John Houseman Movies

This quietly compelling film explores the hardships and anxieties of high school with intelligence, sensitivity, warmth and humor. Chris Makepeace stars as a shy, bookish student who has recently moved to Chicago and begun a new school. There he finds himself the target of a group of punks led by Matt Dillon (ideally cast as the weasel-like bully), who threaten him each day to turn over his lunch money for protection...or else. When he stands up to them, he nearly loses his dental work before being saved by Ricky Lindemann (Adam Baldwin), a hulking loner rumored to have murdered his own brother. Makepeace offers the boy a job as his bodyguard, and the two become unlikely friends -- that is, until the ousted bullies find a champion of their own who challenges Lindemann. When Lindemann refuses to fight back, he disappears into reclusion, and the bullying begins anew, worse than ever. Makepeace then learns the truth about Lindemann's past: he did indeed kill his brother, but the death was an accident while the two young boys were playing with a gun, and Lindemann lives tortured by guilt as a result. Just when things seem at their worst, the bodyguard returns to face his nemesis as Makepeace and Dillon square off in the final showdown of good versus evil. The real strength of the film is its handling of the relationships between its characters, particularly between Makepeace and Baldwin, and Makepeace and his family (Martin Mull and Ruth Gordon). My Bodyguard is light but thoughtful entertainment with a Rocky theme that's suitable for the entire family. ~ Jeremy Beday, All Movie Guide

Following the phenomenal box-office success of his seminal horror classic Halloween, director John Carpenter teamed up with producer Debra Hill for a second independent horror project, this time in the mode of an old-fashioned ghost story. The end result was The Fog, a spooky romp about a dark secret that returns to haunt the Pacific fishing community of Antonio Bay on the 100th anniversary of the town's charter. Carpenter sets the mood in the film's prologue, which features grizzled old sea salt Mr. Machen (John Houseman) spinning ghost stories for a group of local children. For his final tale, he recounts the legend of the Elizabeth Dane -- a ship which crashed 100 years ago against the very rocks upon which the children are sitting. Meanwhile, as the clock strikes midnight on the fateful anniversary of that disaster, eerie phenomena begin to plague the town as a dense fog bank creeps toward the bay. Seeming to appear from nowhere and emitting a ghostly glow, the fog surrounds a small trawler filled with drunken fishermen, who glimpse the vague outline of a decrepit sailing vessel before being brutally killed by shadowy figures brandishing hooks and swords. That morning, news of their disappearance is relayed to the town by Stevie Wayne (Adrienne Barbeau), owner and operator of the local radio station. The news reaches the wife of one of the fishermen, city councilwoman Kathy Williams (Janet Leigh) and local boy Nick Castle (Tom Atkins), who takes a trip out to the abandoned boat to investigate, accompanied by teenage drifter Elizabeth Solley (Jamie Lee Curtis). As the day progresses, a grim series of events paints a decidedly unpleasant picture of Antonio Bay's founders, and foreshadows the ghostly retribution that awaits the town's present-day residents. When Mrs. Williams visits local priest Fr. Malone (Hal Holbrook) about a benediction for that night's centennial ceremony, he relates a ghastly tale discovered in his grandfather's journal, which details the town fathers' decision to murder a group of lepers who had planned to build a commune outside of Antonio Bay. Just as the night's proceedings are haunted by the horrors of the past, the ghosts of the murdered dead have returned to seek symbolic revenge by claiming the lives of six townspeople, arriving amid the ominous fog bank which has completely engulfed Antonio Bay. Carpenter reportedly shot and inserted additional gory scenes after the original 'PG' cut failed to impress preview audiences. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

The Babysitter is sweet-faced Stephanie Zimbalist, who is hired as housekeeper by married couple Patty Duke Astin and William Shatner. As she takes care of the couple's daughter (Quinn Cummings), Zimbalist slowly, subtly poisons the child's mind against her parents. She then sets about to seduce Shatner, fully intending to ruin his relationship with Astin. While not as horrific as the similar theatrical feature The Hand That Rock the Cradle (1992), The Babysitter is unsettling enough to give married viewers pause before hiring their own nannies. John Houseman does a "special guest star" stint in this made-for-TV melodrama, which first aired November 28, 1980. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Spoofing the entire 1940s detective genre, and his own performances as a bumbling private detective, Peter Falk plays Lou Pekinpaugh, a San Francisco private detective accused of murdering his partner at the instigation of his mistress, the partner's wife, Georgia Merkle (Marsha Mason). Police Lieutenant DiMaggio (Vic Tayback) has his eye on Lou and blunders around in a way which complicates Lou's efforts to clear his name. Lou gets a new client when Mrs. Montenegro (Madeline Kahn) and her cronies (John Housman, Paul Williams and Dom DeLuise) hire him to search out a dozen diamond eggs. Marlene DuChard (Louise Fletcher) also comes to him for help of a complicated nature. In this madcap comedy written by Neil Simon, obstacles and complications appear every few minutes, and a great many famous actors show up in hilarious cameos. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Ostensibly a six-hour miniseries adaptation of Bert Hirschfield's novel Aspen, the program actually used only the title of the Hirschfield work; the plot proper was lifted from another novel by a different author, Bart Spicer's The Adversary. Set in the titular Colorado ski resort in the 1960s, the story line incorporated equal amounts of sex, greed, ambition, and murder, with the trial of accused rapist-killer Lee Bishop (Perry King) at the center of the storm, and the efforts by a gangster to grab up the local land, coupled with the amorous misadventures of a jet-setting glamour girl, taking up the slack whenever the plot threatened to lag. Despite a huge and varied cast, Sam Elliott emerged as the star of the proceedings in the role of straight-arrow attorney Tom Keating. Originally shown by the NBC network from November 5 to 7, 1977, Aspen was rebroadcast under the more lurid title The Innocent and the Damned. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Introduced by Henry Fonda, this unrated but good family movie is an adaptation of Flannery O'Connor's short story. Taking place in Georgia in the 1940s, Irene Worth plays a widow who allows a Polish WWII refugee family to live on and work her land, but she is soon infected with the same prejudice afflicting many of her neighbors when the immigrants prove so industrious that the home folk are put to shame and begin to feel threatened. Depicting the prejudice that faces many immigrants when they are struggling to make it in a new country, this movie advocates the strong work ethic embodied by the ambitious newcomers to America. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide

Ex-crime reporter turned novelist Raymond St. Ives (Charles Bronson) is drawn back into the world of his former profession by wealthy Abner Procane (John Houseman). St. Ives is hired to locate a stolen set of ledgers that, if made public, could trigger an all-out mob war. Amazingly, St. Ives fails to recognize who his real friends and enemies are in the course of his investigation, and it takes all his mental and physical resources to keep from being exterminated. One of the characters who isn't all that she seems is sexy Janet Whistler (Jacqueline Bisset). While the "main" cast is serviceable, the lineup of future stars in minor roles (Daniel J. Travanti, Jeff Goldblum, Robert Englund, Michael Lerner) is fascinating. Based on The Procane Chronicle, a novel by Oliver Bleeck. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Directed by Stacy Keach, this 1976 made-for-television movie features a performance of Nobel Prize-winner Luigi Pirandello's fantastical drama Six Characters in Search of an Author. Starring Andy Griffith, the play takes place on the set of a made-for-television adaptation of Pirandello's The Rules of the Game and finds the cast and crew questioning their reality when six strangers magically appear. Also starring John Houseman, Julie Adams, Beverly Todd, and James Keach, the program was released as part of Kultur's Broadway Theatre Archive series. ~ Matthew Tobey, All Movie Guide

