Christopher M. Brown Movies
- 1998
Bob "Bulldog" Briscoe (Dan Butler), KACL's resident sports call-in host and all-around jerk, suddenly finds himself being hailed a hero. It seems that a gunman had invaded the restaurant where Bulldog was having a cozy dinner with a woman other than his wife -- and when the dust settled, the criminal had been subdued, apparently as a result of Bulldog's courage. Only Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) knows the real story, and he is all for exposing Briscoe as a philandering coward -- but then he relents figuring that Bulldog will eventually crack under the strain of his own conscience (assuming, of course, that he has one). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1997
The detectives are frustrated when their investigation of an apartment co-op manager's murder leads to a dead end. Things pick up again with the possibility that someone else had been the intended victim. Ultimately, the D.A.'s office goes after a shady loan officer, with Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston) playing fast and loose with legal ethics to secure a prosecution -- much to the dismay of McCoy's partner Ross (Carey Lowell). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Suburbanites from outer space arrive on Earth to clean up the inner city -- strictly for fun -- in this sci-fi-tinged comedy. With the death of his mother, Joseph (Christopher M. Brown) is trying to put his life back on track after several years as a street punk. He decides to turn the family home into a boarding house, but the house happens to be in one of the worst neighborhoods in Los Angeles and Joseph doesn't get many customers. One day Charlie (George Wendt) and Rhonda (Shanna Reed), a cheerful middle-class couple, arrive with their teenage daughter Daphne (Anastasia Sakelaris) looking for a place to stay; Joseph thinks something odd is going on, but given his lack of customers (and Daphne's attractive appearance), he keeps his thoughts to himself. It turns out that something strange is happening, however; Charlie and Rhonda are actually aliens from another planet who have come to Earth on a vacation, and their favorite pastime is hunting and killing the sort of low-life criminals who run rampant in Joseph's neighborhood. Alien Avengers was also released under the title Welcome to Planet Earth. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- George Wendt, Shanna Reed, (more)
- 1996
With his brother Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) out of town, Niles (David Hyde Pierce) subs for him on his daily radio advice show. One of the callers is Reggie McLemore (Lorenzo Newton), a popular basketball player who is going through a slump. After providing some sage off-mic advice for the athlete, Niles soon discovers he has become a celebrity -- but not for the reasons that he might suspect. This episode was rewritten to accommodate the well-publicized "leave of absence" of star Kelsey Grammer, who herein makes but a token appearance. ~ All Movie Guide
- 1995
Detectives Briscoe (Jerry Orbach) and Logan (Chris Noth) dedicate themselves to identifying a young woman who was apparently killed while making a snuff film. They are both shocked and relieved to discover that the so-called victim, teenager Corey Russell (Monica Keena), is still very much alive. But things take another grim turn when it is revealed that Corey is somehow involved in a high school "sex-for-points" club. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1994
Class of 1999, Part 2: The Substitute was (surprise!) a sequel to 1989's Class of 1999--which was itself a sequel of 1982's Class of 1984. Once again, the setting is an embattled high school, where no mere mortal teacher dare walk the corridors. To keep the homicidally-inclined student body in line, a fleet of android teachers are put on the faculty. The robots went ballistic in Class of 1999, inspiring their students to new heights of mayhem. In the sequel, rogue android Sasha Michael, though trained to kill, attempts to try less drastic means to get through to the students. Michael is shadowed by a sinister stranger, who will not be satisfied unless the android does what he (it?) is ordered to do. Like its predecessor, Class of 1999, Part 2: The Substitute is a very hard "R." ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1994
Carl Lumbly stars as an unlikely super-hero in this made-for-television sci-fi movie. Lumbly stars as Dr. Miles Hawkins, a wheel-chair bound scientist who concocts a device that not only liberates him from his chair, but turns him into a crime-fighting super hero. The idea was later developed into a popular TV-series of the same name, also starring Lumbly. ~ Bernadette McCallion, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gina Torres
Originally made for television, this prison drama centers on a hard-core convict who for the past decade has been the king of the other prisoners. Just before he is to be paroled, a young inmate challenges him. This creates considerable tension until he learns that he and the youth are related by more than mere circumstance. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
This debut offering from twin brothers Albert and Allen Hughes was one of the most critically-acclaimed urban crime films to appear in the wake of John Singleton's influential Boyz N the Hood. Set in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles, the film is narrated by 18-year-old Caine (Tyrin Turner), a drug dealer and car thief who lives with his religious grandparents. After graduating from high school, Caine shows no ambition beyond hanging out with his friends, so his grandparents kick him out. Among his other troubles are his best friend O-Dog (Larenz Tate), a vicious thug hunted by the police, and the friends and family of the girl Caine got pregnant and then turned his back on. Perhaps the lone positive influence in his sphere is Ronnie (Jada Pinkett), a single parent struggling to raise her young son without the boy falling prey to the 'hood mentality. When their friendship becomes a love affair, Ronnie tries desperately to convince Caine to move with her to Atlanta; soon afterward, he is shot and nearly dies. After recovering, he accepts Ronnie's offer, but tragedy strikes as they pack their van in preparation to leave. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tyrin Turner, Jada Pinkett Smith, (more)
- 1993
Sipowicz (Dennis Franz) goes after a private eye who may be cheating his client by feeding him with false hopes about his missing child. The father of a 13-year-old murdered in the street seeks out justice on his own when the killer injures LaSalle (Wendy Makkena) and escapes. Will this incident hurt LaSalle's chances of landing a job at a local equal-employment-opportunity office? Real-life NYPD commissioner Raymond Kelly appears, uncredited, as himself. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1992
As the "genius" of the Bundy family (though that's not saying much), Bud (David Faustino) is both surprised and suspicious when his buxom but birdbrained sister Kelly (Christina Applegate) is invited to the "Alpha Club", an organization comprised of geniuses. When it turns out that the nerdy club members have an ulterior motive, Kelly and Bud plot an appropriate revenge. Meanwhile, Peg (Katey Sagal) and Marcy (Amanda Bearse) laugh and laugh while their husbands Al (Ed O'Neill) and Jefferson (Ted McGinley) kill themselves trying to assemble the "Handyman's Workbench 5000." ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1992
- R
A pair of climbers attempts to scale the world's second-largest and most dangerous mountain in this visually impressive but dramatically weak adventure. Skirt-chasing lawyer Taylor Brooks (Michael Biehn) and sedate family man Harold Jamison (Matt Craven) share a love of risky mountain climbing and embark on numerous collaborative expeditions. During one of these climbs, they encounter a team of fellow mountaineers preparing to tackle the legendary Pakistani mountain K2. Brooks immediately becomes obsessed with this task, and he convinces the reluctant Jamison to join the team. The bulk of the film centers on the dangerous climb and even more challenging descent, beset with challenges both natural and human. Though adapted from a stage play by Patrick Myers, the schematic personal dramas take a back seat to cinematographer Gabriel Beristain's overwhelming landscapes, filmed both on location at the real K2 and on a smaller Canadian peak. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Michael Biehn, Matt Craven, (more)
Director Lawrence Kasdan's Grand Canyon is a gathering of random events, uniting the film's wildly divergent protagonists. Driving home from an LA Lakers game, Mack (Kevin Kline), an immigration attorney, is stranded in an unsavory part of town when his car breaks down. He is rescued from a gang of hoods by Simon (Danny Glover), an African-American tow truck driver, inaugurating a friendship between these two men. Mack offers to repay Simon's kindness by helping his sister (Tina Lifford) find an apartment in a better neighborhood, and by arranging a blind date between Simon and Jane (Alfre Woodard), a friend of Mack's secretary Dee (Mary Louise Parker). Woven into this fabric are the tribulations of Mack's best friend, a pompous exploitation movie producer (Steve Martin), who is later wounded in a robbery similar to the one threatening Mack at the beginning of the film; of Mack's wife Claire (Mary McDonnell), who adopts an abandoned baby, and disenfranchised son Roberto (Jeremy Sisto); and of Simon's nephew (Patrick Malone), who is contemplating joining a street gang. The title is symbolic, referring to the class-imposed chasms which would normally separate the characters. Kasdan co-wrote the screenplay with his wife Meg. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Kevin Kline, Danny Glover, (more)
In this suspense drama, a lawyer finds out more than she wanted to know about her friends and lovers. T.K. Katwuller (Barbara Hershey) is a lawyer with a firm command of her career but an unstable hold on her private life; she's more single than she'd like to be, and she's become romantically involved with one of her clients, Steven Seldes (J.T. Walsh), a real estate agent. When T.K. bumps into her college roommate Ellie (Mary Beth Hurt), she discovers that Ellie is Steven's wife, which T.K. hardly regards as welcome news. T.K. then learns that Steven has been accused of financing porn movies dominated by underage actors; after an angry confrontation, she bitterly breaks off the affair. The next day, Steven turns up murdered, and T.K. discovers that Ellie is the prime suspect. She agrees to handle Ellie's case, and Ellie is acquitted. However, T.K.'s conversations with police detective George Beutel (Sam Shepard) begin to plant a seed of doubt in her mind about Ellie's innocence. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Barbara Hershey, Sam Shepard, (more)
- 1991
Frank (Joe Regalbuto), Miles (Grant Shaud) and Jim (Charles Kimbrough) have all elected to get in touch with their inner selves by joining a new men's movement created by Eli White (Brandon Maggart). All of this is a source of great amusement for Murphy, who dismisses the movement as merely a scam. Even so, she agrees to join her male coworkers for a weekend of "bonding"--meaning she'll be the only pregnant person on the premises. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Set during the Watts riots of the mid-'60s, the made-for-cable Heat Wave follows the story of Los Angeles Times reporter Robert Richardson (Blair Underwood), who was the only journalist on staff able to cover the story, since White reporters were unable to gain access to the area and the rioters. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Blair Underwood, Cicely Tyson, (more)
After his brother is badly beaten by a street gang, Jean-Claude Van Damme deserts the foreign legion in order to avenge his honor in this action film also known as A.W.O.L. and Wrong Bet. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jean-Claude Van Damme, Harrison Page, (more)
