Dennis Burkley Movies
Supporting actor Dennis Burkley has been onscreen from the '80s. ~ All Movie Guide
- 1996
Sipowicz (Dennis Franz) is more edgy than usual as the pregnant Sylvia's (Sharon Lawrence) due date approaches. Donna (Gail O'Grady) considers leaving the precinct for a better job opportunity on the West Coast. The nephew of a robbery-homicide victim is suspiciously in possession of the stolen swag. A bouncer at a strip club is beaten to death. And as the final scene of this episode approaches, the world is introduced to a new arrival named Theo Sipowicz. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1995
When Benton (Eriq La Salle) breaks his hand in a parking-lot fracas, Carter (Noah Wyle) must replace him in surgery. Greene (Anthony Edwards) is forced to mediate in the ongoing battle of wills between Lewis (Sherry Stringfield) and Weaver (Laura Innes), and also tends to the needs of an elderly, abandoned woman (Celia Kushner). And outside the walls of the ER, paramedic Shep (Ron Eldard) again puts his life on the line. This ER episode originally aired on the same evening that the heavily promoted ABC series Murder One debuted, leading observers to wonder which series would pull the biggest audience (guess who won). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1994
Will (Will Smith) relates an incredible, hair-raising story of how he once witnessed a mob killing, forcing himself and the Banks family into the Witness Relocation Program, whereupon everyone is bundled off to the Alabama boonies (in a town called Deliverance!) Truth to tell, however, Will's tall tale has been concocted to distract Jazz from continually winning at poker against Will and Carlton. A pre-Everybody Loves Raymond Brad Garrett appears as a VERY tall hit man. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1993
Made for cable television, this frothy western spoof chronicles the exploits of a citified optometrist who exchanges his well-ordered Big Apple life for a wild and woollier version in Tombstone, Arizona. Once there, he is thrilled to meet his hero Wyatt Earp. Unfortunately, the heroic Earp he admired in the many dime-store novels he read is totally different from the real McCoy who turns out to be myopic and continually skunk drunk. Still with the optometrist's help, the sheriff is able to clean up the town. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1988
When Claire (Linda Kozlowski) learns her grandmother has been bilked out of $50,000 by the crooked televangelists Ray (Tim Curry) and Darla Porter (Annie Potts), she recruits her redneck boyfriend Jesse (Bill Paxton) to help recover the money. They travel to the Tower of Bethlehem deep in the Arkansas woods to break into the studio and hold the hosts of the show hostage. This timely comedy came in the wake of scandals involving real-life televangelists Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker and Jimmy "I Have Sinned" Swaggert. Neil Cohen and Joel Cohen wrote the screenplay. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bill Paxton, Linda Kozlowski, (more)
- 1985
In this Stephen Cannell-produced pilot for a potential TV detective series, Mac Davis plays an ex-highway patrolman and Joseph Cortese an ex-trucker, related by marriage. Their wives were twin sisters--were, because in addition to all the other "ex" qualifications in their lives, Davis and Cortese are ex-husbands. Still pals after their group divorce, the boys become private eyes. Their first case is to get the goods on a shady tycoon (Robert Culp), who happens to be their former father-in-law. Brothers-in-Law was the first Steven J. Cannell independent production which failed to sell as a series, but it wouldn't be the last. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1985
The Dukes don't believe in UFOs, but they change their minds in a hurry when they find what seems to be a space alien (played by dwarf actor Felix Silla, formerly The Addams Family's Cousin Itt) hiding in the General Lee. Though the Duke boys make a game effort to pass off the unearthly visitor as their "li'l cousin", Boss Hogg is bent upon capturing the alien and selling him to the highest bidder. Meanwhile, Sheriff Roscoe (James Best) and a pair of out-of-town crooks named Mickey (Dennis Burkley) and Buck (Britt Leach) hatch separate schemes to use "Li'l Cousin" as a cover for their latest scams. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1984
A blizzard traps everyone in the courtroom without electricity or supplies. Well, almost everyone: Harry (Harry Anderson) is stuck in an elevator with a gentleman named Warren Wilson, who turns out to be gay--and who is also very, VERY attracted to the nonplussed judge. Former Bob Newhart Show costar Jack Riley is atypically cast as the love-smitten Mr. Wilson. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1984
Bikinis and rippling, manly muscles abound in this lively, youth-oriented Southern California-set adventure that chronicles the experiences of a curvaceous high school graduate who decides to work as a life guard for a summer before going to med school. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Julianne Phillips, Ted Shackelford, (more)
- 1980
Country superstar Loretta Lynn appears as herself in this episode. Hazzard County is thrown into an uproar when Loretta is kidnapped by a trio of shabby amateur crooks (Henry Gibson, Dennis Burkley Rebecca Reynolds) who demand a ransom of $1136.15! Truth to tell, the kidnappers aren't all that villainous or menacing: they simply want to recoup the money that was cheated out of them by a fraudulent record company. To clear themselves of blame for the abduction, Luke (Tom Wopat) and Bo (John Schneider) set out to rescue Ms. Lynn and see that justice is served all around. Loretta Lynn sings "Y'all Come". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1979
An angry mother (Cloris Leachman) fights an ineffective judicial system to bring justice to her daughter's rapist. The film was based on a true story and made for television in 1979. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- 1979
Director Joel Schumacher makes like Robert Altman in the made-for-TV Amateur Night at the Dixie Bar and Grill. In the tradition of Altman's Nashville, Schumacher's film is a rambling, anecdotal study of an amateur talent show in a tawdry Southern saloon. The link between the two films is strengthened by the presence in Amateur Night of Henry Gibson, who'd played a Porter Wagoner type in Nashville. Among the contestants is country-western singer Tanya Tucker, who also contributed some of the background themes for the film's musical score. Amateur Night at the Dixie Bar and Grill was produced by Motown Industries' motion picture division. Sidebar: To improve ratings, the ad copy for this film was headlined "Disco Killer on the Loose!"--then, in smaller type, the copy explained that "killing" was merely a slang term for winning over the audience! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1979
Charleston is a brazen rip-off of Gone with the Wind which premiered over NBC on January 15, 1979--one month before CBS' planned telecast of Wind. Delta Burke, who was an unknown in 1979, very nearly remained that way in the role of post-Civil War Southern belle Stella. As Stella fiddle-dee-dees around in an effort to raise the tax money to maintain her mansion, her faithful ex-slave Minerva (Lynne Moody) runs the household with an iron hand (that must hurt). Also lurking about is Stella's cousin Valerie (Patricia Pearcy), who squanders her own savings in an effort to find her missing husband. This is the sort of film in which the aggressively urbanized actor Mandy Pantinkin plays a corn-fed character named Beaudine Croft. Martha Scott, the only "name" actor in Charleston, is wasted in a peripheral role as Stella's mom. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1979
An angry John Cooper (Bo Hopkins) decides to take the law in his own hands when his pal Jim (James Garner) is beaten and his sister Gail (Laurie Jefferson) is raped by members of the Rattlers motorcycle gang. Harking back to his own leather-jacket days as a member of the Vincent Black Shadow gang, Coop takes his cycle out of mothballs and goes undercover to exact vengeance against Rattlers leader Willie Green (Paul Koslo). Meanwhile, Jim has recovered sufficiently to chase after Coop in hopes of preventing him from committing cold-blooded murder. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1977
Delta County USA was the feature-length pilot film for a proposed prime-time serial. The titular county is an old, hidebound Southern community, harboring ever so many dark secrets. The dramatic tension of the film is manifested in the lack of understanding between the older citizens and the young set. Jim Antonio heads the cast as "Jack the Bear," who's smarter than the av-er-age...you know. Delta County USA was initially telecast May 20, 1977. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1977
Season Three of Quincy M.E. gets off to a running start when Quincy (Jack Klugman) is interrupted during a nocturnal romantic rendezvous by the sudden arrival of his old friend Carl Hopwood, an investigative reporter. It is obvious that Hopwood has been beaten and mutilated, but before Quincy can find out what has happened, his friend dies. Rushing the body to the police morgue, Quincy performs an autopsy without witnesses and personally records the vital lab data. The next morning, Quincy returns to the morgue to find that the body has disappeared...and with it all evidence that an autopsy ever occurred. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1977
Jim Rockford (James Garner) arranges for his ex-jailbird "pal" Gandy Fitch (Isaac Hayes) to work as a legman for Marcus Hayes (Louis Gossett Jr.), a private eye who'd once been Jim's parole officer. Gandy repays the favor by horning in on "Rockfish"'s current case, involving the search for a missing heir named Finn O'Herlihy (Jack Collins)--who, as it turns out, is on the lam from the Mob. In the course of their investigation, mismatched Gandy and Marcus (aka "Gabby" Hayes) manage to stumble into a neo-Nazi bar, where, as the only two black men on the premises, they are more than a little conspicuous! Things come to a rousing climax at a Polish wedding where the elusive O'Herlihy is employed as a musician. This episode was intended as the pilot for a possible spinoff series starring Isaac Hayes and Lou Gossett Jr., tentatively titled "Gandy and Gabby" (which, as Jim observes at one point, sounds more like a puppet show!) ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1976
Why is someone using violence to force Rocky (Noah Beery Jr.) to sign away his lease to Parcel 334, a supposedly worthless piece of property in Coulter County? And what does this have to do with the case of a missing oil driller? That's what Jim (James Garner) wants to find out before he ends up behind bars on a phony murder rap which is tied in with both the land and the missing person. Perhaps that old codger (John Anderson) living in a bomb shelter near Rocky's property can come up with the answers--and then again, perhaps not! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1976
Unlike the 1935 film version of Jack London's 1897 novel Call of the Wild, which devoted most of its running time to a romance between Clark Gable and Loretta Young, this 1976 TV-movie version wisely remains faithful to the source. The star is a magnificent dog--part St. Bernard, part German shepherd--which is kidnapped from its home in California and spirited away to the Yukon. The dog is sold to two greenhorn prospectors (John Beck and Bernard Fresson) who name the animal "Buck". Though faithful to his new masters, Buck shows inclinations of succumbing to the "call of the wild" and running off into the woods at any moment. James (Deliverance) Dickey adapted the London novel for this TV version, which was filmed in the Sierra Madres and the Grand Tetons. Call of the Wild premiered on May 22, 1976. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
A man who lives what many would consider to be the perfect life begins to see the cracks forming on the surface of his porcelain smooth façade in director Stu Pollard's paranoid tale of deception and betrayal. David Dailey (Gil Bellows) has a picture-perfect home, a career with a promising future, and a key role in the community -- but all of that is about to change. With the sexual obsessions of his lusty wife Susan (Kim Raver) gradually taking their toll on David and his longtime assistant blatantly setting his sights on the established professional's job, the stress of his personal life eventually drives David into the arms of beautiful stranger Melody Carpenter (Jennifer Westfeldt). Despite outward appearances, Melody's charming and rich ex-boyfriend Sean (Christian Kane) hasn't taken too warmly to her new relationship with David and sets into motion a devious plan to win her back at any cost. Meanwhile, Sean's powerful and overprotective father (Stacy Keach) has hired a sexy spy (Elizabeth Peña) to keep close tabs on all involved. As the relationship between David and Melody grows increasingly intense, so do their mutual suspicions of being watched, and David soon realizes that the only thing worse than having nothing at all is having it all swept out from under your feet when you least expect it. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gil Bellows, Kim Raver, (more)
Roy McAvoy (Kevin Costner) is a talented golf pro, who owns his own driving range. That sounds impressive, but the reality is quite different. While it's true that Roy is indeed a talented golfer and does own a driving range, it is in a tiny, unheard of Texas backwater. With almost no customers, he is likely to go broke. His golfing talents remain untapped and his life is rapidly going nowhere. To pass the time, he drinks a lot of beer with his buddies, or swings at a bucket of balls. Sometimes, he even plays real golf, and his friend and assistant Romeo (Cheech Marin) caddies for him. That's all there is for Roy, until he is wakened from his deathlike reverie by a visit from a newcomer in town, psychologist Molly Griswold (Renee Russo). Teaching her how to swing a club reminds him of feelings he had nearly forgotten. Discovering that she is the girlfriend of his old golfing rival, David Simms (Don Johnson), goads him yet further, and he returns to the PGA golf tour to compete in the U.S. Open. Maybe he'll get Molly for himself, maybe not, but in the meantime he has some things to prove to himself. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Kevin Costner, Rene Russo, (more)
An emotionally distraught cop is traumatized by memories of an abusive childhood in which he was forced to kill the uncle who was abusing him. Fired by his corrupt boss, he is recruited to infiltrate a ring of murderous, gun-running bikers, who would kill him in a second if they found out who he was -- which his friends begin to suspect was why he took the job in the first place. ~ Brian Gusse, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Charlie Sheen, Linda Fiorentino, (more)
Val Kilmer delivers what was considered one of 1991's best performances as Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's hallucinatory bio-pic of the seminal 1960s rock group The Doors. Stone cuts a jagged swath through Morrison's life, starting with a childhood memory where Morrison sees an elderly Indian dying by the roadside. It picks up with Morrison's arrival in California and his assimilation into the Venice Beach culture, followed by his film school days at UCLA; his introduction to his girlfriend Pamela Courson (Meg Ryan); his first encounters with Ray Manzarek (Kyle MacLachlan); and the origin of The Doors -- made up of Manzarek, Robby Kreiger (Frank Whaley), and John Densmore (Kevin Dillon). As the fame of The Doors grows, Morrison's obsession with death increases. The band grows weary of Morrison's missed recording sessions and no-shows at concerts. Morrison, meanwhile, sinks deeper into a drug-induced haze, having mystical sexual encounters with Patricia Kennealy (Kathleen Quinlan), an older rock journalist involved with sadomasochism and witchcraft. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Val Kilmer, Meg Ryan, (more)
Based on a gritty, semi-autobiographical novel by author Kim Wozencraft, this crime thriller was adapted for the screen by noir novelist Pete Dexter and marked the directorial debut of producer Lili Fini Zanuck. Jennifer Jason Leigh stars as Kristen Cates, a rookie police officer recruited to partner with Jim Raynor (Jason Patric), an undercover Texas cop trying to infiltrate the criminal ring of major drug dealer Will Gaines (Gregg Allman) in the 1970s. What Kristen isn't told is that, as part of his deep cover masquerade, Jim must take drugs in order to be convincing and, unsurprisingly, has become an addict. Although this dangerous practice is not acceptable police procedure, Jim and Kristen's zealous superiors Larry Dodd (Sam Elliott) and Donald Nettle (Tony Frank) are obsessed with taking Gaines down because he has corrupted the daughter of a prominent local citizen. Jim and Kristen, who fall in love and move in together, befriend a petty car thief, Walker (Max Perlich), who has ties to Gaines. Since they both become drug addicts, Jim and Kristen's case makes little progress, until they clean up and convince Walker to turn on Gaines. Their investigation becomes tainted, however, when they are pressured from above to manufacture false evidence against their target. The soundtrack for Rushcontained the hit song "Tears in Heaven" by Eric Clapton. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Jason Patric, Jennifer Jason Leigh, (more)
