Laurencio Cordero Movies
Director Russell Mulcahy takes over for the third chapter in the Resident Evil film franchise, which finds genetically altered Alice (Milla Jovovich) joining forces with Carlos (Oded Fehr) and L.J. (Mike Epps) to take down the Umbrella Corporation once and for all. Upon emerging from her hideout in the Nevada desert, Alice is quickly joined by old friends Carlos and L.J., as well as survivors Claire (Ali Larter), K-Mart (Spencer Locke), and Nurse Betty (Ashanti). Now instilled with super-human strength, senses, and dexterity as a result of the biogenetic experimentation conducted on her by the Umbrella Corporation, Alice and the rest of the survivors set out to eliminate a virus that threatens to turn every living human undead, and ensure that the mysterious organization pays the price for their horrific crimes against humanity. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Milla Jovovich, Oded Fehr, (more)
A shy radio telescope operator named Zane Ziminski (Charlie Sheen) picks up a series of regular signals coming from space -- and deliberately pointed toward Earth. Convinced that he has discovered alien transmissions, Ziminski is first chastised and then fired by his boss (Ron Silver). Obsessed, he builds a makeshift radio telescope in his house to find out where the signals were sent. Convinced that they're intended for aliens already hidden on Earth, he tracks them to a bleak, isolated Mexican village, where he joins forces with a female scientist (Lindsey Crouse), who has suspicions of her own after witnessing an acceleration of global warming. The villagers turn out to be aliens, and the village a front for an underground alien complex. The aliens are here to "terraform" Earth and prepare it for the arrival of the rest of their race, who will die unless they leave their homeworld and colonize elsewhere. Only Ziminski can stop them. Written and directed by David N. Twohy, The Arrival is a throwback to the genre chillers of the '50s. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charlie Sheen, Ron Silver, (more)
Director Clare Peploe (wife of Bernardo Bertolucci) adapted this blend of noir mystery and magical realism from the story Miss Shumway Waves a Wand by James Hadley Chase. Bridget Fonda stars as Myra Shumway, an apprentice to a magician (Kenneth Mars) in 1952 Los Angeles. Myra is unhappily engaged to Cliff Wyatt (D.W. Moffett), a sleazy, Howard Hughes-like uranium heir who wants to run for president. After her fiancée accidentally kills her boss, Myra flees to Mexico in search of a renowned female shaman who may be able to teach her the secrets of magic. Wyatt sends an investigator, Alex Ross (Russell Crowe), to find Myra and bring her back. A former photojournalist traumatized by the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Ross finds Myra but falls for her and joins her on the quest to find the medicine woman, as does Doc Ansell (Jim Broadbent), an eccentric patent medicine salesman seeking an ancient Mayan cure for constipation. During the journey, a series of mystical events occur, including levitation during sex, a dog with the power of speech, a human being laying a blue egg, and the transformation of an assailant into a sausage. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bridget Fonda, Russell Crowe, (more)
- 1993
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This surreal variant on the classic vampire tale is the directorial debut of Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro, who garnered international acclaim and several awards. The film tells the story of elderly antique dealer Jesus Gris (Federico Luppi, in a role originally written for Max Von Sydow) who, with his eight-year-old granddaughter Aurora (Tamara Shanath), discovers an ancient artifact secreted within a statue obtained from the estate of a 16th-century alchemist. Unbeknownst to Gris, the device -- which resembles an ornate, gilded mechanical beetle -- houses an immortal parasite which will grant eternal life to its host. Naturally, there is a terrible price for this gift, which Gris is doomed to discover after the object anchors itself to his body. He begins to develop an extreme aversion to daylight, as well as an agonizing thirst for human blood. To compound matters, dying millionaire Dieter de la Guardia (Claudio Brook) has learned of the device's existence -- thanks to an occult tome obtained from its inventor -- and wishes to obtain it for his own use. To this end he employs his vain, brutish nephew Angel (Ron Perlman) to retrieve it for him. Angel's techniques are less than subtle, and he inevitably winds up killing Gris in his futile search for the artifact... but death is not permanent for the host of the Cronos, and he rises from the mortuary slab to reunite with the long-suffering Aurora. Together they confront de la Guardia and his nephew one last time, hoping to find a way to reverse the horrible process before Gris suffers the same monstrous fate as the device's creator. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Federico Luppi, Ron Perlman, (more)
Dutch (Arnold Schwarzenegger) has a code of honor which he will not violate, even when his life depends on it. Paradoxically, his code of honor gives him the backbone to survive as a military special forces operative when he is sent on a covert mission to rescue another group which was sent in to assist some nefarious U.S. government plan in a Latin American country. Once there, he encounters an old army buddy (Carl Weathers) who has gotten too deep in the CIA's good graces for Dutch's comfort. When he and his team go into the jungle to rescue the others, they get involved in a pitched battle with local guerillas, but they are more than capable of besting these vicious fighters. However, not long after that, they encounter signs that the equally capable men they were sent to rescue were all killed unawares and in an unusually gruesome fashion. Given their training, it should have been impossible for anyone to best all of these commando warriors. Soon, the men from Dutch's own team get picked off one by one, as they grow aware that they are up against something uncanny, not of this world, something that is hunting them for sport. Why? Because their skills make them worthy opponents for the perfectly camouflaged Predator. This carefully paced action movie was given poor reviews by many movie critics, but was sufficiently satisfying for its (largely male) audiences that a successful sequel (Predator 2) was released in 1990. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Arnold Schwarzenegger, Carl Weathers, (more)
Dan Bartlett (John Cusack) is a lovestruck teen who misses his plane to the Caribbean in this engaging comedy. He was to join sweetheart Lori (Wendy Gazelle) and her father Bill (Monte Markham) in the tropical paradise. Determined to get to the island, his efforts are stalled by three natives with a penchant for marijuana. After he shakes the stoners, Dan is captured by the pirate Mac MacClaren (Robert Loggia). He escapes the scurvy buccaneer only to land in jail on bogus charges. Dan later follows his sweetheart to a yacht where her family is being hijacked by another crook. Veteran funnyman Jerry Stiller provides comedy relief. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Cusack, Robert Loggia, (more)
A star-studded cast portrays political movers and shakers in this drama about politics and the media. Richard Gere is Pete St. John, a gilt-edged "image" advisor to the likes of powerful and often crooked politicians -- including a South American candidate for the top office in his country and, reluctantly, a conservative industrialist named Jerome Cade (J.T. Walsh). Cade is after a Senate seat vacated by Sam Hastings (E.G. Marshall), a liberal politician who fits in with the views that Pete once upheld. When things start to go wrong, it looks like Cade's gruff advisor Arnold Billings (Denzel Washington) might hold one of the keys to Pete's discovery of the truth about Cade -- and may be the reason why Hastings is leaving his job. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Gere, Julie Christie, (more)
In yet another slick, formulaic Charles Bronson vengeance film (they would continue until the actor was in his mid-70s, still playing the morally insulted friend/husband/lover), Bronson is Holland, an assassin for hire who has just come out of retirement to finish off a Guatemalan thug by the name of Moloch (Joseph Maher). Moloch tortures and terrorizes the good guys and is protected by a misguided American government agency -- though nothing can stop Holland once he starts killing his way to the chief villain. No one except the wife of one of Moloch's victims -- and perhaps a few viewers now and again -- raises any questions about Holland's trail of corpses. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charles Bronson, Theresa Saldana, (more)
This gripping, emotional story of a roving photographer's transformation from a neutral artist with a camera to an involved human rights activist with a camera begins in Chad, travels to Nicaragua in the early 1980s, and ends when the Nicaraguan dictator Somoza takes off for the palm trees and beaches of Florida. Nick Nolte brilliantly interprets his role as the photographer Russell Price, and Joanna Cassidy is Claire, the radio journalist he meets while in Chad, along with her lover, Time Magazine reporter Alex (Gene Hackman), who ends up opting for a plush job as a TV anchorman and a quiet life on Long Island. When Alex leaves, Claire heads off to the next hot spot, Nicaragua, and Russell decides to tag along -- not because he is that interested in Nicaragua, but because he is interested in Claire. Once in the war-torn, Central American country, it does not take Russell long to see the vast difference between the corrupt, U.S.-backed dictatorship and the struggling guerrilla forces who have been fighting for a decade already. As his eyes are opened, he and Claire decide to go along with the rebels and film their fighting behind the lines. During one battle, the much-venerated rebel leader is shot dead, and Russell reluctantly agrees to fake a photo of the man as though he were still living, so as not to demoralize the army that looks up to him for leadership. The photo appears in the news around the world and causes such a furor that Alex shows up to demand an interview with the leader for national American television. It is on the way to this supposed interview that Alex leaves the car for a moment and is senselessly shot and killed by a government soldier, the whole episode filmed for the world by Russell's camera. This outrage (which actually occurred when journalist Bill Stewart was inhumanly shot by a Somoza soldier in full view of the video camera) soon makes global news and helps to hasten the overthrow of the corrupt dictatorship. Meanwhile, Russell has new issues to consider once his camera has become an "active" and not a "passive" observer of political unrest. René Enriquéz who plays the dictator Somoza in this film is a native Nicaraguan, related to a newspaper reporter killed by Somoza's government. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nick Nolte, Gene Hackman, (more)
- 1982
In this average, made for pay-TV adventure yarn loosely based on Arthur Conan Doyle's Challenger's Gold, the archaeologist Dr. Christopher Falcon (John Marley) is called away from a dig in an Arab country to assess a startling find in Mexico, with the usual dangerous results. When he arrives, he immediately sees that among the uncovered items is a fertility goddess that was once part of a group of precious objects missing since a devastating, 17th-century earthquake. Determined to find the rest of the treasure -- also vaunted as having supernatural powers -- he sets out on an expedition funded by Murdoch (George Touliatos) a suspicious-looking, but super-rich business tycoon. Along for the ride are Falcon's daughter Tracey (Louise Vallance), a spirited British journalist (Simon MacCorkindale), and their guide, the attractive B.G. Alvarez (Blanca Guerra). Following in quick succession like the old-fashioned serials in the Saturday matinees are moments of betrayal, disaster, sudden change, and various sexual encounters. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Marley, Simon MacCorkindale, (more)
- 1979
Jake (Charles Grodin), an insurance investigator, is assigned to probe the killing of a wealthy businessman in Acapulco. To help him, he hires a beautiful New York model, Ellie (Farah Fawcett), to act as his wife, and they pretend to be tourists on vacation. Art Carney plays Marcus, a local detective who befriends Jake but gets him into various scrapes. Joan Collins also appears as the suspicious Nera. Sunburn was a made-for-TV movie which featured a pop-song soundtrack blaring from characters' tape recorders that included tunes by Herbie Hancock. The movie was based on the novel The Bind by Stanley Ellin. ~ Michael Betzold, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Farrah Fawcett-Majors, Charles Grodin, (more)
- 1972
- R
In this women's prison exploitation item from director Michel Levesque (Werewolves on Wheels), sexy Phyllis Davis stars as Sugar, framed for drug possession and sent to a Costa Rican sugar plantation. There, Sugar encounters sadistic guards including The Hills Have Eyes' James Whitworth and a mad scientist (Angus Duncan) who injects the inmates with hallucinogens. The usual violence and copious nudity are on display for devotees. Blaxploitation fans will recognize prisoner Ella Edwards from Detroit 9000 and Timothy Brown from The Dynamite Brothers Co-writer Stephanie Rothman later directed Terminal Island, also starring Davis. ~ Robert Firsching, All Movie Guide
- 1970
Tarzan (Ron Ely) tries to stop a bloodthirsty Colonel (Jock Mahoney) from taking over an African village with his soldiers of fortune. The ape-man has been rendered deaf by an exploding hand grenade, effectively limiting one of his keen senses. Tarzan relies on his telepathic powers to stop a lion. Woody Strode also appears in this film that combines two made for television episodes. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Ron Ely, Jock Mahoney, (more)
