Bernard Schwartz Movies

Patsy Cline was one of the first great female stars of country music, and her best-known hits (such as "Sweet Dreams" and "Walking After Midnight") not only broadened the audience for country but brought a new sophistication to the Nashville sound. Cline was at the peak of her popularity when she died in a plane crash in 1963, and Sweet Dreams is a biopic which examines her life and career, with a particular focus on her troubled relationship with her second husband, Charlie Dick. Cline (played by Jessica Lange) is unhappily married and playing small-time gigs in West Virginia when she meets Dick (Ed Harris), whose charm and aggressive self-confidence catch her attention. In time, Cline leaves her husband to marry Dick, and she gives up music to focus on raising their children. But after Dick goes into the Army, Cline begins singing again, and after joining forces with manager Randy Hughes (David Clennon), Cline becomes a rising star on the country music scene. However, Cline's success fuels her self-confidence, much to Dick's annoyance, and he becomes increasingly abusive (both physically and emotionally) as she attempts to assert her independence. Rather than attempt to re-create Patsy Cline's vocals, Jessica Lange instead opted to lip-synch with Cline's original recordings. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A sequel to one of the most popular horror films of all time, this psychological thriller received a pleasantly surprised, positive critical reception. Anthony Perkins returns as Norman Bates, who has just been released from an insane asylum after 22 years, having been judged clinically sane by the State of California over the objections of Lila Crane Loomis (Vera Miles), sister to one of Norman's murder victims. Norman returns home to the hotel and hilltop mansion he once inhabited with his mother. As a parole condition, Norman is hired at a local diner, where he struggles to join mainstream society, despite the stares of patrons aware of his past. At the diner, Norman befriends Mary (Meg Tilly), a waitress, and it seems that he may be putting some semblance of a life back together. But then Norman begins to experience hallucinatory encounters with his long-dead mother, including a handwritten note, a phone call, and a sighting of her standing at her favorite window. Is Norman's psychosis manifesting itself again, or are old enemies attempting to drive him back into an institution? As the pressure mounts, bodies pile up, and Norman's fragile hold on normality becomes more and more tenuous. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi

Loretta Lynn was one of the first female superstars in country music and remains a defining presence within the genre; with her strong, clear, hard-country voice and tough, no-nonsense songs about husbands who cheat and wives who weren't about to be pushed around, Lynn introduced a feminist mindset to Nashville years before the phrase "women's liberation" became common currency. Coal Miner's Daughter is a screen adaptation of Lynn's autobiography, starring Sissy Spacek as Loretta Lynn. One of eight children born to Ted Webb (Levon Helm), a coal miner raising a family despite grinding poverty in Butcher's Holler, KY, Loretta married Dolittle "Mooney" Lynn (Tommy Lee Jones) when she was only 13 years old. A mother of four by the time she was 20, Lynn began singing the occasional song at local honky-tonks on weekends, and at 25, she cut (at Mooney's suggestion) a demo tape that earned her a deal with an independent record label. Loretta and Mooney's tireless promotion of the record (including a long road trip through the south in which they stopped at every country radio station they could find) paid off -- Loretta's first single, "Honky Tonk Girl," hit the charts and earned her a spot on the Grand Ole Opry. Stardom called and Loretta never looked back, but success brought with it both joy (a long string of hit records and sold-out concerts and a close friendship with Patsy Cline) and sorrow (a nervous breakdown brought on by overwork and a great deal of stress to a marriage that endured -- but just barely). Sissy Spacek won an Academy award for her vivid, thoroughly natural performance as Loretta (she also did her own singing), and Levon Helm (drummer for the legendary rock group the Band) made an impressive screen debut as her father. Ernest Tubb makes a cameo appearance as himself. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A man moves to the small and racially divided town where his bar-owning brother was murdered after he refused to pay crooked white cops for "protection." When he is threatened himself, he calls in some hefty men to help him, but they instead decide to take over the town. In order to oust the baddies, the hero becomes a one-man army with a mission. This blaxploitationer features the action hero, Fred Williamson. ~ Kristie Hassen, Rovi

A man who fights his way to success learns the people who helped him may be his biggest enemies in this action drama. B.J. Hammer (Fred Williamson) is a dock worker who used to box in the Golden Gloves and still knows how to handle himself in a fight; when he gets into a brawl at work, he's seen in action by an associate of Davis (Bernie Hamilton), a flashy businessman who manages boxers. Davis thinks Hammer has potential, and offers him a contract. Soon Hammer is training with Professor (Mel Stewart, an experienced boxing coach, and begins romancing Lois (Vonetta McGee), one of Davis's secretaries. After easily winning several fights, Hammer's career is on the rise and he seems poised to become a championship contender. But Davis isn't just interested in boxing; he's an underworld kingpin who also traffics in drugs and prostitutes, and often uses washed-up fighters as pawns in his criminal games. Hammer soon learns just how Davis operates when his manager orders him to take a dive in an upcoming fight, and when Hammer refuses, both he and Lois could face deadly retribution. Also starring William Smith and D'Urville Martin, Hammer was a major box-office success that established Fred Williamson as one of the major stars of the 1970s blaxploitation boom; the film also included an original score from soul music legend Solomon Burke. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

This offbeat potboiler from Psycho scripter Joseph Stefano involves a plot hatched by mod couple Wylie (Michael Sarrazin) and Kassia (Gayle Hunnicutt) to murder Wylie's wealthy, cat-loving aunt Danny (Eleanor Parker). There's only one hitch in their scheme, but it's a doozy: Wylie suffers from a severe case of ailurophobia -- an irrational fear of all cats. In order for their plot to succeed, the pair must first eliminate Aunt Danny's legions of feline companions...which turns out to be much more difficult than expected, thanks to a sly, deadly counter-plot. Despite some bizarre cues hinting at some sort of evil intelligence on the part of the cats, the suggested horror elements are downplayed in favor of a substandard psycho-thriller. Sadly, Stefano's script is the film's greatest failure, littered with silly dialogue and plot holes a mile wide. ~ Cavett Binion, Rovi