Cliff Robertson Movies

Derivative of the John Boorman action thriller Deliverance (1972), this grim, ostensibly socially-conscious parable is at its best moments disturbing, and at its worst, absurd. Cliff Robertson stars as Rex, a gun enthusiast and military veteran who, with his buddies Lou (Ernest Borgnine) and Zeke (Henry Silva), stalks wild game in the forest. It's a weekend ritual that Rex in particular eagerly anticipates, as he is bored and disillusioned with his marriage and career. After a frustrating day that's left them empty-handed, however, the party comes to a river. Another band of hunters appears on the other side, menacingly staring them down. Suddenly a gun goes off, and Zeke retaliates by shooting and killing one of the men on the other riverbank. After an exchange of gunfire, Rex and his friends win the skirmish, driving their attackers off. Deciding to keep the incident a secret from the police, they round up a posse of friends and pursue the other hunters through the woods in a bloody mini-war that only the reasonable Lou seems to question. Shoot also bears some passing similarity to a later and far superior film, Southern Comfort (1981). ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

The readjustment of astronaut Edwin E. "Buzz" Aldren to life after triumphantly walking on the moon is chronicled in this drama based on a true story. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

"His code name is Condor. In the next 24 hours, everyone he trusts will try to kill him." As the ads ominously announced, a low-level spook confronts the unfathomable in Sydney Pollack's 1975 political thriller, adapted from the James Grady novel Six Days of the Condor. CIA researcher Joe Turner (Robert Redford) returns from lunch to find the entire staff of his small New York office assassinated. When he meets his boss (Cliff Robertson) at another location to tell him what happened, someone tries to shoot Turner as well. On the run from the cops and his agency, a desperate Turner resorts to holing up with innocent civilian Kathy (Faye Dunaway), who becomes his only ally. Joe decides to save himself the only way possible: by going to The New York Times. But will it work? One of a cycle of conspiracy films from the 1970s that also included The Parallax View (1974) and Redford's All the President's Men (1976), Three Days of the Condor pits a working Everyman (albeit a CIA everyman) against a far-reaching conspiracy, as it also criticizes the CIA during a period of increasing publicity about federal wrongdoing, from the Pentagon Papers through Watergate and other congressional investigations; the challenge of negotiating New York City, shot on location, becomes one more sign of the forces that Joe must face. With its timely subject matter, taut suspense, and sympathetic Redford hero, Three Days of the Condor became a substantial hit. Balancing the conspiracy cycle's pessimism with a margin of attenuated hope, Three Days of the Condor suggests that one man can still discover the truth, but whether it helps him remains to be seen. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide

Betty Smith's best selling novel A Tree Grows in Brooklyn inspired an Oscar-winning 1945 film, a play and a Broadway musical; this 1974 73-minute telefilm - a pilot for a weekly series drama -- represents the fourth incarnation. Cliff Robertson plays Johnny Nolan, a bibulous waiter living in turn-of-the-century Brooklyn. When Nolan dies, it is up to his widow Katie (Diane Baker) to carve out an existence for herself and her children Francie (Pamelyn Ferdin) and Neely (Michael James Wixted). Ultimately, Katie marries kindly Brooklyn cop McShane (James Olson). Nancy Malone costars as Katie's promiscuous sister Sissy. First telecast March 27, 1974, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn failed to generate high enough ratings for a regular series. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Though previously filmed several times in one- and two-reel form, Edward Everett Hale's classic 1863 novel The Man Without a Country was not given a full-length treatment until this ABC "Kodak Special" TV presentation. Cliff Robertson stars as young, zealously patriotic American military officer Philip Nolan, who after participating in Aaron Burr's abortive efforts to establish an independent government is placed on trial for treason. During the proceedings, a flustered Nolan exclaims, "Damn the United States! I wish I may never hear of the United States again!" The judge solemnly grants Nolan his "wish," sentencing him to spend the rest of his life on a Navy vessel, where no one will ever be permitted to mention the United States in his presence, and from which he will never be allowed to return to his native soil. Thus is Nolan's fate sealed for the next 60 years -- yet somehow, the prisoner's innate patriotism and love for the land of his birth is never completely extinguished. Capped by one of the most moving deathbed scenes in all American literature, The Man Without a Country was filmed on location in Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Niagara, NY. The film first aired on April 24, 1973. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The oft-told story of the rise and fall of the James Younger gang is given the Dragnet treatment in The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid. With meticulous attention to detail, the film recreates the outlaw gang's most infamous escapade: the September 7, 1876, robbery of "the biggest bank west of the Mississippi" in Northfield, MN. Cliff Robertson plays Cole Younger, and Robert Duvall appears as Jesse James, herein depicted as a pair of vengeance-driven sociopaths, but no worse than the greedy railroad magnates who've driven them into a life of crime. Younger is also quite the manipulator, convincing the immigrant farmers of Northfield that the bank is completely impervious to robbery, thereby increasing the deposits that he intends to steal. Duvall's Jesse James is a cold-blooded murderer, but, like Younger, not without his own personal charm. The climactic raid is filmed cinéma vérité style, looking more like a haphazard CNN news event than a well-oiled machine (this film is not, thankfully, the standard "slick" Hollywood product). Though it drags in spots, The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid is a superb, iconoclastic reproduction of an era long past. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Filmed on location in the Philippines Robert Aldrich's Too Late the Hero is set in the last months of World War II. Lackadaisical navy lieutenant Cliff Robertson, who happens to speak fluent Japanese, is ordered to go on a suicide mission to wipe out an enemy observation post. Robertson's equally unwilling partners in this venture are British captain Denholm Elliot and pugnacious cockney private Michael Caine. All three men prove to have unsuspected reserves of courage when the going gets toughest. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Cliff Robertson essays a dual role in the made-for-TV Sunshine Patriot. He portrays a top secret agent as well as an American businessmen; both Robertsons are currently behind the Iron Curtain, both on "business." In order to evade a team of assassins and to smuggle valuable microfilm to the Good Guys, Robertson the spy switches passports and identities with Robertson the businessman. There are two points of particular interest in the moderately entertaining Sunshine Patriot. Donald Sutherland makes his American TV-movie debut in one of the many minor roles he essayed in his pre-MASH days. And, when Robertson goes to the opera in one sequence, we are treated to an extensive excerpt from the 1943 Universal Technicolor epic Phantom of the Opera. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In 1961, Cliff Robertson starred in The Two Worlds of Charley Gordon, a TV adaptation of Daniel Keyes' story Flowers for Algernon. Determined not to lose out on the film version of this play as he'd done with Days of Wine and Roses, Robertson bought up the movie rights to Keyes' story so that he and he alone would star. This determination paid off in the form of the Best Actor Academy Award for Robertson in 1968. The star plays Charly, a 30-year-old mentally retarded bakery worker. Neurosurgeon Dr. Richard Nemur (Leon Janney) and psychiatrist Dr. Anna Straus (Lilia Skala) approach Charly and ask him to participate in an experiment. Previously, Dr. Nemur was able to accelerate the intelligence of a mouse named Algernon by performing a radical new form of brain surgery; could not such a procedure work on a human being? As a result, Charly not only achieves normal intelligence, but also becomes a genius. Emboldened by his new mental status, Charly proposes marriage to his very receptive special-ed teacher (Claire Bloom). Alas, Charly notices that Algernon has begun to regress, and he reasons that he also will return to his old developmentally challenged state. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this blend of action-adventure and spy satire, the British government has been negotiating with the Middle Eastern nation of Ramaut to lease their oil fields for drilling by U.K. petroleum companies, but at the last minute, the deal collapses, and Col. Drexel (Jack Hawkins), a military leader who has worked with the authorities in Ramaut before, is given an unusual assignment. The young Prince Jamil of Ramaut (Christopher Witty) is scheduled to take the nation's throne and become the country's leader. Drexel and his men are to kidnap Jamil, hold him until he is of age, and then release him once they've persuaded him to sign the oil lease agreement. American operative David Frazer (Cliff Robertson) is called in to help, and he meets Drexel at the villa where Jamil is being held captive. However, shortly after Frazer is confronted by Sophie (Marisa Mell) and a gang of agents, he's knocked senseless and wakes up to find that Jamil is missing. Drexel's superiors think that Frazer was in on the plot to free Jamil, and while Drexel knows better, it just so happens that he has his own agenda -- Drexel has been negotiating with Jamil's family to release him in exchange for a cash payment that would go directly into his pocket. Incidentally, if you have trouble finding Ramaut on a map, don't worry -- it exists only in the mind of screenwriters William Goldman and Michael Relph. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Repeated infidelities and an unexplained death set the stage for this glossy soap opera. Kit Jordan (Lana Turner) is a wealthy woman slipping into middle age who likes attractive men and isn't averse to the notion of paying for their company. Her husband Pete (Cliff Robertson) is a one-time gigolo whom Kit met on the beach of the ocean side community in Acapulco she calls home. Neither are much on fidelity, and Pete sometimes has mistresses just as Kit has her boy-toys whom she meets in much the same way as she met him. One day, a dead body washes up to the shore wearing a bracelet with the inscription "Love Is Thin Ice." It turns out that the man was one of Kit's many former boyfriends, and the police are not sure if the death was an accident, suicide, or possibly murder -- with the Jordans as suspects. Carol Lambert (Stefanie Powers), the dead man's sister, arrives in town to get to the bottom of her brother's death, but she falls into a fling with Pete. Meanwhile, Hank (Hugh O'Brien), another beach bum, has been dallying with rich widow Margot Eliot (Ruth Roman), but with Pete getting more serious about Carol, he begins to think that Kit might be a more lucrative target for his affections. As the police step up their investigation of the death, the parties involved begin to realize that they're all going to have to settle on one partner, once and for all. Turner's costumes were designed by Edith Head, who spent a then-record $1 million on the many stylish beach outfits which are frequently changed by the cast. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide