Danny Trejo Movies
With his intimidating, tattooed, muscle-bound appearance, character actor Danny Trejo has formed a successful career as the all-purpose hard case over his curious and enduring cinematic career. Beating the odds of repeat offender syndrome after being released from prison, Trejo has risen through the ranks to find himself in high demand as an actor, and has even expanded his talents to include a producer credit to his resumé. His life story is just about as pristine an example of rehabilitation as one could ask for.Raised in the mean streets of East L.A., Trejo spent many of his early years incarcerated in such legendary prisons as Folsom and San Quentin on drug and robbery convictions. Channeling his intense energy into the boxing ring and winning numerous lightweight and welterweight titles, Trejo was released as a new man after completing a life-changing 12-step rehabilitation program to overcome his addictions. Applying the ideas that changed his life in an attempt to help others headed down a similar path, upon release Trejo became involved with numerous rehabilitation and counseling programs. A chance meeting with a young man who asked for his support at a Cocaine Anonymous meeting in 1985 later found the sympathetic ex-con meeting the struggling addict on the set of Runaway Train, and Trejo was quickly offered a role as a convict presumably based on his threatening appearance. Chance piled upon chance found an old prison buddy/screenwriter who remembered Trejo's hard-hitting boxing skills on the same set, and Trejo was then offered a chance to train Eric Roberts for a film, and was eventually offered the role as his opponent in the ring. Following with roles in The Hidden (1987), and later Lock-Up (1989), Marked for Death (1990), Mi Vida Loca (1993), and Heat (1995), Trejo formed an alliance with director Robert Rodriguez with Desperado in 1995, and soon graduated to such bigger-budget films as Con Air (1997) and The Replacement Killers (1998) in the latter 1990s. The Rodriguez-Trejo twosome found the actor taking on the role of Uncle Isadore "Machete" Cortez in the director's 2001 smash hit Spy Kids, and was later cast in both the film's sequel and Rodriguez's Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2002). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
A successful real estate agent, casual drug user, and part-time dealer serves as the catalyst for a lonely single mother's demise in this harrowing tale of addiction starring Daniel Baldwin, Danny Trejo, and Dee Wallace-Stone. Vince Gallagher may be a success in business, but he has never maintained any kind of close emotional ties. These days, however, Vince has grown tired of living alone and is eager to find a good woman to settle down with. One night while out at the restaurant/bar, Vince's friends Katie and Shawn direct his attentions towards the lovely Andrea, who is dining nearby with her daughter and the young girl's sitter. While sitter Connie notices Vince and tries to set the pair up, Andrea is reluctant to befriend a man in a bar and Vince isn't sure he wants to take on an instant family. Later, when Andrea heads to the local real estate office to find a new home and bumps into Vince once again, the two lonely souls begin to grow increasingly close. After Vince and Shawn help Andrea move in, things quickly start to get serious between the newly formed couple. When Vince and Andrea spend a special night together and it's revealed that Vince is into methamphetamine, the frightened woman attempts to kick him out of her house in order to avoid exposing her family to the drug culture. But Vince isn't willing to let go of Andrea quite so easily, and soon convinces her to try the drug so that she may better understand it. Now, as an addiction takes hold and plunges both down a darkened street of despair, the frightening reality of their situation threatens to destroy everything they have worked to hard to build together. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Joe Knight, Nancy Weyrauch, (more)
Russian director Andrei Konchalovsky's second American film may well be the only existential adventure flick in Hollywood history. Two prisoners, Manny (Jon Voight) and Buck (Eric Roberts), escape from a desolate Alaskan maximum-security facility. They hop aboard a speeding train, making a clean escape. But the engineer has suffered a heart attack, and the train goes out of control. To prevent a disastrous head-on collision, the railroad heads decide to derail the runaway train, killing its occupants to save the lives of hundreds of others. Once Manny catches on to what's happening, he tries to jump off the train, only to be talked out of such a foolhardy act by railroad employee Sara (Rebecca DeMornay). As doom approaches, Manny apparently goes mad, viciously preventing any attempts to stop the train or rescue its passengers: if he's to die, and if the others are to be saved, it will be on his terms, or no terms. Runaway Train was slated as a project for Akira Kurosawa in 1970, but for various creative and scheduling reasons, it remained on the back burner for 15 years. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jon Voight, Eric Roberts, (more)
Charles Bronson, weary and comatose, is trotted out again as the cocked crusader Paul Kersey in Death Wish 4: The Crackdown. Director Michael Winner has jumped ship for this installment, replaced by J. Lee Thompson (who has seen better days). Kersey is back in L.A. and dating attractive reporter Karen Sheldon (Kay Lenz). Of course, the clock is ticking, and the gong goes off when Karen's daughter overdoses on crack. Before you can say "kaboom" the drug dealer, along with a large cast of bit players, are blown to bits by the single-minded vigilante. An enterprising publisher whose own daughter has died from a drug overdose hires Kersey to wipe out the city's two rival drug dealers and their legions of flunkies. Kersey has no trouble agreeing, and using the technique limned in Yojimbo, he methodically eliminates gang members, first from one side and then the other, until one gang's paranoia about the other gang causes the two competitors to engage in a major confrontation that impacts both groups. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charles Bronson, Kay Lenz, (more)
- 1987
- R
The third entry in the violent cycle of prison dramas has street-kid turned prizefighter Too Sweet back in the slammer again. Because he is such a great fighter, he finds himself caught in the uncomfortable position of having to choose whether to fight for the warden or for the crook who rules the inmates. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Leon Isaac Kennedy, Anthony Geary, (more)
A cop discovers that there's something unusual about his new partner in this unusual sci-fi thriller. A seemingly well-mannered stock broker one day snaps, robbing a bank, stealing a Ferrari, and driving straight into a police barricade without any thought for his own safety, and he's mowed down by a hail of bullets. The detective assigned to the case, Tom Beck (Michael Nouri), thinks that he notices a strange look in the eye of the thief, but when FBI agent Lloyd Gallagher (Kyle MacLachlan) informs Tom that he's also been assigned to the case, he thinks that he sees the same curious look in Lloyd's eyes as well. Lloyd also has an odd way of carrying himself, as if he's not entirely in control of his own body, and in time, Tom discovers what the two men have in common -- both are actually aliens from another planet. They are creatures from another world capable of entering a human (or animal) body at will and using it as a vessel as long as they need. When the stockbroker died, the rogue alien simply crept into another body to begin his crime spree all over again. Lloyd has been sent to Earth to bring the thief's reign of terror to a halt and has taken over the body of an FBI agent with that in mind. A major cult favorite, The Hidden also features Clu Gulager, Ed O'Ross, and Claudia Christian. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Nouri, Kyle MacLachlan, (more)
Frank McBain (Gary Busey) is a cop who earned the nickname of "bulletproof" from the dozens of shootings he has survived over his career. He is called on to retrieve a tank held by communists across the border of Mexico. The enemies are cardboard caricatures of Arabs, Russians, and Mexicans led by the evil Colonel Kartiff (Henry Silva). Darlanne Fluegel co-stars with Juan Fernandez and Rene Enriquez in this forgettable feature. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gary Busey, Darlanne Fluegel, (more)
Sylvester Stallone is a tough but essentially decent convict in a relatively humane prison. He's on such good terms with the authorities that he's occasionally allowed a weekend furlough. This idyllic situation ends abruptly when he's transferred to a nasty prison run by sadistic warden Donald Sutherland (remember way back when Sutherland played good guys and Stallone played secondary hoodlums?) Harboring a grudge against Sly over an unfortunate incident at another prison, Sutherland does everything he can to make Stallone's term a Hell on Earth. But in the end, it is Sutherland who is Stallone's prisoner--and, since Sly's name comes first on the credits, it is Sutherland who blubberingly confesses to a string of crimes perpetrated on the helpless inmates. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sylvester Stallone, Donald Sutherland, (more)
- 1989
Cynical Philadelphia lawyer-turned-p.i. Jamey Sheridan aims his investigatory skills at an international smuggling ring. Sheridan wants to know who's supplying the weapons that are leaving the country, and who's supplying the drugs that are rolling in. The deeper he digs, the dirtier it gets; Sheridan unearths unholy alliances among idealistic freedom fighters, Central American drug lords, and corrupt American officials. Shannon's Deal was written by John Sayles, directed by Lewis (Jewel of the Nile) Teague, and scored by musical wizard Wynton Marsalis. Those concerned about Jamey Sheridan's wellbeing in this film should be advised that there was no way he'd turn up dead: Shannon's Deal was the pilot for an unsold TV series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Once again, Charles Bronson plays a renegade cop out for vigilante justice in the darkest heart of the urban jungle. This time, he is targeting an especially ruthless pimp who has been leading innocent young girls into prostitution. When the pimp kidnaps the beautiful daughter of a Japanese businessman, rapes her and forces her to begin streetwalking, the cop decides to let nothing, not even the law, stop him from bringing the slimeball to graphically violent justice. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charles Bronson, Perry Lopez, (more)
- 1990
- R
"You have the right to remain silent . . . Forever!" This sequel to Maniac Cop pits Matt Cordell (Robert Z'dar), the crazed, murderous "Maniac Cop" of the first film (now horribly disfigured after a particularly brutal stay in prison), and Turkel (Leo Rossi), a serial killer who likes to murder strippers, against a frenzied NYPD detective, Sean McKinney (Robert Davi), who is just one step ahead of a nervous breakdown. His nerves don't get much relief when officers Jack Forrest (Bruce Campbell) and Teresa Mallory (Laurene Landon) insist that Cordell is still alive -- not only alive, but unkillable. Then Jack is murdered and the silent Maniac Cop breaks Turkel out of jail. With a group of rancid prisoners, they take police department psychologist Susan Riley (Claudia Christian) hostage. When the prisoners attempt a massive prison break, McKinney musters his forces to hunt down Cordell and Turkel and save Susan. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Davi, Claudia Christian, (more)
In Marked for Death, Steven Seagal is told to "try to find the gentle person inside yourself." But he doesn't spend too much time looking, preferring instead to crack the spines of his victims. Seagal plays John Hatcher, a burned-out narcotics agent who resigns from the Drug Enforcement Administration after his partner is killed. He returns to his hometown and finds the city in the thrall of a vicious Jamaican drug gang, led by the nasty Screwface (Basil Wallace). He meets an old friend, now a high school football coach, who tells John about losing his best player and his 13-year-old nephew to drug overdoses. Soon John's family is threatened and his prize Mustang stolen, so John joins forces with his buddy to take on Screwface and the drug gang themselves. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Steven Seagal, Basil Wallace, (more)
- 1990
- R
Erik Estrada stars as an arms dealer, smuggling weapons from China to South America, who's being pursued by a pair of sexy female secret agents. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Erik Estrada, Dona Speir, (more)
- 1991
Based on the true-life adventures of the late Drug Enforcement Agency spy Barry Seal, this exciting espionage adventure chronicles the events that lead up to his death in 1984. Before coming to work for the DEA, smooth-talking Seal (Dennis Hopper) had been a drug smuggler for the notorious Medellin Cartel in Colombia. The DEA captures him and he agrees to become their informant. Unfortunately, though he is a master con artist, he is no match for the con men running the U.S. government agency. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dennis Hopper
- 1991
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, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Beverly D'Angelo, Eric Roberts, (more)
In this futuristic action drama directed by Lewis Teague, Frank Warren (Rutger Hauer) is a man accused of stealing millions of dollars worth of gems. In prison, all the inmates wear collars which are electronically joined to those of an unknown partner. The collars will explode if either partner gets more than 300 feet away from the other. Warren is determined to escape, however, and finds that his partner is Tracy Riggs (Mimi Rogers). They plan and execute an elaborate escape and head off to search for the stolen diamonds. But members of Warren's former gang pursue them. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rutger Hauer, Mimi Rogers, (more)
- 1991
- R
A police detective must rescue his ex-wife from a kidnapper who is hiding out in an uncompleted skyscraper in this action film also titled The Concrete War. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- 1991
- NC17
Russell's avowed purpose with Whore was to avoid the glamorous depiction of prostitution common to such slick Hollywood products as Pretty Woman. As played by Theresa Russell (no relation to Ken), the eponymous character lives a hellish existence. Relating her story directly to the camera, Russell introduces us to her no-good former husband (Jason Saucier), her brutish pimp (Benjamin Mouton), and the kinkiest of her "johns." Her one true friend, a bag man named Rasta (Antonio Fargas), also saves her life -- but not her soul. The film exists in three versions: an 82-minute R cut, an 82-minute NC-17 cut, and the 92-minute European version, which sometimes carries a rating, sometimes merely a disclaimer. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Theresa Russell, Benjamin Mouton, (more)
Sunset Grill directed by Kevin Connor is a suspenseful, well-written and acted contemporary film noir with an idiosyncratic look at life on the wild side. Ryder Hart (Peter Weller) is a burnt-out former L.A. private detective who hears about the murder of a trafficker in illegal aliens, but who does not get involved until his wife is murdered. Investigating the murder, Ryder meets tycoon Shelgrave (Stacy Keach), who collects Mayan art, and his seductive assistant Loren (Lori Singer). The rather complicated plot includes double-crosses, possible murders of illegal aliens to sell their organs, and it culminates in a bloody shootout. Director Conner deftly ties up all the loose ends of the plot and gives them an internal consistency, as one incident leads to and explains another, creating a portrait of a complex, anti-hero, whose pain is explained but not sentimentalized. The plot is over-complicated, and the supporting cast contains more lunatics than most asylums, however Sunset Grill delivers what it promises: complex, contemporary mystery at its very best. ~ Linda Rasmussen, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Weller, Lori Singer, (more)
- 1992
Maniacal Dennis Hopper plays a high-strung L.A. homicide detective who embarks upon a vengeful hunt for the drug pushers who brutally murdered his partners. His investigation soon reveals that the dealers' influence extends to the highest echelons of city government. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
Taylor Hackford directed this urgent melodrama about the realities of street crime, gangs, and prison life among the Chicanos of East Los Angeles. Miklo (Damian Chapa), Paco (Benjamin Bratt) and Cruz (Jesse Borrego) are three friends who are living in the East Los Angeles of 1972 as it is torn apart by violence. When the gang violence hits the three friends, they are affected by their participation in the bitter violence in different ways. Cruz, an artist, becomes crippled, and he sinks deeply into drug addiction. Paco, an accessory to murder, joins the military to avoid jail time, leading to a spot on the LAPD. Miklo, the kid with the gun, is sent to jail, where he slowly rises up in the ranks of La Onda, the San Quentin Latino gang. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Damian Chapa, Jesse Borrego, (more)
- 1993
Poor Maddalena (Sophia Diaz). She's so beautiful and sexy that men in her native Italy could not stop trying to romance her. She could have gone to a convent and she would have had trouble with the priests. There was no place that she could think of that she wouldn't be constantly subject to sexual and romantic demands by men. At some point, though, she remembered what she had heard about the stodginess, even the natural puritanism of the British. And British men are famous for their lack of sexual prowess. In this British-made comedy (penned by the very witty Simon Gray), Maddalena has moved to the British countryside and married a perfectly pleasant British man. Unfortunately, instead of inspiring lust in her new homeland, her great beauty inspires cardiac arrest in those who inopportunely view too much of it on the not infrequent occasions when her breasts break free of their moorings. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Simon Callow, Donald Pleasence, (more)
Kiefer Sutherland directed and stars in this death-row drama, playing an inmate who forms a complex relationship with a guard (Forest Whitaker). ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Kiefer Sutherland, Forest Whitaker, (more)
Neighborhood pride runs deep in Echo Park, so when two lifelong friends join the local gang as a matter of course, they're handed down gang names from the previous generation of homegirls. Unfortunately, Sad Girl (Angel Aviles) and Mousie (Seidy Lopez) don't remain friends for long. When Mousie withdraws into herself to cope with the responsibilities of young motherhood after bearing the child of her one true love, Ernesto (Jacob Vargas), Sad Girl and Ernesto turn to each other for comfort. Soon, Sad Girl herself ends up pregnant, and warm sisterhood cools to an icy feud. Ernesto starts dealing drugs to support his two young families -- and to outfit the gussied-up low rider that he hides from both of his unsuspecting girlfriends. The economic and romantic entanglements of these three characters serve as the entry point into this multifaceted exploration of L.A. street life, but Mi Vida Loca rapidly expands in scope to take in other characters, most of them female. Bleach-blond Whisper (Nelida Lopez), for instance, learns the drug-dealing ropes from Ernesto and considers crossing gender lines to open her own operation. The slightly older Giggles (Marlo Marron), however, refuses to fall into old dependencies and habits after being imprisoned for four years for a crime her boyfriend committed. Sad Girl's sister, La Blue Eyes (Magali Alvarado), the only character to choose college over gang life, chances upon a poem written by a prison inmate and becomes hopelessly smitten, abandoning her books for a passionate jailhouse correspondence. The focus of Mi Vida Loca shifts freely between these and several other characters, many of whom take turns providing narration and context. The director's daughter, Tiffany Anders, has a small role in the film alongside many real-life Echo Park denizens; several musicians and film directors also make cameos, among them Spike Jonze, Kurt Voss, Kid Frost, and the members of Los Lobos. Salma Hayek got her SAG card by playing a tiny role. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Angel Aviles, Seidy Lopez, (more)
Based on a story by Richard Lupoff (a short filmization of the same story earned an Oscar nomination for 1990), 12:01 centers on a member of the personnel department in a science lab, who discovers that the world has become somehow trapped in a strange time warp that causes the same 24-hour period to repeat itself. During the course of that endlessly repeated day, Barry Thomas, the only one who seems to be aware of what's happening, must somehow figure out how to put time back on its normal course and solve the murder of a physicist, Lisa Fredricks (Helen Slater) with whom he is infatuated. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
A successful career criminal considers getting out of the business after one last score, while an obsessive cop desperately tries to put him behind bars in this intelligent thriller written and directed by Michael Mann. Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro) is a thief who specializes in big, risky jobs, such as banks and armored cars. He's very good at what he does; he's bright, methodical, and has honed his skills as a thief at the expense of his personal life, vowing never to get involved in a relationship from which he couldn't walk away in 30 seconds. Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino) is an L.A.P.D. detective determined to catch McCauley, but while McCauley's personal code has forced him to do without a wife and children, Hanna's dedication has made a wreck of the home he's tried to have; he's been divorced twice, he's all but a stranger to his third wife, and he has no idea how to reach out to his troubled step-daughter. While McCauley has enough money to retire and is planning to move to New Zealand, he loves the thrill of robbery as much as the profit, and is blocking out plans for one more job; meanwhile, he's met a woman, Eady (Amy Brenneman), whom he's not so sure he can walk away from. The supporting cast includes Val Kilmer as Chris, one of McCauley's partners; Ashley Judd as his wife Charlene; Jon Voight as Nate; Hank Azaria as Alan Marciano; and Henry Rollins as Hugh, who is beaten up by Hanna. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, (more)
