Vince Martin Movies

Debuting in May 1989, the Australian TV soap opera E Street was designed as a "hip," youth-oriented variation of the long-running continuing drama A Country Practice, featuring one of the stars of the earlier series, Penny Cook. Set in the inner-city community of Westside, the daily 50-minute series cast Cook as dedicated general practitioner Dr. Ellie Fielding. Other regulars included beat cop George Sullivan (Les Dayman); George's rebellious teenaged daughter Alice (Marianne Howard); feisty legal-aid lawyer Sarah McKillop (Katrina Sedgwick), who was abruptly killed off six months into the series; Sarah's rather sexier replacement, Jennifer St. James (Virginia Hey); social worker Martha O'Dare (Cecily Polson); pub keeper Ernie Patchett (Vic Rooney) and his hotheaded son Chris (Paul Kelman), who was forced via an unwanted pregnancy to wed snooty socialite Megan Bromley (Lisabeth Kennaly); and the series' most popular character, "cool" Reverend Bob Brown (Tony Martin), who like most of the adults on the program was saddled with a contentious offspring, namely his son Harley (Malcolm Kennard). Whenever the ratings flagged -- as they did when Ellie Fielding was written off the series -- the producers hauled in another Country Practice alumnus, notably Kate Raison as rich-bitch dowager Sheridan Sturges and Joan Sydney as Ernie Patchett's sister Mary. The series also indulged in the time-honored practice of sweeping the boards clean by having several characters killed off at once in a single tragedy (an explosion, an auto accident, etc.) so that a whole new flock of younger, prettier regulars could be introduced. By the time the series entered the home stretch, most of the stories focused on a crippled rock singer named Wheels (Marcus Graham) and his entourage. Created by Forrest Redlich, E Street chalked up 404 episodes before its cancellation in 1993. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Premiering October 23, 1988, the revival of the classic suspense series Mission:Impossible was hobbled during its first few weeks on the air by a Hollywood writer's strike. Thus, several episodes of the new series were remakes of scripts from the "old" version. Case in point was the series' pilot, "The Killer", in which returning IMF head Jim Phelps (Peter Graves) endeavors to avenge the death of his protegee Tom Copperfield (Vince Martin). The unknown assassin's next target is equally unknown, as is the identity of the killer's employer; it is up to the new IMF team to learn the truth and prevent another murder. If this sounds familiar, it is because Arthur Weiss' script for "The Killer" was originally filmed as Mission:Impossible's fifth season opener in 1970. Guest-starring in the new version were John DeLancie ("Q" on Star Trek: The Next Generation) as Matthew Drake, and Paul Smith (The Midnight Express, Popeye) as Tim. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this martial-arts film, a highly-principled karate student accidentally sees his sen-sei kill an unarmed man, and must now fight for his life until justice is done. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi