Bob Gould Movies

Alan Rudolph wrote and directed this typically off-beat drama. A brief romantic liaison between a wealthy European and an American ballet dancer results in a pair of identical twins, who are separated and raised by others shortly after birth. Henry (Matthew Modine) was adopted by Pete (M. Emmet Walsh), an auto mechanic, and Henry grows up to follow in his Pete's footsteps. Emotionally fragile, Henry is in a relationship with Beverly (Lara Flynn Boyle), a rich but painfully shy woman who is terrified by sex. Henry, however, finds his own sexual appetite increasing, and he becomes involved with Rosie (Marisa Tomei), a prostitute living in his neighborhood. Meanwhile, Henry's brother, Freddy (also played by Matthew Modine), lives in the same city, though they've never met. Freddy is a gangster and hired killer working for crime kingpin Mr. Paris (Fred Ward). While Freddy is cool and confident on the surface, deep down he hates his job and tells his wife, Sharon (Lori Singer), that he wishes he had enough money to quit and move away. As fate would have it, Freddy and Henry's mother, who sank into a severe depression after losing her children and her lover, has died, leaving a substantial fortune to her two sons, who must now meet in order to collect their inheritance. Equinox premiered at the 1992 Seattle Film Festival, though it would not open theatrically until a year later. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

This exciting sci-fi thriller chronicles the further adventures of a 1943 sailor who is thrust into the mid 1980s during an experiment in time travel. Still stuck in his future, the sailor marries and starts a family. His wife dies, and afterward, he begins suffering blinding headaches. Worried, he goes to the scientist responsible for getting him to the future and learns that the scientist has again been toying with his invention. Once again the sailor is caught in a time warp and awakens to find himself several years in the future. By the early '90s, the world has changed dramatically. Now the U.S. is a military state. The sailor cares little for the world's sorry state and is only interested in returning to the '80s to be with his son. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In this satirical skewering of the lifestyles of the rich and famous, a divorced Beverly Hills gal ends up on the doorstep of her next-door neighbor, an out-of-work TV sitcom actress who happens to have a socially eclectic group of friends and a deceased husband who can't accept the fact that he is dead. The topic of conversation is sex, and before long, a wager between servants sets the sexual escapades into action. ~ All Movie Guide

Director Alan Rudolph's 1989 model mood piece stars Tom Berenger as shabby private eye Harry Dobbs, who is hired by the mysterious Miss Dolan (Anne Archer). Dolan wants Dobbs to tail her abusive boyfriend, Rick (Neil Young). Dobbs immediately demonstrates his uncanny powers of detection by trailing the wrong man (Ted Levine), whose story turns out to be far more fascinating than Rick's. Meanwhile, Dobbs is himself pursued by female P.I. Stella Wynkowski (Elizabeth Perkins), which hardly pleases Dobbs' jealous girlfriend, Doris (Ann Magnuson). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the expatriate-littered Paris of the 1920s, painter Nick Hart (Keith Carradine) mingles with Ernest Hemingway (Kevin O'Connor) and other leading lights of the Lost Generation while palling around with gossip columnist Oiseau (Wallace Shawn), whose reportage has helped establish the international reputation of the writers and artists who fled America for France after WWI. Older and less successful than many of his fellow painters, Hart relies on gallery owner Libby Valentin (Genevieve Bujold) to sell what she can of his work while he supports himself drawing cartoons for Oiseau's weekly column. In a café one day, Hart spies Rachel Stone (Linda Fiorentino) on the arm of her husband, Bertram (John Lone), a condom magnate and art patron who's trying to buy his way into society. It seems Hart and Rachel share a romantic past of which Stone is completely unaware. At the salon of writers Gertrude Stein (Elsa Raven) and Alice B. Tolkas (Ali Giron), Hart suffers a nasty run-in with the Stones and meets Nathalie de Ville (Geraldine Chaplin), a rich socialite who wants to steal three paintings from her estranged husband. Nathalie plies Hart with sexual favors and the promise of cash in exchange for his help in forging copies of the paintings. Although he's loath to follow in the footsteps of his father, a gifted forger, Hart acquiesces, and soon his rivalry with Stone and his involvement with the forgeries leads to death, destruction, and scandal in the art world. Bujold, Shawn, Chaplin, and Carradine are all regular collaborators of iconoclastic director Alan Rudolph, who filmed The Moderns in Montréal and would go on to lens the similarly intellectual Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide

Alan Rudolph directed this offbeat, boy-meets-girl romance in which boy dies, dead boy meets dead girl, dead boy loses dead girl, and dead boy tries to find dead girl again. The tale begins is a small Pennsylvania town, where Mike Shea (Timothy Hutton) dreams of escaping small town life and moving to California with his girlfriend Brenda (Mare Winningham). But Brenda leaves him with his motor running and Mike takes off alone. On the way, he rescues a woman and her children from an icy river but perishes himself. He finds himself in Heaven, where he is greeted by Aunt Lisa (Maureen Stapleton), who explains the rules and regulations. Once in the ethereal realm, Mike falls in love with a heavenly lass with flaxen locks named Annie (Kelly McGillis). But their love is torn asunder because Annie has not yet earned her wings on Earth; she must leave on a tour of duty and put in time inhabiting a human body. Mike is beside himself in despair, but the heavenly powers, in the form of Emmett (Debra Winger), chain-smoking and sporting an orange crewcut like a ghostly Laurie Anderson, offer him a deal. Mike can return to Earth, but only on the stipulation that neither he nor Annie will remember each other. They then have thirty years in which to find one another again. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

This psychodrama is set in New Zealand during the 1880s and is based on the true story of an orphaned 18-year-old who marries a cruel, much-older man. He constantly abuses her and keeps her under his thumb until she snaps and using hypnotism, kills him. Later she is tried in court. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The lives of five L.A. natives intertwine in this romantic comedy from independent filmmaker and former Robert Altman protégé Alan Rudolph. Eve (Lesley Ann Warren) is a bar owner who has sworn off permanent commitments, seeking only the temporary sexual satisfaction of men. Her roommate Ann (Genevieve Bujold) is her polar opposite. In reality, Ann is secretly the radio sex therapist Dr. Nancy Love, but she has little romantic experience despite her profession. Into their lives comes Mickey (Keith Carradine), a recent mental patient who might be an enigmatic pathological liar. Though she's powerfully attracted to Mickey, Eve's kept at arm's length by her lover Zack (Patrick Bauchau), a married man whose wife (Rae Dawn Chong) also finds Mickey irresistible. When Nancy sleeps with Mickey, he proposes marriage, but she rejects him, though the assignation does have a positive effect on her radio show. Considered Rudolph's seminal work, Choose Me (1984) was the third in a thematically-linked trilogy from the quirky low-budget director, the first two being Welcome to L.A. (1977) and Remember My Name (1978). ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

This low-budget ($18,000) amateur, black-and-white film ostensibly tells the story of Benjamin Steiner (Bob Gould) who walks around Los Angeles looking for someone to kill, though he never seems able to make up his mind about which victim looks best. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide