Bob Wilson Movies
- 1997
In the second of Law & Order's three "crossovers" with the Baltimore-based NBC crime series Homicide: Life on the Street, a teenaged model dies on the streets of New York, apparently the victim of toxic-shock syndrome. An autopsy reveals that the girl had been raped, a crime that would have to have been committed while she was in Baltimore. Thus, detective Lennie Briscoe (Jerry Orbach) calls in his Baltimore counterpart, John Munch (Richard Belzer), to assist in the investigation. Meanwhile, New York assistant DA McCoy (Sam Waterston) finds himself locked in a jurisdictional battle with the Baltimore DA -- a battle complicated by the actions of the dead girl's parents. In addition to Richard Belzer, Homicide regulars Jon Seda (Falsone) and Yaphet Kotto (Giardello) also appear. The first episode of the two-part "Baby, It's You" aired as the November 11, 1997, installment of Law & Order; the conclusion was seen November 14 on Homicide: Life on the Street. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1991
- R
This lively and off-beat Canadian comedy tells the tale of a regular Joe whose life is turned topsy turvy when he teams up with a strange restaurateur who convinces the fellow to invest in his latest project: an Italian restaurant with operatic waiters. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robbie Coltrane, Michael Riley, (more)
Executed in the manner of a 1940's low-budget programmer, this comedy-thriller chronicles the misadventures of screenwriter Edgar Allen (Rufus Butler Seder), aspiring to move along in the literary footsteps of another, 19th-century Edgar Allen. Edgar is trying to come up with good horror script in order to impress an agent. If the script is good, the agent will take on the scenarist. Needing digs, but having little dough, Edgar agrees to work for room and board as a janitor of the ramshackle Welcome Apartments, owned by an odd experimental filmmaker. Edgar finds that every resident is more than a little eccentric and uses them in his new script. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Rufus Butler Seder, Katy Bolger, (more)
Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven, the long-awaited follow-up to his 1973 debut Badlands, confirmed his reputation as a visual poet and narrative iconoclast with a story of love and murder told through the jaded voice of a child and expressive images of nature. In 1916, Chicago steelworker Bill (Richard Gere, stepping in for John Travolta) flees to Texas with his little sister Linda (Linda Manz) and girlfriend Abby (Brooke Adams) after fatally erupting at his boss. Along with other itinerant laborers, they work the harvest at a wealthy, ailing farmer's ranch, but the farmer (playwright Sam Shepard) falls in love with Abby, and, believing her to be Bill's sister, asks the three to stay on at his elysian spread. Seeing it as his one real chance to escape perpetual poverty, Bill urges Abby to marry the sick man. Marriage, however, has more restorative powers, and the farmer has more magnetism, than Bill had planned. "Nobody's perfect," Linda impassively observes in one of her many voiceovers, after their brief paradise is erased by plagues of locusts, fire, and lethal jealousy. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Gere, Brooke Adams, (more)
- 1976
In this film, outspokenly homosexual filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim has documented his encounters with friends in the New York "underground" arts movement, the better-known of whom are William Burroughs (who says nothing for the camera), Andy Warhol (seen in the distance) and Fernando Arrabal (who is interviewed in Spanish). The emigrants named in the title are notable Germans who left the country before World War II, such as Greta Keller and Grete Mosheim. Reviewers at the time of the film's release considered it to have been a sort of paid vacation for the filmmaker rather than a serious effort. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- William S. Burroughs
In this violent comedy, the sequel to Dolemite, the rotund rapster must hit the road for California after an Anglo sheriff finds him fooling around with his wife. Once there he gets involved with a sexy, hard-living madame and her flock of kung fu fighting females who are fighting a ruthless local gangster. The fugitive gets a few licks in too, unfortunately, just as he is about to celebrate his victory he is shot by the angry sheriff. Fortunately, the Human Tornado is not easily killed as he was wearing a bullet proof vest. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1974
The renowned director of England's National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company, Sir Peter Hall, produced and directed this unusual film, adapted from the book Akenfield, which summarizes a sociological study of village life in Suffolk. The amateur cast mostly play themselves or close facsimiles, and the work of generations of farming and rural people is revealed through their depictions of daily life and conversations. Everyday life in the 1970s alternates, through flashbacks, with the more strenuous but nearly identical lives of the players' forebears in Edwardian times. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- 1972
- R
Incredibly, this romantic melodrama was directed by the same man who brought The Night of the Living Dead to the screen. The story concerns a recently discharged young army veteran (Ray Laine), who doesn't want a regular job but wants to drift around and enjoy things for a while. He finds a girlfriend with a good job (Judith Streiner) who is willing to support him while he pretends to be writing a novel, and they have a good time for a while. Eventually she tries to get him to take a regular job. He does, but quickly gives it up. When she discovers that she is pregnant, she goes through a lot of soul-searching about it without telling him. At first she plans to have an abortion but then decides to return to her hometown and marry a childhood sweetheart who is comfortable with her having a baby. Landing on his feet, the army veteran decides to take up his father's offer of a job and a place to live after all. His father consoles him with the aphorism that when other "flavors" of life pall, "there's always vanilla." ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
Michael Ritchie, better known for his gentle satires of American social institutions, enters Don Siegel territory in the unusual crime thriller Prime Cut. Lee Marvin is surly collection agent Nick Devlin, who is hired by Chicago racketeer Jake (Eddie Egan) to collect an overdue payment from Kansas cattle baron Mary Ann (yes, Mary Ann!) (Gene Hackman). When Devlin travels west to get Jake's money from Mary Ann, he finds the cattle king mixed up in complex drug deals and pimping wild women -- two of which are Poppy and Violet (Sissy Spacek and Janit Baldwin -- both in their film debuts). ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Lee Marvin, Gene Hackman, (more)
- 1957
Professional burglar Nat Harbin (Dan Duryea) and his two associates, Baylock (Peter Capell) and Dohmer (Mickey Shaughnessy), set their sights on wealthy spiritualist Sister Sarah (Phoebe Mackay), who has inherited a fortune -- including a renowned emerald necklace -- from a Philadelphia financier. Using Nat's female ward, Gladden (Jayne Mansfield), to pose as an admirer and case the mansion where the woman lives, they set up what looks like a perfect break-in; even when Nat's car is spotted by a couple of cops, he bluffs his way through, gets the necklace, and makes the getaway. But the trio -- plus Gladden -- can't agree on how to dispose of the necklace, and soon their bickering becomes a lot less important than the fact that someone is on to what they've done -- a woman (Martha Vickers) is working on Nat, while a man (Stewart Bradley) is working on Gladden. Equally serious, the trio kills a New Jersey state trooper while on their way to warn her. And among the cops chasing them is one with larceny in his heart and murder on his mind. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dan Duryea, Jayne Mansfield, (more)
