Stuart Whitman Movies
Stuart Whitman, with a rugged build and sensitive face, rose from bit player to competent lead actor, but never did make it as a popular star in film. The San Francisco-born Whitman served three years with the Army Corps of Engineers where he was a light heavyweight boxer in his spare time. He next went on to study drama at the Los Angeles City College where he joined a Chekhov stage group. He began his film career in the early '50s as a bit player. Although never a star, he did manage to quietly accumulate $100 million dollars through shrewd investments in securities, real estate, cattle, and Thoroughbreds. For his role as a sex offender attempting to change in the 1961 British film The Mark, Whitman was nominated for an Oscar. In addition to features, Whitman has also appeared extensively on television. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
Chuck Norris stars in this made-for-TV thriller as Joshua McCord, a Presidential secret agent. Though still quite virile and limber, McCord feels that he is getting too old for his job, thus he begins training a younger man named Deke Slater (Dylan Neal) as his replacement, using Zen and proper nutrition as primary teachings tools. But McCord springs back into action -- and kicks plenty of serious butt in the process -- when the First Lady is kidnapped by a terrorist organization. First telecast by CBS on April 2, 2000, The President's Man was followed two years later by a sequel, The President's Man: A Line in the Sand. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Chuck Norris, Dylan Neal, (more)
- 1998
In this inspiring drama based on a true story, Sunny Matthews (Kelsey Mulrooney) is a young girl whose life is shattered after she suffers severe leg injuries in an auto wreck which also claims the life of her father. Despondent over her tragedy, Sunny sinks into a deep depression, until she develops a friendship with a horse named Ginger, whose legs are damaged much like her own. Second Chances also features Stuart Whitman, Tom Amandes, and Isabel Glasser. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tom Amandes, Kelsey Mulrooney, (more)
- 1995
In this psychological drama, Sam has come to work on a dairy farm in Marin, California. He had been living in New York, but found himself tormented with terrible nightmares. On the farm he works closely with his friend Danny. Not long after his arrival, Sam gets in trouble with Robert, the owner. He is also in trouble with Danny's daughter, Rosie who wanted the job Sam filled. The trouble with the owner comes when Sam begins trying to save poor Rachel, the dairyman's daughter whom Robert keeps locked in the house. Thinking she is being abused, Sam talks to her. She shows her gratitude sexually. Now Sam becomes even more determined to save her. Unfortunately, Rachel isn't as much abused as she is dangerously unstable. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1995
Upon learning that her wealthy father has suffered a severe stroke, an independent, willful and successful Wall Street accountant leaves her high-powered job and heads down to her family's Texas ranch in hopes of guaranteeing her inheritance. While back home, the woman feels a strange stirring in her heart and begins remembering how much she once loved the land. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Paula Devicq, Stuart Whitman, (more)
- 1994
- R
Sexual harassment and revenge are the themes of this thriller. A secretary is murdered in a New York office building. In L.A. Ashley, who works for an advertising agency, is at an office party.There she surreptitiously has sex with a fellow employee. Michael Miller just moved from New York to be the new marketing head. With him he brings his pregnant wife and his daughter Emily. Soon after his arrival he begins harassing Ashley culminating in an attack in an elevator. She goes to court charging him with sexual harassment, but because she has a reputation for making it with others in the office, loses. Despondent, she offs herself in a car crash. Ashley's sister is livid and decides she will avenge her sister's death by ruining Michael. First she gets a job at the agency. Next she seduces Michael and video tapes him making love to her. Mayhem ensues when she repeatedly blackmails him. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Steven Bauer, Tahnee Welch, (more)
Joanne Whalley-Kilmer stars as a woman corrupted by the criminal justice system in this courtroom suspense thriller. She plays a civil servant named Valerie Alston, a single mother living in New York City, who gets placed on a jury trying the case of mob boss Rusty Pirone (Armand Assante). A former homicide detective gone bad, Tommy Vesey (William Hurt), is now working for Pirone. He kidnaps Valerie and threatens her and her son with more harm if she votes to convict Pirone. At the trial, District Attorney Daniel Graham (Gabriel Byrne) proves himself to be willing and able to stoop to unethical means to convict Pirone. In the jury room, Valerie skillfully exploits factions among the jurors in order to win an acquittal. Now cynical and corrupt herself, Valerie seduces mob boss Pirone to extract her own rewards for her service. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Joanne Whalley, Armand Assante, (more)
Madeleine Stowe, Mary Stuart Masterson, Andie MacDowell, and Drew Barrymore are the stars of this Western whose main gimmick is making heroes into heroines. They all start out as prostitutes, as Cody (Stowe) shoots a drunken colonel who attempts to molest Anita (Masterson). She is about to be lynched for defending her friend when the other "bad girls" ride in and rescue her, pursued by detectives. The rest of the film follows their adventures as they get caught up in hostage situations, bank robberies, shootouts, and romantic interludes with handsome young cowboys with never a hair out of place or an unsightly smudge of Western dust. Amazingly, all four former prostitutes are able to ride, shoot, rope, and fight as well. Bad Girls is not likely to be thought of as a realistic view of how women lived in the Old West. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Madeleine Stowe, Mary Stuart Masterson, (more)
In this crime drama, members of a formerly peaceful community fight back after the cops fail to protect them from the gangsters who have turned their neighborhoods into battlefields. They do this by hiring a boozy detective to investigate the backgrounds of the supposedly upstanding local politicals and businessmen behind the mayhem. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1992
This unforgettable episode is set at Universal Studios, where Jessica (Angela Lansbury) has arrived to supervise the film version of her novel "Messengers of Midnight." It isn't long before Jessica has had a confrontation with the film's abrasive producer Darryl Hayward (Ron Leibman), who seems to revel in making enemies, among them his leading lady Leonora Holt (Paula Prentiss). While paying a visit to the infamous "Bates Hotel" set from Hitchcock's Psycho, Jessica stumbles across Darryl's dead body--in the shower, of course! Henry Gibson appears as an obsessed fan of Leonora's, who just happened to be in the "Psycho House" when the killing occurred. Naturally, the episode is brimming with "inside" movie and pop-culture references, courtesy of scriptwriter (and future Babylon 5 maven) J. Michael Straczynski. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1992
Following a terrible auto wreck, a woman reawakens but can remember nothing about herself or the events leading up to the tragedy. This makes it all the more painful when she discovers that a man and his little boy were killed in the crash, one that she may have caused. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lynda Carter, Dee Wallace, (more)
- 1991
- R
Someone is killing phone-sex girls and a policeman is obsessed with finding the killer. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1990
- R
This gangster satire involves a boss (William Hickey) who turns over the reins of his organization to an incompetent son (Eddie Deezen). ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Deezen, Morgan Fairchild, (more)
- 1990
- PG13
Japan's answer to Don Simpson -- a flamboyant and brash producer drawn to make flamboyant and brash films -- Haruki Kadokawa takes a turn at the director's chair with this sprawling historical epic featuring a massive budget: a record-breaking five billion yen, and thousands of extras comprising most of the student population from the University of Calgary. Set during the Warring States era (1482-1558), the film opens on the real-life rivalry between feuding warlords Takeda Shingen and Uesugi Kenshin. The latter (Takaaki Enoki) begins the film as Nagao Kagetora, the younger brother of the lord of Echigo Province. Encouraged by court retainer Usami Tadayuki (Tsunehiko Watase), he challenges his inept brother for the reigns of power and kills him in an ensuing duel. Soon after becoming lord of the province, he faces a new threat with Takeda Harunobu (Masahiko Tsugawa), lord of the neighboring Kai province. Both have grand dreams of uniting their war-torn land and ruling from the imperial capital of Kyoto. Ultimately, this clash of egos, personalities, and ambitions leads to the cataclysmic 1561 battle of Kawanakajima. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Takaaki Enoki, Masahiko Tsugawa, (more)
- 1989
- R
After witnessing her boyfriend's killing by gangsters, a woman escapes to Florida with the mob hot on her trail. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Linda Blair
- 1989
In a post-apocalyptic world, peaceful citizens are terrorized by renegade biker gangs. When one of the gangs kills the family of a village preacher, however, he decides to turn vigilante in order to exact justice. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stuart Whitman, David Heavener, (more)
- 1988
The made-for-TV Once Upon a Texas Train offers us the once-in-a-lifetime teaming of Richard Widmark, Willie Nelson and Angie Dickinson. Nelson plays a veteran outlaw who robs a bank less than 6 hours after being paroled from jail. He uses the money to reunite his old gang, then sets about to repeat the train robbery that had gotten him arrested 20 years earlier. This time, however, Nelson is himself targetted for theft by a young, hungrier band of desperadoes. Widmark plays the lawman who caught Nelson before and intends to do so again. Written and directed by the reliable Burt Kennedy, Once Upon a Texas Train premiered January 3, 1988. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1987
When Mary Rose Welch (Joan Caulfield) is injured in a car accident, she prevails upon Jessica (Angela Lansbury) to travel to the town of Eden, where Mary's sister has recently died under mysterious circumstances. Figuring that the best way to get to the truth is to adopt a guise, Jessica poses as Mary and shows up in Eden for the funeral. It doesn't take her long to determine that this "idyllic" community is hardly Edenlike, and that skeletons in the closet abound! Among the suspects on this occasion are Sheriff Landry (Roy Thinnes), Dr. Lynch (MacDonald Carey) and realtor C.J. Dobbs (Stuart Whitman)--all of whom knew Mary a little more intimately than they're willing to reveal. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1987
This mystery is set in Washington, D.C. and chronicles the exploits of a TV correspondent who is sent there to interview a prominent senator. While there, she begins realizing that her subject and a weird old house are strangely connected. Mayhem ensues as she begins her investigation. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1986
Somewhere in the Deep South, young singer Matt Burns (Brian L. Green) has been arrested for the murder of local bully Ed Bonner (Jeffrey Osterhage), son of the town's most influential citizen (Stuart Whitman). Innocent bystanders to this developing drama are Jessica Fletcher (Angela Lansbury) and her friend and fellow writer Ames Caulfield (Craig Stevens), one of whose former students happened to be Matt's mother. At the request of Matt's girl friend (and the dead man's sister) Linda (Cindy Fisher), Jessica does her best to prove Matt's innocence--while an angry lynch mob begins to swarm around the town jail. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
