Lee Rich Movies

Featuring a reunion of most of the cast of the long-running family series, The Waltons, this touching drama centers on the attempt of the now grown and scattered brood of Olivia and John Walton to regroup for an old fashioned family holiday. Unfortunately, John-Boy is not among them. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In A Fish Called Wanda, Jamie Lee Curtis plays an ambitious con artist who uses every ounce of her sexual wiles to obtain a fortune in jewels stolen by her gangster lover Tom Georgeson. First, she romances Georgeson's dimwitted but deadly henchman Kevin Kline (who won an Academy Award for his performance). Then, to clear the path for her getaway with Kline, Jamie woos Georgeson's starched-shirt attorney, John Cleese -- and it's Cleese whom she genuinely falls in love with. Michael Palin, Cleese's former Monty Python cohort, plays a stuttering mob flunkey who continually messes up his one big assignment: killing a little old lady (it isn't that he has any qualms about knocking off the old dear; it's just that her pet dogs keep getting in the way). A Fish Called Wanda was scripted by star John Cleese. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This fact-based made-for-television drama tells the story of nurse Joy Ufemal and her invaluable work with those dying of incurable diseases. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The sixth TV-movie spinoff of the popular family series The Waltons, A Walton Easter manages to reunite all of the surviving cast members--and in so doing, unintentionally reveals why several of those performers hadn't been doing much acting recently. Throwing the orginal series' chronology to the four winds, executvie producer Earl Hamner Jr. would have us believe that the 40th wedding anniversary of John and Olivia Walton (Ralph Waite, Michael Learned) is taking place in the year 1969, which doesn't quite explain how the couple managed to have all those teenaged offspring back in the late 1930s. Once we're past this inconsistency, the story boils down to the Easter reunion of the family at Walton Mountain in West Virginia--and more specifically, the return to the fold of John-Boy Walton (Richard Thomas), now a successful TV news anchorman in New York. John-Boy has not only brought along his pregnant wife Janet (Kate McNeil), but also Aurora Jameson (Sydney Walsh), a Time magazine photojournalist who is covering the reunion. Gradually, the various intrigues of the other Waltons are shunted to the background as the film's Big Question raises its head: Will John-Boy return to New York with his city-bred wife Janet, or will he sentimentally choose to remain at Walton Mountain...with someone else by his side? A Walton Easter debuted March 30, 1997 on CBS. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

"Bad" Ronald (Scott Jacoby) has been in hiding in a secret room ever since going off the deep end and killing a teenaged girl who'd made fun of him. Ronald's mother (Kim Hunter) helps her son to remain hidden, even when the house in which he is sequestered is rented by a family. As luck would have it, three of the family members are nubile young girls--perfect targets for the lonely, and looney, Ronald. In the original John Holbrook Vance novel on which this TV-movie is based, Ronald abducts, repeatedly rapes and ultimately kills two women. The video version of Bad Ronald is heavily laundered, but no less terrifying. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Mixing humor and melodrama, this curiosity has a husband-and-wife detective duo investigating Satanic goings on in an American suburb, all the while bickering about their in-laws and other domestic problems. ~ Mark Hockley, All Movie Guide

Having proven itself as a viewer magnet during its five-episode trial in the spring of 1978, the multi-plotted prime-time serial Dallas launched its second season (and its first "full" one) in the fall of that same year, though it would not be until the series was moved from Saturday to Friday night that it would begin its rapid upward climb in the ratings. Already established as the series' antihero is the charming but thoroughly untrustworthy J.R. Ewing, eldest son of Texas oil millionaire Jock Ewing (Jim Davis) and his wife, Miss Ellie (Barbara Bel Geddes). Throughout the second season, J.R. carries on a two-pronged battle, not only feuding with the politically ambitious Cliff Barnes (Ken Kercheval), the son of Jock's hated rival Digger Barnes (played briefly by David Wayne before the role is taken over by Keenan Wynn), but also engaging in a fierce power struggle over control of Ewing Oil with his honest younger brother, Bobby (Patrick Duffy) -- who happens to be married to Cliff's sister, Pam (Victoria Principal). This season marks the first appearance by J.R. and Bobby's other brother, Gary, played in the first three episodes of the year by David Ackroyd, who would be replaced by Ted Shackelford when it was decided to spin Gary and his wife, Valene (Joan Van Ark), into their own series, Knots Landing.

Perceiving Gary as a threat, J.R. connives to get Gary's daughter Lucy (Charlene Tilton) to move out of the family mansion, Southfork; however, many of his schemes come a cropper, such as his plan to marry off Lucy to millionaire Kit Mainwaring (Mark Wheeler) -- who turns out to be gay. J.R. also does his best to undermine Bobby by trying to break up his marriage to Pamela. This may not be too difficult, inasmuch as Bobby is considerably put out when he discovers that Pam was married before, to Vietnam veteran Ed Haynes (Robin Clarke). Meanwhile, J.R.'s troubled wife, Sue Ellen (Linda Gray), worried that Pam will bear a child before she will, embarks upon a "conception race" with her sister-in-law. Also, the viewer is introduced to Pam's mother, Patricia (Martha Scott), and her younger sister Kristin, played in two episodes this season by Colleen Camp (the role would be taken over on a permanent basis by Mary Crosby in season three). Almost immediately upon arrival, Kristin makes a play for Bobby -- which of course delights the devious J.R. In other developments, Morgan Fairchild makes her one and only appearance as Bobby's old flame Jenna Wade, a role that would ultimately be played, as a "regular," by Priscilla Presley. Miss Ellie faces a crisis when her presumed-dead brother, Garrison (Gene Evans), shows up, insisting that he is rightful owner of Southfork; Susan Howard is introduced as the politically well-connected Donna Culver, who proceeds to cheat on her husband with Southfork's sullen and secretive manager, Ray Krebbs (Steve Kanaly); and after facing political ruin at the hands of J.R., Cliff Barnes steps up his vendetta against the "man you love to hate." As the season rushes to a close, a pregnant Sue Ellen is rushed to the hospital to bear a son, John Ross Ewing III -- but J.R., who doesn't trust his wife any farther than he can throw her (he's already tried to have her locked away in a sanitarium), is convinced that his rival Cliff is the baby's father! ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

"Who shot J.R.?" Those were the words on the lips of Dallas fans throughout the world as the popular prime-time serial launched its fourth season on CBS. Speculation ran high over the identity of the person who, at the tail end of season three, had pumped several slugs in the chest of the sublimely unprincipled Texas oil tycoon J.R. Ewing (Larry Hagman). It was one of the best-kept secrets in the annals of popular entertainment; indeed, not even the cast members knew "who dun it" (to cover their bets, the producers filmed scenes of every member of the cast pulling the trigger -- including Larry Hagman). During the fifth episode of the season, which became the second highest-rated show in TV history, the culprit is exposed -- and it is giving nothing away at this late date to reveal that J.R.'s would-be assassin was his cast-off mistress Kristin (Mary Crosby), younger sister of his own wife, Sue Ellen (Linda Gary). Upon his recovery, J.R. resumes his power struggle with younger brother Bobby (Patrick Duffy), who in J.R.'s absence has assumed control of Ewing Oil. Almost immediately upon returning to his office, J.R. hires sharkish PR agent Leslie Stewart (Susan Flannery) to promote his "new" image as "The All-American Businessman" -- even as he tries to undermine his own country's foreign affairs by engineering a political coup in a faraway country in order to increase his wealth!

Meanwhile, Sue Ellen's lover, Dusty Farlow (Jared Martin), urges her to leave J.R. and take her son, John Ross (now played by Tyler Banks) with her. After numerous dead-end love affairs, J.R.'s niece Lucy (Charlene Tilton) decides to marry Mitch Cooper (Leigh McCloskey), a poor medical student who is troubled by the Ewing's affluence; J.R. doesn't think much of Mitch, but he develops a hankerin' for his sister, Afton (Audrey Landers), a professional singer. And in one of the season's most momentous developments, Southfork manager Ray Krebbs (Steve Kanaly) is revealed to be the illegitimate song of J.R. and Bobby's dad, Jock Ewing (Jim Davis) -- whereupon Ray further increases his influence in the community by wedding the politically powerful Donna Culver (Susan Howard). In an effort to whip up audience interest in the same manner as the previous season's cliffhanger, season four of Dallas closes as attorney Cliff Barnes (Ken Kercheval), sworn enemy of J.R. Ewing, finds the body of a woman floating in the Ewings' swimming pool. Even if this contrivance hadn't occurred, CBS had no fear that Dallas would lose its audience; as of the end of its fourth season, the series was America's top-rated series -- the first dramatic program to pull off this coup since Marcus Welby, M.D. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Although he enjoyed great critical success with crime dramas and slice-of-life pictures, director Barbet Schroeder continued dabbling in the thriller genre with this action-oriented film. Andy Garcia stars as Frank Conner, a widowed San Francisco police officer whose young son Matt (Joseph Cross) is suffering from leukemia. Without a bone marrow transplant, Matt will die, but Frank isn't a donor. In fact, the only potential match is prison inmate Peter McCabe (Michael Keaton), a psychotic but charming serial killer. At first, McCabe refused to participate despite Conner's pleas, but eventually, the convict relents and agrees to the procedure. It is all a ruse, however, as McCabe has discovered a clever way to escape the confines of the operating room where Matt's oncologist, Dr. Hawkins (Marcia Gay Harden) is scheduled to perform the transplant. Faced with the dual nightmare of his son's deteriorating condition and a mass murderer on the loose in a major metropolitan hospital, the frantic Conner finds himself bending and even breaking the law to bring McCabe down and save Matt's life. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

Ranking with Dan Curtis' Trilogy of Terror as one of the spookiest made-for-TV horror films of the 1970's, this atmospheric monster chiller stars Kim Darby and Jim Hutton as a comfortable, reasonably happy young couple who inherit the archetypal "Old Dark House" from the wife Sally's deceased aunt. While renovating the creepy mansion, they enter a previously-sealed room, which features a securely bricked-up fireplace. Despite the insistence of a local contractor (My Three Sons' William Demarest) that they leave the room undisturbed, Sally's husband manages to open the flue, releasing a horde of shriveled mini-monsters imprisoned there for decades. The little demons immediately fixate their malevolent attention on Sally in an effort to claim her soul, a mission which can only be averted by the love of her husband -- which, in light of his self-centered careerism, means poor Sally's pretty much on her own. Director John Newland manages to pull off this one-note premise with some effective, frightening scenes -- especially when he chooses to show as little of the goofy-looking monsters as possible -- but it's hard to sustain this level of suspense for a full 90 minutes. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

Acknowledging the death of series regular Diana Hyland during the previous season of Eight is Enough, Season Two opens with Sacramento columnist Tom Bradford (Dick Van Patten) being identified as a widower, whose wife Joan has been deceased for nearly one year. While this time passage makes it respectable for Tom to re-enter the dating scene, it does not explain the fact that his eight children have only aged a few months since last we saw them at the end of Season One! But Tom does not remain unattached for long. In the season's second episode, Betty Buckley joins the cast as Sandra Sue "Abby" Abbott, a widowed teacher hired to tutor Tom's son Tommy (Willie Aames) while the boy is healing from a sports injury (in the same episode, daughter Mary [Lani O'Grady] defiantly moves out of the Bradford home to set up housekeeping with her boyfriend, played by no less than Don Johnson). The subsequent romance between Tom and Abby leads swiftly to the altar, as they become man and wife in the two-hour episode "Children of the Room", originally telecast November 9, 1977 (which is the same day that they wed in the context of the episode!) The following week, the entire family honeymoons in Hawaii, where the younger Bradfords characteristically stir up as much trouble as possible. Later on, an emotional high point is reached when the children celebrate their first Christmas without their "real" mom. In other episodes, daughter Joannie (Laurie Walters) precipitates a crisis when she agrees to appear nude in a stage play; Mary despairs when she is rejected from medical school; Tom is strongarmed into writing a newspaper advice column as "Ms. Dinah"; Tommy (Willie Aames) resorts to cheating in order to pass his English class; and when Abby suffers a serious concussion, the kids keep her awake until the doctor comes by describing highlights from past episodes (yes, it's a "clip show"). The season finale "Who's on First" takes place during a community talent show, permitting Broadway veteran Betty Buckley to show off her spending singing voice (no, she doesn't sing her signature tune from "Cats", mainly because it hadn't been written yet). Guest stars during Season Two include Sylvia Sidney, Robin Williams, Will Geer, Danny Bonaduce, Stepfanie Kramer, and Dick Van Patten's own sons Jimmy and Timmy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

As Season Four of Eight is Enough gets under way, David Bradford (Grant Goodeve), the oldest of Sacramento journalist Tom Bradford's (Dick Van Patten) eight children, is eagerly anticipating his marriage to his attorney fiancée Janet (Joan Prather). Romance also enters the life of David's sister Susan (Susan Richardson) when she falls for charming minor-league baseball player Merle "The Pearl" Stockwell (Brian Patrick Clarke). Thus it is that the wedding ceremony becomes a double header when Susan and Merle wed on the same day as David and Janet (conveniently just in time for the Fall ratings sweeps!). Elsewhere in the Bradford household, Tom's wife Abby (Betty Buckley) studies for a PhD in Education; daughter Joannie (Laurie Walters) lands a job at a local TV station, when she meets and falls in love with coworker Jeffrey Trout (Nicholas Pryor); 18-year-old Elizabeth (Connie Newton, previously billed as Connie Needham) enters college; David establishes his own construction business; second-youngest son Tommy (William Aames) organizes a band; Tom's freewheeling sister Vivian (Janis Paige) treats the family to a Hawaiian vacation (no, they don't meet the Brady Bunch); the kids and Abby help Tom come to grips with his 50th birthday; youngest son Nicholas (Adam Rich) "jinxes" the Bradfords by breaking a chain letter; and Susan finds out that she's pregnant--just after Merle has walked out on her. New to the series this season is Michael Goodrow as Tommy's new friend Ernie, who turns out to have a serious drinking problem. As Season Four draws to a close, Susan prepares for motherhood, and Tommy throws a graduation party that gets him into hot water with the local constabulary. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this fact-based made-for-TV tearjerker, the promising life of a talented teenage athlete is suddenly destroyed when he is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Despite the bad news, the boy does all he can to fight the disease. His devoted mother supports him to the bitter, inevitable end. The story is based on the experiences of Doris Lund, the late Eric's mother. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide