JFK: Watch Responsibly

Photo: Warner Some time after the premiere of Oliver Stone’s JFK, Roger Ebert ran into Walter Cronkite and received a “tongue-lashing” for having praised the film. In Cronkite’s view, it was full…

GoodFellas: Married to the Mob

Photo: Warner Making GoodFellas a horribly realistic film took its toll. Joe Pesci had qualms about playing such an evil character as Tommy DeVito and Lorraine Bracco started thinking of…

V 

The weekly TV series that followed the first two miniseries showed the evil visitors making a dramatic comeback on Earth, reigniting the war; they were only hiding behind the moon.…

V: The Fourth Reich

Photo: NBC A major hit in several countries when first shown on TV, this miniseries frightened me to the degree that I could barely watch it. I was only nine…

Music Box 

When Michael Laszlo (Armin Mueller-Stahl) is accused of having committed war crimes in Hungary 40 years earlier, his daughter, attorney Ann Talbot (Jessica Lange), decides to represent him. Another politically…

Taxi Driver: Rough Justice

Robert De Niro. Photo: Columbia Travis Bickle can’t stand the streets of New York. He’s waiting for the rain that will wash the trash off the streets, all the thieves,…

Battle for the Planet of the Apes

The fifth and concluding chapter in the original Planet of the Apes series presents apes as eloquent and bright as the ones in the first movie, a gigantic leap from…

Conquest of the Planet of the Apes

The third, fourth and fifth films in this Planet of the Apes series explore how apes came to rule the Earth. In the near future, in the year of 1991,…

Escape From the Planet of the Apes

In this third part in the Planet of the Apes series, Zira (Kim Hunter), Cornelius (Roddy McDowell) and a colleague of theirs (Sal Mineo) journey to present-day Earth; as one…

Midnight Caller 

One of those shows that were a little short on entertainment value but had something to say. It was the story of the cop who quit and became “The Nighthawk”,…