Jon Avnet Movies

Lawrence Fishburne, Martin Landau, and Bradley Whitford star in this Hallmark Films production based on Mitch Albom's best-selling non-fiction book, an uplifting tale of friendship and faith. The story centers on successful Detroit broadcaster Albom (Whitford) and the wisdom imparted to him by New Jersey Rabbi Albert Lewis (Landau) and Detroit pastor Henry Covington (Fishburne) as Albom explores the full spectrum of their disparate worlds, and the power of their unwavering faith. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Jon Avnet's thriller Righteous Kill stars Al Pacino and Robert De Niro as a pair of Big Apple police officers investigating a series of murders committed by a serial killer. Carla Gugino co-stars as a crime-scene investigator who has romantic ties to De Niro. 50 Cent, Donnie Wahlberg, Brian Dennehy, and John Leguizamo co-star. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

Based on the 2005 bestselling novel by Gigi Levangie Grazer, the six-part miniseries The Starter Wife starred former Will & Grace leading lady Debra Messing as Molly Kagan, an archetypal "Hollywood wife" who for ten years had enjoyed the perks and privileges of being married to powerful studio executive Kenny Kagan (Peter Jacobson). All of this changed drastically when Kenny dumped his spouse for a much-younger pop singer named Shoshanna (Trilby Glover), adding insult to injury by informing Molly that their marriage was through via cell-phone. Having carefully timed the breakup to coincide with the expiration of the couple's pre-nuptual agreement, Kenny was able to escape without providing Molly with a huge monetary settlement, leaving our benumbed heroine high and dry. Also, Molly was now "persona non grata" in her Brentwood community, with many old doors (especially those on stores and restaurants) being literally closed in her face, and such fair-weather friends as Cricket Stewart (Miranda Otto) and Joan McAllister (wonderfully played as a self-hating lush by Judy Lewis) conspicuously unavailable. Vowing to start life anew for the sake of herself and her teenaged daughter, Molly relocated to Malibu, where she found a new best friend in the form of airheaded Malibu gate guard Lavender Caraway (Arika Noni Rose). She also entered into a brace of tempestuous relationships with aging, moody movie producer Lou Manahan (Joe Mantegna) and handsome but untrustworthy beachcomber Sam Knight (Stephen Moyer). All of the episodes were scripted by Josann McGibbon and Sara Parriott and directed by Jon Avnet--and curiously, all were filmed in Australia rather than "La-la Land". Making its USA Network debut on May 31, 2007 with a two-hour episode, The Starter Wife ran on a weekly, hourly basis until June 28 of that year. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

The debut film by director Robert Edwards, Land of the Blind, is a political satire starring Ralph Fiennes as a military man who helps overthrow his government. He does so at the urging of a political prisoner, played by Donald Sutherland, who has been outspoken about the corruption of the current regime. The soldier learns that corruption may in fact be an inevitable part of having power. Set in an unnamed country without ever giving indication of a specific time period, the allegorical film had its North American debut at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

The NBC "ensemble" drama series Boomtown was set in contemporary Los Angeles, where crime and punishment was practically a way of life. Each episode featured a different criminal case which, in Rashomon fashion, was related from virtually everybody's point-of-view: the city detectives, the beat cops, the politicians, the ER staff, the media -- and of course, the criminals. Naturally, not everyone saw things in the same way, and this divergence of opinion (and the scriptwriters' avoidance of taking sides) was the heart of the series. The enormous cast of regulars included Neal McDonough as deputy D.A. David McNorris, Gary Basaraba and Jason Gedrick as uniformed officers Ray Heckler and Tom Turcotte, Donnie Wahlberg and Mykelti Williamson as detectives Joel Sears and "Fearless" Bobby Smith, Nina Garbiras as investigative reporter Andrea Little, and Lana Parrilla as paramedic Theresa Ortiz. Bathed in a hauntingly atmospheric Raymond Chandler-esque ambience, Boomtown made its first TV appearance on September 29, 2002. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Steal This Movie! is a dramatic account of the tumultuous life and times of Abbie Hoffman, one of the most visible and influential figures of America's 1960s counter-culture. (Its title was inspired by Hoffman's irreverent "survival guide," Steal This Book.) Hoffman's founding of the Youth International Party (better known as the "Yippies") and inventive acts of street theater -- including an "exorcism" of the Pentagon and the riotous protests at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago -- made him a household name and a star of the anti-war movement. They also earned him enemies, and he was eventually arrested for trying to sell cocaine to an undercover cop, a bust that he contended was a set-up meant to discredit him. Rather than face a long prison sentence, Hoffman went underground, leaving behind his wife and children and posing as "Barry Freed," who became a respected environmental activist. In time, Freed acknowledged that he was Hoffman, spent two months in jail, and returned to activism full-time until his 1989 death. Steal This Movie stars Vincent D'Onofrio as Hoffman, Janeane Garofalo as his wife Anita, Kevin Corrigan as Jerry Rubin, Troy Garity as Tom Hayden, and Jeanne Tripplehorn as Joanna Lawrenson, who became romantically involved with Barry Freed. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Although Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her does bear some similarities to Short Cuts and Magnolia in its setting (Southern California) and mood (modern malaise), and its multiple story format, its focus is exclusively on female characters, and it's possible to view each story on its own. The film begins with a prologue: Police detectives are investigating the apparent suicide of a Hispanic woman (Elpidia Carillo). "This Is Dr. Keener" deals with Dr. Elaine Keener (Glenn Close), a single professional woman attempting to care for her aging and infirm mother and deal with her own loneliness. She invites Christine (Calista Flockhart), a tarot card reader, into her home to make some sense of her life. "Fantasies About Rebecca" profiles a successful bank manager (Holly Hunter) involved with a married man (Gregory Hines). When she learns that she is pregnant, he coldly advises her to take care of the "problem." Before she visits Dr. Keener to have an abortion, she impulsively has a fling with a colleague (Matt Craven). She is also confronted by a female street person in the bank's parking lot. "Someone for Rose" is about a single mother (Kathy Baker), a writer of children's books. She is attracted to a new neighbor, a dwarf (Danny Woodburn), and he catches her spying on him in his house. She's also amazed to find that her son is more sexually active than she knew -- and more than she is herself. "Good Night Lilly, Good Night Christine" details the relationship between the tarot card reader Christine and her lover, Lilly (Valeria Golino), who is critically ill with an unnamed disease. The final story, "Love Waits for Kathy," concerns two sisters, Carol (Cameron Diaz), a lovely blind woman with an active social life, and her police detective sibling, Kathy (Amy Brenneman), one of the detectives who appeared in the prologue. Kathy is attracted to the medical examiner in the suicide case, and her story ends with him taking her out on a date. In an epilogue, Dr. Keener drops in to a bar, where she meets a male character from one of the earlier stories. Debuting director Rodrigo Garcia, a noted cinematographer, is the son of writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Things You Can Tell made its debut on cable television, although it was originally intended to be a theatrical release. ~ Tom Wiener, Rovi

For this TV movie, Bob Rafelson directed James Caan as famous shamus Philip Marlowe. The novel Raymond Chandler (1888-1959) was writing during the year of his death remained unfinished until it was completed 30 years later by Spenser author Robert Parker. The British-based, Czech-born screenwriter/playwright Tom Stoppard scripted this telefilm adaptation. In 1963, the middle-aged Marlowe has put on a few pounds and gained a new wife, wealthy heiress Laura (Dina Meyer). In Poodle Springs, California, on the Nevada border, the couple lives in a house given them by P.J. Parker (Joe Don Baker), Laura's father. Framed for murder, Marlowe is bailed out by Laura, and he's soon hired to locate a gambler who owes $100,000. Investigating lowlife photographer Larry Victor (David Keith), Marlowe learns of a blackmail plot involving stripper Lola (La Joy Farr); he follows a trail that leads to a land scheme, while corpses begin to litter the landscape. This was James Caan's first TV role since Brian's Song (1971, later released theatrically), and the whodunit premiered July 25, 1998 on HBO. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

Director Peter Werner teams with screenwriters David Stevens and Carol Schreder to adapt author Alex Haley's sprawling novel centering on the struggles of an African American family contending with racism and strife while living in the rural south. Set in the early-20th Century, the film follows aging widow Flora as she sets her sights north following the death of her husband. Though the determined matriarch had hoped to start a new life for her family away from the prejudice that gripped the American south, she discovers that their struggle is far from over when the country is plunged into the Great Depression, and the entire globe is rocked by two world wars. Later, brave black leaders fight for social change in the Civil Rights Movement, and the Black Panthers emerge as a force to be reckoned with. Through it all, Flora never loses the will to give her children the best life possible. Queen Latifah, Mario Van Peebles, Cicely Tyson, and Blair Underwood star. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Jay Ward's fondly-remembered cartoon series about a klutzy king of the jungle gets the big-screen, live-action treatment in this comedy from Walt Disney Pictures. A young boy named George becomes lost in the jungles of the African nation of Bukuvu following a plane crash, where he's rescued and raised to manhood by an articulate ape called Ape (voice of John Cleese). George grows to become a strapping adult (played by Brendan Fraser) who is cheerful and good-hearted but not terribly bright, not to mention his nasty habit of running into trees while swinging on vines from one part of the jungle to another. Ursula Stanhope (Leslie Mann), an heiress from San Francisco, travels to Bukuvu for a safari, both to satisfy her thirst for adventure and because she's trying to get away from the snooty Lyle Van Der Groot (Thomas Haden Church), whom she is engaged to marry even though she doesn't like him very much. Lyle follows Ursula to Bukuvu, hoping to catch up with her and locate the legendary White Ape of the Jungle; when Ursula becomes stranded and is rescued by George, Lyle is determined to rescue her from the savage ape man, even though George is a greater threat to himself than anyone else. George finds himself infatuated with the lovely Ursula, and he hopes to win her heart, even though he's a bit rusty on the particulars of the human courtship ritual (Ape tries to help by lending him a copy of "Coffee, Tea, or Me?"). We also get to meet George's faithful pet Shep, an elephant who seems to have gotten the idea that he's a Cocker Spaniel. Blaxploitation legend Richard Roundtree also appears as Bukuvu dignitary Kwame. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A story about a career television journalist who eclipses her mentor, this drama's plot resembles that of A Star Is Born, and it shares the same screenwriters as those who penned the 1976 version of that film, John Gregory Dunne and Joan Didion. It's based loosely on the real-life story of newscaster Jessica Savitch. Sally Atwater (Michelle Pfieffer) gets a job at a Miami TV station based on a demo tape from her hometown of Reno, Nevada. The station's news director is Warren Justice (Robert Redford), a former high-profile Washington newsman whose career has suffered from his insistence on integrity. He makes Sally his gofer and criticizes her clothes and appearance while she begs him for a chance to go on-air. She becomes the station's weathercaster and Warren gives her the stage name of Tally. With Warren's constant advice, she breaks into news reporting and her star rises quickly as the two become romantically involved. She takes a better job in Philadelphia, with Warren's blessing, and there she soon eclipses the anchorwoman Marcia McGrath (Stockard Channing). From there, Tally's career continues to flourish, while her relationship with Warren takes some strange twists and turns. ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

The discovery of marital troubles in her family causes a young woman to question her own upcoming nuptials in this clever romantic comedy. Sarah Jessica Parker stars as Gwyn, a bright, slightly neurotic advertising copywriter who is initially thrilled when her boyfriend Matt (Gil Bellows) finally proposes. Soon afterwards, however, she learns that her mother Nina (Mia Farrow) is indulging in an extra-marital affair with a handsome Latin stud (Antonio Banderas). This is only the first of several shocking revelations, as Gwyn soon learns of infidelity by her father (Paul Mazursky), brother (Kevin Pollack), and even newlywed sister (Carla Gugino). These indiscretions make Gwyn question the validity of the entire institution of marriage and doubt her own future. Director David Frankel, who also penned the screenplay, follows in the footsteps of Woody Allen in using introspective dialogue to detail the romantic troubles of a wealthy, neurotic Jewish family; practiced performances and a colorful use of Miami locations give the film its own personality. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi

A daughter haunted by the memory of a morbid love affair suspects that the man who once seduced her has returned to kill her after eighteen-years after being convicted and imprisoned for murdering her mother. Mother and daughter have both had a torrid love affair with the same man, and in the end the mother paid for the transgression with her life. Though the diabolical seducer was quickly convicted and sent to prison, nearly twenty-years have passed and now the woman who was once a frightened young girl begins to suspect that the man who killer her mother has returned to claim her life as well. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi