Roses," remain intact from the original Broadway production. Gypsy was remade for television in 1993, with Bette Midler as Rose. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

James Congdon plays Tony Nelson, a brilliant but foolhardy young scientist who is experimenting with matter and its relationship to time and space. Using a specially designed amplifier, he thinks he has found a way of releasing matter from the time and space that it occupies, thus allowing its atoms to freely intermingle with any surrounding matter without losing its integrity. After accidentally destroying the lab where he is working, he goes to his older brother Scott (Robert Lansing) for help. Scott is even more brilliant than Tony, but is his opposite in every other way: very orthodox, highly respected in his field, and also horribly overworked in his job and responsibilities. The two also have a fiercely competitive relationship that becomes more strained when Tony develops an attraction to Linda Davis (Lee Meriwether), Scott's fiancée. In testing Tony's equipment, Scott gets the experiment to work, passing one object through another, and achieves much more; his own hand accidentally passes through one of the test objects, gets caught, and then released. When he tries to repeat the experiment for Tony, he again passes his hand through the test object, and then discovers that the amplifier isn't functioning properly; the power to move into 4D is now being channeled through his own brain. He can pass through any solid object at will, and the previously staid, stolid scientist is uncharacteristically exultant at this success, though it seems to nullify the project he has spent years working on, the development of a supposedly impenetrable substance. Possessing this power causes Scott's basest desires to emerge for the first time; he starts out by going on a robbery spree, passing through locked bank vaults and stealing the financial reward that has been denied him in his job. The truly dire consequences of his new-found powers emerge the next morning, however, when Scott awakens to discover that he looks and feels at least 15 years older; apparently, using his new ability to move into 4D drains his life force. Worse yet, he discovers that he can replenish his life energy, but only by passing himself through people; this contact restores him, but accelerates their aging so that they shrivel up and die in seconds. Scott is riven by the struggle between his basic decency and his desire to survive, coupled with his now unbridled lust and greed, and the body count keeps rising as he rampages through the city. The police are unable to stop him, and Tony, feeling more responsibility than he's ever displayed before, prepares to turn the 4D amplifier on himself so that he can battle his brother. It is Linda, however, who takes the ultimate risk, luring Scott back to normal one last time. The story is exciting (albeit a bit grim) and played in a lively fashion, and the careful use of Ralph Carmichael's jazz-based score to accent the action also helps set 4D Man apart from other science fiction films of the era. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi