Paul Hipp Movies

Directed by actor D.B. Sweeney, Two Tickets to Paradise tells the story of three lifelong friends who are each facing problems of their own. Mark has developed a serious gambling problem that is beginning to hamper his marriage, as well as his relationship with his child. McGriff can't shed his dreams of becoming a famous rock star even though he has a loving and supportive wife. Jason refuses to grow up, and still lives with his parents. When the three men escape their various responsibilities to go see a big college football game, their trip teaches them lessons about the maturing they each need to do. ~ Perry Seibert, All Movie Guide

In the wake of his rise to power, Adolf Hitler became known as perhaps the most villainous and destructive political leader of the 20th century. But what was he like before he formed the Nazi party? Screenwriter and director Menno Meyjes explores that question in this drama, a work of fiction keyed to the fact that Hitler unsuccessfully pursued a career as an artist following World War I. In 1918, Max Rothman (John Cusack) is a former artist who lost an arm during the war. While Max can no longer create, his eye for talent is as keen as ever, so he has become a successful art dealer, specializing in Modernists such as George Grosz. Max's success has brought him a fine home and a beautiful wife, Nina (Molly Parker); he's also acquired a mistress, Liselore (Leelee Sobieski), a lovely young woman with artistic aspirations of her own. One day, Max meets Adolf Hitler (Noah Taylor), an emotionally intense, fellow war veteran who has found himself penniless in Munich. Adolf fancies himself an artist, and while Max isn't especially impressed with his technique, he sees in him a burning passion and a desire to communicate, so he encourages Adolf to express his demons through his art. While Adolf takes Max's advice to heart and strikes up a friendship with him, Max's friends find Adolf's open advocation of anti-Semitism rather troubling; Max, who is Jewish, simply chalks Adolf's attitudes up to unpleasant wartime experiences. But as Adolf immerses himself more deeply into his political interests and his thoughts on social engineering, he begins to leave painting behind in favor of a more interesting art form, the political arena. Max marked the first directorial effort of noted screenwriter Meyjes. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Season nine of ER begins ten minutes after season eight left off, with the County General ER still in lockdown in the face of a possible smallpox epidemic. Though most of the patients and staffers have been evacuated, a handful are quarantined at the ER for two weeks, among them Carter (Noah Wyle), Abby (Maura Tierney), Chen (Ming-Na), and Pratt (Mekhi Phifer), now a full-fledged series regular. In the midst of the chaos and confusion, Carter and Abby have managed to find the opportunity to lock lips, thereby inaugurating a whole new phase in their relationship. Meanwhile, on the roof of the hospital, Romano (Paul McCrane) throws another temper tantrum, with disastrous consequences when, in mid-rant, he backs into the tail rotor of a helicopter. And in faraway London, the newly widowed Elizabeth Corday (Alex Kingston) has joined her father's business -- but may now be too "Americanized" for her family's tastes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A man finds his melancholy turning to madness in this thriller. Young lawyer Fielding Pierce (Billy Crudup) has just thrown his hat in the ring for an upcoming congressional election. He has also been haunted by the memory of his girlfriend Sarah (Jennifer Connelly), who recently died in a car bombing -- and haunted not just figuratively but literally: he's seeing apparitions of Sarah everywhere, and he's starting to wonder if she's really there or if he's going mad. Waking the Dead is based on a novel by Scott Spencer, who also wrote Endless Love, and directed by actor-turned-filmmaker Keith Gordon. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Jon Reiss made his feature directorial debut with this psychological drama. In Los Angeles, Hallie (Bitty Schram) keeps her photographer husband Robert (Paul Hipp) under her thumb, dictating sex on demand. She ignores Robert's weak protests when she allows friends of friends to occupy their house during their upstate New York vacation. Back in L.A., they find the couple let their fish die amid a messy house. Nevertheless, since inconsiderate Zack (Boyd Kestner) and sexy Sophie (Rhada Mitchell) haven't made much of an effort to find a place of their own, Hallie and Robert let them stick around -- despite the couple's crude manners and loud sex sessions. However, when Hallie sees Robert has fallen for Sophie, she explodes and exits. A few minutes later, Sophie also splits. Echoes of Harold Pinter's The Servant (1963) reverb and demented behavior rises to the surface as the two men then struggle for dominance. Reiss claims he found the premise for this script from a real-life incident when he loaned his house to filmmaker Amos Poe and came back some weeks later to find the fish dead. The title, says Reiss, is a reference to Marc Antony's relationship with Cleopatra. Shown at the 1998 L.A. Independent Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

In this drama, a drug smuggler makes a devil's bargain with government authorities: she will go undercover to solve the murder of a girl involved in a sex ring in exchange for the release of her incarcerated lover (who is also her half-brother). ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Cult figure Abel Ferrara directed this dark, emotional tale of life among the criminal underworld, set in the late 1930s. The Tempio Brothers -- Ray (Christopher Walken), Chez (Chris Penn), and Johnny (Vincent Gallo) -- work with the mob; Ray is the cool and methodical type, Chez is an angry man who tends to fly off the handle, and Johnny is the odd man out, whose work with labor unions has given him a strong interest in socialism. When Johnny is murdered by rival mobster Gaspare (Benicio del Toro), it has a profound effect on his brothers. Ray is determined to seek revenge, even though his wife Jeanette (Anabella Sciorra), realizing a reprisal will only lead to more violence, begs him to reconsider, while Chez begins losing his tenuous grip on reality, causing no small discomfort for his wife Clara (Isabella Rossellini). In time, both brothers are forced to deal with the ugly repercussions of their family's long-standing criminal lifestyle. Chris Penn's performance as Chez earned him the "Best Actor" trophy at the 1996 Venice Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Paull Hipp plays "Dangerous" Dan O'Dare an entertaining radio host who gets locked up in the station's control room when an alien being takes over the broadcast. The being starts mesmerizing attractive female listeners with jivy tunes and then uses some sort of transmission contraption to shrink the listening lasses and transport them to the station, where they're placed in foot-high bottles. Apparently, he intends to take them back with him to wherever he came from. While all this goes on, the locked up DJ O'Dare is broadcasting the goings-on, but everybody listening thinks its another of the over-the-airwaves pranks that he's famous for. When a TV reporter named Lisa (Martha Quinn) shows up, the alien wants to bottle her up too, but O'Dare sees how the alien does it, and figures out a way to thwart his kidnapping scheme. ~ All Movie Guide

If police lieutenant Harvey Keitel's life could get any more sordid, he could probably sell tickets. The least of his vices is gambling, which has gotten him in Dutch with the mob. He abuses his body with drugs and his soul with hookers, and now he's turned to exploiting teenage girls for sex. Keitel is forced to reassess his life while investigating the rape of a nun. Director Abel Ferrara co-wrote the screenplay with Zoe Lund, who as Zoe Tamerlis starred in Ferrara's cult classic Ms. 45. A soundtrack tune by rapper Schoolly D, which was included in the initial release of Bad Lieutenant, featured a sample from Led Zeppelin which was used without permission; the song has since been excised from the soundtrack. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This screwball urban comedy is about two dippy roommates, struggling musicians Lolly (Melanie Mayron) and Hattie (Helen Slater), who are asked by an equally spacey, drug-dealing friend-of-a-friend Diane (Loretta Devine) to baby-sit a bag containing nearly a million dollars while she scoots out of town in order to avoid trouble. Once the money is in their possession, however, temptation proves too much for Lolly and Hattie, who use the ill-gotten cash to pay the rent, buy new instruments, and embark on a shopping spree for earrings, clothes, and shoes. While the girls dig themselves deeper into trouble with every dollar spent, they also encounter a variety of eccentric characters, including a fellow musician (Danitra Vance), their ailing landlady (Eileen Brennan), Lolly's boyfriend (Christopher Guest), and a parking lot attendant (Stephen McHattie). The latter, however, is actually a cop who's keeping surveillance on them from across the street. Mayron co-wrote the script for Sticky Fingers (1988) with actress and first-time director Catlin Adams. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide