Gary Busey Movies

Novelist/journalist Pete Hammill was responsible for the screenplay of the two-part TV movie The Neon Empire. Ray Sharkey stars as a Bugsy Siegel-like New York gangster. It is Sharkey's dream to turn the sleepy Nevada town of Las Vegas into the gambling capital of the world. Part One, running 105 minutes details Sharkey's "blueprinting" of his vision. In the concluding 85-minute chapter, having transformed sedentary little Las Vegas, Nevada, into a gambling mecca, Sharkey finds that his ambitions have made him a pariah to his New York mob colleagues. Linda Fiorentino, Gary Busey, Dylan McDermott and Martin Landau costar in this "a clef" drama. Neon Empire premiered over the Showtime Cable Network; later on, both portions of the film were melded into one three-hour "special." Neon Empire was first telecast on the Showtime Cable network on December 3 and 4, 1989. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

LA cop Martin Riggs (Mel Gibson), whose wife has recently died, is a loose cannon with a seeming death wish. This makes him indispensable in collaring dangerous criminals, but a liability to any potential partners. Roger Murtaugh (Danny Glover), a conservative family man who wants to stay alive for his upcoming 50th birthday, is partnered with Riggs. As Riggs gets to know Murtaugh and his family, he begins to mellow, though his insistence on using guerilla tactics to catch criminals is still (put mildly) above and beyond the call of duty. The main villain is The General (Mitchell Ryan), a drug dealer responsible for the death of the daughter of one of Murtaugh's oldest friends. The General is also in charge of a deadly, militia-like gang of smugglers. Adding fuel to the fire is The General's chief henchman, played with all stops out by Gary Busey. Moviegoers familiar only with the relatively tongue-in-cheek Lethal Weapon sequels may be amazed to find out how dangerous and unpredictable Riggs is in the first Lethal Weapon -- and how likely it seems that Murtaugh might not survive until fade-out time. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The budget may be loftier, but Eye of the Tiger is essentially an up-to-date AIP motorcycle flick. Ex-convict Buck Mathews (Gary Busey) lives as quietly as possible in his old home town. The corrupt local sheriff (Seymour Cassel) would give anything to drive Buck out of town: thus, the sheriff looks the other way when a motorcycle gang headed by Blade (William Smith, who else?) invades the community and targets Buck for extermination. With no one else on his side, Buck turns to honest cop J.B. Deveraux (Yaphet Kotto), but he's a few days away from retirement and doesn't want to get involved. It turns out that the only "good guy" Buck can depend upon is a "bad guy": A well-connected Latino drug lord who owes Buck a favor. When the chips are down and Buck's daughter is kidnapped, Deveraux joins in the climactic offensive against the bikers--which, of course, boils down to a mano-y-mano struggle between Buck and Blade. You've seen it all before, but in this case familiarity does not breed contempt. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this undistinguished Stephen King horror adaptation, the good residents of Tarker's Mill are dense enough to ignore or explain away a series of violent deaths until a little boy is torn to pieces while flying his kite after dark. At that point, the men gang up and go into the fog-shrouded woods to hunt down whatever slasher is out there. The most they achieve is the sighting of one hairy arm and a few more sacrificial victims. But life goes on, and when the summer fireworks show is cancelled because people have deduced it might be fatal to stay out after dark, the Coslaw family's invalid, wheelchair-bound son Marty goes coasting off to the bridge to shoot his own fireworks. Needless to say, the hairy killer beast that is certain to be lurking there gets shot in the eyeball by one of Marty's rockets and is now an unhappy hairy killer beast. Even when a respected town biggie starts wearing an eyepatch, no one really takes notice. They must not watch many horror films. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Using four famous but unnamed individuals to symbolize a notorious era in American politics, as well as to explore the nature of despair, director Nicolas Roeg has created an intriguing drama. Based on a play by Terry Johnson, the story begins with the blond Theresa Russell as a sex-goddess actress working on a scene over a subway grate, with her skirts billowing out in the updraft. A famous Professor from Princeton with white hair opens his door to the actress, who takes out a few props and goes through her rendition of the theory of relativity. Between her theatrical mode of speech and his world of mathematics, there is a certain entente. Enter the ballplayer who is her husband (Gary Busey), in love but without a clue as to the actress' inner sadness. Throw in the senator from Wisconsin (Tony Curtis) before whose sub-committee on Unamerican Activities the Professor has to appear, and the undercurrent of a societal witch-hunt that ruined many careers in Hollywood, in academics, in sports, and in politics is churned into the story. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Among the first original anthology series to be produced for cable television, The Hitchhiker was a collection of tales of the supernatural and bizarre. The title character, played during the first season by Nicholas Campbell and thereafter by Page Fletcher, was an unnamed drifter who wandered ubiquitously from story to story, sometimes briefly commiserated with the main characters, sometimes acting as a disinterested observer, but always ready with a few pithy and occasional chilling comments of the events which had transpired. Inasmuch as the series carried on pay cable and not "mainstream" commercial TV, the stories contained an abundance of nudity, profanity, and violence. Even so, in most of the half-hour playlets, Evil was severely punished (usually in an ironic "postman always rings twice" fashion) and Virtue more or less triumphed. After 39 episodes on HBO, the series moved to a basic-cable channel, USA, for 46 additional installments. While censorship was somewhat more stringent on USA, The Hitchhiker still managed to serve up rawer and meatier fare than was customary on over-the-air TV of the period. The series was first-run on HBO from November 23, 1983, to May 12, 1987, and on USA from January 4, 1989, to February 22, 1991. ~ All Movie Guide

In this comedy, a Walter-Mitty-esque college youth creates a fabulous daydream world when he finds himself increasingly unable to relate to real life. In his own La-La land, he pretends that he commands a sailing ship. With a crew comprised of schoolmates, they set sail for many adventures. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In Robert Kaylor's Carny, the world of the carnival is an illusion manipulated by the carnies to fleece the suckers. The marks generally deserve what they get, because of their greed, corruption, or just plain stupidity. It's share and share alike for Frankie (Gary Busey) and Patch (Robbie Robertson), partners in a dunk-the-bozo act in a carnival travelling through the American South. At one of the small-town stops, Donna (Jodie Foster), an alienated teenager, dumps her obnoxious boyfriend and, with Frankie's encouragement, joins up and moves into their trailer (and Frankie's bed). Feeling displaced, Patch schemes to get Donna out of the carnival. However, the carnival's owner needs Donna to foil a loathsome pair of local officials who demand payoffs. She plays her part perfectly and is accepted by all, although she moves into another trailer. ~ Steve Press, All Movie Guide

This 1979 episode of Saturday Night Live is hosted by actor Gary Busey and features Gregory Hines and Eubie Blake as the musical guests. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Movie Guide

Jan-Michael Vincent plays a self-destructive beach bum to whom surfing is a Zen experience. We first meet Vincent in the devil-may-care 1960s, in the company of his carefree buddies William Katt and Gary Busey. The boys reunite ten years later, after one has served time in Vietnam. The beach is still there, the waves still break upon the shore, and towards the end of the film, the characters become people that we truly care about. Barbara Hale, the real-life mother of costar William Katt, makes a piquant supporting appearance. Cut from 129 minutes to 104 for its pay-cable release, Big Wednesday is also known as Summer of Innocence. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

For better or worse, The Gumball Rally was the catalyst for a short-lived cycle of "illegal cross-country race" flicks. As thick-headed cop Roscoe (Norman Burton) does his best to stop the titular rally, a vast and varied contingent of contestants prepare to burn rubber from New York to California. The best-looking of the racers is played by top-billed Michael Sarrazin; Franco, a delightfully narcissistic Italian road jockey played by Raul Julia, also competes. Producer/director Chuck Bail was formerly a stunt coordinator, which helps to explain the incessant car crashes and near-misses in the film. Surprisingly, the doggedly low-budget Gumball Rally was produced by First Artists, a company formed by such major stars as Dustin Hoffman, Barbra Streisand, and Steve McQueen for the purpose of creating "prestige" film fare. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A pre-One Day at a Time Mackenzie Phillips guest stars as Mindy, a runaway teenager. Undercover cop Tony Baretta (Robert Blake) manages to catch up to Mindy and to handcuff himself to the girl. Anxious to return to headquarters, Baretta and Mindy clamber into a police squad car and ask the uniformed drivers for a lift. Unfortunately, the two "cops" at the wheel turn out to be a pair of homicidal holdup men (played by Strother Martin and Gary Busey). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In 1945, private Eddie Slovik, a "born loser" who made no secret of his desire to escape the army in any way possible, became the first American to be executed for desertion since the Civil War. William Bradford Huie's chronicle of this unfortunate wartime episode, The Execution of Private Slovik, was published in 1954. Frank Sinatra optioned the movie rights for the book, intending to cast Steve McQueen as Slovik and to have blacklisted writer Albert Maltz write the screenplay. The US military reluctantly agreed to okay the film on the proviso that Slovik would not be portrayed sympathetically. Out of deference to his friend John F. Kennedy, Sinatra abandoned the project, and that was that -- until the award-winning TV-writing team of Richard Levinson and William Link became intrigued in the Huie book. After a series of convoluted negotiations, Levinson and Link were finally able to put The Execution of Private Slovik on the small screen on March 13, 1974 (Albert Maltz, upset that the pair had decided upon a strict "no villains" policy in their adaptation, washed his hands of the whole affair). Martin Sheen was selected to play Slovik, though for a while Dustin Hoffman was seriously considering taking a cut in salary to essay the role. Abandoning the linear style of Huie's book, the writers adopted a Citizen Kane approach, using flashbacks to illustrate the events leading up to the execution. It is made clear throughout the film that no one, neither the military brass nor Slovik himself, truly believed that the private would ever face a firing squad; the usual custom was to postpone the execution until after the war, then reduce the sentence to a long prison term. Thanks to an unfortunate chain of misunderstandings and snafus, Slovik ended up dying by gunfire in a lonely French courtyard -- a fact long withheld from the public (Slovik's wife Antoinette learned of her husband's true fate for the first time from author Huie). The film's most famous scene, in which Slovik nervously repeats his "Hail Marys" as the hood is being fitted over his head, was Martin Sheen's own idea. Filmed on location in California and Canada, The Execution of Private Slovik won a Peabody award for the NBC television network. Originally running a full 120 minutes, it was re-edited into a 97 minute version for theatrical release overseas. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide