Peter Barsocchini Movies

High School Musical 3: Senior Year continues the ongoing tune-filled love story between basketball player Troy Bolton (Zac Efron) and brainy beauty Gabriella Montez (Vanessa Anne Hudgens). As they head toward high-school graduation, the couple realizes that they'll be separated when they head to different colleges in the fall, so they join with their friends to produce a spring musical that will help them express their hopes and fears about the future. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

The captain of the East High basketball team and the key member of the academic club shock the student body by teaming to audition for the upcoming school musical in a Disney Channel Original Movie that's all about being yourself and following your dreams. Troy (Zac Efron) is best known as the player who keeps the East High basketball team on the scoreboard. Of course, life isn't always about athletics, though, and as Troy slam-dunks on the boards, beautiful and brainy Gabriella (Vanessa Anne Hudgens) is raising the reputation of East High as the key member of the school's successful academic team. Despite their outgoing natures, no one would ever peg Troy and Gabriella as theater types. When word gets out that this popular pair has secretly chosen to reach for the stars and try their luck on the stage, the students of East High are about to learn an important lesson in teamwork while gearing up for a musical performance that will have their audience dancing in the aisles. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

A Cuban woman who escapes to America finds herself in political, financial, and romantic jeopardy in this taut drama. Cuban refugee Isabel (Greta Scacchi) flees her country and makes her way to Miami after her husband, Nestor (Jimmy Smits), a political activist, is sentenced to a long stay in a Cuban jail. In their dangerous voyage to the United States, Isabel and her daughter are rescued by Sam (Vincent D'Onofrio), a fisherman from Miami; Sam helped Isabel find her way in her new home, and a romance blossoms between the two. However, when Nestor is finally released from prison eight years later and escapes to Miami to be with his wife, he discovers that Isabel's affections are now divided between himself and Sam, while his daughter barely remembers or recognizes him. Danger faces all three sides of this romantic triangle; Sam is asked to use his boat to smuggle Cuban dissidents into Miami, Nestor falls in with a radical fringe group hoping to stage an armed invasion of Cuba, and Isabel, who has become involved with a numbers racket, is in deep trouble after several massive payments were made to someone who never placed a bet. Fires Within was also shown under the title Little Havana; it premiered in Miami, appropriately enough, in its short-lived theatrical release. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi