Rick Bota Movies
Clive Barker's sinister creation Pinhead returns again in this horror outing, the eighth feature in the Hellraiser franchise. A handful of teenagers have become big fans of the latest Hellraiser video game -- so much so that they create a tribute website called "Hellworld.com," which simulates a digital Lament Configuration in cyberspace. However, Pinhead (Doug Bradley) is not at all happy with this turn of events, and decides to take action agaist the young people, luring them to a "party" where their frightening fantasies become a far more disturbing reality. Hellraiser: Hellworld also stars Lance Henriksen, Katheryn Winnick, Christopher Jacot, and Henry Cavill. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Doug Bradley, Katheryn Winnick, (more)
The cenobites are back and they're bringing an army of the dead to create hell on earth on the latest installment of the long-running Hellraiser series. After viewing a mysterious videotape showcasing a shocking act of death and resurrection, undercover reporter Amy Klein (Kari Wuhrer) soon learns of an underground group who possesses the power to restore life to the dead. Soon deeply entangled in the group's malevolent experiments with the afterlife, Amy finds herself caught in a life-or-death struggle that threatens to tear her soul apart. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Doug Bradley, Kari Wuhrer, (more)
When the puzzle box is solved and the gates of hell are cast open, an old nemesis must prevent the fearsome Cenobites from turning the Earth into a flaming pit of eternal torment in this installment of the long-running Hellraiser series. In his entire demonic history, only Kirsty Cotton (Ashley Lawrence) has ever had the power to defeat the mighty Pinhead (Doug Bradley). Now that the puzzle has been solved again, Pinhead is back, and Kirsty must summon the powers of light to defeat the fury of hell and send her old nemesis screaming into the fire. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
The novel of the same name by author Tom Savage becomes this horror film starring Marley Shelton as Kate Davies. Kate's in a troubled relationship with journalist Adam Carr (David Boreanaz), a problem drinker, but she receives support from her best friends, the same four girls she's known since grade school: Paige Prescott (Denise Richards), Dorothy Wheeler (Jessica Capshaw), Lily Voight (Jessica Cauffel), and Shelly Fisher (Katherine Heigl). When Shelly is murdered and the other girls begin receiving gruesome Valentine's Day cards signed "JM," they begin to speculate that the killer could be an awkward schoolmate named Jeremy Melton, whom they once teased mercilessly at a school dance, leading to his beating and humiliation. Dorothy in particular is afraid that a false accusation she made against Jeremy might be causing him to seek bloody retribution, but the macho detective (Fulvio Cecere) assigned to investigate Shelly's murder has some other suspects in mind. As the body count is racked up and Dorothy's lavish Valentine's Day party approaches, Kate begins to suspect that the true identity of Jeremy, who likely underwent plastic surgery to alter his appearance, could hit very close to home. Valentine is the second slasher flick from Urban Legend (1998) director Jamie Blanks. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- David Boreanaz, Denise Richards, (more)
This long-delayed science fiction thriller from director Gary Fleder was actually filmed prior to his box-office hit Don't Say a Word (2001), which preceded it in theaters by several months. Based on a 1953 short story by Philip K. Dick, the film shares that schizophrenic author's long-running obsessions with concealed identity and humanity's potential inferiority to alternative life forms. Gary Sinise stars as Spencer John Olham, a respected government scientist in the year 2079 trying to devise a secret weapon that will help his fellow humans win a decade-long war with invading aliens that are cloning human subjects and using the replicas as walking time bombs. Suddenly, Olham is accused of being an alien spy and a nationwide manhunt to capture him ensues. With even his doctor wife (Madeleine Stowe) unsure that she can trust him, Olham must uncover the truth on his own, even as he's relentlessly pursued by Hathaway (Vincent D'Onofrio), a federal agent charged with destroying the clones. Imposter has a complicated history, originally produced in early 2000 as a 30-minute short to be included in an anthology entitled "The Light Years Trilogy," a project that never got off the ground. So impressed was Dimension Films with the completed piece, however, that the footage was incorporated into a new feature version. That film was then shuffled around the release schedule for more than a year as effects were completed, reshoots were ordered, and the film was recut for a PG-13 rating instead of its original R. The R-rated "director's cut" was later released on DVD. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gary Sinise, Madeleine Stowe, (more)
After the success of Scream, I Know What You Did Last Summer, and television's Dawson's Creek, screenwriter Kevin Williamson made his directorial debut with this screwball thriller in which an honor roll student and two friends kidnap their witchy teacher. Although her single mom (Lesley Ann Warren), a waitress, struggles to make ends meet, aspiring writer Leigh Ann Watson (Katie Holmes) works hard, avoids sexual temptation, and focuses on her studies. She hopes to make valedictorian and earn a scholarship to college -- and get away from her dead-end hometown. As her senior year draws to a close, however, she's dogged by harsh grades from her vituperative history instructor, Mrs. Tingle (Helen Mirren). On the same day she finds out that she's still in second place behind fellow valedictory candidate Mary Beth Carter (Liz Stauber), Leigh Ann must endure Mrs. Tingle's fierce criticism of the final project into which she's poured her heart. After commiserating with her best friend, aspiring actress Jo Lynn Jordan (Marisa Coughlan), and hunky stoner Luke Churner (Barry Watson), Leigh Ann runs even further afoul of Mrs. Tingle; Luke stashes an advance copy of the teacher's final exam in Leigh Ann's backpack and Tingle discovers it, promising to turn Leigh Ann in for cheating and ruin her chances of a better life. When the three teens turn up at Tingle's house to try to reason with her, Luke and Jo Lynn manage to accidentally kidnap Mrs. Tingle. Soon the three students are keeping their teacher a prisoner, trying to figure out how to blackmail her into silence while maintaining the illusion that nothing strange is going on. Teaching Mrs. Tingle was filmed under the name "Killing Mrs. Tingle," but the title was changed after a rash of real-life high school killing sprees made the headlines. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Helen Mirren, Katie Holmes, (more)
In this remake of William Castle's campy 1958 classic, an eccentric millionaire named Steven Price invites a diverse group of people to a reputedly haunted mansion that was formerly the site of an insane asylum. Steven offers his guests $1,000,000 each if they can spend the entire night at the old house without fleeing in terror. It sounds simple enough, but when those stories about ghosts haunting the mansion turn out to be true, the guests may no longer opt to stick around. In this version, Steven is played by Geoffrey Rush, and his guests include Jeffrey Combs, Taye Diggs, Peter Gallagher, Chris Kattan, and Bridgette Wilson; Famke Janssen plays Evelyn Price. Sadly, this remake does not feature the original's memorable special-effects gimmick, "Emergo," an inflatable plastic skeleton that rolled on wires through the theater during showings. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, (more)
While one would imagine that the average New Yorker would be used to dealing with bugs after years of apartment dwelling, a scientific experiment gone wrong results in an insect that even Raid can't handle in this sci-fi/horror thriller. In Manhattan, cockroaches are spreading a deadly disease that is claiming hundreds of the city's children, so entomologist Susan Tyler (Mira Sorvino) uses genetic engineering techniques to create what she and her colleague (and husband) Peter Mann (Jeremy Northam) call the Judas Breed, a large insect that will feed on the disease carrying roaches. Since the Judas bugs have been designed so that they can't breed, the mutated species should die out in a matter of a few years. However, Susan, Peter, and their staff severely underestimated the cockroach's ability to adapt to its conditions. The Judas Breed has indeed found a way to reproduce itself, but more importantly, the insect has grown remarkably large (sometimes reaching six feet in length), has developed a taste for meat, and can mimic the appearance and behavior of other creatures with uncanny accuracy -- including humans. Susan and Peter have learned that huge swarms of the Judas Breed are living beneath the city in the subway system, and with the help of Leonard (Charles S. Dutton), a transit system employee who knows the labyrinth of subway tunnels like the back of his hand, they search out the humanoid insects before they can take over the city. Mimic also features Giancarlo Giannini, Josh Brolin, and F. Murray Abraham. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mira Sorvino, Jeremy Northam, (more)
This thriller is adapted from the 1995 novel by James Patterson about a serial killer prowling a Southern university. Washington, D.C., forensic psychologist Dr. Alex Cross (Morgan Freeman) is also a best-selling author. After his niece Naomi (Gina Ravera) is reported missing, he heads his Porsche for Durham, North Carolina, where eight young women have been reported missing. Bodies are found by local policemen (Cary Elwes and Alex McArthur), along with the killer's signature, "Casanova." Casanova is a "collector" of strong-willed women who are forced to submit to his demands. Soon, local doctor Kate McTiernan (Ashley Judd) is abducted from her home and taken to a dungeon -- where other women are imprisoned in underground chambers. After McTiernan succeeds in escaping, she joins Cross and other detectives in the search for Casanova -- a trail that leads to Los Angeles, where similar crimes are being committed by someone known as "The Gentleman Caller." Are these two criminals in competition with each other or are they working together? ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Morgan Freeman, Ashley Judd, (more)
Two cops with almost nothing in common find themselves brought together to capture a psychotic murderer in this action thriller. Jack Cole (Steven Seagal) was once a government intelligence operative known as "The Glimmer Man," because he could move so quickly and quietly that his victims would only see a glimmer before they died. Having left international espionage behind him, Cole -- steeped in Eastern mysticism and not used to working with others -- has become a detective with the Los Angeles Police Department, where he's paired up with Jim Campbell (Keenen Ivory Wayans), a tough, no-nonsense cop with a weakness for weepy movies (Casablanca is one of his favorites) and little patience for Cole's New Age philosophies and outsider attitude. Cole and Campbell have to set aside their differences when they're assigned to track down a serial killer the press has dubbed "The Family Man," for his habit of dispatching entire households at once. However, when the Family Man's latest victims turn out to be Cole's former wife and her current husband, Campbell learns about Cole's secret past, and they both think that Cole's former bosses may somehow be involved with this current crime wave. Leading man Seagal also wrote and played guitar on several blues-based songs that appear on the film's soundtrack. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Steven Seagal, Keenen Ivory Wayans, (more)
Set in the year 2017, Barb Wire takes place after democracy has fallen and a fascist military junta has taken over the U.S. government, plotting to wipe out the country with Red Ribbon, a laboratory-manufactured disease derived from the AIDS virus. The entire test city of Topeka has been annihilated, and only the small bastion of Steel Harbor remains the last free zone in the country, conveniently the home of the title heroine Pamela Lee. Barb, a leather-clad, silicon-stretched motorcycle mama, happens to carry antibodies for Red Ribbon in her DNA, thus making her an enemy of the state. She sets out to defend freedom and take down the evil government by posing as a stripper and seducing foolish male adversaries with her well-displayed assets. The plot thickens as she happens upon her freedom-fighter ex-lover and his wife (much in the vein of Casablanca). ~ Jeremy Beday, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Pamela Anderson, Temuera Morrison, (more)
A nubile young babysitter (Alicia Silverstone) has no idea that she is the center of a maelstrom of male sexual fantasies. Based on a disturbing short story by Robert Coover, the drama presents a non-linear account of a perfectly mundane event. Having a social engagement, a couple calls for their babysitter. She arrives, they go out, her boyfriend comes over, and the weirdness begins -- for director Guy Ferland makes little distinction between the character fantasies and what is really occurring. Something will happen, and then it will happen again; only the outcome is different. What makes this dark film so disturbingly creepy is that none of the males involved, neither the frustrated boyfriend, the horny husband who hired her, or even her little charge has nice fantasies about her. The film contains several sexual scenes and some scenes of violence. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Alicia Silverstone, Jeremy London, (more)
This first theatrical feature spun off from the television series Tales from the Crypt (which was in turn inspired by the infamous EC horror comics of the 1950s) concerns a mysterious man named Brayker (Bill Sadler), who arrives at a church-turned-rooming house in a small town in New Mexico. Hot on his trail is an equally mysterious and very menacing figure known as the Collector (Billy Zane), who arrives with policemen in tow; he claims that Brayker stole some keys from him, and he wants the cops to help him reclaim them. It turns out, however, that the "keys" are actually several amulets that contain drops of the blood of Christ; they can be used to ward off evil in the right hands, but they can lead the world to doom if used improperly. The Collector and his forces lay siege to the house with the other residents caught in the middle between Brayker and the Collector, including alcoholic Uncle Willy (Dick Miller), prostitute Cordelia (Brenda Bakke), sleazy Southerner Roach (Thomas Haden Church), postal employee Wally (Charles Fleischer), sensible Jeryline (Jada Pinkett), and landlady Irene (CCH Pounder). Bordello of Blood, the second Tales from the Crypt feature, hit theaters the following year. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Billy Zane, Bill Sadler, (more)
- 1992
- R
When a well-known music-video star turns up dead, it is up to her sister and an inexperienced police officer to track down the killer. ~ Iotis Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- 1992
Like its theatrical-feature precursor Not Without My Daughter, the made-for-TV Desperate Rescue is based on a true story, though it would appear that several liberties have been taken. Mariel Hemingway plays a young mother whose daughter Lindsay Haun is abducted by Andrew Masset, Mariel's Jordanian ex-husband. Masset takes the girl back to his native Jordan, beyond the reach of the US authorities. Denied aid and comfort by the American government, Mariel takes matters into her own hands, hiring ex-Delta Force commandos Clancy Brown, Jeff Kober and James Russo to muscle their way into Jordan and rescue Lindsay. Based on an article by David Halevy and Neil C. Livingstone, Desperate Rescue premiered January 18, 1993: its title at that time was Desperate Rescue: The Cathy Mahone Story. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mariel Hemingway, Clancy Brown, (more)
- 1991
Action hero Don "The Dragon" Wilson appears in this third, quickie sequel to Bloodfist. Wilson plays Jimmy Boland, who has been sentenced to a California maximum-security prison for a murder that he didn't commit. When he sees some black prison inmates sodomizing his friend, he flies into a rage and kills the gang leader. The prison warden, in an effort to do Jimmy in, transfers him to the black wing of the prison, where he is sure the black prisoners will dispatch him quickly. This looks to be a safe bet, since the gang member Jimmy had killed was a drug supplier to Blue, the leader of the black prison gang. Wheelhead, a white inmate and leader of a group of white supremacists, takes Jimmy under his wing and offers Jimmy support if he joins the gang. Jimmy refuses, preferring to stay neutral. Meanwhile, Jimmy warms up to his cellmate Stark (Richard Roundtree), and Stark invites Jimmy to join a multi-racial group of prisoners who tend the rooftop prison garden. Jimmy has managed to maintain his neutrality, but at a price. Now both Blue and Wheelhead want to see him dead. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Richard Roundtree, (more)
- 1991
A made for TV movie, on the surface it is the story of a young, slightly retarded girl who has been cared for by her sister. When the girl wins the lottery, her recovering alcoholic Mother is suddenly on the scene again. Amy Madigan's portrayal of the over-protective sister of the lucky winner is an interesting psychological study. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Amy Madigan, Chloe Webb, (more)
- 1991
Actress Susan Ruttan, who played the quietly efficient legal secretary on LA Law, does an artistic about-face in the TV movie Deadly Medicine. She plays a Texas pediatrics nurse who may have committed several "mercy killings" of her charges. 43 babies die under mysterious circumstances, with Ms. Ruttan seemingly always lurking in the corridor. When confronted by doctor Veronica Hamel, Susan threatens to accuse Ms. Hamel of the murders--and she does, with astonishing success. Though constructed like a network "mystery of the week", Deadly Medicine is founded on fact. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