In the year 2018 violence has been outlawed and corporations have replaced government as the ruling party following the demise of politics. With the absence of war or conflict, a forcibly passive population's bloodlust is satisfied by a brutal new sport known as Rollerball. A high-octane melding of the outlawed sports of the past, the worldwide phenomenon of Rollerball has resulted in a corporate-backed sensation. The most popular athlete in the world, Jonathan E. (James Caan) has steadily risen through the ranks to become a legendary veteran of the sport. When the corporate backers of Rollerball begin to fear that Jonathan's popularity has instilled him with a potentially dangerous amount of power, a thunderous struggle between man's free will and the oppression of the masses threatens to shatter the fragile strings that the puppet masters use to manipulate mankind. His determination to remain with the sport flying in the face of the very reason Rollerball was conceived, the corporate rulers hatch a plot to abandon the rules in hopes that Jonathan will be killed and their grip of power will remain an unyielding chokehold on an increasingly bloodthirsty populace. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

William Devane stars as John Henry Faulk, a popular radio and TV entertainer of the 1950s. In 1956, Faulk is blacklisted on the basis of an attack from the self-appointed anticommunist group AWARE. Fired by CBS, Faulk decides to sue AWARE for libel. His attorney Louis Nizer (George C. Scott) warns him that such a case will take several years to get to court, thus Faulk reluctantly takes a series of low-paying jobs to sustain himself during his "down period". In 1962, the case is finally brought before a judge, with several witnesses pointing out the idiotic iniquities of the Blacklist mentality (one child actor was prohibited from working because he had a name that sounded like that of an adult blacklistee). Appearing as themselves during the courtroom scenes are actress Kim Hunter, herself a blacklist victim, and producers David Susskind and Mark Goodson. Faulk wins his case, though his original award of $3.5 million in damages is later reduced to $550,000, and he is never able to completely return to his pre-blacklist prominence. Like several other filmic recreations of the "witch-hunt" era, Fear on Trial was first presented in the mid-1970s (October 2, 1975, to be exact), long after the most zealous of the 1950s anti-Red groups had fallen by the wayside. The film earned an Emmy award for screenwriter David Rintels. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This filmization of John Jay Osborn Jr.'s novel Paper Chase ended up one of the surprise hits of the 1973-74 movie season. Timothy Bottoms stars as the Minnesotan Hart, a brilliant but naive first-year student at the Harvard Law School. Like most of his fellow aspiring attorneys, Hart is in fearful awe of his demanding, ego-deflating instructor, Professor Kingsfield (John Houseman). He is not so much intimidated by Kingsfield, however, as to resist falling in love with the professor's pretty daughter (Lindsay Wagner). An eminent theatrical and film producer, John Houseman won an Oscar for his first important film role (no, it wasn't his first film role ever; he'd played an unbilled cameo in 1964's Seven Days in May), launching Houseman on a latter-day acting career wherein he spent most of his time playing variations of Kingsfield. Houseman also recreated the role for a Paper Chase TV series, which first ran on CBS, then on public television, then on the Showtime pay cable service. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Henry Varnum Poor, muralist, ceramist and Realist painter, is profiled by John Houseman, neighbor and friend. ~ All Movie Guide

Adapted by Rod Serling from the best-selling novel by Fletcher Knebel and Charles Waldo Bailey II, Seven Days in May was allegedly inspired by the far-right ramblings of one General Edwin Walker. Burt Lancaster plays General James M. Scott, who, convinced that liberal President Jordan Lyman (Fredric March) is soft on America's enemies, plots a military takeover of the United States. Every effort made by President Lyman to find concrete evidence of General Scott's scheme is scuttled by political protocol, human error and accidental death. Ultimately, Lyman must rely upon the man who first uncovered the plot: Colonel "Jiggs" Casey (Kirk Douglas). John Frankenheimer's terse direction and Ellsworth Fredericks' stark black and white photography enhance the "docudrama" feel of Seven Days in May. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide