Phil Spector Movies

Different relaxing Christmas scenes are accompanied on the soundtrack by Phil Spector produced performs holiday classics including Darlene Love's "White Christmas," The Ronettes' "Frosty the Snowman," and The Crystals' "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer." ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

When Rodney Bingenheimer was just a teenager -- a diminutive, long-haired kid who was picked on a lot -- his mother, a divorced autograph hound, dropped him off in front of the home of actress Connie Stevens and essentially said, "Good luck." Stevens was on location shooting a movie and Bingenheimer says he didn't see his mother again for five or six years after that. The Mayor of the Sunset Strip, a documentary by George Hickenlooper (Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse), tracks Bingenheimer's rise from the 1960s, when he was a groupie -- eventually landing his first show-business job as a double for Davy Jones on The Monkees -- through stints as a successful club owner and influential DJ to his current status as a fading musical icon. The film takes us from the innocent pop of Brian Wilson and Sonny & Cher through the raucous heyday of L.A.'s punk scene and beyond. Hickenlooper also delves into Bingenheimer's relationships, showing him mourning his neglectful and unbalanced, but beloved, mother and visiting with his father, who never attempted to make contact with Bingenheimer after his mother abandoned him. He also pines for a close friend, Camille Chancery, and helps out a seemingly hopeless middle-aged wannabe rock star, Ronald Vaughan. While Bingenheimer used his skills as a consummate hanger-on and his genuine enthusiasm for rock & roll to become a central figure in the L.A. music scene for a couple of decades and is lauded in the film for his good taste and good nature by celebrities from Cher to David Bowie to Gwen Stefani, his current life is shown to be somewhat sad and lonely. The Mayor of the Sunset Strip is chock full of cameos and features a star-studded soundtrack. It was shown at the 2003 New York Film Festival. ~ Josh Ralske, Rovi

Offbeat fashion student Betsy Hopper (Molly Ringwald) and her straight-laced investment-banker fiancé, Jake Lovell(Dylan Walsh), just want an intimate little wedding reception, but Betsy's father, Eddie (Alan Alda), a Long Island construction contractor, feels so threatened by Jake's rich WASP parents (Nicolas Coster and Bibi Besch) that he blows the ceremony up into a bank-breaking showpiece, sending his wife, Lola (Madeline Kahn), into a financial panic. Pressure from Betsy's extended family to include their joint Jewish and Italian-Catholic heritage in the ceremony doesn't do much to assuage the title character's worries, nor does the lovelorn bitterness of her older sister, Connie (Ally Sheedy), who's single, her parents assume, because she has the audacity to pursue the unfeminine profession of police officer. With all of his funds tied up into the money pit of a house he's building, Betsy's dad has to turn to his crooked brother-in-law, Oscar (Joe Pesci), for financial assistance, and soon a soft-spoken but menacing young mobster named Stevie Dee (Anthony LaPaglia) is supervising Eddie's construction project and casting his romantic aspirations toward the clueless Connie. Underworld hijinks and unconventional matrimonial practices ensue in this broad domestic comedy written and directed by star Alan Alda. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi

Disco-gone-Latin, that's what's happening in Salsa, where a grease monkey who's sick and tired of knuckle-busting lives for his nights on the dance floor where he gyrates to the salsa beat. Not much plot but plenty of dancing is the fare here, as the lead guy (Robby Rosa) is out to show he's the Travolta of the Latino swing scene. ~ Rovi

Stanley Kubrick's return to filmmaking after a seven-year hiatus, this film crystallizes the experience of the Vietnam War by concentrating on a group of raw Marine volunteers. Based on Gustav Hasford's novel The Short Timers, the film's first half details the volunteers' harrowing boot-camp training under the profane, power-saw guidance of drill instructor Sgt. Hartman (R. Lee Ermey, a real-life drill instructor whose performance is one of the most terrifyingly realistic on record). Part two takes place in Nam, as seen through the eyes of the now thoroughly indoctrinated marines. Ironically, Full Metal Jacket was filmed almost entirely in England. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This Danish film is set in 1963, at the height of Beatlemania. Played out against the standard pop-culture backdrop is the story of the friendship between Adam Tonsberg and Lars Simonson. His ego in tatters thanks to a domineering father, Simonsen yearns for the affections of snooty Ulrikke Juul Bondo, though it is "common knowledge" that she's Tonsberg's girl. Tonsberg, however, prefers the company of the down-to-earth Camilla Soeberg. When Soeberg becomes pregnant, Tonsberg is forced to borrow the abortion money from former girlfriend Bondo, who wants him to spend a weekend with her in exchange. This is all going according to Bondo's plan, and soon she and Tonsberg are making wedding plans. Suddenly gaining a moral backbone, Tonsberg calls off the wedding, then helps his friend Simonsen, who is endeavoring to prove that his mother is not the lunatic described by his tyrannical father. The coming-of-age process in this film is even more complex than these notes would suggest, but young Danish filmgoers had no trouble relating to Twist and Shout (originally Tro, Hab Og Karlighed), which allegedly made more money than any previous Danish film. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Tossing wristwatches away, two bikers hit the road to find America in Dennis Hopper's anti-establishment classic. After a major cocaine sale to an L.A. connection (Phil Spector), free-wheeling potheads Billy (Hopper) and Wyatt, aka Captain America (Peter Fonda, who also produced), motor eastward to party at Mardi Gras before "retiring" to Florida with the riches concealed in Wyatt's stars-and-stripes gas tank. As they ride through the Southwest, they take a hitchhiker (Luke Askew) to a struggling hippie commune before they get thrown in a small-town jail for "parading without a permit." Their cellmate, drunken ACLU lawyer George Hanson (Jack Nicholson, replacing Rip Torn), does them a "groovy" favor by getting them out of jail and then decides to join them. Babbling about Venusians, George discovers the joys of smoking grass, but an encounter with Southern rednecks soon proves how right he is about the danger posed by Billy's and Wyatt's unfettered life in a country that has lost its ideals. With the straight world closing in, Wyatt and Billy try to revel in New Orleans with some LSD and hookers (Karen Black and Toni Basil), but the acid trip is shot through with morbidity. Once they reach Florida, Billy raves about attaining the American dream; Wyatt, however, knows the truth: "We blew it."

Produced and directed by two Hollywood iconoclasts with under a half-million non-studio dollars, Easy Rider shook up the languishing movie industry when it grossed over 19 million dollars in 1969; it captured the spirit of the times as it woke Hollywood up to the power of young audiences and socially relevant movies, along with such other landmarks of the late '60s as Bonnie and Clyde, The Graduate, and 2001. Shot on location by Laszlo Kovacs, Easy Rider eschewed old-fashioned Hollywood polish for documentary-style immediacy, and it enhanced its casual feel with improvised dialogue and realistically "stoned" acting. With a soundtrack of contemporary rock songs by Jimi Hendrix, the Band, and Steppenwolf to complete the atmosphere, Easy Rider was hailed for capturing the increasingly violent Vietnam-era split between the counterculture and the repressive Establishment. Experiencing the "shock of recognition," youth audiences embraced Easy Rider's vision of both the attractions and the limits of dropping out, proving that audience's box-office power and turning Nicholson into a movie star. The momentarily hip Academy nominated Nicholson for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar, and Fonda, Hopper, and Terry Southern for their screenplay. Though none of its imitators would match its impact, Easy Rider remains one of the seminal works of late '60s Hollywood both for its trailblazing legacy and its sharply perceptive portrait of its chaotic times. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi