Robert Richardson Movies

Filmmaker Errol Morris (Gates of Heaven, The Thin Blue Line) takes an unflinching look at the Abu Ghraib prison scandal while meditating on the frightening side effects of the War on Terror in a thought-provoking documentary from Participant Productions (An Inconvenient Truth). ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

One man bears witness to the secret history of America during the Cold War in this drama directed by celebrated actor Robert De Niro. In 1939, Edward Wilson (Matt Damon) is a young man with a bright future ahead of him -- he's a top student at Yale and the protégé of one of the school's leading English professors, Dr. Fredericks (Michael Gambon). But Wilson's life changes dramatically when he's invited to join Yale's powerful secret society, Skull and Bones. Through his Skull and Bones connections, Wilson meets Sam Murach (Alec Baldwin), an mysterious FBI agent who asks Wilson to investigate charges that Fredericks is a Nazi sympathizer working with the German government. Later, at a Skull and Bones party, Wilson is introduced to Clover Russell (Angelina Jolie), the sister of one of his classmates and the daughter of a powerful politician; their one-night stand leaves Clover pregnant, and Wilson must leave the woman he loves, Laura (Tammy Blanchard), to wed Clover and give their child a name. Shortly after their wedding, thanks to his work with Murach, Wilson is invited to join the Office of Strategic Services, a military intelligence organization organized by Bill Sullivan (Robert De Niro), and Wilson accepts. Through World War II, Wilson serves with the OSS, and learns he can trust no one in the game of international espionage, which helps make him little more than a stranger to his wife, his son, and his few friends. As the OSS evolves into the Central Intelligence Agency after the war, Wilson becomes party to America's darkest and most dangerous secrets, and in the wake of the futile Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, Wilson is forced to make a terrible choice between the security of his nation and the safety of his family. Inspired by the true-life story of CIA founder James J. Angleton, The Good Shepherd boasts an impressive supporting cast, including William Hurt, John Turturro, Billy Crudup, Joe Pesci, and Timothy Hutton.

~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Martin Scorsese directed this fast-moving, epic-scale biopic documenting the life and loves one of the most colorful Americans of the 20th century, Howard Hughes. The Aviator follows Hughes (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) as the twentysomething millionaire, having already made a fortune improving the design of oil-drilling bits, comes to Hollywood with an interest in getting into the picture business. It doesn't take long for Hughes, with his passion for airplanes, to jump from producer to director of his first major film project, a World War I air epic called Hell's Angels, which took three years to complete thanks to the shift from silent to sound filming and Hughes' relentless perfectionism. However, the film was a massive hit, and the eccentric inventor became a mogul in Hollywood, making Jean Harlow (Gwen Stefani) a star and enjoying a romance with Katharine Hepburn (Cate Blanchett). But Hollywood's old-boy network never fully accepted Hughes, and in time his passion for flying began to reclaim his attentions as he began designing new planes, setting air speed records, flying around the world, and risking his life testing aircraft. Hughes also found time to romance Ava Gardner (Kate Beckinsale) and founded his own airline, Trans-World Airlines, though as his ideas became bolder, his approach became more eccentric, and he gained many powerful enemies, including the head of Pan-American Airlines, Juan Trippe (Alec Baldwin), and Senator Ralph Owen Brewster (Alan Alda), who attempted to prove that Hughes' radical design ideas were actually part of an effort to bilk taxpayers for millions of dollars through government contracts. The Aviator's star-studded cast also includes John C. Reilly, Jude Law, Willem Dafoe, Ian Holm, and Frances Conroy. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A.E.W. Mason's perennially popular tale of honor and adventure is brought to the screen yet again in this lavish period action-drama. In 1884, Harry Feversham (Heath Ledger) is a young officer-in-training in the British Army who is soon to graduate and is expected to be shipped of to the Sudan, where the King's military are battling Muslim insurgents who are attempting to overturn English colonial rule. Feversham, however, has developed serious ethical reservations about going along, and on the eve of his departure, he resigns his commission. Feversham's best friend and fellow officer Jack Durrance (Wes Bentley) in response presents him with a white feather (a symbol of cowardice), and two of his classmates follow suit. Ethne Eustace (Kate Hudson), Feversham's fiancée, presents him with a fourth white feather shortly before breaking off their engagement. Sufficiently humbled, Feversham attempts to win back his honor and the respect of his family and friends by secretly becoming an undercover operative in the Sudan. His initial attempts to pose as an Arab are not especially convincing, but he makes friends with Abou Fatma (Djimon Hounsou), a local sympathetic with the British cause who proves to be a valuable source of insider information and advice on how to blend with the rebels. Meanwhile, Durrance is briefly ordered back to England to help recruit new soldiers for the colonial forces, and he takes the opportunity to begin wooing Eustace, the former flame of his former friend. This adaptation is the fifth film version of The Four Feathers, following two silent screen adaptations (released in 1915 and 1928), Zoltan Korda's memorable 1939 version, and a 1977 made-for-TV movie. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Throughout his work, documentary filmmaker Errol Morris has sought out characters lost in their own eccentric worlds, and he has managed to convey their sense of wonder with their passion, be it a topiary gardener arguing the merits of hand shears in Fast, Cheap & Out of Control (1997) or astrophysicist Stephen Hawking discussing the origin of the universe in A Brief History of Time (1992). In his most provocative work since The Thin Blue Line (1988), Morris details what happens when this interior dreamscape collides with the hard facts of history. As a young man accompanying his father to work at a state prison, Fred A. Leuchter, a bespectacled mouse of a man, learned how inefficient and inhumane most executions were, and he set out to design and build a better electric chair. Soon he began getting offers from state institutions throughout the country to redesign their electric chairs, along with gas chambers, gallows, and lethal injection machines. He quickly became a renowned expert in capital punishment. When the notorious Nazi sympathizer Ernest Zündel was arrested in Canada, he needed an expert witness to corroborate his assertion that the Holocaust was a hoax; and Leuchter soon found himself chiseling chunks from the gas chamber walls in Auschwitz -- on his honeymoon. His illegal samples showed no significant residue of cyanide, so he concluded that the Holocaust did not happen. He soon became a celebrity of the neo-Nazi set: he testified on behalf of Zündel, gave lectures around the world, and published the Holocaust revisionist tract Leuchter Report. Much to his surprise, his death-machine business began to flounder, his marriage collapsed, and he found himself pursued by Jewish organizations and creditors. This film was screened at the 1999 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Robert Redford directed himself for the first time in this romantic drama adapted from the 1995 best-seller by Nicholas Evans. Fourteen-year-old Grace MacLean (Scarlett Johansson of Manny & Lo) and her friend Judith go horseback riding in upstate New York on a winter morning, but their horses lose their footing on ice and slide onto a road, where Judith and her horse are killed by a jackknifing truck. Grace and her horse are also seriously injured -- doctors must amputate Grace's right leg -- and the frightening incident leaves a lasting trauma not only on Grace but also on her horse, Pilgrim. Grace's mother -- magazine editor Annie MacLean (Kristin Scott Thomas) -- seeking Grace's recovery, feels there's a link between her crippled, embittered daughter and Pilgrim's behavior. Learning about a horse trainer with a special gift, she takes Grace and Pilgrim to Montana where horse whisperer Tom Booker (Robert Redford) lives on a ranch with his younger brother Frank (Chris Cooper), Frank's wife Diane (Dianne Wiest) and their children. Tom's work with the horse also has a rejuvenating effect on the guilt-ridden Grace. Annie loses her magazine job, and the low-key romantic involvement between Annie and Tom develops during the summer, stifled by the unexpected arrival of Annie's husband, Robert MacLean (Sam Neill). Screenplay by Eric Roth and Richard LaGravenese (who adapted The Bridges of Madison County). Filmed in Montana and Saratoga Springs, New York. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

Innovative documentary filmmaker Errol Morris often finds a startling surreal edge in the midst of reality, seeking unique subjects, and discovering humor and pathos in odd, off-the-beaten-path locales. After Morris attracted attention with his memorable look at pet owners and pet cemeteries in Gates of Heaven (1978), he traveled into a backwash of quirky humor by filming Floridians in Vernon, Florida (1981). His controversial The Thin Blue Line (1988) helped free the innocent Randall Adams from prison. Morris ventured into drama with The Dark Wind (1991), and he also made a biographical profile of Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time (1992). Now Morris returns with a film he described as "four versions of the myth of Sisyphus." Four eccentrics talk about their seemingly diverse lives, interests, and offbeat occupations: Lion tamer Dave Hoover, following paths trod by his hero Clyde Beatty, offers some curious theories about wild animal thought processes; topiary gardener George Mendo clips hedges to create giraffes, bears, and other creatures; mole-rat specialist Ray Mendez researches the insect-like behavior of these hairless, buck-toothed mammals; robotics scientist Rodney Brooks assembles autonomous robots. Morris finds thematic connections relating the four. While Hoover and Mendo provide footnotes on the fading American scene, Mendez and Brooks look to the future. Contrasting viewpoints are edited into an essay on existence and the human condition, incorporating Morris' reflection on his recently departed parents. Morris and cinematographer Bob Richardson employed a variety of film formats -- black-and-white, color, 35mm, Super-8, and 16mm. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

Oliver Stone, the most outspokenly political American filmmaker of the 1980s and '90s, directs this epic-length biography of Richard Nixon, the 37th President of the U.S., who was re-elected by a landslide in 1972, only to resign in disgrace two years later. Taking a non-linear approach, Nixon jumps back and forth between many different periods and events, from Nixon's strict upbringing at the hands of his Quaker mother, through the many peaks and valleys of his political career, to his downfall in the wake of the Watergate scandal. The facts of his life are blended with supposition and speculation to create a portrait that is often critical of the man's policies but displays an unexpected compassion toward his failings as a human being. Anthony Hopkins stars as Nixon, Joan Allen plays his long-suffering wife Pat, Mary Steenburgen portrays his mother Hannah, Bob Hoskins is cast as J. Edgar Hoover, Powers Boothe plays Alexander Haig, Paul Sorvino portrays Henry Kisinger, and Ed Harris plays E. Howard Hunt. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A frenetic, bloody look at mass murder and the mass media, director Oliver Stone's extremely controversial film divided critics and audiences with its mixture of over-the-top violence and bitter cultural satire. At the center of the film, written by Stone and Quentin Tarantino, among others, are Mickey (Woody Harrelson) and Mallory (Juliette Lewis), a young couple united by their desire for each other and their common love of violence. Together, they embark on a record-breaking, exceptionally gory killing spree that captivates the sensation-hungry tabloid media. Their fame is ensured by one newsman, Wayne Gale (Robert Downey, Jr.), who reports on Mickey and Mallory for his show, American Maniacs. Even the duo's eventual capture by the police only increases their notoriety, as Gale develops a plan for a Super Bowl Sunday interview that Mickey and Mallory twist to their own advantage. Visually overwhelming, Robert Richardson's hyperkinetic cinematography switches between documentary-style black-and-white, surveillance video, garishly colored psychedelia, and even animation in a rapid-fire fashion that mirrors the psychosis of the killers and the media-saturated culture that makes them popular heroes. The film's extreme violence -- numerous edits were required to win an R rating -- became a subject of debate, as some critics asserted that the film irresponsibly glorified its murderers and blamed the filmmakers for potentially inciting copy-cat killings. Defenders argued that the film attacks media obsession with violence and satirizes a sensationalistic, celebrity-obsessed society. Certain to provoke discussion, Natural Born Killers will thoroughly alienate many viewers with its shock tactics, chaotic approach, and disturbing subject matter, while others will value the combination of technical virtuosity and dark commentary on the modern American landscape. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

In this military courtroom drama based on the play by Aaron Sorkin, Navy lawyer Lt. Daniel Kaffee (Tom Cruise) is assigned to defend two Marines, Pfc. Louden Downey (James Marshall) and Lance Cpl. Harold Dawson (Wolfgang Bodison), who are accused of the murder of fellow leatherneck Pfc. William Santiago (Michael de Lorenzo) at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Kaffee generally plea bargains for his clients rather than bring them to trial, which is probably why he was assigned this potentially embarassing case, but when Lt. Commander JoAnne Galloway (Demi Moore) is assigned to assist Kaffee, she is convinced that there's more to the matter than they've been led to believe and convinces her colleague that the case should go to court. Under questioning, Downey and Dawson reveal that Santiago died in the midst of a hazing ritual known as "Code Red" after he threatened to inform higher authorities that Dawson opened fire on a Cuban watchtower. They also state that the "Code Red" was performed under the orders of Lt. Jonathan Kendrick (Kiefer Sutherland). Kendrick's superior, tough-as-nails Col. Nathan Jessup (Jack Nicholson), denies any knowledge of the order to torture Santiago, but when Lt. Col. Matthew Markinson (J.T. Walsh) confides to Kaffee that Jessup demanded the "Code Red" for violating his order of silence, Kaffee and Galloway have to find a way to prove this in court. A Few Good Men also features Kevin Bacon as prosecuting attorney Capt. Jack Ross and Kevin Pollak as Kaffee and Galloway's research assistant, Lt. Sam Weinberg. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The November 22, 1963, assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy shocked the nation and the world. The brisk investigation of that murder conducted under the guidance of Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren distressed many observers, even though subsequent careful investigations have been unable to find much fault with the conclusions his commission drew, the central one of which was that the assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, acted alone. Instead of satisfying the public, one result of the Warren Commission Report was that an unimaginable number of plausible conspiracy theories were bruited about, and these have supported a sizeable publishing mini-industry ever since. In making this movie, director Oliver Stone had his pick of supposed or real investigative flaws to draw from and has constructed what some reviewers felt was one of the most compelling (and controversial) political detective thrillers ever to emerge from American cinema. Long before filming was completed, Stone was fending off heated accusations of artistic and historical irresponsibility, and these only intensified after the film was released. In the story, New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner) is convinced that there are some big flaws in the investigation of Oswald (Gary Oldman), and he sets out to recreate the events leading up to the assassination. Along the way, he stumbles across evidence that a great many people had reason to want to see the president killed, and he is convinced that some of them worked in concert to frame Oswald as the killer. Among the suspects are Lyndon Baines Johnson (the next president), the CIA, J. Edgar Hoover, and the Mafia. Over the course of gathering what he believes to be evidence of a conspiracy, Garrison unveils some of the grittier aspects of New Orleans society, focusing on the shady activities of local businessman Clay Shaw (Tommy Lee Jones). Garrison's investigations culminate in his conducting a show trial that he knows he will lose and which he is sure will ruin his career in order to get his evidence into the public record where it can't be buried again. This movie won two of the many Academy Awards for which it was nominated: one for Best Photography (Robert Richardson) and the other for Editing (Joe Hutshing). ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

The second of three films by co-writer/director Oliver Stone to explore the effects of the Vietnam War (Platoon and Heaven and Earth are the others), Born On The Fourth Of July tells the true story of Ron Kovic (Tom Cruise), a patriotic, All-American small town athlete who shocks his family by enlisting with the Marines to fight in the Vietnam War. Once he is overseas, however, Kovic's gung-ho enthusiasm turns to horror and confusion when he accidentally kills one of his own men in a firefight. His downfall is furthered by a bullet wound that leaves him paralyzed from the chest down. He returns home, spends an appalling, nightmarish stint in a veterans' hospital, and follows an increasingly disillusioned and fragmented path that ultimately leaves him drunk and dissolute in Mexico. However, Kovic somehow turns himself around and pulls his life together, becoming an outspoken anti-war activist in the process. The film is long but emotionally powerful; many consider it Stone's best work and Cruise's best performance. Both were nominated for Oscars, as was the film itself, but only Stone, who co-wrote the film with Kovic from the latter's book, won for Best Director. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide