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The House of the Spirits | Prologue
A young woman, Blanca Trueba (Winona Ryder), arrives at a house with an old man and the young woman starts remembering her life.
Clara and Esteban
Blanca's mother, Clara del Valle (Meryl Streep) was a child with psychic power when Esteban Trueba (Jeremy Irons) came to propose to Clara's older sister, Rosa del Valle. Esteban left his fiancée with her family to earn money for their wedding. One day, Clara has a vision and tells her sister Rosa that there will be a death in the family. The next day, Rosa dies after drinking poison intended for her father, Senator Severo. Clara blames herself for her sister's death, and after watching her sister's autopsy, decides never to speak again.
Esteban was heartbroken. At home, his sister, Férula (Glenn Close) lives and takes care of their sick mother. Esteban used the money he earned from mining and bought a hacienda, Tres Marías. He finds many natives living on his land and tells them to work for him for food and shelter. For the next twenty years, Esteban makes Tres Marías an example of a successful Hacienda. One day he rapes a peasant girl, Pancha García (Sarita Choudhury) and she gave birth to a son. He spends some nights with Tránsito, a local prostitute (María Conchita Alonso), to whom he lends money so she can start a new career in the capital.
Twenty years later, Esteban receives a letter that his mother has died. After her funeral, Esteban decides to ask for Clara's hand, despite Férula's protests that Clara is too sickly and will not take care of him properly. When he shows up at the Del Valle family's house, Clara asks him right away if he has come to ask her to marry him, thus speaking again for the first time in twenty years.
Férula meets Clara at a coffee shop to talk about her own future, and Clara, sensing Férula's worries, promises her that she can live with her and Esteban in Tres Marías after the wedding and the two will be like sisters.
Clara gives birth to a girl as she predicted, and names her Blanca. One day, the girl whom Esteban raped, Pancha García appears at the family house with Esteban's illegitimate teenage son, Esteban García and asks for money. Esteban Trueba gives them some money and harshly orders them never to come back threatening to have his dogs attack them both if they return.
Clara holds classes for the peasant children and Blanca. Pedro Tercero, the young son of Esteban's foreman Segundo at Tres Marias befriends Blanca and the two become playmates. Esteban Trueba does not like his daughter playing with a peasant boy and sends Blanca to a boarding school.
Blanca and Pedro Tercero
After graduating from school, Blanca returns home to Tres Marías and meets with Pedro Tercero (Antonio Banderas) by the lagoon every night. One night while Esteban attends a political meeting, there is an earthquake; he worries about Clara and Blanca, goes home to Tres Marías and finds that Férula has climbed into bed with Clara. He is so angry that he throws Férula out of the house telling her never to come back. Férula curses Esteban but leaves. Clara is deeply disappointed that Esteban would kick his sister out of their family home.
One day Esteban brings the French Count Jean de Satigny (Jan Niklas) to his home intending to arrange a marriage between him and Blanca. Clara senses that the French "nobleman" is a fraud while reading cards, but Esteban dismisses her folly. While Satigny is still visiting, Esteban catches Pedro preaching revolutionary ideas that are critical of wealthy landowners like Esteban to the peasant workers. Esteban orders the workers to return to work and punishes Pedro with a fierce whipping and banishes him from Tres Marías. That night at dinner, Férula suddenly appears in the house, kisses Clara on the forehead and leaves again. Clara tells the rest of the family that Férula has died. Clara and Esteban drive into town to Férula's modest house where they find her dead on the bed.
Pedro returns to Tres Marías to talk to the peasants about their rights and nearly gets shot by Esteban. That night, Count Jean de Satigny, who is visiting again, watches Blanca and Pedro meeting secretly at the lagoon. He reveals Blanca's lover to her father who immediately drags Blanca back to the house. When Clara tries to persuade him not to be violent, Esteban hits his wife and she falls. Esteban immediately expresses his regret, but Clara tells him in shock and agony that she will never speak to him again. Clara moves with Blanca to her parents' home in the capital.
Blanca becomes pregnant with Pedro's child and gives birth to a girl named Alba.
Revolution
Esteban is busy with his political career as a senator, but as an old man he is lonely and finds comfort in the arms of Tránsito, who now runs a high-class prostitution establishment.
During the national election, Esteban believes his Conservative Party will win as usual, but the People's Front ends up winning control of the government. Blanca goes out on the street to celebrate and to meet Pedro, now a leading figure in the People's Front. Clara stays home with Alba to decorate the house for Christmas, where after what seems like a heart attack she passes away, instructing the little girl to give the diaries she had kept all her life to her mother Blanca, so that "she may understand better that and how events are related".
Meanwhile, a conspiracy between some Conservative Party members and the military leads to a coup d'état, and the military takes control of the country. At first, Esteban believes it is good for the country and that the military will hand power back to the Conservative Party, but he soon learns that the military have other plans. Under the control of the military, people associated with the People's Party are captured and even killed. Blanca is very involved and eventually the police come to arrest her for being with Pedro Tercero. Blanca reveals to her father that Pedro has been hiding in their house's cellar and begs him to help Pedro get out of the country.
In the coming days, Blanca is tortured and abused by her half-brother, Esteban García, who had joined the military with his father's help. Esteban honours his daughter's wishes and helps Pedro Tercero find exile in Canada. Esteban then turns to Tránsito, now an influential Madam with lots of connections to high level military figures, to help free Blanca. One morning, a beaten and raped Blanca arrives at her home and Esteban tells her that Pedro is waiting for her in Canada.
Epilogue
Blanca and Esteban return to Tres Marías with Alba. Esteban is finally visited by Clara's spirit who has come to help the old man on to the next world. Blanca sits outside and ponders her life, looking forward to a life with Pedro and her daughter Alba. | paranormal, revenge, avant garde, romantic, flashback | tt0107151 |
Bloodbath at the House of Death | The film opens in 1975 at a place called Headstone Manor, which is being used as a "businessman's weekend retreat and girls' summer camp". A few minutes into the film, a group of satanic monks enter the house and kill 18 of its occupants.
In 1983, Doctor Lucas Mandeville (Kenny Everett) and Doctor Barbara Coyle (Pamela Stephenson) are sent to investigate radioactive readings in the area that have been traced to Headstone Manor, now known by locals as the House of Death.
Along with several other scientists, Mandeville and Coyle set up their equipment in the house, while the Sinister Man (Vincent Price), a 700-year-old Satanic priest, prepares a rite in the nearby woods to purge the house of its unwanted guests.
During this time, Mandeville reveals that he was once a successful German surgeon named Ludwig Manheim, who was reduced to "smart-arse paranormal research crap" after a humiliation in the past. Coyle also encounters a poltergeist, and the two engage in sexual intercourse.
Several satanic clones of Mandeville, Coyle and the other scientists enter house, and begin killing off the originals and taking their place. When Coyle is about to be killed, she is rescued by the poltergeist and saved. The satanic monks then take off in a spaceship, revealing that these monks are aliens using the house for their activities on Earth. The film ends with the spaceship soaring into the skies, with an E.T. voice groaning: "Oh, shit! Not again!". | paranormal, violence, satire, murder | tt0086981 |
Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary | In 1897, a visitor from the East, Count Dracula, arrives in London and is inadvertently invited into the home of Lucy Westenra. She is bitten by Dracula, and taken by his curse. Lucy's behavior becomes more erratic leading her to bite her fiancé. Lucy is immediately put under the care of Dr. Van Helsing. Van Helsing does blood tests on Lucy and declares "Vampyre!" as the source of the problem, and puts Lucy to bed adorned with garlic.
That night, Renfield, a mental patient who lives in the asylum next to Lucy's home, escapes from confinement and Lucy's house is broken into by demons. Lucy's mother awakens in the commotion. Panicked by the demons, Lucy's mother opens the door and inadvertently re-invites Dracula into the house. Both Lucy and her mother are killed in this incident and a funeral procession takes place. The next day, Renfield is recaptured and placed back into the mental hospital. Bizarre incidents begin to occur around the city with newspapers headlines proclaiming a "Bloofer Lady" who has been murdering infants. Renfield is interrogated and confesses that Dracula has brought Lucy back from the dead committing these deeds and the solution to the problem lies in the graveyard.
Van Helsing and Lucy's suitors go there and spy Dracula and the undead Lucy in a full romantic embrace. After Dracula leaves, Van Helsing declares, "We must destroy the false Lucy so the real one may live forever". When Van Helsing opens the Lucy's coffin, Lucy rises out and attacks the men. Lucy is eventually subdued by a piercing stab from Jonathan's long wooden stakes and a decapitation with a shovel by Van Helsing who then declares they must find and defeat the vampyre. Van Helsing and his men go to interrogate Renfield finding out that Dracula's next plan is to attack Lucy's best friend Mina.
Mina, who is in a convent, aids her injured fiancé, Jonathon Harker. Harker had journeyed to Castle Dracula, where he had intended to finalize a land sale. Upon arriving, Harker was ravaged by three Brides of Dracula, who overpowered him. Harker eventually finalized the land deal for Dracula, and was imprisoned in the Castle. Harker escaped to the convent. In the convent, Mina finds Jonathon's diary and learns of his pleasures with the Brides of Dracula. With what she has discovered about Harker, Mina becomes progressively more sexually aggressive, which makes Harker nervous. He flees with the diary. Mina attempts to follow Harker but comes face to face with Dracula, who kidnaps her and takes her to Castle Dracula.
In Castle Dracula, Dracula woos Mina, tempting her with offers of riches and eventually biting her on the neck, solidifying his curse. Harker, along with Van Helsing and his men, break into Dracula's castle and dispatch the Brides of Dracula with long wooden stakes. The men eventually stumble upon Mina and find the mark of Dracula's bite upon her. Attempting to root out Dracula, the men smash coffins and place Christian crosses in them. Dracula attacks the men.
After the battle, Dracula and Mina are the only two left conscious. Mina scurries to a window with a cross and pulls it open to stun Dracula with the sunlight. The men regain consciousness, surround Dracula, and stab him with their stakes. The castle is demolished by Van Helsing's men and everyone departs. Dracula is left hanging motionless, impaled on a giant stake. | cult, gothic | tt0293113 |
Ride Him, Bosko! | The cartoon begins as a coyote howls from a mountain top, under a full moon. He takes a deep breath as his body inflates to accommodate extra air and releases another howl.
Next, Bosko is seen riding a horse, playing a banjo and singing the cowboy song, "When the Bloom is on the Sage". His horse seems unable to go over a rock along their path and Bosko is forced to climb down and push him over it before they can continue on their way.
The scene then shows the following words against a black background as the music switches to a piano rendition of "She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain".
Red Gulch
~ where men are men,
nine times out of ten ~
The view is next of a road outside a saloon and shadows in the window indicate that the patrons are having a good time. A small gun chase takes place and a passer-by is whacked on the head with what looks like a bottle of beer. Next, a really tall cowboy walks down the road but has the middle of his body shot out by the patrons. This results in him being reduced to the size of a midget.
Bosko arrives and his horse collapses in a heap beside the pavement. Strolling toward the saloon on the opposite side of the road, Bosko throws open the doors and yells "Howdy" only to be greeted by a volley of gunshots. The patrons yell "Hi Bosko" in return as Bosko laughs uneasily. He then picks up his bullet-riddled hat and walks inside where a three-piece band, comprising banjo, violin and piano, is playing "She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain". Bosko starts to tap dance whilst some onlookers sway to the beat.
The piano player thumps hard on the keys which makes a mug of beer fly through the air and empty the contents into his open mouth. He gulps it down and is suddenly consumed by flames that spread upwards from his feet. This results in his clothes being burnt off, exposing bloomers. He puckers a suddenly lipsticked mouth, crosses his knees in a shyly feminine fashion and walks away seductively.
Bosko steps up to the piano and starts to play, rocking his stool in tune to the music. Next, four cards are seen held in someone's hand: a King, Jack, Queen and Joker. They sing a little ditty but the person holding the cards soon shoots the Joker putting an end to their performance. Bosko is shown still playing the piano whilst the other patrons gather in a circle and start dancing.
The scene then cuts to show the following words
The Deadwood stage
(free wheeling)
Honey (Bosko's sweetheart) is in a carriage that is hurtling down the highway with a big trunk on the roof. The ride is quite bumpy so Honey gets thrown around her seat a bit and exhorts the driver to be careful. A group of highwaymen are also on the move and one of them creep along behind a cliff to look for potential prey. He spots Honey's carriage and hastens back to his cronies who follow his lead. He then positions himself alongside the path of Honey's carriage and aims his guns. However, the carriage hurtles past at such a fast pace that the gunmen gets twisted around himself. Having unravelled he gets on his horse and gives chase along with his gang, all of them shooting non-stop. Eventually, the trunk on the roof of the carriage falls out and the clothes get out and start running away to avoid the hailstorm of bullets. A corset is seen literally 'flying' away.
Inside the carriage Honey is getting thrown about violently as the driver is flung off his perch and lands on a tall cactus. He slides down wincing as hundreds of thorns break off and lands on a skeleton of a bull. The skeleton suddenly comes to life and goes off at a gallop whilst the rider hangs on for dear life.
Back at the saloon, Bosko is still playing the piano when the driver stumbles in and relays the news. He then deflates and collapses dramatically into his pants as his hand grabs a mug of beer and pours it in after himself.
Bosko gets on his horse and gallops away to the rescue, the horse leaping noticeably effortlessly over the rocks he seemed to have trouble with earlier.
The bandits are still chasing the carriage and Honey leans out of a window and implores Bosko to save her. As Bosko continues to gallop after the run away carriage the scene pans out to show Hugh Harman, Rudolf Ising, and Friz Freleng watching the cartoon and adding sound effects. They discuss how they can get Bosko to save the girl, but then decide to go home. This prompts everyone to exit, leaving Bosko in the lurch. | psychedelic | tt0023397 |
Power/Rangers | The Machine Empire defeats the Power Rangers in battle, destroying the Megazord. It is revealed that Earth's governments then negotiate a truce with the Machine Empire and the Power Rangers are disbanded.
Years later, Rocky, the second, now-prosthetic Red Ranger has defected to the Machine Empire, critical of Zordon's use of Power Rangers as child soldiers. He interrogates a restrained Kimberly, the former Pink Ranger, about the location of Tommy Oliver, the former Green Ranger. He details the tragic lives of Jason, Rocky's predecessor as Red Ranger, who was gunned down eight hours after marrying Kimberly, when Bulk and Skull revealed their location to a police force; Zack, the former Black Ranger, was an insatiable action junkie who became a Machine Empire enforcer and was assassinated after a threesome with Divatox and Scorpina; Billy Cranston, the former Blue Ranger, became an openly-gay trillionaire weapons manufacturer who seemingly committed suicide.
Kimberly rejects Rocky's claim that Tommy is hunting down the Rangers. She tells Rocky that she hasn't seen him since Trini's, the former Yellow Ranger, who died at the treaty negotiations, funeral. Rocky acknowledges that he already knew that; she is really being held as bait. Tommy arrives and kills the guards, entering into single combat against Rocky in a sword duel. When Rocky gains the upper hand, Kimberly shoots and kills him. Tommy demands to know who she is, as the real Kimberly died in his arms during the final battle years earlier. It is revealed that she is Rita Repulsa, who killed all the others and wants to rule the world with Tommy. He denies her, attacking her as the film ends. | violence, murder | tt4475970 |
How Green Was My Valley | The movie begins with a monologue by an older Huw Morgan (voice by Irving Pichel): "I am packing my belongings in the shawl my mother used to wear when she went to the market. And I'm going from my valley. And this time, I shall never return." The valley and its villages are now blackened by the coal mines that fill the area.
A young Huw (Roddy McDowall), the youngest child of Gwilym Morgan (Donald Crisp), walks home with his father to meet his mother, Beth (Sara Allgood). His older brothers, Ianto (John Loder), Ivor (Patric Knowles), Davy (Richard Fraser), Gwilym Jr., and Owen all work in the coal mines with their father, while sister Angharad (Maureen O'Hara) keeps house with their mother. Huw's childhood is idyllic, the town, not yet overrun with mining spoil, is beautiful, and the household is warm and loving. Huw is smitten on meeting Bronwyn (Anna Lee), a girl engaged to be married to his oldest brother, Ivor (Patric Knowles). At the boisterous wedding party Angharad meets the new preacher, Mr. Gruffydd (Walter Pidgeon), and there is an obvious mutual attraction.
Trouble begins when the mine owner decreases wages, and the miners strike in protest. Gwilym's attempt to mediate by not endorsing a strike estranges him from the other miners as well as his older sons, who quit the house. Beth interrupts a late night meeting of the strikers, threatening to kill anyone who harms her husband. While returning home, crossing the fields in a snowstorm in the dark, Beth falls into the river. Huw dives in to save her with the help of the townspeople, and temporarily loses the use of his legs. He recovers with the help of Mr. Gruffydd, which further endears him to Angharad.
The strike is eventually settled, and Gwilym and his sons reconcile, yet many miners have lost their jobs. Angharad is courted by the mine owner's son, Iestyn Evans (Marten Lamont), though she loves Mr. Gruffydd. Mr. Gruffydd loves her too, to the malicious delight of the gossipy townswomen, but cannot bear to subject her to an impoverished churchman's life. Angharad submits to a loveless marriage to Evans, and they relocate out of the country.
Huw begins school at a nearby village. Abused by other boys, he is taught to fight by boxer Dai Bando (Rhys Williams) and his crony, Cyfartha (Barry Fitzgerald). After a beating by the cruel teacher Mr. Jonas (Morton Lowry), Dai Bando avenges Huw with an impromptu boxing display on Mr. Jonas to the delight of his pupils.
On the day that Bronwyn gives birth to their child, Ivor is killed in a mine accident. Later, two of Morgan's sons are dismissed in favour of less experienced, cheaper labourers. With no job prospects, they leave to seek their fortunes abroad. Huw is awarded a scholarship to university, but to his father's dismay he refuses it to work in the mines. He relocates in with Bronwyn to help provide for her and her child.
When Angharad returns without her husband, vicious gossip spreads through the town of an impending divorce. Mr. Gruffydd is denounced by the church deacons, and after condemning the town's small-mindedness, he decides to leave.
Just then, the alarm whistle sounds, signalling another mine disaster. Several men are injured, and Gwilym and others are trapped in a cave-in. Young Huw, Mr. Gruffydd, and Dai Bando descend with others for a rescue attempt. Gwilym and his son are briefly re-united before he succumbs to his injuries. Huw rides the lift to the surface cradling his father's body, his coal-blackened face devoid of youthful innocence.
Narration by an older Huw recalls, "Men like my father cannot die. They are with me still, real in memory as they were in flesh, loving and beloved forever. How green was my valley then." The movie ends with a montage of family vignettes showing Huw with his father and mother, his brothers and sister. | melodrama | tt0033729 |
5 Steps to Danger | John Emmett, an American everyman, is on a fishing and hunting trip when his car breaks down. He is offered a ride by a stranger, Ann Nicholson, who is driving to Santa Fe and asks him to take turns behind the wheel.
During a stopover a woman identifying herself as a nurse takes John aside in a diner and says she has been following them because Ann is an escaped mental patient of a Dr. Frederick Simmons. And although he isn't sure what to believe, John begins to doubt Ann when two policemen attempt to arrest them, claiming to be investigating a murder in Los Angeles.
John and Ann manage to slip away. He demands the truth, whereupon Ann says she is an ex-German citizen who stumbled upon a government plot and is in possession of valuable scientific transcripts embedded on a small cosmetic mirror. In order to prevent Simmons from having Ann committed to a mental institution against her will, John asks Ann to marry him, while also declaring his love for her. They wed in a small town and then continue their journey to find the scientist who wrote the transcripts. The chase ends in a confrontation between Simmons, who is actually a Soviet spy, and his accomplices versus FBI and CIA agents, who verify Ann's story. Ann and John enjoy their honeymoon on the fishing trip John had originally planned. | murder | tt0050087 |
Zaalim | Judge Somnath lives with his wife, three sons, and a daughter. Two of his sons, Vikram and Mohan are married, while his daughter, Kaamna, and youngest son, Ravi, are of marriageable age. Somnath had wanted his sons to be a doctor, police officer, and a Judge. While Vikram is a surgeon, Mohan's a Police Inspector, & Ravi is now studying law and on his way to become a lawyer and then a Judge like his dad. The family have a dark secret. Ravi is prone to losing his temper, so much so that he gets out of control, and has killed someone in his childhood. When Kaamna gets raped, the family are reluctant to tell Ravi. When they do, they convince him to control himself, while Mohan gets an arrest warrant for Vinod, Kaamna's molester. Things do not go smoothly in court as the matter is put off for several months and then Somnath and Kaamna are killed in a bomb explosion. Now Mohan and Vikram handcuff Ravi on their balcony while they finalize the funeral arrangements, and when they return Ravi is no longer there. And then the killings begin... | murder, flashback | tt0290940 |
Bloody Murder | Teenage friends Julie (Jessica Morris), her boyfriend Jason (Justin Martin), Dean (Michael Stone), Whitney (Tracy Pacheco) and Tobe (Patrick Cavanaugh) travel to Camp Placid Pines to be camp counselors for the summer. Upon arrival, they meet their boss Patrick (Peter Guillemette), another counselor named Drew (Christelle Ford), who is teamed up as a co-counselor with Julie, and a few other counselors. The teenagers get to work, bringing in food, cleaning, etc. Julie gets a warning from the groundskeeper, Henry (Bobby Stuart), who claims there is danger in these woods. Julie questions Patrick about it, and he brushes it off, saying that Henry is crazy. Late that night, the group sits around a campfire and decides to play a game of "Bloody Murder". One person is "It" and the rest of the group try to find "It" and whoever finds "It" must scream Bloody Murder and then everyone must run back to base before "It" can tag them. Everyone joins in, with Jason being it, and Jason and Dean play a prank on one of the counselors Brad (Dave Smigelski). After the game, Dean witnesses Jason making out with Whitney. Jason gets dressed and is confronted by a figure.
The next morning, Julie begins asking her fellow counselors about the whereabouts of Jason. Dean tells Julie that Jason said something about "taking off for a few days", but Julie still grows worried. The following night, the counselors gather in the mess hall for a movie, and Whitney goes to grab some food from the kitchen and is stabbed to death by a man in a hockey mask. The next day, the counselors inform Patrick that Jason and Whitney have gone missing, and they call the local sheriff who interrogates the group. Everyone suspects Dean, because he is Whitney's ex-boyfriend and he has been acting suspiciously. Dean cannot provide an alibi, so he is taken in for questioning. Julie encounters Henry again who tells her about her dad and a name of Nelson. She emails her dad about it. Brad is killed next by the masked murderer and he goes missing, and Dean is released.
Julie gets an email reply from her dad, and he claims he doesn't remember a man named Nelson. Jason is suspected next, considering he had a past with Brad. Julie is attacked by the hockey-masked killer in the woods and she flees to the road. She quickly returns to camp, trying not to act scared, and Dean is killed by the murderer. Back at the camp, Julie finds a photo of her dad at the camp, with a kid named Nelson Hammond. She searches him, and discovers that Nelson Hammond was almost killed in an accident involving the game "Bloody Murder". He then came back a few years later and killed one of the counselors that caused the prank and was sent to a mental institution. That night, Julie is attacked again by a man who chases her to the mess hall, where she locks him in the freezer. Her attacker is revealed to be Jason, who fled the area because he was worried that Dean would tell about him cheating on Julie with Whitney, and also because he was worried the police were after him. Jason is taken in by the police.
The killer murders Doug. Julie's father arrives after hearing about the police, and Drew and Julie's father walk to the lake, as Julie retreats to her cabin to gather some things. There, she deduces the killer is Drew when she sees that Drew's father was Bill Anderson, the man that Nelson Hammond killed for revenge. She confronts Drew, but is quickly proven wrong when the killer appears and attacks them. Drew is knocked out and Julie flees. Julie runs into Patrick, and then Patrick reveals he is the killer. He is really Nelson Hammond and is seeking revenge for his accident that the other counselors caused. He attacks Julie with an axe, and chases her through the woods. She runs to the camp, and the other counselors, the police, Patrick and Julie gather. Patrick tries to make it seem like Julie hit her head and is delusional. Tobe believes Julie, and threatens to shoot Patrick, but finds out he has no bullets. Patrick swings at Julie, but Drew shoots Patrick in the arm and disables him. Patrick is arrested, Julie's father is safe, and Julie starts having a crush on Tobe. Once Sheriff Williams arrives at the police station with Patrick, he questions why he killed Doug, having nothing to do with Patrick's scheme. Patrick then tells Sheriff Williams that he didn't kill Doug, and it must have been Trevor Moorehouse, hinting that the real Trevor is still out there.
Later, Julie and Jamie say their goodbyes and Julie breaks up with Jason in order to be with Tobe, angering Jason. As Jason is walking home alone, Trevor Moorehouse appears behind bushes wielding a chainsaw, and Jason screams in terror, before the screen cuts out. | murder, prank | tt0240380 |
The Vulture | Hopeless but eager would-be private detective Cedric Gull (Hulbert) has just obtained a diploma from a backstreet 'School of Detection' and is keen to put his new qualification to good use. Fortuitously, he happens to stumble across a crime scene at the office of a diamond merchant, who has just been robbed and assaulted and is being tended by his secretary Sylvia (Brook). The police arrive on the scene, but despite Cedric's proud boasts about his sleuthing qualifications, they decline his kind offers of help.
Striking out on his own, Cedric becomes convinced that the robbery was the work of a notorious gang of East End Chinese jewel thieves led by a mysterious and sinister individual known as The Vulture. He takes on board his ex-con sidekick Stiffy (Walters) and the pair set off in pursuit of the criminals. Their plans come unstuck when their inept bungling lands them both in prison. However the police, aware of their interest in the case, agree to allow them out to act as decoys. Cedric learns that Sylvia has been abducted by the criminals. He decides to disguise himself as Chinese and try to infiltrate their hideout and rescue Sylvia. After a good deal of hapless buffoonery and narrow escapes from sticky situations, he and Stiffy finally succeed in freeing Sylvia, unmasking the thieves and uncovering the identity of the elusive Vulture. | revenge | tt0062463 |
The Fallen Sparrow | John "Kit" McKittrick (John Garfield) endured two years of brutal torture after being captured in the Spanish Civil War. However, he managed to withhold the vital information sought by his captors, particularly their leader, a never-seen Nazi with a limp. His lifelong friend, Louie Lepetino, arranged his escape. When Louie, a New York police lieutenant, dies under suspicious circumstances, Kit ends his convalescence in Arizona and returns to the city to investigate. At the end of the trip, he bumps into attractive fellow passenger Toni Donne (Maureen O'Hara).
When Kit goes to the police to find out what they know, Inspector Tobin (John Miljan) tells him it was suicide, but Kit knows better. After arranging to stay in the apartment of another friend, Ab Parker (Bruce Edwards), he begins to make the acquaintance of the various guests at the party in which Louie made his fatal plunge. Among them are noted Norwegian historian and wheelchair-using refugee Dr. Christian Skaas (Walter Slezak), his nephew Otto (Hugh Beaumont), Kit's old flame Barby Taviton (Patricia Morison), who hosted the ill-fated party, and Toni Donne. Also present were singer Whitney Parker (Martha O'Driscoll), who is Ab's cousin, and her piano-playing accompanist Anton (John Banner). Kit is shaken when Dr. Skaas discusses the superiority of modern methods of torture over those of the past; it jibes too closely with what he endured.
Kit does not know whom to trust, but is attracted to Toni, and she to him. However, it turns out that Toni was the only witness to Louie's fall, raising Kit's suspicions. Meanwhile, Kit repeatedly hears, or imagines he hears, the man with the limp, showing that he may not be fully recovered from his ordeal.
Later, when Kit returns to the apartment, he is attacked in the darkness. He manages to gain the upper hand. When he turns on the light, he discovers his assailant is Anton. Anton reveals that Kit was allowed to escape from Spain, and that he has been watched constantly ever since in the hope that he would betray himself. It turns out that Kit's brigade killed a general who was very close to Adolf Hitler. Hitler vowed to get all those responsible and to hang the brigade's battle standard on his wall; Kit knows where the flag is hidden.
The next morning, Kit is awoken by a shot; he finds Ab dead in the next room with a bullet through the head. Again, Inspector Tobin insists it must have been suicide. However, Kit knows that Ab was terrified of guns as a result of a childhood incident.
Kit publicly gives Toni a medallion (from the battle standard) he has had mounted in a necklace, a declaration for all to see that he knows where the flag is. Toni begs him to give up what she considers to be just a "dirty rag", but Kit is determined to foil the "little man" in Berlin.
In the end, Kit insists she choose between him and the enemy; she agrees to help him get into Dr. Skaas's office during another party. Before though, he has to drink a toast with Skaas. As he had before when drinking with the doctor, Kit switches his goblet with Skaas's, an "old Borgia custom". However, Skaas has outwitted him, having prearranged for Toni to drug his own drink. While Kit is searching the office, he hears once again the man with a limp. The door opens, and Skaas enters, free of his wheelchair and dragging one leg. Skaas reveals that Kit has been drugged, that Otto killed Lepetino (who was investigating the Skaas for the federal government) and that he himself murdered Ab. However, before the drug can take full effect, Kit manages to shoot and kill the doctor, and summon the police.
Before they arrive, Toni explains that she was forced to betray him because of her young daughter, held hostage. Kit lets her go and arranges to meet her in Chicago. However, when he and Inspector Tobin watch her board an airplane bound for Lisbon, he knows for certain that she has thrown in her lot with the enemy. She is removed from the plane, and Kit takes her seat to fetch the flag. | murder | tt0035860 |
Citizen X | A body is discovered on a collective farm during harvesting in 1982. A subsequent search of adjacent woods, authorized by newly installed official, Viktor Burakov, turns up seven more bodies in varying stages of decomposition. The film tells the story of the subsequent eight-year hunt by forensic specialist Burakov for the serial killer responsible for the mutilation and murder of over 50 people, 35 of them children below the age of 18. Burakov is promoted to detective and eventually aided, covertly at first, by Col. Mikhail Fetisov, his commanding officer and the shrewd head of the provincial committee for crime, and, much later, by Dr. Alexandr Bukhanovsky, a psychiatrist.
As well as taking on the form of a crime thriller, the movie depicts Soviet propaganda and bureaucracy that contributed to the failure of law enforcement agencies to capture the killer, Andrei Chikatilo, for almost a decade. Chikatilo's crimes were not reported publicly for years. Local politicians were fearful such revelations would have a negative impact on the USSR's image, since serial killers were associated with Western moral corruption.
Chikatilo first came under scrutiny early in the search when he was spotted at a station and found holding a satchel bag containing a knife. He was promptly arrested. Unfortunately, he was shielded from investigation and released due to his membership in the Communist Party. Additionally, the Soviet crime labs erroneously reported that his blood type did not match that found at the murders. All this changed under the political reforms of glasnost and Perestroika, and the search for the killer began to make progress.
With the passage of time and easing of political restrictions, Burakov and Fetisov devise a plan to blanket almost all the railroad stations, where the serial killer preys upon the young and unsuspecting, with conspicuous uniformed men to discourage the killer. Three stations, however, are left unattended, except for undercover agents. Chikatilo is eventually discovered and identified through the diligence of a local, plainclothes soldier.
Arrested, Andrei Chikatilo is interrogated for seven consecutive days by Gorbunov, a Soviet hardliner who insists that he be the one to extract a confession. Chikatilo will not yield and, under pressure from Fetisov, psychiatrist Bukhanovsky is introduced. Reciting from his lengthy analysis and speculation, made three years earlier, of the sexually frustrated killer's personality and tendencies, Bukhanovsky gets a weeping Chikatilo to admit his guilt and answer specific questions about the details of some murders. Afterwards, Chikatilo leads law enforcement officials to the crime scenes and three additional undetected graves.
Held in a metal cage during his trial, a wild-eyed Chikatilo is convicted and sentenced to death. The film concludes with Chikatilo being led to a nameless prison chamber and shows him staring in shock at a central drain in the room's floor as a uniformed Soviet soldier delivers a pistol shot to the back of the killer's head. | mystery, murder | tt0112681 |
Valley of Flowers | A gang of bandits with their leader Jalan (Milind Soman) who have chosen to live an independent life free from oppression amid the wilderness live by plundering the travelers of the Silk Route of their merchandise. They have their own rules and sense of self-righteousness. While divesting victims of their valuables one day, they come across a demonic mask which intrigues Jalan. There amid the chaos, the bandits are suddenly caught unaware by the approach of a woman who calls herself Ushna (Mylene Jampanoi) who claims to know Jalan, having seen him in her dreams and asks him to let her come along. Jalan, in spite of his companions' warnings includes the woman in their band as he is already mesmerized by her unearthly beauty and mysterious and uncanny aura.
Ushna, at first becomes the group's muse and the mode of satiating Jalan's desire, but on their first encounter itself, Jalan falls in love with her and the two begin to share an insatiable passion and more than material longing for each other. Ushna knows a great deal more than the bandits about the landscape and strategic points and helps the men in more than one successful heists becoming Jalan's consort. She proves to be an excellent horse rider, riding alongside Jalan, claims to have seen the ocean, which is unseen and a subject of myth to the men. She also apparently does not have a navel which Jalan calls "The Centre of the Universe". Jalan grows increasingly dependent upon her, their love and passion ascending unscalable heights.
Madly in love, they decide to find out what future has in store for them and visit an astrologer, who informs them that they are not destined to be united. Rejecting this denial, they decide to change their fate and thereby leave the realms of material thefts and direct their attention towards stealing taboo elements such as Fortune and Energy from people potentially rich in them by stealing their shadows, in the attempt to improve their own fate. They explore too far into stealing things "which they have no right to and which are not theirs" and divest a meditating Yogi of his power of Levitation. Jalan and Ushna unite making use of their newly acquired power, to rise in the air during the act which is witnessed by Jalan's group member Jampa La (Jampa Kalsang Tamang). This is followed by a major fallout between Jalan and the rest of the group who accuse Jalan of breaking the group's rules as they perceive Ushna to be a superhuman and hence a precious asset, which according to the rules of the group should be equally divided. This enrages Jalan who accidentally kills Jampa La in the fracas between the two which results in a final split of Jalan and Ushna with the rest, with Hak Chi (Anil Yadav) rebuking Jalan as they part ways.
Meanwhile, the merchants and travelers, seek the help of Yeti (Naseeruddin Shah), a mysterious wise man and the local protector, for protection against Jalan's group. Yeti seems to recognize Ushna at once from the description given by the victims and immediately sets out for the pair of them with his three bounty hunters. Ushna and Jalan make a narrow escape, until finally they are outsmarted by Yeti and his men. Ushna manages to escape on horseback and Jalan falls into the river. Later, Yeti is confronted by Ushna in his tent who questions him of Jalan's whereabouts. Yeti advises her to go back to where she came from as she can never unite with Jalan because of what she is. Ushna rejects this denial a second time saying she loves him too much and that she never does what she is supposed to and vanishes from sight as Yeti begins to gather his Chöd equipments to capture her.
After this short separation, Ushna succeeds in finding Jalan at a monastery recovering from his wounds. The two set off for another monastery Jalan has heard of during his stay at the former one, where the Yogi prepares the Elixir of life for immortality by extracting the breath out of his pupils. Ushna is a bit reluctant and wishes to spend their lives in their natural spans together at the Valley of Flowers, where nobody could separate them. They however manage to steal the Elixir and consume it, preserving some for "days to come". The unfortunate lovers are confronted by Yeti early next morning direct from their sleep and Jalan in his pride of them attaining immortality shoots Ushna to make a display of it and Ushna in spite of having taken the Elixir is killed. Jalan is rebuked by Yeti for having tampered with things they ought not have. Now bereaved from his soulmate, Jalan is doomed to a vain life of immortality.
Then follows a transition of two centuries into the modern times in Tokyo. The shifting of landscapes and ages is depicted by the famous Time-Walk scene as Jalan's feet are shown to traverse diverse landscapes from rocky wildernesses to blooming pastures to war ridden lands strewn with havoc to modern metalled roads, accompanied by sounds describing the various ages in time.
In Japan, Jalan goes by the identity Jalan Otsal, the controversial Indian doctor who is a legalized practitioner of euthanasia and owner of the firm Valley of Flowers Corporation. He is despised by the people of the city and is stalked everywhere by protesters demanding him to leave Japan and leave death to Nature. Jalan creates news again by jumping from the 62-storey and yet surviving without even a scar, which is telecast live in the local news channels. Sayuri (Eri), the reincarnation of Ushna in this age, who is a singer at a pub is stopped during a performance by this telecast going on in the pub's television and she immediately rushes to the Police Station to rescue Jalan. They board a subway train where she tells Jalan that she has been serving her Karma ever since, this is her fifth reincarnation and that she has remembered him in each one of them, right from her birth, with the pain of separation and her aeonian longing living on with her soul and finally now she can't stand it anymore. Jalan and Sayuri unite in the empty train and rush to a temple where he gives her the Elixir he had preserved earlier. In the morning they wake up to find Yeti who reminds them of the Laws of Karma and Impermanence and of the Buddha, "the one who can turn conflict into collaboration" and gives Jalan the symbolic White Flower. Sayuri starts to flee taking Jalan with her but they are hit by a flower delivery truck. This time Jalan is killed and his body is shown lying amid the flowers fallen from the truck. Sayuri rushes to Yeti in anguish and demands to know why he did this when he had promised her more time with Jalan. Yeti consoles her saying that true love lies in sacrifice. He says that he is just carrying out his duty to restore the balance. Sayuri breaks down at his feet and slowly dissolves in a sea of fumes. Yeti performs the symbolic Chöd rituals of parting by playing the Damaru and blowing the Kangling. He then retrieves the Demon mask which Jalan had found earlier in the movie when Ushna had appeared, from where Sayuri dissolved into fumes.
The movie closes with Yeti fixing the mask upon a stone statuette which is revealed to be its detached face. He wipes off tears from its eyes and walks away as the sea waves lash upon the shore where the two similar statuettes stand on either side of a Torii at the entrance of a cave.
The film has a lot unsaid, unexplained, left to the speculation of the viewers which triggers a lot of research and study into the various cultural, mythological and religious elements incorporated in the film. This mystery element in itself is the flavor of Pan Nalin movies along with the remarkable influences from Buddhism and Buddhist Philosophy. Breathtaking landscapes of the Ladakh plateau, which is another characteristic, adds further to the mood. | romantic | tt0392883 |
The Walking Dead | In 1972 North Vietnam, short-timer Marines are dispatched by helicopter to conduct their last mission: to evacuate the survivors from a POW camp abandoned by the Viet Cong. The landing zone - which they expect to be cold - is actually hot (under fire) and after a short fight, only four members of the rescue mission survive. SSgt. Barkley and Hoover have a brief fight after Hoover wants to radio for an evacuation and Barkley insists they finish the mission. During their fight a mortar lands nearby, knocking them both into a swamp. Barkley saves Branche from drowning. They are joined shortly by Brooks and Evans. The soldiers defer to the ranking Marine, Sgt. Barkley, who insists that they press on to a nearby cathedral. They reach the building and kill several NVA soldiers. At morning, they are planning their next move when they are ambushed by more NVA soldiers including tree snipers. After a firefight they manage to kill the soldiers with the help of Cpl. Pippins, who appears from the brush and also begins attacking them. After subduing Pippins they look for the rest of his platoon and discover them murdered and their radio missing. They decide to tie Pippins up and bring him along as they march toward the POW camp. The group then recollect about each of their individual reasons for joining the Marines. SSgt Barkley was a preacher at a church until he came home to his bedroom seeing his wife in bed having sex with another man, Barkley shoots and kills the man and catches the train out of town. Hoover works for a meat packing place until he got fired for stealing meat. Cole tries to buy a new house, but he is turned down by the real estate agent,because of his race. Brooks tells his girlfriend that he's joining the Marine Corps to be like his grandfather, Pippins was working for Ray until he is killed by gangsters and chased into the military enlistment line without getting caught. While Cole and Barkley go ahead to survey the area, Hoover and Brooks smoke cannabis and talk about Brooks' girlfriend, who just dumped him via the mail. During their break, Pippins escapes and takes Brooks' pistol. The four men regroup and head out without Pippins. When they reach the camp, they discover a deranged Pippins holding a Vietnamese woman hostage. After killing the woman in front of them, Pippis turns on them with a gun and is killed by Sgt. Barkley. After seeing the camp is empty, the men realize they are expendable decoys. They radio in and are informed that the Marines cleared the POW camp four hours earlier, and that they have 20 minutes to reach their pickup point before the entire area is bombed. As the men go to leave bombs begin dropping on them. They escape the bombardment and head through the jungle to the landing zone, but are ambushed by more NVA soldiers. Brooks is killed, and Cole and Barkley wounded. Hoover goes back and rescues Barkley and the three men are evacuated by helicopter. During an epilogue, we are told that Cole became a career Marine who retired after 20 years of service, Sgt. Barkley took a job counseling troubled teens in Georgia, and Hoover went back home, married his girlfriend and opened up his own business. | violence | tt1520211 |
Burn Notice: The Fall of Sam Axe | Set two years before the pilot episode, the film is narrated by Sam Axe (Bruce Campbell), a US Navy SEAL Commander, who is being questioned by Admiral Lawrence (John Diehl) about a mission in Colombia. Sam reveals that he had unwittingly had an affair with a superior's wife (Chandra West) and that he was punished with a dangerous mission: to track down a terrorist group known as the Espada Ardiente and assess the need for American support against them.
In Colombia, Sam meets his new team, including Commandante Veracruz (Pedro Pascal), then goes to a local clinic to tell them that they're in danger only to be brushed off by the two employees, doctor Ben Delaney (RonReaco Lee) and charity worker Amanda Maples (Kiele Sanchez). Later, while scouting the area against orders, Sam discovers that Veracruz and his men are preparing to attack the clinic themselves and kill him to game the system for aid, so Sam sneaks off to the clinic to sound the alarm again, yet they still won't take his help. Thinking Sam has been kidnapped, Veracruz moves quickly to destroy the clinic but a local teenager, an orphan girl named Beatriz (Ilza Rosario), gets to the clinic early and tells Sam he's coming. Once he's convinced Ben and Amanda of the danger, Sam helps them get all the patients out and blow up the clinic as a distraction for the escape. Beatriz suggests hiding with her only friends, the Espada Ardiente, which works for Sam and his mission, especially since they have no alternative. Upon their arrival, Sam discovers that the Espada Ardiente is merely a small, but resilient, group of shepherds on a small farm that the corrupt Veracruz is trying to secure as a way-point for drug transportation. After watching them do very basic training and promising Amanda he won't leave them, Sam heads back to Veracruz's camp to call for support and stall long enough for help to arrive. Veracruz calls his bluff and almost forces him to reveal where the Espada Ardiente are hiding out, but the farmers give Sam a way out and he escapes back to them, where he apologizes and tells them how they can all help him stop Veracruz. Altogether, they then travel to a CIA outpost to ask for help, narrowly escaping a trap set by Veracruz along the road. They arrive to the isolated outpost and find its only use is observation, and is practically empty except for two men and some radio equipment, which they use to call for assistance. Sam is instructed that nothing will happen until he travels to the nearest military base first to detail the situation. Again, Sam promises he'll return and gets on the helicopter with the two men, but they admit nobody is coming until they go through the proper channels, and that the locals are essentially being left for dead in a "compromised" facility, giving Sam no choice except to force them to land at gunpoint.
In the present, the Admiral tips his hand that things are heading towards a trial, but Sam refuses a lawyer and continues his story.
At the outpost in Colombia, Sam strong-arms the CIA men into calling for backup, which won't arrive for three hours, leaving him and the others to hold off Veracruz as long as possible. Their odds get worse when reinforcements show up for Veracruz, and, despite their best efforts to block his path, eventually they run out of ammunition and must retreat back to the outpost. Still anticipating assistance, Sam has the guys call out again, birthing his alias "Chuck Finley," and learns that they won't have enough time. Shortly thereafter, Veracruz arrives on scene, so Sam heads outside to buy his friends more time. They refuse to surrender to Sam and rough him up a bit before firing on the outpost, and then, the cavalry arrives to save the day. Once Veracruz and his forces are in custody, and all of Sam's friends have said their goodbyes, he is escorted back to the base to testify.
The Admiral evaluates the situation and threatens Sam with a court martial, but Sam has an ace up his sleeve: Beatriz, seeking redemption for influencing her friends to fight in the first place, has photographs of the entire operation and published them in Colombia's largest newspaper with his encouragement. He then strikes a graymail deal with Lawrence, promising to remain silent about the whole thing in exchange for the following: exoneration for all his friends; rebuild the clinic; leave the farmers alone to their herds; finally, for himself, an honorable discharge with full pension, a first-class plane ticket to the city of his choice (Miami), a change of clothes, and one ice-cold beer. | humor | tt1697851 |
How the Grinch Stole Christmas! | The Grinch is a bitter, grouchy, cave-dwelling creature with a heart "two sizes too small" who lives on snowy Mount Crumpit, a steep high mountain just north of the town of Whoville, home of the merry and warm-hearted Whos. His only companion is his unloved, but loyal dog, Max. From his cave, the Grinch can hear the noisy Christmas festivities that take place in Whoville. Annoyed, he decides to stop Christmas from coming by stealing their presents, trees, and food for their Christmas feast. He crudely disguises himself as Santa Claus, and forces Max, disguised as a reindeer, to drag a sleigh to Whoville. Once there, the Grinch slides down the chimney and steals all of the Whos' Christmas presents, the Christmas tree, and the log for their fire. He is briefly interrupted in his burglary by Cindy Lou, a little Who girl, but concocts a crafty lie to effect his escape from her home.
The Grinch then takes his sleigh to the top of Mount Crumpit, and prepares to dump all of the presents into the abyss. As dawn breaks, he expects to hear the Whos' bitter and sorrowful cries, but is confused to hear them singing a joyous Christmas song instead. He puzzles for a moment until it dawns on him that "maybe Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more" than just presents and feasting. The Grinch's shrunken heart suddenly grows three sizes. The reformed Grinch returns all of the Whos' presents and trimmings and is warmly invited to the Whos' feast, where he has the honor of carving the Roast Beast. | cult, fantasy, psychedelic, entertaining, humor | tt0060345 |
A Little Trip to Heaven | The very beginning of the film, before the opening credits, shows a new widow sitting in a life insurance office. Expecting to be compensated for her husband's death, the widow is informed that she is not entitled to full death benefits because the insurance company has captured footage of her husband smoking and attributes his death to cigarettes. Abe Holt looks on as his co-worker convinces the widow that she's lucky to leave with a small fraction of the award she was expecting.
The film centers around three vehicle crashes, which are first introduced to the viewer one after another at the very beginning of the movie. The first shows a young couple flying through the open roof of their convertible, which has been ejected over a cliff. They swim to shore, where the woman hits the leg of her fellow passenger with a pipe. The second involves a city bus and insurance adjustor Abe Holt (Forest Whitaker), who has arrived at the scene on the suspicion that many of the passengers boarded the bus after the accident, looking to file a claim. Holt bluffs, claiming a hidden camera will help sort out who was truly on the bus; many leave, and his co-worker (Peter Coyote) quickly tells him their company wants him to investigate a crash in the remote and desolate town of North Hastings, Minnesota.
The third crash involves an unnamed young man who is stranded at the side of the road on a rainy night, after stopping in the local bar. He accepts a ride from the man who has drained his gas tank, who proceeds to speed the car against the wall of a tunnel, injuring his passenger in the wreck. The anonymous man is dragged to the front seat and buckled in before the gas is poured over the car and set ablaze. However, to those who later discover the crash it appears that Kelvin Anderson has died after crashing his own car into the tunnel wall, prompting a spontaneous vehicle fire that burned his body beyond recognition. The local police are convinced it is an open-and-shut case, as Kelvin’s driver's license is found in the glovebox, the plates on the car match Kelvin's, and Kelvin's sister, Isold (Julia Stiles), lives on the other side of the tunnel.
However, Holt is suspicious because while the body is conveniently unidentifiable the license is still intact and Isold, the sole beneficiary of the $1 million policy, is skittish and was not expecting her brother's visit. Isold’s husband, the suspiciously cheerful and vaguely threatening "Fred" McBride (Jeremy Renner), further convinces Holt there's something else to this case. As he continues to investigate the case Holt discovers a number of surprising secrets, among them the fact that Frederick McBride is actually dead (buried in a field outside the abandoned McBride home) and that the supposedly dead Kelvin has a record as a con man. The most convincing evidence are photos of Kelvin, from his criminal record and high school, showing him looking like the man posing as "Fred." Holt eventually determines that the charred body pulled from the car wreck is not Kelvin's, that Isold's "husband" is actually her brother Kelvin. A flashback reveals that the couple from the convertible seen at the opening of the movie was Isold and Kelvin, wrecking their car—and Kelvin's leg—for insurance money.
When Isold figures out that her brother has murdered an innocent drifter she is horrified, but Kelvin convinces her to "play her part" in this last con by holding hostage his son Thor, whom Isold has been helping him raise since the boy's mother left. When Isold visits the insurance office to collect on Kelvin's policy, Holt—in an echo of the movie's opening scene—informs her that he cannot award her the full $1 million she expects, only the blue book value of his car ($1500). Isold leaves angrily; when Holt tells her she's lucky he hasn't exposed her as an accessory to murder, she tells him that her brother has taken Thor. Moved and concerned, Holt puts a one-day hold on her check (ensuring that she'll return to the bank the next day) and changes the name of the insured on the policy from "Kelvin Anderson" to "Frederick McBride."
The next day Isold cashes her check and opens a safety deposit box, in which she puts a childhood picture of her and her brother. She returns to the motel where Kelvin is staying with Thor, and tries to convince him that she has left the rest of the money in the safety deposit box so that she can leave with Thor. Kelvin doesn't buy it, and gets in his car with Thor—only to find he's held at gunpoint by Holt, in the backseat. Holt tells Isold to leave with the boy and Fred speeds off, buckling his seatbelt (a sign he'll crash the car). Kelvin crashes the car, killing both men, and Isold is awarded the full benefits of the tampered life insurance policy.
The film ends with Abe is walking in a beach (probably heaven) which is identical to a beach featured in the insurance company's commercial seen earlier in the film, as the credits roll. | murder, flashback | tt0420740 |
The Squaw Man | James Wynnegate (Dustin Farnum) and his cousin, Henry (Monroe Salisbury), are upper class Englishmen and have been made trustees for an orphans’ fund. Henry loses money in a bet at a derby and embezzles money from “the fund” to pay off his debts. When war office officials are informed of the money missing from “the fund," they pursue James, but he successfully escapes to Wyoming. There, James rescues Nat-U-Ritch (Lillian St. Cyr), daughter to the chief of the Utes tribe, from local outlaw Cash Hawkins (William Elmer). Hawkins plans to exact his revenge on James, but has his plans thwarted by Nat-U-Ritch, who fatally shoots him. Later, James gets into an accident in the mountains and needs to be rescued. Nat-U-Ritch tracks him down and carries him back to safety. As she nurses him back to health, they fall in love and later have a child. Meanwhile, during an exploration of the Alps, Henry falls off a cliff. Before he succumbs to his injuries, Henry signs a letter of confession proclaiming James’ innocence in the embezzlement. Before Henry's widow, Lady Diana (Winifred Kingston), and others arrive in Wyoming to tell James about the news, the Sheriff recovers the murder weapon that was used against Cash Hawkins inside of James and Nat-U-Ritch's home. Realizing their son was not safe, the couple sends him away, leaving them both distraught. Facing the possibilities of losing both her son and her freedom, Nat-U-Ritch decides to take her own life instead. The movie ends with both the chief of the Utes tribe and James embracing her body. | murder | tt0004635 |
The Last Lovecraft: Relic of Cthulhu | Jeff Philips is working a dead end job at a call center. One day, an old man arrives at his apartment to tell him he is the last descendent of H.P. Lovecraft and must guard a relic to keep it from being reunited; if the pieces of the relic are united while the stars are in alignment, the sunken city of R'lyeh will rise from the sea and the demonic creature Cthulhu will be released upon an unsuspecting world.
Shortly thereafter, squid-like "deep ones" attack and Jeff flees with his friend Charlie, a comic book artist. Cult followers of Cthulhu pursue them to reunite the relic. They find an old high school acquaintance, Paul, and enlist him in their cause. The three flee to the desert to seek Captain Olaf, a sailor who has first-hand experience with the cult. Eventually, the cult members attack them and Paul is taken by the cult, only to later escape and reunite at Olaf's RV. Cthulhu's general, Starspawn, and the deep ones corner them in the captain's RV. In their haste to flee, Jeff and Charlie leave the relic behind, and Starspawn re-assembles it. This causes everyone but Jeff, as the last in the Lovecraft bloodline, excruciating pain. As Cthulhu prepares to escape his undersea prison, Jeff shoots some dynamite, destroying Star Spawn, separating the relic, and saving the world.
Sometime later, we see Charlie doing a comic book signing for his new book based on his and Jeff's adventures. While telling a small disbelieving comic fan that the story is true, Jeff arrives with an ancient map of more artifacts they must safeguard. They quickly leave for the Antarctic and arrive at the Mountains of Madness. | comedy | tt1522262 |
Down with Love | In early 1960s New York City, Barbara Novak arrives in town at Banner House to present her new work, Down with Love, a book the intent of which is to free women from love, teach them to enjoy sex without commitment, and to replace the need for a man with things such as chocolate. Following her rules would, she believes, help to give women a boost in the workplace and in the world in general.
The men who run Banner House refuse to support the book. The only way Vikki Hiller, Barbara's editor, can find to promote the book is for Barbara to meet Catcher Block – a successful writer for the magazine Know and a notorious "ladies' man, man's man, man about town" – but he avoids her repeatedly by postponing their dates until she gets fed up, insults him, and walks out.
Catcher's boss and best friend, Peter MacMannus, and Vikki take a liking to one another. However, their relationship revolves around Barbara and Catcher, and neither is brave enough to express their feelings for the other. Peter feels overshadowed by Catcher's strong personality, and Vikki wants to see emotional commitment in her lover. She even assumes Peter must be gay due to his perceived lack of interest.
Barbara starts promoting her book with Vikki's help, and things take off when they get Judy Garland to sing the song "Down with Love" as a promotion to the book on The Ed Sullivan Show. Sales skyrocket, as housewives and women around the world buy the book and rebel against their men; Catcher now wants to meet Barbara, but now it is she who rejects him.
It all comes to a boiling point when Barbara appears on a national TV show talking about a chapter from the book – "The Worst Kind of Man" – and cites Catcher Block as the perfect example. Subsequently, Catcher's date rejects him, which infuriates him. Catcher swears revenge on Barbara and to undo the damage (as he sees it) done by her book by writing the "exposé of the Century" - he will prove to the world that, deep down, all women are the same, they all want love and marriage. Including Barbara Novak.
He arranges for a casual meeting at a dry cleaner shop, taking advantage of the fact that Barbara has never met or seen him, and he poses as an astronaut, Major Zip Martin, attentive and polite. Barbara appears to be immediately infatuated with this man who seemingly has no idea who she is, in contrast to men who now avoid her, viewing her as the enemy since the publication of her book.
"Zip" takes her to the most fashionable locations in New York while maintaining considerable sexual tension between them by feigning naivete and a desire to remain chaste until he is "ready" for a physical relationship. But he starts falling for her, and it gets harder to go through with his plan.
When Barbara finds Catcher/Zip at a party he is almost caught out, and decides it is time to take everything to the next level: he tells Barbara that Catcher Block wants to interview him for an exposé on the NASA space program and asks her to accompany him. It is his own apartment, and he sets everything up to record her saying she loves him. But then it is she who reveals the truth: she knew he was really Catcher from the beginning, but she also lied as she is not Barbara Novak but Nancy Brown, once one of Catcher's many secretaries, who fell in love with him while working at Know, but who turned him down when he asked her out because she did not want to be just another one in his long list of romances.
She tells him she did this to be different from all the women he knew, and make him love her. They both realize that Catcher does love her, but as he is proposing, one of his many lovers appears and thanks Barbara for what she has done for womankind. Barbara realizes that she does not want love or him as she has become a real "down with love" girl. Vikki and Peter's relationship also changes when she insults him for helping Catcher. Peter realizes he is indeed like any other man and takes Vikki to Catcher's apartment to take things to the next level.
Days later, Catcher is completely depressed; all his efforts to win Barbara back have failed. Even his exposé is ruined now that Barbara has told her story in her own magazine, Now. Peter is also depressed as his relationship with Vikki is now apparently based only on sex. Catcher realizes he can do something and writes a new exposé "How Falling In Love With Barbara Novak Made Me A New Man". He learns there is an opening at Now and goes for an interview with her. There, he tells her how much she changed him, and it is obvious she wants him but turns him down anyway; he says he wished there could be a middle ground for them "somewhere between a blonde and a brunette", referring to her real persona, where she was a brunette.
As he is leaving her office, he realizes she is not coming after him, but she surprises him on the elevator, showing him a bright red hair style: she has found the middle ground and she wants to be with him. They fly to Vegas to get married, influencing Vikki and Peter, who also decide to get married. Their marriage results in a new book intended to end the battle of the sexes, with the pair ultimately singing "Here's To Love." | revenge | tt0309530 |
Incubus | In a lake at a rock quarry, a young woman named Mandy and her boyfriend, Ray, are swimming. The two spend the night at the lake camping, but are attacked by an unseen figure; Ray is killed, and Mandy is taken to the hospital with a ruptured uterus and serious trauma. As the attack occurs, teenager Tim Galen experiences a recurring nightmare he has in which a woman is tortured by a monstrous figure; his grandmother, Agatha Galen, tries to dissuade him of his suspicions about the premonitory dream. At the hospital, Mandy is treated by Sam Cordell (John Cassavetes), a surgeon and physician in the small community of Galen.
Sam's teenaged daughter, Jenny, is dating Tim, but he disapproves of their relationship. At the hospital, Sheriff Hank Walden (John Ireland) questions Sam about Mandy's injuries, and a nosy local reporter, Laura Kincaid, arrives to question Walden, who forces her to leave. That night at the local library and museum, a librarian named Carolyn Davies is brutally raped and murdered while closing the building. During her autopsy, Sam finds she suffered similar wounds as Mandy, and finds an inexplicable amount of semen in her vagina.
Attempts to question the comatose Mandy about her attacker are futile. Sam shows Laura pictures of his deceased 2nd wife and their amazing resemblance to each other. The following day, local farmer Ernie Barnes and his two daughters are brutally slain at their farmhouse. Tim again is tormented by his vision, and runs into a local movie theater in an attempt to distract himself. While there, a young woman is raped and murdered in the downstairs bathroom of the theater, and the metal stall door is found nearly bent in half. Sheriff Walden and Sam arrive at the crime scene shortly before Laura, who insists she may be able to help the investigation. She confides in Sam that she discovered historical records detailing Satanism and similar crimes occurring throughout the town's history.
Tim confronts Jenny at her home, hysterical, and says he believes his dreams are responsible for the crimes. Sam gets a sample of Tim's semen to compare against that which was found inside the victims, but they do not match. Tim and Agatha meet with Sam, Jenny, Laura, and Sheriff Walden at the library that night, where Laura reads a passage from a book detailing the shapeshifter known as the incubus, which manifests through dreams and can appear in human form. Agatha reveals that Tim's mother had died before his birth and had been accused of witchcraft due to psychic powers she possessed; Agatha claims that the Galen family has a legacy of witch hunters, and that his dreams are a result of this.
Laura and Tim return with Sam and Jenny to their home. As Laura takes Jenny upstairs to go to bed, Sam attempts to induce Tim's dream to prove its connection to the murders. Tim goes into a seizure-like state and runs upstairs into Jenny's room where he tries to attack Laura with a dagger given to him by Agatha, but Sam intervenes and stabs him to death. Laura then approaches Sam, and her face briefly shifts into that of the monstrous incubus; it is revealed that Laura has in fact been the incubus all along, manifesting in female form. As Laura embraces Sam, he looks over her shoulder to see Jenny's dead body lying on her bed, blood pouring out from between her legs. | violence, flashback | tt0462359 |
Miranda | Frank (Simm), a librarian in the United Kingdom, falls in love with a mysterious American dancer named Miranda (Ricci). Frank appears naive, but his character is a complex as Miranda's. Graphic scenes of sex and seduction illustrate Frank's fantasy and unrealistic love for Miranda. She suddenly disappears, and he tracks her down in London, finding out that she is actually a con artist. He leaves her, returning to Northern England.
Miranda and her boss (Hurt), who not so secretly "loves" her, are in business selling buildings that they don't own to unwitting customers. These buildings are really being prepared for demolition. In one scene in which Miranda was negotiating the sale of a warehouse with Nailor (MacLachlan), Nailor saw men putting down cable around the building. He asked Miranda what were they doing and she replied that they were putting in cable TV when,in fact, they were preparing the warehouse for demolition. After making a big score, by successfully conning Nailor to buy the warehouse, her boss leaves her, and Nailor seeks revenge against Miranda.
Frank realizes that he should not have left her, and returns to London, with a very quirky friend who was instrumental in saving Miranda from a knife wielding Nailor. While Frank’s friend distracted Nailor with fancy jiu jitsu manoeuvres, Frank slams a table over Nailor’s head. The film ends in comic relief with Frank and Miranda living the good life off Miranda's ill begotten funds. | comedy | tt1533435 |
Les misérables | === Volume I – Fantine ===
The story begins in 1815 in Digne, as the peasant Jean Valjean, just released from 19 years' imprisonment in the Bagne of Toulon—five for stealing bread for his starving sister and her family and fourteen more for numerous escape attempts—is turned away by innkeepers because his yellow passport marks him as a former convict. He sleeps on the street, angry and bitter.
Digne's benevolent Bishop Myriel gives him shelter. At night, Valjean runs off with Myriel's silverware. When the police capture Valjean, Myriel pretends that he has given the silverware to Valjean and presses him to take two silver candlesticks as well, as if he had forgotten to take them. The police accept his explanation and leave. Myriel tells Valjean that his life has been spared for God, and that he should use money from the silver candlesticks to make an honest man of himself.
Valjean broods over Myriel's words. When opportunity presents itself, purely out of habit, he steals a 40-sous coin from 12-year-old Petit Gervais and chases the boy away. He quickly repents and searches the city in panic for Gervais. At the same time, his theft is reported to the authorities. Valjean hides as they search for him, because if apprehended he will be returned to the galleys for life as a repeat offender.
Six years pass and Valjean, using the alias Monsieur Madeleine, has become a wealthy factory owner and is appointed mayor of a town identified only as M____-sur-M__ (i.e., Montreuil-sur-Mer). Walking down the street, he sees a man named Fauchelevent pinned under the wheels of a cart. When no one volunteers to lift the cart, even for pay, he decides to rescue Fauchelevent himself. He crawls underneath the cart, manages to lift it, and frees him. The town's police inspector, Inspector Javert, who was an adjutant guard at the Bagne of Toulon during Valjean's incarceration, becomes suspicious of the mayor after witnessing this remarkable feat of strength. He has known only one other man, a convict named Jean Valjean, who could accomplish it.
Years earlier in Paris, a grisette named Fantine was very much in love with Félix Tholomyès. His friends, Listolier, Fameuil, and Blachevelle were also paired with Fantine's friends Dahlia, Zéphine, and Favourite. The men abandon the women, treating their relationships as youthful amusements. Fantine must draw on her own resources to care for her and Tholomyès' daughter, Cosette. When Fantine arrives at Montfermeil, she leaves Cosette in the care of the Thénardiers, a corrupt innkeeper and his selfish, cruel wife.
Fantine is unaware that they are abusing her daughter and using her as forced labor for their inn, and continues to try to meet their growing, extortionate and fictitious demands. She is later fired from her job at Jean Valjean's factory, because of the discovery of her daughter, who was born out of wedlock. Meanwhile, the Thénardiers' monetary demands continue to grow. In desperation, Fantine sells her hair and two front teeth, and she resorts to prostitution to pay the Thénardiers. Fantine is slowly dying from an unspecified disease.
A dandy named Bamatabois harasses Fantine in the street, and she reacts by striking him. Javert arrests Fantine. She begs to be released so that she can provide for her daughter, but Javert sentences her to six months in prison. Valjean (Mayor Madeleine) intervenes and orders Javert to release her. Javert resists but Valjean prevails. Valjean, feeling responsible because his factory turned her away, promises Fantine that he will bring Cosette to her. He takes her to a hospital.
Javert comes to see Valjean again. Javert admits that after being forced to free Fantine, he reported him as Valjean to the French authorities. He tells Valjean he realizes he was wrong, because the authorities have identified someone else as the real Jean Valjean, have him in custody, and plan to try him the next day. Valjean is torn, but decides to reveal himself to save the innocent man, whose real name is Champmathieu. He travels to attend the trial and there reveals his true identity. Valjean returns to M____-sur-M__ to see Fantine, followed by Javert, who confronts him in her hospital room.
After Javert grabs Valjean, Valjean asks for three days to bring Cosette to Fantine, but Javert refuses. Fantine discovers that Cosette is not at the hospital and fretfully asks where she is. Javert orders her to be quiet, and then reveals to her Valjean's real identity. Weakened by the severity of her illness, she falls back in shock and dies. Valjean goes to Fantine, speaks to her in an inaudible whisper, kisses her hand, and then leaves with Javert. Later, Fantine's body is unceremoniously thrown into a public grave.
=== Volume II – Cosette ===
Valjean escapes, is recaptured, and is sentenced to death. The king commutes his sentence to penal servitude for life. While imprisoned in the Bagne of Toulon, Valjean, at great personal risk, rescues a sailor caught in the ship's rigging. Spectators call for his release. Valjean fakes his own death by allowing himself to fall into the ocean. Authorities report him dead and his body lost.
Valjean arrives at Montfermeil on Christmas Eve. He finds Cosette fetching water in the woods alone and walks with her to the inn. He orders a meal and observes how the Thénardiers abuse her, while pampering their own daughters Éponine and Azelma, who mistreat Cosette for playing with their doll. Valjean leaves and returns to make Cosette a present of an expensive new doll which, after some hesitation, she happily accepts. Éponine and Azelma are envious. Madame Thénardier is furious with Valjean, while her husband makes light of Valjean's behaviour, caring only that he pay for his food and lodging.
The next morning, Valjean informs the Thénardiers that he wants to take Cosette with him. Madame Thénardier immediately accepts, while Thénardier pretends to love Cosette and be concerned for her welfare, reluctant to give her up. Valjean pays the Thénardiers 1,500 francs, and he and Cosette leave the inn. Thénardier, hoping to swindle more out of Valjean, runs after them, holding the 1,500 francs, and tells Valjean he wants Cosette back. He informs Valjean that he cannot release Cosette without a note from the child's mother. Valjean hands Thénardier Fantine's letter authorizing the bearer to take Cosette. Thénardier then demands that Valjean pay a thousand crowns, but Valjean and Cosette leave. Thénardier regrets that he did not bring his gun and turns back toward home.
Valjean and Cosette flee to Paris. Valjean rents new lodgings at Gorbeau House, where he and Cosette live happily. However, Javert discovers Valjean's lodgings there a few months later. Valjean takes Cosette and they try to escape from Javert. They soon find shelter in the Petit-Picpus convent with the help of Fauchelevent, the man whom Valjean once rescued from being crushed under a cart and who has become the convent's gardener. Valjean also becomes a gardener and Cosette becomes a student at the convent school.
=== Volume III – Marius ===
Eight years later, the Friends of the ABC, led by Enjolras, are preparing an act of anti-Orléanist civil unrest on the eve of the Paris uprising on 5–6 June 1832, following the death of General Lamarque, the only French leader who had sympathy towards the working class. Lamarque was a victim of a major cholera epidemic that had ravaged the city, particularly its poor neighborhoods, arousing suspicion that the government had been poisoning wells. The Friends of the ABC are joined by the poor of the Cour des miracles, including the Thénardiers' eldest son Gavroche, who is a street urchin.
One of the students, Marius Pontmercy, has become alienated from his family (especially his grandfather M. Gillenormand) because of his liberal views. After the death of his father Colonel Georges Pontmercy, Marius discovers a note from him instructing his son to provide help to a sergeant named Thénardier who saved Pontmercy's life at Waterloo—in reality Thénardier was looting corpses and only saved Pontmercy's life by accident; he had called himself a sergeant under Napoleon to avoid exposing himself as a robber.
At the Luxembourg Garden, Marius falls in love with the now grown and beautiful Cosette. The Thénardiers have also moved to Paris and now live in poverty after losing their inn. They live under the surname "Jondrette" at Gorbeau House (coincidentally, the same building Valjean and Cosette briefly lived in after leaving the Thénardiers' inn). Marius lives there as well, next door to the Thénardiers.
Éponine, now ragged and emaciated, visits Marius at his apartment to beg for money. To impress him, she tries to prove her literacy by reading aloud from a book and by writing "The Cops Are Here" on a sheet of paper. Marius pities her and gives her some money. After Éponine leaves, Marius observes the "Jondrettes" in their apartment through a crack in the wall. Éponine comes in and announces that a philanthropist and his daughter are arriving to visit them. In order to look poorer, Thénardier puts out the fire and breaks a chair. He also orders Azelma to punch out a window pane, which she does, resulting in cutting her hand (as Thénardier had hoped).
The philanthropist and his daughter enter—actually Valjean and Cosette. Marius immediately recognizes Cosette. After seeing them, Valjean promises them he will return with rent money for them. After he and Cosette leave, Marius asks Éponine to retrieve her address for him. Éponine, who is in love with Marius herself, reluctantly agrees to do so. The Thénardiers have also recognized Valjean and Cosette, and vow their revenge. Thénardier enlists the aid of the Patron-Minette, a well-known and feared gang of murderers and robbers.
Marius overhears Thénardier's plan and goes to Javert to report the crime. Javert gives Marius two pistols and instructs him to fire one into the air if things get dangerous. Marius returns home and waits for Javert and the police to arrive. Thénardier sends Éponine and Azelma outside to look out for the police. When Valjean returns with rent money, Thénardier, with Patron-Minette, ambushes him and he reveals his real identity to Valjean. Marius recognizes Thénardier as the man who "saved" his father's life at Waterloo and is caught in a dilemma.
He tries to find a way to save Valjean while not betraying Thénardier. Valjean denies knowing Thénardier and tells him that they have never met. Valjean tries to escape through a window but is subdued and tied up. Thénardier orders Valjean to pay him 200,000 francs. He also orders Valjean to write a letter to Cosette to return to the apartment, and they would keep her with them until he delivers the money. After Valjean writes the letter and informs Thénardier of his address, Thénardier sends out Mme. Thénardier to get Cosette. Mme. Thénardier comes back alone, and announces the address is a fake.
It is during this time that Valjean manages to free himself. Thénardier decides to kill Valjean. While he and Patron-Minette are about to do so, Marius remembers the scrap of paper that Éponine wrote on earlier. He throws it into the Thénardiers' apartment through the wall crack. Thénardier reads it and thinks Éponine threw it inside. He, Mme. Thénardier and Patron-Minette try to escape, only to be stopped by Javert.
He arrests all the Thénardiers and Patron-Minette (except Claquesous, who escapes during his transportation to prison; Montparnasse, who stops to run off with Éponine instead of joining in on the robbery; and Gavroche, who was not present and rarely participates in his family's crimes, a notable exception being his part in breaking his father out of prison). Valjean manages to escape the scene before Javert sees him.
=== Volume IV – The Idyll in the Rue Plumet and the Epic in the Rue St. Denis ===
After Éponine's release from prison, she finds Marius at "The Field of the Lark" and sadly tells him that she found Cosette's address. She leads him to Valjean's and Cosette's house on Rue Plumet, and Marius watches the house for a few days. He and Cosette then finally meet and declare their love for one another. Thénardier, Patron-Minette and Brujon manage to escape from prison with the aid of Gavroche. One night, during one of Marius's visits with Cosette, the six men attempt to raid Valjean's and Cosette's house. However, Éponine, who has been sitting by the gates of the house, threatens to scream and awaken the whole neighbourhood if the thieves do not leave. Hearing this, they reluctantly retire. Meanwhile, Cosette informs Marius that she and Valjean will be leaving for England in a week's time, which greatly troubles the pair.
The next day, Valjean is sitting in the Champ de Mars. He is feeling troubled about seeing Thénardier in the neighbourhood several times. Unexpectedly, a note lands in his lap, which says "Move Out." He sees a figure running away in the dim light. He goes back to his house, tells Cosette they will be staying at their other house on Rue de l'Homme Arme, and reconfirms to her that they will be moving to England. Marius tries to get permission from M. Gillenormand to marry Cosette. His grandfather seems stern and angry, but has been longing for Marius's return. When tempers flare, he refuses his assent to the marriage, telling Marius to make Cosette his mistress instead. Insulted, Marius leaves.
The following day, the students revolt and erect barricades in the narrow streets of Paris. Gavroche spots Javert and informs Enjolras that Javert is a spy. When Enjolras confronts him about this, he admits his identity and his orders to spy on the students. Enjolras and the other students tie him up to a pole in the Corinth restaurant. Later that evening, Marius goes back to Valjean's and Cosette's house on Rue Plumet, but finds the house no longer occupied. He then hears a voice telling him that his friends are waiting for him at the barricade. Distraught to find Cosette gone, he heeds the voice and goes.
When Marius arrives at the barricade, the "revolution" has already started. When he stoops down to pick up a powder keg, a soldier comes up to shoot Marius. However, a man covers the muzzle of the soldier's gun with his hand. The soldier fires, fatally wounding the man, while missing Marius. Meanwhile, the soldiers are closing in. Marius climbs to the top of the barricade, holding a torch in one hand, a powder keg in the other, and threatens to the soldiers that he will blow up the barricade. After confirming this, the soldiers retreat from the barricade.
Marius decides to go to the smaller barricade, which he finds empty. As he turns back, the man who took the fatal shot for Marius earlier calls Marius by his name. Marius discovers this man is Éponine, dressed in men's clothes. As she lies dying on his knees, she confesses that she was the one who told him to go to the barricade, hoping they would die together. She also confesses to saving his life because she wanted to die before he did.
The author also states to the reader that Éponine anonymously threw the note to Valjean. Éponine then tells Marius that she has a letter for him. She also confesses to have obtained the letter the day before, originally not planning to give it to him, but decides to do so in fear he would be angry at her about it in the afterlife. After Marius takes the letter, Éponine then asks him to kiss her on the forehead when she is dead, which he promises to do. With her last breath, she confesses that she was "a little bit in love" with him, and dies.
Marius fulfills her request and goes into a tavern to read the letter. It is written by Cosette. He learns Cosette's whereabouts and he writes a farewell letter to her. He sends Gavroche to deliver it to her, but Gavroche leaves it with Valjean. Valjean, learning that Cosette's lover is fighting, is at first relieved, but an hour later, he puts on a National Guard uniform, arms himself with a gun and ammunition, and leaves his home.
=== Volume V – Jean Valjean ===
Valjean arrives at the barricade and immediately saves a man's life. He is still not certain if he wants to protect Marius or kill him. Marius recognizes Valjean at first sight. Enjolras announces that they are almost out of cartridges. When Gavroche goes outside the barricade to collect more ammunition from the dead National Guardsmen, he is shot by the troops.
Valjean volunteers to execute Javert himself, and Enjolras grants permission. Valjean takes Javert out of sight, and then shoots into the air while letting him go. Marius mistakenly believes that Valjean has killed Javert. As the barricade falls, Valjean carries off the injured and unconscious Marius. All the other students are killed. Valjean escapes through the sewers, carrying Marius's body. He evades a police patrol, and reaches an exit gate but finds it locked. Thénardier emerges from the darkness. Valjean recognizes him, but his filthy appearance prevents Thénardier from recognizing him. Thinking Valjean a murderer lugging his victim's corpse, Thénardier offers to open the gate for money. As he searches Valjean and Marius's pockets, he surreptitiously tears off a piece of Marius's coat so he can later find out his identity. Thénardier takes the thirty francs he finds, opens the gate, and allows Valjean to leave, expecting Valjean's emergence from the sewer will distract the police who have been pursuing him.
Upon exiting, Valjean encounters Javert and requests time to return Marius to his family before surrendering to him. Javert agrees, assuming that Marius will be dead within minutes. After leaving Marius at his grandfather's house, Valjean asks to be allowed a brief visit to his own home, and Javert agrees. There, Javert tells Valjean he will wait for him in the street, but when Valjean scans the street from the landing window he finds Javert has gone. Javert walks down the street, realizing that he is caught between his strict belief in the law and the mercy Valjean has shown him. He feels he can no longer give Valjean up to the authorities but also cannot ignore his duty to the law. Unable to cope with this dilemma, Javert commits suicide by throwing himself into the Seine.
Marius slowly recovers from his injuries. As he and Cosette make wedding preparations, Valjean endows them with a fortune of nearly 600,000 francs. As their wedding party winds through Paris during Mardi Gras festivities, Valjean is spotted by Thénardier, who then orders Azelma to follow him. After the wedding, Valjean confesses to Marius that he is an ex-convict. Marius is horrified, assumes the worst about Valjean's moral character, and contrives to limit Valjean's time with Cosette. Valjean accedes to Marius' judgment and his separation from Cosette. Valjean loses the will to live and retires to his bed.
Thénardier approaches Marius in disguise, but Marius recognizes him. Thénardier attempts to blackmail Marius with what he knows of Valjean, but in doing so, he inadvertently corrects Marius's misconceptions about Valjean and reveals all of the good he has done. He tries to convince Marius that Valjean is actually a murderer, and presents the piece of coat he tore off as evidence. Stunned, Marius recognizes the fabric as part of his own coat and realizes that it was Valjean who rescued him from the barricade. Marius pulls out a fistful of notes and flings it at Thénardier's face. He then confronts Thénardier with his crimes and offers him an immense sum to depart and never return. Thénardier accepts the offer, and he and Azelma travel to America where he becomes a slave trader.
As they rush to Valjean's house, Marius tells Cosette that Valjean saved his life at the barricade. They arrive to find Valjean near death and are reconciled with him. Valjean tells Cosette her mother's story and name. He dies content and is buried beneath a blank slab in Père Lachaise Cemetery. | tragedy, romantic | tt0230534 |
The Wiz | === Prologue ===
Dorothy Gale lives with her Aunt Em, Uncle Henry, and dog, Toto, on their farm in Kansas. Though her work on the farm keeps her busy, she often gets distracted in her boredom with farm life, choosing instead to play with Toto and dream of someday seeing far off lands. Aunt Em, however, hasn't much patience for her niece's daydreaming, believing that their way of life doesn't leave room for dawdling. After an argument, Aunt Em apologizes to Dorothy for an unintentionally hurtful remark. She then explains that she only scolds because she wants Dorothy to be the best she can be, and fears that she won't be ready for the responsibilities life will soon put upon her. Underneath it all, she still loves her niece dearly, and hopes they will always be as close as when Dorothy was a child ("The Feeling We Once Had").
=== Act I ===
When an approaching storm turns out to be a tornado, Dorothy takes shelter in the farmhouse as Aunt Em and Uncle Henry hide in the storm cellar. As the tornado hits the farm, the house, with Dorothy inside, is lifted right up into the air and carried for miles within the cyclone ("The Tornado"). It finally comes to rest with a bump in the middle of an emerald green field covered with flowers. There, Dorothy is met by the Munchkins, who are all dressed in blue, and Addaperle, the Good Witch of the North, who tells her that she is in the land of Oz. Furthermore, her house has fallen on Evamean, the Wicked Witch of the East, and killed her, freeing the Munchkins from her evil powers. Dorothy, distressed and confused, wants only to return to Aunt Em, Uncle Henry, and Toto in Kansas. With her magic unable to take Dorothy beyond the country boundaries, Addaperle decides her best bet is to follow the Yellow Brick Road to Emerald City in the centre of Oz, and see the great and powerful Wizard of Oz, or "The Wiz" for short ("He's the Wizard"). She gives the child the Witch of the East's silver slippers, and tells her not to take them off before she reaches home, for they hold a mysterious, but very powerful charm that will keep her safe.
Dorothy sets off down the Yellow Brick Road, full of doubt and fear at what lies ahead ("Soon As I Get Home"). Stopping to rest by a cornfield, she is startled when a Scarecrow hanging on a pole strikes up a conversation with her ("I Was Born on the Day Before Yesterday"). He tells her of his longing for brains so that he can be like other people, and she invites him to accompany her to see if the Wiz can help him. ("Ease On Down the Road #1").
The Yellow Brick Road leads them into a great forest where they discover a man made of tin, rusted solid. They oil his joints ("Slide Some Oil To Me") and he tells them how, to prevent him from marrying a servant girl, the Wicked Witch of the East put a spell on his axe so that it began to cut off parts of his body. Each time it happened, a tinsmith replaced the missing part with one made of tin until he was entirely made of it. The one thing the tinsmith forgot was a heart, and the Tin Man has longed for one ever since. Dorothy and the Scarecrow invite him on their journey to see the Wizard with the hope that he may give him one ("Ease On Down the Road #2").
The three continue following the Yellow Brick Road deeper into the forest, where they are attacked by a large lion ("I'm a Mean Ole Lion"). However, he is quickly revealed to be a coward hiding behind bravado as Dorothy stands up for her friends. When he learns where they are going, he apologizes and asks if he may accompany them to ask the Wizard for some courage. They agree and the trio becomes a quartet ("Ease On Down the Road #3"), but face a new danger when they are attacked by half-tiger, half-bear creatures called Kalidahs ("Kalidah Battle"). After a great fight and harrowing escape, they stop by the road to rest. The Lion is embarrassed by his cowardice in the battle, but is comforted by Dorothy's kind words ("Be a Lion").
Seeing a green glow in the distance, they continue their journey to the Emerald City, and wander into a field of poppies who blow opium dust on them. Not being made of flesh, the Scarecrow and Tin Man are unaffected, but Dorothy and the Lion begin to become disoriented and drowsy. Dorothy recalls that the Munchkins warned her of the dangerous poppies, and runs from the field as fast as she can with the Scarecrow and Tin Man behind her. The Lion is overcome by the dust and begins to hallucinate ("Lion's Dream"). He is dragged from the field and returned to his friends by the Field Mice who police the area.
Marching up to the gates of the beautiful Emerald City, they are met by the Gatekeeper who insists they must all be fitted with a pair of green tinted glasses that are locked on to prevent their eyes from being blinded by the dazzling sights. They enter the city and look about in awe at the richly dressed people that inhabit this magnificent place ("Emerald City Ballet"). The haughty and condescending people laugh and ridicule this odd party for wanting to see the Wiz until they see that Dorothy is wearing the Witch of the East's silver slippers. The quartet is promptly shown right into his palace.
Once in the throne room, they are assaulted by a great show of lights, smoke, and pyrotechnics as the Wiz appears in several forms before them ("So You Wanted To See the Wizard"). They each plead their case to him, the Tin Man doing so in song ("What Would I Do If I Could Feel?"). The Wiz agrees on one condition: they must kill Evillene, the Wicked Witch of the West. With their goals seeming further out of reach than ever before, Dorothy and her companions sink to the floor in tears.
=== Act II ===
Evillene rules over the yellow land of the west, enslaving its people, the Winkies. She is evil, power hungry, and ruthlessly determined to get her hands on the silver slippers, so that she may increase her power and rule over all of Oz ("Winkie Chant/Don't Nobody Bring Me No Bad News"). Receiving word of Dorothy and her odd friends approaching, she sends her Winged Monkeys to kill them ("Funky Monkeys"). Catching up to the group in the forest surrounding the castle, the monkeys dash the Tin Man against rocks until he falls apart, and rip the straw out of the Scarecrow, leaving both of them helpless. Seeing Dorothy's silver slippers, however, they dare not harm her. Instead, they carry her to Evillene's castle along with the Lion. While searching for a way to get the slippers from Dorothy, the witch forces her and the Lion to do menial chores around the castle. She takes delight in torturing the Lion before Dorothy, threatening to have him skinned unless she hands over the silver slippers. Angered by this, Dorothy picks up a bucket of water and throws it over Evillene, who melts until only her magic golden cap remains. Her spell on the Winkies is lifted, and they show their thanks by restoring the Scarecrow and Tin Man to top condition, and reuniting the four friends ("Everybody Rejoice").
Returning to the Emerald City, they see the Wiz (now a booming voice that seems to come from the very air). He reneges on his promise, and the Lion knocks over a screen in anger. Behind it stands a bewildered man who claims to be the real Wizard. He shows them the elaborate mechanical effects used to create his illusions, and tells them that he is really a balloonist from Omaha named Herman Smith who traveled to Oz by accident when his hot air balloon drifted off course. The people of Oz had never seen such a sight and proclaimed him Wizard. Not wanting to disappoint them, he assumed the role and had a great city built. He then had everyone in it wear green glasses, and in time, the people came to believe it was green.
Furious, the quartet confronts the Wizard on his deceptions ("Who Do You Think You Are?"), but he points out that the Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Lion already have the things they seek as shown in their behavior on the journeys they have made ("Believe In Yourself"). They remain unconvinced, so he creates physical symbols of their desires and they are satisfied. He proposes that Dorothy can return to Kansas the way he came, and offers to pilot her in his hot air balloon. He addresses the citizens of the Emerald City in person for the first time in many years, telling them of his imminent journey, and leaving the clever Scarecrow in charge ("Y'all Got It!"). Just as his speech reaches its climax, the balloon comes free from its moorings and rises quickly into the air, taking Dorothy's hopes of getting home with it.
Just as the group despairs of finding help, Addaperle reappears in a flash of light, suggesting that Dorothy ask Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, for assistance. She transports them to Glinda's palace in the red land of the south, where they are warmly welcomed and invited to rest after their many trials ("A Rested Body Is a Rested Mind"). Glinda is a beautiful and gracious sorceress, surrounded by a court of pretty girls. She tells Dorothy that the silver slippers have always had the power to take them home, but like her friends, she needed to believe in their magic and in herself before it was possible ("If You Believe"). Dorothy bids a tearful goodbye to her companions, and as their faces fade into the darkness, she thinks about what she has gained, lost, and learned throughout her journey through Oz ("Home"). Clicking the heels of the silver slippers together three times, she finds herself transported back to Kansas in an instant. As an overjoyed Aunt Em and Toto appear, and Dorothy runs to hug them both, she knows that she is back home at last ("Finale"). | cult, blaxploitation | tt0078504 |
Cold Sweat | During the Korean War, Joe Moran, a U. S. Army sergeant, was convicted for striking a colonel. He was imprisoned in Germany. In the military prison he encountered his former company commander Captain Ross, and a fellow soldier who served under Joe called Vermont. They had been imprisoned for black marketeering and hijacking army vehicles. Joe agrees to escape with them. The escape is organised by a former French Foreign Legionnaire named "Katanga". Things go according to plan until Katanga kills a curious German police officer. Frightened and disgusted by the murder, Joe escapes by himself, abandoning his friends and Katanga, who are recaptured.
Years later, Joe is known as Joe Martin. He makes a legitimate living renting boats in the South of France. He lives with his wife, Fabienne, and 12-year-old daughter. Things are going fine for Joe. When Joe's picture appears in a local news story, Ross, Vermont and Katanga appear. Now wanted drug smugglers, they want revenge on Joe and use of his rental operation to move contraband. To ensure Joe's cooperation, they kidnap his wife and daughter and hold them hostage. | murder | tt0106586 |
TerrorVision | On an alien planet named Pluton, an alien garbage disposal converts a monstrous mutant called a Hungry Beast into energy and beams it into space. Meanwhile, on Earth, the Putterman family is getting satellite television, courtesy of a temperamental DIY antenna. The reception is poor at first, but suddenly strengthens when a bolt of the alien energy hits the dish.
Sherman Putterman and his ex-military, survivalist grandfather set out to enjoy a night of horror films hosted by the buxom Medusa. Meanwhile Sherman's parents go out to meet some swingers and his sister Suzy goes out with her rocker boyfriend O.D.. Sherman and his grandfather eventually fall asleep, but are awakened when the Hungry Beast materializes out of the TV and eats the grandfather. Sherman's parents later arrive along with swingers Cherry and Spiro. Despite Sherman's plea, his mother locks him in the fallout shelter so he will not ruin their evening.
Sherman tries calling the police, but they take him to be a prank caller. He also calls Medusa, but she dismisses him as a psychotic. Later, the Beast travels through the television into the house's sex-themed "Pleasure Dome", eats Cherry, and imitates her to lure Spiro. Sherman's parents also get eaten after they discover the remains of the swingers. Sherman uses some plastic explosive to break out of the bunker as O.D. and his sister arrive.
Sherman's sister doesn't believe his story about a monster, and when they check their parents' room, they find imitations of them, their grandfather and the swingers. Soon after though, they encounter the Beast in another room. It chases after them, but relents at the sight of O.D.'s heavy metal paraphernelia, which he finds appealing due to its resemblance of his caretaker's gloves. They then discover that they can subdue the Beast with food and television, and teach it a few words such as "TV", "music" and their names. They consider using the Beast for profit, and call Medusa in the hope of securing a TV appearance. She is initially dismissive, but shows interest when they promise to hold a party.
However, the Beast becomes enraged and eats O.D. when its alien captor appears on the TV to warn the earthlings that they must destroy their television equipment to prevent the Beast from spreading. A police officer arrives to arrest Sherman for the prank calls only to be eaten by the Beast. Sherman breaks all the TVs he can find, and eventually the Pluthon alien captor appears through the television to exterminate the Beast. Medusa arrives at the house and kills the Pluthon Alien, mistakenly believing that he is in fact the Beast that Sherman and Suzy have described to her. When the real monster arrives, it sucks the group of three into its mouth with a powerful gust of air.
The next morning, Medusa's chauffeur is woken up by a crude imitation of his employer hiding in the back seat of his car, demanding to be taken to the TV station. | satire | tt0092074 |
The Boy Next Door | Claire Peterson (Jennifer Lopez) separates from her husband Garrett (John Corbett), after he was caught cheating with his secretary. Her colleague and best friend Vicky Lansing (Kristin Chenoweth) urges Claire to divorce. Claire meets 19-year-old Noah Sandborn (Ryan Guzman)—the orphaned nephew of her wheelchair-bound neighbor—who has just moved in next door. Noah befriends Kevin (Ian Nelson), Claire's teenage son, and begins attending his school, where Claire teaches English literature. Noah is drawn to Claire, expressing love for Homer's Iliad. With Kevin and Garrett away on a fishing trip, Claire watches a naked Noah in his room through her window.
Claire goes on a miserable double date with Vicky and her boyfriend Ethan (Travis Schuldt), and his ill-mannered friend Benny (Bailey Chase). With Kevin still away, Noah calls Claire over to help him cook. She ends up having dinner with him, during which he unashamedly flirts with her. Despite Claire's hesitation, she lets Noah seduce her and they have sex. Claire tells Noah that she regrets their night together, causing him to punch a wall in rage. The school year begins, with Noah joining an uncomfortable Claire's class after hacking into her computer, making it appear as if she had requested this. Noah manipulates Kevin into hating his father, causing him to lash out at Garrett. Later, Kevin overexerts himself at the gymnasium and goes into shock; Noah saves his life by injecting him with Kevin's EpiPen. Claire receives flowers from Noah, and she confronts him about this. Noah witnesses Claire and Garrett on a date together, which escalates his obsession with her.
After an incident where Noah—in defense of Kevin—slams a bully's (Adam Hicks) head into a locker repeatedly, Vicky (who is vice principal at the school) discovers that Noah was kicked out of his previous school for disorderly conduct. After an encounter where Noah insults her, she expels him. During the fall fling, Claire goes to investigate a leak in the boys' bathroom, where she instead sees the words "I fucked Claire Peterson" written on the wall before Noah emerges. He attempts to force himself on her, but she fends him off and demands that he stay away from her and Kevin. The following day, Noah leaves a printer running in Claire's classroom, with images of them sleeping together scattered everywhere. When Garrett's car brakes fail to work, he and Kevin are nearly involved in an accident. Noah blackmails Claire; telling her that he has a tape of them having sex, which he will relinquish to her if she continues sleeping with him. She refuses, and organizes a plot with Vicky to steer Noah away from his house. Claire breaks into Noah's house and sees hundreds of images of herself in his basement. She finds his laptop, deleting their sex tape, and also sees images of car brakes, implying that he rigged Garrett's brakes. She meets with Detective Chou (François Chau), who informs her that Noah's father was killed after swerving into a truck with his minivan.
Noah binds and gags Vicky with duct tape and uses an audio recording of her voice to lure Claire to her house. When Claire arrives, she discovers Vicky's dead body, with her throat having been slashed by Noah. A horrified Claire contacts the police, but runs into Noah again. He reveals to her that his mother killed herself after his father cheated on her, so he rigged the brakes of his father's minivan, killing him and his mistress. Noah takes Claire to a barn house where he has kidnapped Garrett and Kevin, threatening to kill them unless Claire stays with him. A violent altercation occurs as Claire attempts to free them. Noah pours kerosene around the barn, causing it to ignite in flames. Garrett, having freed himself, attempts to choke Noah with a rope, prompting Noah to shoot him in the chest. Claire stabs Noah's eye with Kevin's EpiPen. When Noah removes the EpiPen from his eye and blindly attempts to strangle Claire to death, she then jams her thumb into the same damaged eye to blind him further, much to Noah's agony and he strikes her across the face. When he later holds Kevin at gunpoint, she pulls a switch that drops an engine on Noah, killing him. Claire and Kevin then help a wounded Garrett exit the burning barn house as the police arrive. Garrett is put in an ambulance. A paramedic says that Garrett will be fine. Claire and Kevin ride in the ambulance with him and Claire tells Garrett that he's gonna be okay and promises him after he arrives at the hospital, "we're going home.", hinting at a family reconciliation between Claire, Garrett and Kevin. As all three family members remain together in the ambulance truck, the ambulance then drives off into road to the hospital and the camera pans out to the moon hovering in the night sky. | suspenseful, murder | tt1340765 |
Highlander II: The Quickening | In August 1994, news broadcasts announce that the ozone layer is fading, and will be completely gone in a matter of months. In Africa, millions have perished from the effects of unfiltered sunlight. Among the dead is Connor MacLeod's wife, Brenda Wyatt MacLeod. Before dying, Brenda extracts a promise from Connor that he will solve the problem of the ozone layer.
By 1999, Connor MacLeod becomes the supervisor of a scientific team headed by Dr. Allan Neyman, which attempts to create an electromagnetic shield to cover the planet, and protect it from the Sun’s radiation. The team succeeds, in effect giving Earth an artificial ozone layer. MacLeod and Neyman are proud to have saved humanity, and believe they will be remembered for a thousand years.
The shield has the side effect of condemning the planet to a state of constant night, a high average global temperature, and high humidity. By 2024, the years of darkness have caused humanity to lose hope and fall into a decline. The shield has fallen under the control of the Shield Corporation. The corporation’s current chief executive, David Blake, is focused on profit, and is imposing fees for the corporation’s services. A number of terrorist groups have begun trying to take down the Shield, among them Louise Marcus, a former employee of the Shield Corporation.
Meanwhile, MacLeod, now a frail old man, expects to eventually die of natural causes. As he watches a performance of Wagner’s Götterdämmerung, an image of Juan Sanchez Villa-Lobos Ramirez appears, and induces MacLeod to recall a forgotten event of his past. On the planet Zeist, a last meeting is held between the members of a rebellion against the rule of General Katana. The rebellion’s leader, Ramirez, chooses "a man of great destiny" from among them—MacLeod—to carry out a mission against Katana. At this moment, Katana and his troops attack, crushing the rebellion. Katana orders his men to capture Ramirez and MacLeod alive and kill the rest of the rebels. The two captives are put on trial by Zeist's priests, who sentence them to be exiled and reborn on Earth in pursuit of "The Prize." Winning the Prize gives the victor the choice to either grow old and die on Earth, or to return to Zeist. Katana is unsatisfied with their decision, but the sentence is executed, leading to the events of the original 1986 film.
Back in 2024, Louise Marcus discovers that the ozone layer has in fact restored itself naturally, which means that the shield is no longer needed. The Shield Corporation is aware of this development, but has chosen to hide it from the general public in order to maintain its main source of profit. Meanwhile, on Zeist, Katana decides that MacLeod cannot be allowed to return, and sends his immortal henchmen, Corda and Reno, to kill him.
Marcus manages to reach MacLeod first, and asks for his help in taking down the Shield. To her disappointment, she finds the passionate person she once admired has grown into a tired old man. MacLeod explains to her that he is dying and expresses his disapproval of terrorism. Before they can finish their conversation, Corda and Reno attack. MacLeod manages to decapitate them both, absorbs their energy during the Quickening, and regains his youthful appearance. In the process, MacLeod summons Ramirez back to life.
In Glencoe, Scotland - the location of his death in the first Highlander film - Ramirez is revived. He finds himself on a theatrical stage during a performance of William Shakespeare's Hamlet. Meanwhile, MacLeod has found a new lover in Marcus. He attempts unsuccessfully to explain to her the concepts of his immortality. Elsewhere, General Katana arrives in New York, the scene of The Gathering and begins wreaking havoc.
Both Ramirez and Katana soon adapt to their new environment. Ramirez’s earring is apparently valuable enough to pay both for a new suit he acquires from the finest and oldest tailor’s shop in Scotland, and for an airplane ticket to New York City. Katana finds New York much to his liking. After entertaining himself for a while, Katana encounters MacLeod at a church. Since immortals are forbidden from fighting on holy ground, they do not fight each other, but MacLeod expresses rage at being immortal once again.
Soon thereafter, MacLeod is contacted by Ramirez, who joins them in their plan to take down the Shield. Katana, expecting this, forges an uneasy alliance with David Blake, who mentions that shutting down the planetary shield would require so much energy that the planet would be destroyed. The conflict between the two sets of allies eventually leads to the deaths of Dr. Allan Neyman, Ramirez, Blake and General Katana himself. MacLeod succeeds in taking down the Shield by using the combined energies of his final Quickening from General Katana. Marcus sees the stars for the first time in her life. MacLeod then claims The Prize by returning to Zeist with Marcus. | comedy, murder, cult, violence, flashback, good versus evil, action, revenge, sci-fi | tt0102034 |
The Yards | Leo Handler (Mark Wahlberg) rides the subway to his mother's house in Queens, New York, where she throws a surprise party in honor of his parole. His cousin Erica (Charlize Theron) is at the party with her boyfriend Willie Gutierrez (Joaquin Phoenix). Willie takes Leo aside and thanks him for serving time in prison, implying that Leo had taken a fall for their gang of friends.
Leo is eager to find a job to support his mother (Ellen Burstyn), who has a heart condition. Willie suggests working for Erica's stepfather Frank Olchin (James Caan).
The next day, at the railway car repair company Frank owns, Leo is encouraged to enter a 2-year machinist program and Frank offers to help finance his studies. Needing to work right away, Leo asks about working with Willie for the company but Frank discourages that idea. Leo is advised by Willie not to worry about it, saying Frank tried to get him into a machinist program as well.
At Brooklyn Borough Hall, Willie explains how corrupt the contract system is for repair work on the subway. After a hearing to award contracts, Willie is approached by Hector Gallardo (Robert Montano) about leaving Frank's firm for his. Willie brushes him off, taking Leo with him to Roosevelt Island, where he bribes an official in charge of awarding contracts.
One night, Willie takes Leo to a rail yard, where he and a gang sabotage the work of Gallardo's firm in order to lower their quality rating and lessen their ability to get contracts. Leo is told to stand watch while the crew sabotages the train couplings. Willie heads into the yard master's office to pay him off with Knicks tickets, but is told to get his crew off the tracks, Gallardo having brought him $2,000 in cash. The yard master sounds the alarm, which draws a police officer. Terrified of returning to jail, Leo tries to run. When the cop begins to hit Leo with his night stick, Leo beats him into unconsciousness. As he runs off, he sees Willie kill the yard master.
With the cop in a coma at a hospital, the crew tells Leo that he must murder the officer to prevent him from identifying Leo when he wakes up. If the cop lives, Leo's the one who will be killed. Leo flees. When the cop awakes, he identifies Leo as his attacker, triggering a broad manhunt. The police assume Leo is also responsible for the yard master's murder. When they raid his mother's apartment, she has a heart attack, leaving her in an even weaker state.
Even though Willie has told him to lay low, Leo emerges from hiding to visit his sick mother. Erica is tending to her. She finds out Willie was with him at the yards and realizes it was Willie who actually killed the yard master. She breaks off their engagement.
Erica implores her stepfather Frank to help, but instead Leo realizes that Frank is prepared to kill him. Out of options, Leo turns to Gallardo for protection. With Gallardo's lawyers at his side, Leo turns himself in at a public hearing into the rail yard incident and contract corruption. Realizing that the injured cop's testimony against Leo is in no one's interest, Frank and Gallardo negotiate a new split of the contracts with the Queens Borough President (Steve Lawrence) in a backroom deal.
After being disowned by Frank and unsuccessfully trying to accept a deal offered to him earlier by Gallardo for protection, which Leo had already accepted, unbeknownst to Willie, Willie goes to see Erica, trying to win her back. Frank has told him that Erica and Leo had been in love when they were younger, and once were caught having sex. Fearful of his temper and jealousy, Erica triggers the silent house alarm. Willie tries to embrace her, but as she pulls away, he accidentally throws Erica off the second floor landing, causing her to fall to her death. Outside the house, he surrenders to the police, who have responded to the alarm, and cries in remorse and guilt for Erica's death as he is cuffed and taken away.
Police enter the hearing to inform Erica's mother Kitty (Faye Dunaway) and stepfather Frank of the incident at the house, and the discovery of Erica's body.
After his stepdaughter's funeral, Frank takes Leo aside to promise help in the future. After turning away in muted disgust, Leo joins the grieving Kitty and the rest of the family in an embrace of support. Leo then leaves Queens on the elevated train.
(Note: A non-director's cut of the film ended with Leo testifying against Frank and his company, rejecting the deal. The version currently available on the Miramax DVD in the US is the director's cut.) | romantic, murder | tt0138946 |
Fong sai yuk | The brash and ambitious Fong Sai-yuk meets the beautiful Ting-ting during a track and field competition and falls in love with her. Ting-ting is the daughter of Tiger Lui, a hot-headed hooligan. Lui stages a martial arts competition for interested men to participate and win his daughter's hand in marriage. The contestant must defeat Lui's wife, Siu-wan, in order to win. Fong joins the contest at his friends' urging and defeats Siu-wan. He catches a glimpse of his future bride, who is actually a servant maid to replace Ting-ting, who went missing during the contest. Fong decides to forfeit the match and leaves.
Fong's mother, Miu Tsui-fa, enters the contest in disguise as a man to help her son win back his lost pride. She defeats Siu-wan by knocking her off the scaffold, but catches her as she falls and they land safely on the ground. After that intimate moment together, Siu-wan becomes romantically attracted to Miu without knowing that Miu is actually a woman in disguise. Lui then forces Miu to marry his daughter. To save his mother from embarrassment, Fong marries Ting-ting on behalf of his "brother" (his mother in disguise as a man), and is confined in his father-in-law's house. He is unaware that his bride is actually his love interest and they fight in the dark. They discover each other's identities eventually.
Miu manages to persuade Lui to let her son return home. Just then, Fong's father, Fong Tak, returns home from a trip. Fong discovers that his father is a member of the Red Flower Society, an underground resistance movement that aims to overthrow the ruling Manchu-led Qing dynasty. While Fong Tak is having a conversation with fellow members, they are ambushed by the Governor of Nine Gates and his soldiers. The Governor demands that Fong Tak hand over the name list of the society's members, but he refuses. Just then, Fong Sai-yuk and his mother show up, and Fong fights with the Governor and holds him off until his parents have escaped.
Fong and his parents hide in their in-laws' house to evade the authorities, but the Governor visits Lui's house and recognises them. In the ensuing fight, Fong Tak is captured while Siu-wan dies from a gunshot wound. Fong lies to his mother that his father has been rescued and decides to save his father alone without letting her know. He attempts to storm the execution ground and fights with the Governor to save his father. At the critical moment, Miu appears with the Red Flower Society's members and their leader, Chan Ka-lok. They defeat the Governor and his men and succeed in freeing Fong Tak. Before the film ends, Fong Sai-yuk becomes Chan's godson and joins his godfather on their quest as they ride towards the far horizon. | cult, violence | tt0106936 |
Hellboy Animated: Sword of Storms | The film starts in the middle of an unspecified mission which sees Hellboy, Liz Sherman and Abe Sapien battling bat-worshipping Mayan zombies who are led by a gigantic zombie bat. The group are eventually able to defeat their opponents when Liz unleashes her pyrokinetic powers, although she is still unsure of her ability to control her powers.
Meanwhile, Japanese folklore expert Professor Sakai obtains an ancient scroll containing the myth of two demonic brothers, Thunder and Lightning. Hundreds of years ago, the brothers roamed the earth, unleashing storms on the lands of a Japanese Lord. In exchange for mercy, the Lord promised to give them his beautiful daughter. One of the Lord's samurai warriors was in love with the daughter and hid her in a shrine to protect her. Armed with the Sword of Storms, a mystical sword imbued with an ancient spell to defeat Thunder and Lightning, the warrior fought the brothers and trapped both demons' spirits in the sword. Although his lands and daughter had been saved, the Lord was not pleased since the warrior's actions meant the Lord had broken a promise. In an act of vengeance, the Lord summoned the gods to turn the warrior to stone and then killed his daughter in the shrine.
In current-day Japan, Professor Sakai is possessed by the spirits of Thunder and Lightning while reading the scroll. The demonic brothers send the professor in search of the mystical sword. After he attacks the sword collector who currently owns the sword, the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense is alerted and Hellboy, Kate Corrigan, and a psychic named Russell Thorne are called in with a team to investigate. During the investigation, Hellboy picks up a discarded katana and vanishes to another dimension that is reminiscent of ancient Japan. Hellboy meets a wise kitsune, who tells him that the sword he holds is the Sword of Storms and that the goal of his journey lies to the west. Hellboy travels through the alternate universe and learns that he can only return to his own world by breaking the sword, although that will also free the demonic brothers. Along the way Hellboy encounters several mythical Yōkai, sent by the still possessed Professor Sakai, who try to steal the sword from him, including the kappa, a trio of rokurokubi, a group of nukekubi, a Jorōgumo, Gashadokuro, tengu, Yomotsu-shikome, and the restless ghost of the Lord's daughter. Hellboy is able to outsmart or defeat all of them.
Meanwhile, Abe Sapien and Liz Sherman are called to the sites of disturbing earthquakes and discover that Thunder and Lightning are summoning their brothers, the dragons. They meet the same kitsune who guided Hellboy and are instructed to stop the dragons. One of the dragons attacks them but Liz manages to hold it back using her pyrokinetic abilities.
Professor Sakai, in the meantime, has gone to the shrine where the Lord killed his daughter, followed by Kate and Russell who have just survived an attack by several objects from Japanese folklore. At the same time, Hellboy is tricked into destroying the sword by the giant Oni (who faded away before the final blow can be struck) which releases Thunder and Lightning, frees Professor Sakai, and sends Hellboy to the shrine as well. Hellboy eventually manages to trap both spirits in the sword again. As a result, the dragons are sealed back into the underworld. The ghosts of the daughter and the Lord possess Kate and Russell, in order to replay the daughter's execution. Hellboy accidentally frees the ghost of the samurai warrior from its stone form and then convinces the Lord to forgive his daughter and the warrior, thereby breaking the cycle of their unending deaths. The spirits depart, thankful to Hellboy and the others for helping them. | violence | tt0810895 |
Lolita 2000 | Set in the 1950s, the film begins in medias res near the end of the story, with a confrontation between two men: one of them, Clare Quilty, drunk and incoherent, plays Chopin's Polonaise in A major, Op. 40, No. 1 on the piano before being shot from behind a portrait painting of a young woman. The shooter is Humbert Humbert, a 40-something British professor of French literature.
The film then flashes back to events four years earlier. Humbert arrives in Ramsdale, New Hampshire, intending to spend the summer before his professorship begins at Beardsley College, Ohio. He searches for a room to rent, and Charlotte Haze, a cloying, sexually frustrated widow, invites him to stay at her house. He declines until seeing her daughter, Dolores, affectionately called "Lolita". Lolita is a soda-pop drinking, gum-snapping, overtly flirtatious teenager, with whom Humbert becomes infatuated.
To be close to Lolita, Humbert accepts Charlotte's offer and becomes a lodger in the Haze household. But Charlotte wants all of "Hum's" time for herself and soon announces she will be sending Lolita to an all-girl sleepaway camp for the summer. After the Hazes depart for camp, the maid gives Humbert a letter from Charlotte, confessing her love for him and demanding he vacate at once unless he feels the same way. The letter says that if Humbert is still in the house when she returns, Charlotte will know her love is requited, and he must marry her. Though he roars with laughter while reading the sadly heartfelt yet characteristically overblown letter, Humbert marries Charlotte.
Things turn sour for the couple in the absence of the nymphet: glum Humbert becomes more withdrawn, and brassy Charlotte more whiny. Charlotte discovers Humbert's diary entries detailing his passion for Lolita and characterizing her as "the Haze woman, the cow, the obnoxious mama, the brainless baba". She has an hysterical outburst, runs outside, and is hit by a car, dying on impact.
Humbert drives to Camp Climax to pick up Lolita, who doesn't yet know her mother is dead. They stay the night in a hotel that is handling an overflow influx of police officers attending a convention. One of the guests, a pushy, abrasive stranger, insinuates himself upon Humbert and keeps steering the conversation to his "beautiful little daughter," who is asleep upstairs. The stranger implies that he too is a policeman and repeats, too often, that he thinks Humbert is "normal." Humbert escapes the man's advances, and, the next morning, Humbert and Lolita enter into a sexual relationship. The two commence an odyssey across the United States, traveling from hotel to motel. In public, they act as father and daughter. After several days, Humbert tells Lolita that her mother is not sick in a hospital, as he had previously told her, but dead. Grief-stricken, she stays with Humbert.
In the fall, Humbert reports to his position at Beardsley College, and enrolls Lolita in high school there. Before long, people begin to wonder about the relationship between father and his over-protected daughter. Humbert worries about her involvement with the school play and with male classmates. One night he returns home to find Dr. Zempf, a pushy, abrasive stranger, sitting in his darkened living room. Zempf, speaking with a thick German accent, claims to be from Lolita's school and wants to discuss her knowledge of "the facts of life." He convinces Humbert to allow Lolita to participate in the school play, for which she had been selected to play the leading role.
While attending a performance of the play, Humbert learns that Lolita has been lying about how she was spending her Saturday afternoons when she claimed to be at piano practice. They get into a row and Humbert decides to leave Beardsley College and take Lolita on the road again. Lolita objects at first but then suddenly changes her mind and seems very enthusiastic. Once on the road, Humbert soon realizes they are being followed by a mysterious car that never drops away but never quite catches up. When Lolita becomes sick, he takes her to the hospital. However, when he returns to pick her up, she is gone. The nurse there tells him she left with another man claiming to be her uncle and Humbert, devastated, is left without a single clue as to her disappearance or whereabouts.
Some years later, Humbert receives a letter from Mrs. Richard T. Schiller, Lolita's married name. She writes that she is now married to a man named Dick, and that she is pregnant and in desperate need of money. Humbert travels to their home and finds that she is now a roundly expectant woman in glasses leading a pleasant, humdrum life. Humbert demands that she tell him who kidnapped her three years earlier. She tells him it was Clare Quilty, the man that was following them, who is a famous playwright and with whom her mother had a fling in Ramsdale days. She states Quilty is also the one who disguised himself as Dr. Zempf, the pushy stranger who kept crossing their path. Lolita herself carried on an affair with him and left with him when he promised her glamour. However, he then demanded she join his depraved lifestyle, including acting in his "art" films, which she vehemently refused.
Humbert begs Lolita to leave her husband and come away with him, but she declines. Humbert gives Lolita $13,000, explaining it as her money from the sale of her mother's house, and leaves to shoot Quilty in his mansion, where the film began. The epilogue explains that Humbert died of coronary thrombosis awaiting trial for Quilty's murder. | pornographic | tt0130089 |
Girl Vs. Monster | The movie begins on the day before Halloween with Skylar, a fearless 15-year-old teenager with a powerful singing voice, prepares for the ultimate Halloween bash with her best friends, Henry and Sadie. The plan is for Skylar to sing at the party, with rock band member Ryan Dean. Skylar is crushed when the next afternoon, her parents make her stay home and even activate an alarm system to keep her in. She attempts to sneak out of the house by cutting the power so the alarm system won't work. That unfortunately unleashes a monster named Deimata (that was contained in her parents' monster containment unit) who is determined to feed the fear on Skylar and her family forever. As Skylar’s world is turned upside down, she learns that her parents have been keeping a big secret – that she comes from a long line of monster hunters. She is the 5th generation. Now, it’s up to Skylar and her friends to channel their inner strength and conquer more than just this monster. Every person has their own personal monster, which feeds on their fear.
Now that Deimata is loose, Skylar experiences all the fear she never had before and tries to deny what is happening. She, Sadie and Henry go, armed with Skylar's parents' monster-hunting tools, to the party at the McQuarry Mansion. But Henry becomes frozen in fear, after being scared by his monster. Cobb, her parents' assistant, comes and takes him back home to fix him. Meanwhile, Deimata lures Skylar's parents into a trap by pretending that Skylar is in trouble. After this, Myra, Skylar's rival, who is at home with a broken neck, is eating ice cream. Soon, the red smoke comes out and it transforms into Deimata. She then controls Myra and goes to the party where she publicly insults Skylar of being nervous to sing at Ryan's party and Sadie comforts Skylar after she runs out, embarrassed. A possessed Myra sings in Skylar's place and turns to Theodosia and Bob (Sadie and Henry's monsters). Myra falls downstairs after Deimata leaves Myra's body as Skylar and Sadie find her. Myra informs them about Deimata and how she can possess people- like she did with her. Skylar thanks her, and she and Sadie rush to save the people upstairs.
During a confrontation with his personal monster, a fixed and armed Henry learns that letting go of his fears will cause the monsters to disintegrate into nothing. He goes to the mansion to inform Skylar of this. So, she grabs the microphone and tells Ryan to grab his guitar and meet her outside. But, Deimata possesses Ryan to better discourage Skylar from facing her fears, but he manages to break free by facing his greatest fear: asking Skylar out. Skylar faces her fears and sings in front of everybody, while Ryan and his band performs as well. While Skylar sings, all the monsters vanish and Sadie also gathers the courage to stand up to Theodosia by spelling things she couldn't when she was a little girl. When all the monsters are all vanquished, Deimata comes and reveals she cannot be destroyed that way. She then reminds Skylar that she still has Skylar's parents in captivity, and Skylar rushes off to find them, with Sadie and Henry following behind with everybody especially Ryan and Myra watches them from a distance.
Skylar and her friends try to fight off Deimata, but she doesn't seem able to be stopped. Although Skylar has overcome her fear, she soon realizes Deimata is still feeding off of her parents' fears—about Skylar's safety. Once Skylar gets her parents to trust her, Deimata is weakened and the three friends defeat her and capture her. At the end of the movie, Henry and Sadie are shown having no fear by doing what they are scared about doing the most. Later that day, Skylar and Ryan sing at Ryan's party in his basement. Myra becomes friends with Skylar. However, in a post-credits scene, Deimata blows on the glass in the hunting unit, cracking it and we hear it break as Deimata's laugh is heard one last time, hinting at a sequel. | horror | tt2326087 |
War Chod Na Yaar | The film begins with Captain Rajveer Singh (Sharman Joshi) and Captain Quereshi (Javed Jaffrey) are captains of India and Pakistan playing cards with their partners at Indo-Pak border. Suddenly bomb explodes. Then the film flashback into 17 hours before. At that time the Defense minister of India calls Rut Dutta (Soha Ali Khan), the reporter of GBC news to talk some important top secret. He reveals that after 2 days war will be declare between India and Pakistan. At 14 hours before, Defense minister of Pakistan with Pakistani General contacts with Defense minister of China for some help. Defense minister of China tells that he will attack nuclear bomb in New Delhi. At Indo-Pak border Pakistan armies are becoming very lazy. Then don't want to pay attention to commander Khan(Sanjai Mishra). In In
Captain Rajveer Singh (Sharman Joshi) and Captain Quereshi (Javed Jaffery) are battalion captains of India and Pakistan – two countries forever embroiled in conflict and turmoil with each other. However, on the actual battle-field, Raj and Quereshi and his troops form an unlikely friendship and camaraderie, reared on a love for conversations and playing antakshari(a game)of Hindi film songs and non-veg food. Midst them, arrives Ruth Dutta (Soha Ali Khan), an ambitious TV reporter, assigned to make a documentary on the lives of the soldiers of these two sides, as reported from on-ground. But when war is announced between these two countries, the easy friendship between the two sides is tested and conspiracy theories are hatched – all with hilarious results. In the end, the question which haunts everybody is : why the war and to what end? | satire | tt3129282 |
Uccellacci e uccellini | Totò and his son Ninetto roam the neighbourhood and the countryside of Rome. During the walk they observe a body being removed from a house following a murder. They next encounter a talking crow, who is described in the intertitles thus: "For the benefit of those who were not paying attention or are in doubt, we remind you that the Crow is – as you say – a left-wing intellectual of the kind found living before Palmiro Togliatti's death").
The Crow subsequently recounts the tale of "Fra Ciccillo" and "Fra Ninetto" (still played by Totò and Ninetto), two Franciscan friars, who are bid by St. Francis to preach the Gospel to the hawks and the sparrows. After many months, they succeeded in preaching the commandment of love unto the species separately, but are not able to get them to love each other. The sparrow-hawks continue to kill and eat the sparrows, as it is in their nature.
After the tale, the journey of Totò and Ninetto carries on, the Crow still accompanying them. They encounter other individuals: land-owners who order them out off their land when they are caught defecating; a family living in absolute poverty with no food and who Totò threatens to drive out of the house if the rent is not paid; a group of travelling actors (representing figures marginalised from society such as women, those that are gay, the elderly, racial minorities, and the disabled) and who persuade the pair to push the group's Cadillac car for them; and a rich man who is waiting for Totò to give him the money he owes him (in contrast to the earlier episode where Toto had demanded rent). After that, a brief extract of news footage of the funeral of Palmiro Togliatti, the long-time leader of the Italian Communist Party. Then, after having met a prostitute, they end up killing and eating the Crow, whom they found to be unconscionably boring.
Pasolini declared that Uccellacci e uccellini was his favourite film, as it was the only one that did not disappoint his expectations.
Ennio Morricone's opening theme music features Domenico Modugno singing the movie's credits. | allegory, psychedelic, satire, philosophical | tt0061132 |
The Night Stalker | In the opening, Kolchak is sitting on the bed of a sleazy hotel room, listening to a replay of his dictation on his portable tape recorder. The notes are about a series of murders that have plagued the Las Vegas Strip, and a cover up of those events by the authorities. All of the victims had their bodies drained of blood. When a meeting is conducted with the sheriff's department, the DEA, the police and others, they discover the suspect's true identity is Janos Skorzeny, who is the prime suspect in multiple homicides involving massive loss of blood extending back years. When Skorzeny attempts to rob a hospital, the police are called to stop him. Skorzeny is shot multiple times without effect, and manages to escape by outrunning a police car and motorcycle.
Kolchak has a girlfriend named Gail Foster (Carol Lynley) who earns her living as a dancer, which Kolchak attempts to get her to give up. At Gail's urging, Kolchak looks into vampire lore. The evidence persuades Kolchak to suspect that Skorzeny is a vampire, much to the disbelief of his boss Anthony Vincenzo (Simon Oakland). Kolchak is able to convince the police that they are fighting a vampire, as the suspect possesses incredible strength and cannot be harmed by gunfire. Kolchak ultimately destroys the vampire, and unlike subsequent productions, he does so with the help of his friend in the FBI (a credible eyewitness).
Kolchak writes his version of the story for the newspaper, and proposes to his girlfriend, telling her that they will both move to New York City. However, in quick succession, the authorities print a false version of the newspaper story with his byline, and threaten to charge Kolchak with first degree murder unless he quietly leaves Las Vegas. Kolchak is told that his girlfriend Gail has already been forced to leave the city for "engaging in unsavory activities". Carl exhausts his savings placing personal advertisements across the country in a futile attempt to find her.
The final scene is of Kolchak in the sleazy hotel room, finishing his book. He explains that if anyone tries to verify the events in the book, they will find that everyone involved in the incident in even the slightest way has either left town, is not talking, or is dead, there is no file on the suspect, all of the evidence has been destroyed by the authorities, and all of the bodies were cremated. | murder | tt1821657 |
Das schreckliche Mädchen | A German high school student, Sonja (Lena Stolze as a fictionalized version of Anna Rosmus) wins an essay contest and goes on a trip to Paris.
Martin Wegmus begins teaching physics at Sonja's school and one of Sonja's classmates falls in love with him. Almost by luck, Mr. Wegmus and Sonja kiss. The teacher promises to return for her.
The next year, she enters the contest again. She chooses "My Town During the Third Reich" from the possible topics. Her research leads her to discover that her picture-perfect town had been intimately involved in the Third Reich and that nearly all of the city's prominent families were members of the Nazi party long before it came to power. As she digs further, local authorities stonewall her efforts. Sonja persists and learns that there had been eight concentration camps in the area and that all the Jews were forced out of the town and had their property confiscated.
Sonja marries Martin, and the townsfolk think Sonja has dropped the issue of Nazi involvement. Sonja bears two daughters and studies history at the University. She resumes her research into the town's Nazi past, and wins court cases granting her access to archives. She still has to employ trickery to get the information she wants, however. In response, her town's hostility grows from verbal abuse, to death threats to physical assaults as they attempt to silence her with increasing desperation, but nothing deters her.
Meanwhile, her husband feels emasculated as he's forced to take care of the children. The family survives a bomb from the angry townsfolk, but Sonja keeps up her research.
At the end, the townspeople change their tune, even putting a bust of Sonja at the town hall. Sonja sees this as a means to silence her and rejects the honor. | psychedelic, comedy, alternate history | tt0100557 |
TC 2000 | In 2020, ecological disaster has driven the wealthy to an underground city. Jason Storm is part of an elite security force called the Tracker-Communicators who protect the city against the surface world survivors who could not afford to escape. Zoey Kinsella, the deceased founder's daughter, joins him as his rookie partner. After a raid by starving surface world survivors breaches the city's force field, Zoey comes to believe they have inside help. Storm acknowledges the possibility but is more concerned with his clashes against the Controller, the leader of the city's security, and his enforcer, Bigalow. The Controller wants to use a cybernetic project to replace the Tracker-Communicators, but he can not find any volunteers
Niki Picasso and his gang penetrate the underground city's force field and head directly to a disused area of the city. There, in a hidden cache, they find ammunition and an automatic rifle, a weapon that has become extremely rare. While Picasso pins down Storm and Kinsella, an unseen adversary shoots Kinsella dead. Convinced of a coverup, Storm angrily resigns, only to have the Controller send Bigalow to kill him. When Storm escapes the city, the Controller frames him for Kinsella's death and sets the security forces after him. Unknown to Storm, the Controller has Kinsella resurrected as a cyborg and programs her to be his personal assassin. Her first mission is to seduce Picasso and recruit him to take over a research facility guarded by the Lifers, a powerful gang.
On the surface world, Storm encounters a martial arts master, Sumai, and his daughter. Sumai helps Storm infiltrate Picasso's lair, but the cybernetic Kinsella easily defeats Storm. As Storm recovers, Sumai trains him. Sumai, former head of security at the research facility, tells Storm that Kinsella's father was the person who founded it. The facility was originally meant to counter the ecological damage but was converted into a chemical weapons factory. Suspecting that the Controller seeks the biological weapons to take over the surface world, Storm and Sumai recruit fighters who are willing to stand up to Picasso. As Picasso overpowers the Lifers with his rifle, the Controller murders the city's leader, the Overlord, and joins him.
After launching the chemical weapons, the Controller double-crosses Picasso. As the Controller flees the facility, Picasso confronts and kills him, though he left trapped in a silo. The chemicals, though currently inert, will kill every surface dweller unless a countdown is aborted. After defeating Bigalow and his men, Storm and Sumai break into the control room, where the Controller has left Kinsella. Storm helps her to remember her true self, and she guesses several passwords. Finally, with time running out, Sumai guesses the correct password and saves the surface world. Picasso calls for help; when they ignore him, he vows revenge. | good versus evil, violence, murder, sci-fi | tt0108277 |
White Mischief | With much of the rest of the world at war, a number of bored British aristocrats live dissolute and hedonistic lives in a region of the Kenya Colony known as Happy Valley, drinking, drugging and indulging in decadent sexual affairs to pass the time.
On 24 January 1941, Josslyn Hay, the philandering Earl of Erroll, is found dead in his car in a remote location. The Earl has a noble pedigree but a somewhat sordid past and a well-deserved reputation for having affairs with married women.
Diana Delves Broughton is one such woman. She is the beautiful wife of Sir John Henry Delves Broughton, known to most as "Jock," a man 30 years her senior. Diana has a pre-nuptial understanding with her husband that should either of them fall in love with someone else, the other will do nothing to impede the romance.
Diana has indeed succumbed to the charms of the roguish Earl of Erroll, whose other lovers also include the drug-addicted American heiress Alice de Janze and the somewhat more reserved Nina Soames. The Earl is more serious about this affair than any of his earlier dalliances, and wants Diana to marry him. She is reluctant to leave what she thinks is the financial security of her marriage to formalise her relationship with Erroll (who has no funds or prospects), unaware that Delves Broughton is deep in debt. Privately humiliated but appearing to honour their agreement, Delves Broughton publicly toasts the couple's affair at the club in Nairobi, asking Erroll to bring Diana home at a specified time. Delves Broughton appears to be extremely intoxicated for the rest of the evening; once he is alone it is clear he was feigning drunkenness. After dropping off Diana, Erroll is shot to death in his car not far from the home of Delves Broughton who is soon charged with Errol's murder.
Diana is distraught over losing her lover, as is Alice, who openly masturbates next to his corpse at the mortuary. A local plantation owner, Gilbert Colvile, whose only friend is Delves Broughton, quietly offers Diana advice and solace and ultimately shocks her by proposing marriage.
Delves Broughton stands trial. There are no witnesses to the crime and the physical evidence that appears incriminating is also circumstantial. He obviously had the motive and means, but is found innocent and the scandal comes to an end. De Janze is dying of a drug overdose, and Diana discovering further evidence that implicates her husband in her lover's death. After menacing her with a shotgun, Broughton shoots himself in front of her. The film ends with a fleeing, bloodstained Diana discovering the remaining Happy Valley set partying around de Janze's grave. | murder | tt0094317 |
The Super Cops | The film opens with archival footage from a press conference where NYPD officers Dave Greenberg and Robert Hantz are lauded by Commissioner Patrick V. Murphy commends them for the sheer volume of drugs and weaponry that the two cops have removed from the streets.
After a credits sequence, the narrative begins at the New York City Police Academy, where Greenberg (Leibman) and Hantz (Selby) graduate as probationary officers. They are assigned to low-level work like clerical tasks and directing traffic, but they chafe against the insignificance of these tasks and frequently abandon them to follow the sound of gunfire. One day, Greenberg is standing on the street in plain clothes when an elderly man offers to sell him some "French films" (porn). When he refuses, the old man attacks Greenberg, who arrests him. Greenberg gets in trouble for making an arrest while off-duty.
Greenberg and Hantz decide to keep making off-duty collars. They go to Coney Island disguised as Texaco attendants. They make a drug bust under the boardwalk and bring their collars to the local precinct, where the supervising officer is astonished to learn that two off-duty probationary cops confiscated so many illegal weapons and drugs. The pair continue to make busts around the city in their spare time. They stop a stolen car on Convent Avenue in Harlem, and at the local precinct, they bluff their way into being treated as senior officers from the "SUB" division, which is just the acronym for traffic enforcement.
After their probationary period, they are assigned to the fictional 21st Precinct in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. On their way to report for duty, they are aghast at the state of the neighborhood, and the precinct seems to be in just as much disarray. They are told to not make waves and to report for their first full day of duty the following morning. Instead, they find some prostitutes, hoping to get information. Greenberg tells his prostitute, Sara (Frazier), that he is a cop and asks where he can find some drug dealers. She screams for her pimp, causing a commotion.
Undaunted, Greenberg and Hantz manage to find an informant and make their first drug bust. As they book their collars, they identify themselves as new to the precinct. They are asked when they started, and Greenberg replies, "Tomorrow". They track down the precinct Captain Krasna (Frazer). He is convinced his office is bugged, and he views Greenberg and Hantz' enthusiasm warily.
Greenberg meets Sara again at Hank's Tip Top Inn and accompanies her back to her apartment. He presses her for information about drug activity. The duo start making busts with her information. Captain Krasna calls them into his office and accuses them of being on the take because of all their independent drug busts. He pretends to call Internal Affairs, but when they do not react like corrupt cops, he decides to encourage their freelancing. Sara tells Greenberg that a contract has been put out on them. An anonymous tip to the station confirms her warning. Greenberg and Hantz lay in wait for their assassins and make a daring bust in broad daylight. The bystanders jokingly yell out greetings to the adventurous cops who they call "Batman and Robin".
At the arraignment for the case, Greenberg and Hantz are offered $1,500 to lie and get the case dropped. They try to gather evidence about the attempted bribe, but the District Attorney's office ruins the bust by warning off the targets. The officers are growing more isolated by their fellow cops, who either resent them for showing them up, or view them with suspicion as being either corrupt or part of Internal Affairs.
The partners eventually corner the three Hayes Brothers who run the drug market in Bed-Stuy. The Hayes offer them a $1,000-week bribe, which Greenberg and Hantz pretend to take. Greenberg insists on meeting the Hayes' suppliers, but on the way to the meeting, one of the Hayes notices Greenberg's wire. Greenberg and Hantz kill the brothers in self-defense, and they are taken off duty while Inspector Novick (Hingle) conducts an internal investigation.
Greenberg is approached by another officer who has just transferred from the 80th Precinct. He offers to cut Greenberg and Hantz in on a scam. They meet at the Fish Delight Hut to discuss the details. It turns out the officer is from the Knapp Commission, and when he tries to arrest Greenberg and Hantz, the pair, in turn, try to arrest him for engaging in conspiracy. Greenberg threatens to arrest the other Knapp officers on the scene for entrapment. When Insp. Novick and Cpt. Krasna arrive at the restaurant, both factions of officers reveal that they have been taping each other. The stalemate is resolved by promoting everyone. The film ends with a re-enactment of the opening press conference, with Novick commending Greenberg and Hantz for their service. | neo noir | tt0072228 |
Big Jim McLain | House Un-American Activities Committee investigators Jim McLain (John Wayne) and Mal Baxter (James Arness) come to Hawaii to track American Communist Party activities. They are interested in everything from insurance fraud to the sabotage of a U.S. naval vessel.
After receiving useful information from reporter Phil Briggs (Vernon "Red" McQueen), the agents begin searching for Willie Nomaka, a former party treasurer, who has allegedly experienced a nervous breakdown and attends the clinic of psychiatrist Dr. Gelster (Gayne Whitman). The doctor's secretary, Nancy Vallon (Nancy Olson), is helpful as well. McLain asks her on a date and a romance develops.
Nomaka's landlady, Madge (Veda Ann Borg), assists in the investigation, flirting with McLain. Nomaka's ex-wife (Madame Soo Yong) also helps McLain. Nomaka is eventually found to be staying in a sanitorium, heavily drugged and unable to speak. Party leader Sturak (Alan Napier) gives orders to Dr. Gelster to get rid of him. Gelster also kills McLain's partner Baxter, by mistake, when he succumbs to an injection of truth serum.
As the investigators close in, Sturak attempts to make Gelster confess to his Party membership so the case can be closed and so others can continue their nefarious work. Their meeting is interrupted by McLain, who instigates a brawl. Police arrive to place Party leaders under arrest, but ultimately he and Nancy Vallon see them plead the Fifth Amendment and go free. | cult, suspenseful, murder, violence | tt0044418 |
Werewolf of London | Wilfred Glendon (Henry Hull) is a wealthy and world-renowned English botanist who journeys to Tibet in search of the elusive mariphasa plant. While there, he is attacked and bitten by a creature later revealed to be a werewolf, although he succeeds in acquiring a specimen of the mariphasa. Once back home in London he is approached by a fellow botanist, Dr. Yogami (Warner Oland), who claims to have met him in Tibet while also seeking the mariphasa. Yogami warns Glendon that the bite of a werewolf would cause him to become a werewolf as well, adding that the mariphasa is a temporary antidote for the disease.
Glendon does not believe the mysterious Yogami. That is, not until he begins to experience the first pangs of lycanthropy, first when his hand grows fur beneath the rays of his moon lamp (which he is using in an effort to entice the mariphasa to bloom), and later that night during the first full moon. The first time, Glendon is able to use a blossom from the mariphasa to stop his transformation. His wife Lisa (Valerie Hobson) is away at her aunt Ettie's party with her friend, former childhood sweetheart Paul Ames (Lester Matthews), allowing the swiftly transforming Glendon to make his way unhindered to his at-home laboratory, in the hopes of acquiring the mariphasa's flowers to quell his lycanthropy a second time. Unfortunately Dr. Yogami, who is also a werewolf, sneaks into the lab ahead of his rival and steals the only two blossoms. As the third has not bloomed, Glendon is out of luck.
Driven by an instinctive desire to hunt and kill, he dons his hat and coat and ventures out into the dark city, killing an innocent girl. Burdened by remorse, Glendon begins neglecting Lisa (more so than usual), and makes numerous futile attempts to lock himself up far away from home, including renting a room at an inn. However, whenever he transforms into the werewolf he escapes and kills again. After a time, the third blossom of the mariphasa finally blooms, but much to Glendon's horror, it is stolen by Yogami, sneaking into the lab while Glendon's back is turned. Catching Yogami in the act, Glendon finally realizes that Yogami was the werewolf that attacked him in Tibet. After turning into the werewolf yet again and slaying Yogami, Glendon goes to the house in search of Lisa, for the werewolf instinctively seeks to destroy that which it loves the most.
After attacking Paul on the front lawn of Glendon Manor, but not killing him, Glendon breaks into the house and corners Lisa on the staircase and is about to move in for the kill when Paul's uncle, Col. Sir Thomas Forsythe (Lawrence Grant) of Scotland Yard, arriving with several police officers in tow, shoots Glendon once. As he lies dying at the bottom of the stairs, Glendon, still in werewolf form, speaks: first to thank Col. Forsythe for the merciful bullet, then saying goodbye to Lisa, apologizing that he could not have made her happier. Glendon then dies, reverting to his human form in death. | cult, murder | tt0027194 |
Jeff, Who Lives at Home | Jeff (Segel) is a 30-year-old unemployed stoner living in his mother Sharon's (Sarandon) basement in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He looks for his destiny in seemingly random occurrences. He finds inspiration in the feature film Signs, which reinforces his belief in this outlook. One day, he answers the telephone; it's a wrong number, from somebody asking for "Kevin," and Jeff contemplates the meaning of this, deciding it's a sign.
Receiving a call from his irritated mother asking him to buy wood glue to fix a door shutter or find a new place to live, Jeff boards a bus, where he sees a kid wearing a sports jersey bearing the name Kevin. He follows Kevin (Ross) to a basketball court, where he joins a pick-up game and the two bond. Jeff agrees to smoke weed with Kevin, but discovers he has been tricked when he is beaten and mugged.
He happens upon a Hooters restaurant where he crosses paths with his older brother Pat (Helms), a successful yuppie struggling with a failing marriage. Pat's wife Linda (Greer) is spotted at a gas station across the street with another man. Jeff and Pat spend several hours following them, first to a restaurant and later to a hotel, with Pat's new Porsche being ticketed, crashed and eventually towed away at various points in the journey. The brothers also visit their father's gravesite and fight over their conflicting life philosophies.
Jeff sees a truck reading "Kevin Kandy" and runs off to hitch a ride, only to end up at the same hotel where Pat has found Linda in a room with another man. Jeff offers to break down the door. The man is a co-worker of hers named Steve (Zissis). Linda quickly ushers Steve out and then confronts Pat about his role in their problems. Frustrated, she leaves, saying she will move in with her mother. Jeff and Pat reconcile. Jeff explains how he is struggling to find his destiny in life, while Pat admits he wants to fall in love with Linda again and for her to do the same with him. Jeff encourages his brother to tell her that, and they hail a taxi to pursue her.
Interspersed within the main story is the story of Sharon, who is at work, frustrated with her unfulfilled life and dissatisfaction with her sons. The doldrum is interrupted when a paper airplane with a beautiful drawing of a flower lands in her cubicle, followed by an anonymous co-worker claiming in an IM message to be a secret admirer. Sharon spends the day trying to deduce the identity of her admirer. She confides her frustrations to colleague and friend Carol (Chong), revealing that she has not dated since her husband's death. Carol encourages her to warm up to the attention she is receiving. Sharon is surprised and confused when the admirer turns out to be Carol herself, and though neither believe themselves to be attracted to their own gender, Carol appeals to Sharon's desire to become close with someone who truly understands her. At that moment, a fire alarm goes off and ceiling sprinklers activate; this is an enlightening moment for Sharon who sets off with Carol on a spur of the moment trip to New Orleans.
Jeff, Pat, Linda, Sharon, and Carol all converge on a bridge, where they are stuck in standstill traffic. Pat exits the taxi and runs through the traffic to tell Linda how he feels, passing Carol's car; Sharon sees her son and runs after him, followed by Carol. As Jeff muses to the cab driver about seeking out his destiny only to find it isn't very exciting, he observes a helicopter flying overhead, jumps out of the taxi and also runs through the traffic, passing Pat, who was sharing his feelings with Linda when they were interrupted by the arrival of Sharon and Carol. Jeff continues onward to discover that the cause of the traffic is an accident in which one car plummeted over the side of the bridge. He dives into the water and rescues two children and their father; when Jeff then fails to resurface Pat dives in and rescues him. The group reconciles after the ordeal, and the audience sees Sharon celebrating her birthday and Pat and Linda apparently faring better in their marriage. Jeff sees a news report about his heroics and learns that the father of the kids he rescued was also named Kevin; now with a sense of purpose, he grabs some wood glue and fixes the door shutter. | philosophical | tt1588334 |
Jagged Edge | An intruder in a black mask ties up San Francisco socialite Paige Forrester at her remote beach house and kills her with a hunting knife. He writes the word "Bitch" on the wall with her blood. Her husband Jack is arrested for her murder by Thomas Krasny, a district attorney. Jack tries to hire high-profile lawyer Teddy Barnes to defend him. Barnes used to work for Krasny, and she is reluctant to take the case, as she stopped working in criminal law after an incident with Krasny.
Krasny runs into Barnes. He tells her that "Henry Styles hanged himself in his cell," which distresses her. Barnes visits Sam Ransom, a private detective who used to work for Krasny's office as well. He stopped private investigations at the same time that Barnes left Krasny's office, and it becomes clear that the Styles case was the reason. Barnes decides to take the case.
While preparing for the trial, Barnes and Forrester spend a great deal of time together, and eventually sleep together. Ransom warns Barnes that Forrester is just trying to make her care more about his case. Her office begins receiving anonymous typed letters that mention things about the case. All of the letter t's are slightly raised, and analysis determines that they were written on a 1942 Corona typewriter.
In a pre-trial meeting, Barnes tells the judge that Krasny has a history of not meeting his discovery obligations. The prosecution's case relies mainly on circumstantial evidence. A jilted woman claimed that Paige told her she was divorcing Jack, but Barnes discredits her with evidence, including a love letter, that her advances had been rejected by Jack, causing Paige to cut off all communication with her. The other main witness is a locker-room attendant at a private club who claims to have seen a hunting knife in Forrester's locker. Barnes proves that the knife was in another member's locker.
Krasny calls a witness who had an affair with Forrester. The details of her relationship with Forrester are eerily similar to the way he seduced Barnes. She threatens to drop the case. She only agrees to proceed out of a sense of duty, though she now believes that Forrester is guilty. Another note arrives at her office saying, "He is innocent. Santa Cruz. January 21, 1984. Ask Julie Jensen."
Barnes interviews Jensen, who testifies at the trial that she was attacked in the same manner as Paige Forrester. All the details match, but she says her attacker seemed to stop himself from killing her. As Krasny objects that the attack on Jensen is unrelated to the one on Forrester, he lets slip that his office had investigated the attack and not revealed it in discovery. In chambers, the judge threatens to have Krasny disbarred. Krasny insists that Forrester staged the earlier attack in order to create an alibi of sorts for Paige's murder, which he had planned for eighteen months. Krasny also insists that Forrester has been sending Barnes the anonymous notes.
After Forrester is found not guilty, Barnes announces to the media that she left Krasny's office over the Henry Styles case, where Krasny suppressed evidence that proved Styles was innocent. Krasny walks off in disgust.
Barnes goes to Forrester's house to celebrate, and they sleep together again. In the morning, she discovers a typewriter in his closet. She tests it, and the "t" is raised, just as in the anonymous notes. She throws clothing over the typewriter and flees with it, pretending to Forrester that her little boy is sick.
When Forrester calls, she tells him that she found the typewriter. Forrester says he is baffled and that he is coming over. Barnes calls Ransom, on the brink of telling him that Forrester is a killer, but instead hangs up. A masked figure breaks in and confronts her in her bedroom. As he starts to attack, Barnes throws back the covers to reveal her gun. She shoots him multiple times until he falls to the floor. Ransom comes in and unmasks the attacker: it is Forrester. | neo noir, murder, intrigue, plot twist, romantic, suspenseful | tt0089360 |
Uyarangalil | Jayarajan (Mohanlal), an over-enthusiastic assistant manager at a tea plantation plans to loot a huge amount. He lures two debt-ridden subordinates, Chandran (Rahman) and Johnny (Nedumudi Venu), into his conspiracy. Though unwillingly, both agree. But during their attempt, A.K.Menon (Janardhanan), the manager of the company catches them red-handed. To keep matters under wraps, Jayarajan enters Menon's house at night along with Johnny and Chandran. Jayarajan kills Menon and escapes from the house. He acts normal the next day and provides help to the police. But both Johnny and Chandran feel guilty. Jayarajan threatens both to keep silent and act as if nothing happened. Soon, however, Jayarajan is elevated as the new Manager of the company. Devi (Kajal Kiran), the virgin young widow of Menon arrives at the plantation for future financial formalities. Jayarajan, who already was having an affair with Padma, a nurse, now eyes Devi. He succeeds in taking her to bed and plans to take up all the financial benefits that she may get as Menon's bereavement benefits. But a cop, Ravi (Ratheesh), becomes suspicious of Jayarajan although he finds himself no match for the flawless and naturally responsive demeanour of Jayarajan. However, neither is he shunning his illicit relationship with Padma, an occasional prostitute and a nurse by profession. In a strange turn of events, for fear of a faint-hearted Chandran spilling out the beans of the Manager's murder and to satiate his avarice and taste of the fresher flesh, Jayarajan finishes off Johnny and Padma. His impeccable yet vile and strong character raises no suspicions of the two new deaths of anybody except Chandran, whose silence Jayarajan buys with scare tactics.
Meanwhile, the elderly owner of the estate (K. P. Ummer) visits the plantation. Knowing that his young daughter Vasanthi is set to inherit the company, Jayarajan tries to woo her too. But Devi becomes a hindrance in his plans and her insistence for a marriage pushes him to plot killing her too. But before he can kill Devi, Chandran informs Vasanthi the truth about the death of Menon and both succeed in calling up cops. But before getting arrested by Ravi, Jayarajan jumps down and commits suicide. | neo noir, murder | tt0292314 |
Tôkyô zankoku keisatsu | The film is set in a near future chaotic Japan. A mad scientist known as "Key Man" (Itsuji Itao) has created a virus that mutates humans into monstrous creatures called "Engineers" that sprout bizarre weapons from any injury. The Tokyo Police Force has been privatized to deal with this new threat of engineers, so a special squad of officers called "Engineer Hunters" are created to deal with them. However, unlike the average police force, the Engineer Hunters are a private quasi-military force that utilize violence, sadism, and streetside executions to maintain law and order.
Helping the police force is Ruka (Eihi Shiina), a troubled loner who is very skilled in dispatching the Engineers. Along with helping the police, she is looking for the killer of her father, an old-fashioned officer who was murdered in broad daylight by a mysterious assassin. Ruka soon receives a new case to hunt down Key Man, but once she encounters him, he infects her by inserting a key-shaped tumor into her scar-riddled left forearm before disappearing. Meanwhile, after an infected police officer massacres the main precinct, the Tokyo police chief (Yukihide Benny) orders a city-wide crackdown on Engineers — indiscriminately executing anyone suspected of being one.
While continuing her investigation, Ruka visits Key Man's home, where he reveals the truth about their past. His father was a police sniper who resigned after a sniping operation gone wrong. Desperate to keep his family out of poverty, he was paid to assassinate Ruka's father, who was leading a rally against the privatization of the police force. But shortly after gunning down Ruka's father before her eyes, he was murdered by the police chief — the real mastermind of the assassination — in front of Key Man. Swearing to avenge his father's death, he injected himself with the DNA of several infamous criminals, mutating him into his present form. After realizing that she and Key Man are seeking vengeance on the same man, Ruka slices him in half with her katana before heading back to the precinct. On her way, she witnesses the police force brutalizing civilians accused of being Engineers. When her bar owner friend (Ikuko Sawada) is drawn and quartered, Ruka's left arm mutates into an alien-like head with razor-sharp claws before she beheads the officers behind the execution. During her rampage, she is shot in the right eye, but her body quickly replaces it with a cybernetic eye. She confronts the police chief, who admits to her father's assassination, but explains that he raised her to become the perfect Engineer Hunter as atonement. Following a grueling sword fight, Ruka dismembers and eventually decapitates the police chief — effectively bringing down his reign on the police force.
During the end credits, it is revealed that Key Man is still alive, having mended himself back into one piece with the help of one of his test subjects. | comedy, cruelty, murder, violence, flashback, absurd, satire, revenge, sadist | tt1183732 |
Breathing Room | Thrown naked in a desolate room with thirteen strangers, Tonya Mane discovers she is playing a deadly game. She must figure out the reason for her abduction. In the room, Tonya finds a tape recorder that explains the rules, one of the which state "Only those without collars can break the rules". One of the strangers cross a forbidden zone, and the electric collar that he wears kills him instantly. A box marked "Pieces" catches Tonya's interest, but none of the strangers tell her what is inside. Another stranger finds a piece of paper in his pocket; written on it is, "Hint: piece the pieces". Another rule is shown that players may not adjust their collars. As the game progresses, they become mad and frantically try to find a way out. The host explains that there can be only one winner, and the prize is that person's life.
The strangers get to know each other. One is a recovering alcoholic, another is a teacher who teaches sixth grade English, and another works in sales; Tonya says she is a psychology student. One of the strangers is kidnapped by an unknown entity; however, another person finds her dead in the toilet. The game progresses once again, and another person finds a paper in a closed drawer. The note reads, "Hint: fourteen is the key", which seems to refer to Tonya, as she is the fourteenth contestant. A bespeckled man finds a paper in his pocket with the words "Hint: Jumble". Later on, another person is killed, and one of the strangers accuses the others of murder. Enraged, the same person screams to break one of the cameras.
The prisoners find a mirror cabinet and use a hammer to break it. Inside, there is a black box, with "serial" written on it and containing flakes and a sealed paper. They open it and find the words, "hint: What is your favorite type of serial? In this game there are three. One rapist, one pedophile and one killer, find the killer, find the reason." The people ask each other more questions, and the host tells them they have a minute before someone is eliminated. One of them commits suicide by shooting himself in the mouth. Tonya pieces together a key. Amid further eliminations, the others learn that these killings are called "curfews". Tonya discovers that the key could unlock one of the collars. Two people get into a fight that causes one of them to start frothing and die. Another person finds himself inside with the others. The new contestant name is Robert Tanner. Tanner later finds a black box containing bullets with another paper with the words "Hint: Bite the bullet". | suspenseful, mystery, murder | tt1220706 |
Submarine Alert | During World War II, with shipping being sunk by submarines and with an American scientist working on radio technology killed by Nazi spies, FBI agent G. B. Fleming (Roger Pryor) comes up with a plan to catch the Nazis. He believes that radio signals are alerting the Germans about ship movements. His plan is to fire all the local radio specialists, who likely will seek any employment, including working with the enemy. Tailing the jobless radio men will help the FBI find the Nazis.
Engineer Lewis J. "Lew" Deerhold (Richard Arlen) thinks he lost his job because he is a Canadian citizen. Lew looks after his niece Tina (Patsy Nash), a war orphan requiring a brain operation. Needing money, he applies for work at a radio repair shop, where he meets Ann Patterson (Wendy Barrie), the victim of a purse snatching. Lew recovers her purse and asks Ann out on a date.
After coming back to his apartment, his new boss is there with Dr. Arthur Huneker (Nils Asther) and his assistant Vincent Bela (Marc Lawrence). Lew is offered a job by Huneker, a Nazi spy commander who needs someone to repair a top-secret stolen radio transmitter. Ann is an FBI agent who has been assigned to follow Lew. She finds blueprints to the transmitter in Lew's possession. When FBI agent Freddie Grayson (Ralph Sanford) searches Lew's apartment, he is shot but is able to tell Lew that the doctor has the stolen transmitter and shot him.
Lew confronts Huneker, who is meeting with Japanese Commander Toyo (Abner Biberman). The pair try to convince Lew to join the Nazi party; he pretends to go along. When they begin to torture the owner of the Bambridge shipping company (John Miljan), their new recruit is ordered to kill Bambridge, who is actually Captain Hargas, an American agent. Instead, Lew escapes, taking with him the codes for the transmitter.
At the doctor's hot springs resort, Lew and Ann join forces, but are captured and locked in a steam room by Huneker. Before they are killed by the steam, Lew devises a transmitter and sends an SOS that is picked up by a young boy whose father calls the FBI. FBI agents rush to save Lew and Ann, and arrest Huneker and his men. Agent Fleming also contacts a bomber squadron that destroys the Japanese submarine laying in wait off the California coast. With his niece Tina recovered from her operation, and Ann in attendance, Lew, now a private in the US Army, is granted American citizenship. | murder | tt0036397 |
Women's Prison | A ruthless superintendent of a prison, Amelia van Zandt, makes life hell for the female inmates. Her rules are rigid and she makes no exceptions.
The newcomer Helene Jensen is not a hardened criminal by any means, but a woman convicted of vehicular homicide after she accidentally killed a child. Out of place here, Helene is so distraught that Van Zandt has her placed in solitary confinement, making it even worse. Helene nearly dies.
The prison has two wings, one for women, one for men. One of the inmates, Joan Burton, has been illicitly having conjugal relations late at night with her husband, Glen, a convict in the other wing. Now she is expecting a baby, and brutal men's warden Brock issues a stern warning to Van Zandt that she'd better find out how the two prisoners have been arranging these meetings.
Joan has the sympathy of the decent Dr. Crane who's in charge of the infirmary and disapproves of the cruel treatment of prisoners he sees. But the heartless Van Zandt goes into a literally homicidal rage while interrogating Joan, beating the pregnant prisoner to death.
A protest erupts in the women's cell block, beginning with a hunger strike organized by Joan's cell mate, Brenda Martin, then turning into a full-scale riot. Naive or timid inmates are swept up along with the vicious, veteran ones, and there is much bloodshed before the uprising is quelled. Dr. Crane intends to go to the prison board and accuse Van Zandt of murder. | insanity, cruelty | tt0048811 |
White Sands | Ray Dolezal, a bored Torrance County, New Mexico Deputy Sheriff, investigates an apparent suicide in the desert. Alongside the body is a suitcase containing $500,000. During the autopsy, they find a digested piece of paper with a phone number; Dolezal, posing as Spenser, calls the number and goes to a meeting, where he is robbed and instructed to meet Gorman Lennox at a restaurant. FBI agent Greg Meeker intercepts Dolezal and informs him that Spenser was an undercover agent. Now that Dolezal has lost the money, Meeker suggests he continue posing as Spenser to recover the money or help arrest Lennox.
Dolezal meets Lennox and his wealthy associate Lane Bodine and learns the money is for illegal arms to fund left-wing freedom fighters in South America. The arms dealers demo the guns for Dolezal and Lennox, but demand an additional $250,000 due to unforeseen expenses; Meeker, unwilling to provide more money, pushes the responsibility on Dolezal, who romances his way into Lane's life so she will attract rich humanitarian donors to fund the deal. Two FBI internal affairs agents hunt for Dolezal, believing he killed Spenser and took the money. Dolezal is forced to admit to Lane he is not really Spenser, but she agrees to help raise the money because she finds Dolezal a better alternative to Lennox.
Dolezal learns from Noreen, who had an affair with the real Spenser, that he was working with an FBI agent who likely killed him. Noreen runs away at the sight of Meeker and the internal affairs agents grab Dolezal. Lennox runs the agents off the road; Dolezal flees and returns to Lane. He discovers Noreen dead and a Polaroid of her with Spenser and Meeker.
Dolezal breaks into a surveillance van outside Lane's house and beats up the FBI agent. He accuses Meeker of killing Spenser and Noreen. Meeker admits he procured the $500,000 without authorization to steal it and capture Lennox, but Spenser lost his nerve and backed out; Meeker confronted him out in the desert and talked him into shooting himself. He taunts Dolezal that the Polaroid proves nothing, and no one will believe his word against that of a minority agent with a spotless record.
Lennox confronts Dolezal and reveals the two internal affairs agents tied up in the trunk of his car. They drive out into the desert, where Lennox says he knows Dolezal is not Spenser, because Lennox is really a CIA agent who wants the arms deal to ensure the survival of the military-industrial complex. Lennox kills the two agents and informs Dolezal that he also kidnapped Lane. Dolezal must find where she hid the $250,000 and meet Lennox on a deserted military base in the White Sands desert.
Dolezal uncovers the money in a briefcase buried in Lane's horse's stall. He kidnaps Meeker, takes him out to the White Sands base, and handcuffs him to a pipe inside an abandoned building. Dolezal explains that Lennox is CIA, the FBI will be arriving soon, and Meeker can either face punishment or try to flee. Dolezal leaves a gun behind, so that with some effort Meeker is able to grab it and hide behind a bathroom stall.
Lennox arrives and reveals that Lane is down the road at the base entrance. Dolezal placed the briefcase in the abandoned building, but when Lennox walks in, Meeker shoots and kills him. After disabling Lennox's car, Dolezal picks up Lane. He drops her off at her estate and explains that needs to return to his family. He hands her the $250,000 she had obtained through her pseudo-fund raising event.
A small army of FBI arrive in cars and helicopters. Meeker breaks the pipe he was cuffed to and runs through the White Sands desert with the briefcase. Dolezal left the original $500,000 he was originally suspected of stealing so the FBI will stop investigating him, but one of the agents notices footprints going out into the White Sands and so they head off in pursuit. As the FBI catches up with him, Meeker stumbles and drops the briefcase, which breaks open; it contains nothing but sand. | comedy, neo noir, murder, violence, intrigue, romantic, suspenseful | tt0105813 |
The Madonna's Secret | Businessman John Earl observes a piece of artwork in a museum, gazing at it reverently. He asks the museum curator how much it costs, and the curator says that it is not for sale. The artist, James Harlan Corbin [Lederer], does not wish to sell the painting. Nonplussed, Earl returns to his office and phones Corbin with his proposal to sell. Again, Corbin refuses. Earl continues his pursuit to find out who the model for the painting was. He learns it is Helen North, a young woman who looks nothing like the woman in the painting. He visits with her to learn his location, but she refuses, telling him that she will be singing at a local nightclub, where Corbin frequents. Earl finds both of them in the museum, and again confronts Corbin. Becoming clearly annoyed, Corbin invites the singer out for a night in his yacht. She agrees, but is later found washed ashore. Although Police Lt. Roberts initially questions Helen's suitor Hunt Mason, Mason implicates Corbin as the last person who saw Helen North. John Earl works with the police department to arrange for Helen's sister Linda to apply for modeling, in order to spy on Corbin. The two return to Corbin's boathouse. While there, Linda calls for Earl and tells his chef that she is in danger and to notify the police. There, she learns that Corbin did not murder her sister. Thereafter, she falls in love with Corbin and agrees to support him against the district attorney's allegations he killed both Helen and another model, Madonna. Although Corbin has visions that he did so, Linda tells him to make sure he is telling the truth before confessing such heinous crimes. Linda returns home with Corbin's mother, who poisons her tea and tries to inject her with a lethal substance before police shoot. Corbin had suddenly recognized who it was that had planted evidence at the boathouse to implicate him. Police arrive just in time to save Linda from death but not Mrs. Corbin, who dies in her son's arms. | murder | tt0038714 |
Dog Tags | This is the coming of age story of Nate Merritt (played by Paul Preiss), who stuck in bad relationships with his fiancee and mother decides to enlist in the military, although he is not sure. In the midst of all this turmoil in his life, he meets Andy Forte (played by Bart Fletcher), a carefree gay guy, and the two immediately strike a chord and become soul mates trying to help each other through their dilemmas and troubled youths.
Both men have domineering mothers and live in broken families. Nate's mother Deb (Candy Clark) is a single mother who hides the real identity of the father Gene (Hoyt Richards) from her son, although the alcoholic Gene still continues to live a destitute life in the vicinity in a one-room shack surviving on permanent disability cheques and doing odd jobs on the side. Andy's divorced mother Louise (Diane Davisson) is a former actress that had to leave everything behind to take care of Andy and Andy's son Travis blaming her son for her own predicament of a stay-home caretaker considering Andy an almost absent irresponsible father.
Nate has to deal with Trish Huddle (Amy Lindsay) a philandering fiancee, who is anxious to conceive a son from any military guy, almost guiding Nate step by step in the mechanics of a sexual ritual to achieve this. She has no qualms to have intercourse in Nate's own residence during his absence with other married military men to achieve having the desired boy as Nate discovers when he calls in home unexpectedly. Meanwhile Nate wants desperately to find his real father, despite grave objections from his mother. He is led to think his father is a married military man called Mark Dessau (Keythe Farley), who had a long-term relationship with Deb, Nate's mother. Meanwhile Andy is fighting his own demons and is constantly haunted by the memories of his first lover, a Marine (played by Justin Mortelliti). Andy is unable to get over the loss of his first love and fails in all his other intimate relationships, despite the fact his relation with the Marine, though intense, never had any chance of survival with the Marine just abandoning him to his misery. When a new guy tries to become intimate with him during a disastrous get-together scene, Andy confesses his incurable love to the Marine and refuses to go further, which prompts the guy to tell him frankly: "once a marine, always a marine". Andy is confused by his aspirations to build a future away from home, his sexual orientation and his responsibilities as a father.
After meeting Nate, during a very bizarre circumstance at the residence of an amateur porn director "Uncle Sam" (played by Barry J. Ratcliffe), who invites them to his house to shoot a pornographic scene for money, Nate and Andy leave the house horrified. When Nate offers Andy help with starting his decrepit car, the two strike an immediate friendship with Andy clearly seeing in Nate a reflection of the Marine he once loved. After learning about Nate's obsession to find his true father, the two journey together on a quest to find him. They also find each other and discover how to confront their true "callings." The two engage to explore their own past, present and future amidst brief flashbacks they see throughout the movie.
The bond strengthens between Nate and Andy including sexual affinity between the two, awakening Nate to his own sexuality. Nate decides to confront Mark Dessau (Keythe Farley), his supposed "father", but discovers this was just an illusion. It turns out Mark went out with Nate's mother only after Nate had been conceived. This puts Nate into further despair as he realizes that his mother always deceived him. In his moment of vulnerability, his resistance is down and he easy gives in to having sex with Andy. The scene uses a montage effect where Nate is replaced by Andy's first Marine-love who went away, as Andy responds to both the real man and the man in his memory. The next morning Nate is confused but not weirded out. "There is no should or supposed to," Andy says, "What does Nate want to do?"
Confronted by Nate for a last time and upon an ultimatum to his mother that he will quit his prospective military career, Deb finally reveals that Gene is the real father. In Gene's shack, Nate's search is culminated with he finding a childhood photograph of himself in an album kept by Gene, with Nate being the result of a sexual relation between Gene and Deb at a drive-in movie. The film ends at the drive-in itself with Nate searching his soul with what he has to do with his own life. It is clear he chooses the military path, despite desire and futile efforts of Andy who tries to convince Nate that the two live together as partners and to take care of Andy's kid Travis. The departure shots in which Andy reluctantly leaves Nate alone to decide for his destiny, is a repetition, and a deja-vu of his earlier experience with his first-Marine love, exactly as the party friend had told Andy at the beginning of the film, "once a marine, always a marine." | plot twist | tt1212408 |
Best of the Best 3: No Turning Back | The film opens in the small town of "Liberty", where a vicious group of neo-Nazis have been terrorizing the populace, most recently having murdered an African-American pastor and set fire to his church. While visiting his sister and brother-in-law in Liberty, Tommy Lee (Phillip Rhee) crosses paths with the group's leader Donnie Hansen (Mark Rolston), and is drawn into the conflict when his sister is attacked in their car. Later, the group attempts to harass a schoolteacher named Margo (Gina Gershon) at the local 4-H fair, but Tommy intervenes and fends them off. Ungrateful at first, she eventually warms up to Tommy when they are set up on a blind date, and they start a relationship.
Meanwhile, the town of Liberty is holding hearings on whether to sell a parcel of land on the outskirts of town to the neo-Nazis, who have set up their headquarters on the land. Margo and Tommy join with the town's residents and convince the town council to reject the land sale, which means the neo-Nazis will soon have to vacate the premises.
After this defeat, the neo-Nazis arm themselves and launch an assault on Tommy's family. After saving Margo from an attempted rape, Tommy returns home to find his sister badly beaten. He and his brother-in-law, the local sheriff Jack Banning (Christopher McDonald), decide to take matters into their own hands and invade the group's heavily guarded compound, where Jack's children have been taken hostage. After a long, climactic fight, the children are rescued and Tommy defeats Hansen in single combat, but refuses to kill him, knowing that it would only further his message of hatred. As Tommy turns away, Hansen takes aim at him with a rifle, prompting a local teenager named Owen Tucker (Peter Simmons) to shoot and kill Hansen himself, thus brokering a new peace in the town. The ending scene shows the pastor's child reading from the Bible and the church being rebuilt. | violence | tt0112483 |
Mangal Pandey: The Rising | The story begins in 1857, when a large part of India was under the control of the British East India Company. Mangal Pandey (Aamir Khan) is a sepoy, a soldier of Indian origin, in the army of the East India Company. While fighting in the Anglo-Afghan Wars, he saves the life of his British commanding officer, William Gordon (Toby Stephens). Gordon is indebted to Pandey and a strong friendship develops between them, transcending rank and race.
Gordon rescues a young widow, Jwala (Ameesha Patel), from committing sati (the act of following her deceased husband on to the funeral pyre); and afterwards, he falls in love with her. Meanwhile, Heera (Rani Mukerji) has been sold into prostitution, to work for Lol Bibi (Kirron Kher). There is a spark of attraction between her and Pandey and a liaison follows.
Gordon and Pandey's friendship is challenged following the introduction of a new rifle: the Enfield rifled musket. Rumours spread among the sepoys that the paper cartridges, which hold the powder and ball for the rifle, are greased with either pig fat or beef tallow. The process of loading the rifle requires the soldier to bite the down on the cartridge, and the soldiers believe that this would cause them to consume pork or beef — acts abhorrent to Muslim and Hindu soldiers for religious reasons.
Gordon investigates this claim, and is told by his superiors to assure Pandey and his men that the cartridges are free from animal contamination. Demonstrating his trust in Gordon, Pandey bites the cartridge, but soon afterwards discovers the truth. This seemingly trivial matter becomes the spark that lights the fire of rebellion among the sepoys. Mutiny breaks out, led by Pandey, and the situation escalates, fueled by the frustration of years of colonialism and subjugation. At one point, Pandey and Gordon engage involved in hand-to-hand combat as the latter tries to dissuade his friend from what he believes to be a futile exercise that will only lead to certain death.
The Company moves to quickly stop the uprising by bringing in army units from Myanmar (Burma). Pandey is captured and set to be exectuted, despite the protestations of Gordon, who reasons that Pandey will be revered as a martyr and that his legacy will cause more protests. This turns out to be correct, and Pandey marries Heera in his jail cell before his execution as scenes of nationwide revolt against British rule are shown. In the aftermath, Gordon is listed as having joined the rebellion against the British Raj.
The film ends with a montage of drawings of the historical rebellion and the narrator describes the progress of the Indian independence movement over the next century. The montage ends with documentary footage of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi leading the Indian National Congress during peaceful protests against British rule in the 1940s, eventually forcing an end to colonialism in the subcontinent. | violence, romantic | tt0346457 |
Comin' 'Round the Mountain | Theatrical agent Al Stewart (Bud Abbott) has successfully booked his client, Dorothy McCoy (Dorothy Shay), "The Manhattan Hillbilly", at a New York nightclub. Unfortunately, he has also booked an inept escape artist, The Great Wilbert (Lou Costello), at the same location. During his performance, Wilbert cannot escape from his shackles and screams for help. Dorothy recognizes Wilbert's shrill scream as the "McCoy clan yell". More evidence of Wilbert's heritage, namely a photograph and concertina, are found in his dressing room, and prove that he is the long-lost grandson of "Squeeze Box" McCoy, leader of the McCoy clan. Granny McCoy (Ida Moore) has been looking for Wilbert, as she will reveal where Squeeze Box hid his gold to "kinfolk" only. Al, Dorothy and Wilbert head to Kentucky, and Granny recounts the story of the McCoy-Winfield feud that began over 60 years ago. The McCoys choose Wilbert to represent them against Devil Dan Winfield (Glenn Strange) in a turkey shoot. Wilbert has never even seen a gun before, and his carelessness leads to a revival of the feud.
Granny informs Wilbert that even though he is Squeeze Box's kin, he must get married before the location of the gold can be revealed. Wilbert proposes to Dorothy, who declines because she is in love with Clark Winfield (Kirby Grant). Wilbert then goes to Aunt Huddy (Margaret Hamilton) to obtain a love potion to use on Dorothy. While obtaining the potion, Huddy and Wilbert make voodoo dolls of each other and proceed to stick pins in them, which inflicts pain in the other person. After finally obtaining the potion, Wilbert gets on Huddy's broom (complete with windshield and wipers), flies through the door and crashes into a tree.
The potion initially works well, as Dorothy does fall for Wilbert, but unfortunately everyone gets a sip of the concoction and falls in love. The potion's effects eventually fade, and Clark and Dorothy prepare to marry. The Winfield clan soon arrives ready for a fight, during which a stray bullet breaks the love potion jar, leading Devil Dan to taste it and fall for Wilbert. Soon afterwards, a map leading to the treasure is found in Wilbert's concertina. Devil Dan helps them enter the mine, where they eventually break through the rock, finding themselves in a vault filled with gold. Armed guards arrive to arrest the hapless treasure seekers, who have just broken into Fort Knox. | comedy | tt0027460 |
Uncommon Valor | Taking place in the early 1980s and set in the context of the Vietnam War POW/MIA issue, retired Marine Colonel Jason Rhodes (Gene Hackman) is obsessed with finding his son Frank, listed as "missing in action" (MIA) since 1972. After 10 years of searching Southeast Asia and turning up several leads, Rhodes believes that Frank is still alive and being kept in Laos as a prisoner of war.
After petitioning the United States government for help, but receiving none, Colonel Rhodes brings together a disparate group of Vietnam War veterans, including some who were a part of Frank's platoon: Wilkes (Fred Ward), a "tunnel rat" who suffers from PTSD; "Blaster", a demolitions expert (Reb Brown); and "Sailor", a mental case with a heart of gold (Randall Cobb). Additionally, two helicopter pilots, Distinguished Flying Cross recipient Johnson (Harold Sylvester) and Charts (Tim Thomerson), join the group. Former Force-Recon Marine Kevin Scott (Patrick Swayze) joins the team and later turns out to be the son of a pilot who was blown up with a grenade in Vietnam and listed as MIA.
With the financial backing of rich oil businessman McGregor (Robert Stack), whose son served in Frank's platoon and is also listed among the missing, the men train near Galveston, Texas, before embarking on their trip to the Laos camp in an attempt to bring back the POWs. However, the CIA, fearing an international crisis from Rhodes' actions, intercepts him in Bangkok and confiscates his weapons and equipment. Still determined to rescue their comrades, the team members put together their expense money given to them by McGregor, and Rhodes contacts an acquaintance of his, deposed local drug baron Jiang (Kwan Hi Lim), who joins the expedition with his two daughters Lai Fun and Mai Lin and manages to supply them with outdated but capable World War II weapons. In the course of the expedition, Charts gradually forms a relationship with Lai Fun.
Near the Laotian border, the group is attacked by a border patrol and Mai Lin is killed. Later, the group divides: Rhodes leads Charts, Sailor, Johnson, and Lai Fun to a helicopter compound to secure escape transportation, while the rest of the team scouts out the prison camp. They find four Americans among the prisoners, but are unable to ascertain Frank's presence among them.
The teams spend the night with preparations, and the next morning they commence the attack. In a heated battle, they manage to spring the prisoners, among them McGregor's son, but Frank is not among them, and Blaster, Sailor, and Jiang are killed in the process. From McGregor, Rhodes has to learn that his son became ill soon after his capture and died, despite McGregor's best efforts. The returners are joyously welcomed by their families, and Rhodes finds that in learning the fate of his son, he has gained some closure for his wife and himself. | comedy, murder, anti war, cult, violence, insanity, tragedy | tt0086508 |
Hangover Square | Set against the backdrop of the days preceding Britain declaring war on Germany, the main character is George Harvey Bone, a lonely borderline alcoholic who suffers from a split personality. He is obsessed with gaining the affections of Netta, a failed actress and one of George's circle of "friends" with whom he drinks. Netta is repelled by George but, being greedy and manipulative, she and a mutual acquaintance, Peter, shamelessly exploit George's advances to extract money and drink from him.
George suffers from 'dead moods' in which he is convinced he must kill Netta for the way she treats him. Upon recovering from these interludes, he cannot remember them. However outside these he embarks on several adventures, trying in vain to win Netta's affections, including a 'romantic' trip to Brighton which goes horribly wrong (Netta brings Peter and a previously unknown man with whom she has sex in the hotel room next to George's).
Apart from being a source of money and alcohol, Netta's other reason for continuing to associate with George is because of Johnnie. He is one of George's long-time friends who works for a theatrical agent, and Netta hopes that through him she will get to meet Eddie Carstairs, a powerful figure in the theatre. However, in a final reversal of fortune it is George, not Netta, who ends up attending a party amongst the theatrical great and good whilst Netta is cast aside by Eddie who (unlike George) has immediately seen her for the unpleasant person she is. George suddenly realises what it is like to be surrounded by 'kind' people who are interested in him as a person rather than what he can provide.
This potentially promising turn of events in George's life is, however, dashed, when he suddenly clicks into a dead mood and resumes his murder plans. He executes his murder of Netta (and also of Peter, whom the narrative describes as a 'fascist' moments before he is murdered) before escaping to Maidenhead. Throughout the novel, Maidenhead represents for George a semi-mythical new beginning, and representing a picture of traditional Englishness in contrast to the seaminess of Earl's Court. However, in the closing pages of the novel the stark fallacy of that dream becomes apparent to George. It is the same as everywhere else. Now penniless, he gasses himself in a dingy Maidenhead boarding house. | insanity, romantic, murder | tt0037761 |
Khuda Gawah | During a Buzkashi competition with a neighbouring tribe in Afghanistan, Badshah Khan (Amitabh Bachchan) falls in love with Benazir (Sridevi) and wants to marry her. Benazir agrees to marry him, on the condition that he must bring her the head of Habibullah, who killed her father. Badshah Khan goes to India to search for Habibullah. He finds Habibullah in a prison and breaks him out to take him back. He has the jailer Ranveer Singh (Vikram Gokhale) on his trail. He chops off Habibullah's head. When confronted by Ranveer, he tells him that he would be back in a month to receive punishment for taking Habibullah. Badshah goes back to Afghanistan and marries Benazir; after the time limit, he comes back to India and surrenders himself to Ranveer Singh, who he addresses as "Rajput Khan" and is jailed for five years. While Badshah Khan is away, his childhood friend Khuda Baksh (Danny Denzongpa) assumes the role of a guardian for Benazir.
To avenge Habibullah's death, his brother Pasha (Kiran Kumar) kidnaps the daughter of jailor Ranveer, Heena, in return for Badshah. Badshah finds out about this and escapes from jail; he confronts Pasha, only to have Inspector Aziz Mirza (Bharat Kapoor) kill Ranveer Singh. With Ranveer Singh's daughter as a pawn in Pasha's hands, Badshah admits to killing Ranveer Singh and is sentenced to 15 years. When Aziz's wife (who thinks of Badshah as her brother) visits him, she ends up killing her husband to protect Badshah, but Badshah takes the blame for that murder as well since he believes that her son Raja needs her.
At that time, Benazir sends Khuda Baksh to check on Badshah. Due to his very long stay in prison, Badshah makes Khuda Baksh promise to take care of his daughter Mehndi and tell his wife Benazir that he is now dead so that she can move on rather than wait for him. Benazir goes mad when she hears the news that her husband is dead.
On coming out of prison, Badshah meets with his now grown daughter, Mehndi (also Sridevi), who has found out that her father is still alive and has come to India to look for her father; the daughter of Ranveer Singh, Heena (Shilpa Shirodkar), who is also in the police force and knows all about Badshah's past and respects him as her uncle; and the son of Inspector Aziz Mirza, Inspector Raja Mirza (Nagarjuna), who has found out that it was Badshah who had killed his father and is out for vengeance. In a twist of fate, Raja is in love with Mehndi, even though he wants to kill her father.
In this are added old enemies and rivalries when Pasha, now a major crime lord, gets involved. Benazir and Khuda Baksh are kidnapped by him. The truth is eventually revealed to Raja about his father, and he joins of hands with Badshah and Heena to beat their mutual enemy. | revenge | tt0104607 |
Wolfhound | The setting of the film is a high fantasy Dark Ages Europe, in which desperate and bloodthirsty warlords fight brutal battles in their eternal quest for overlordship. Yet their swords, shields, lances, spears and arrows are all brittle, prone to wear and tear, and dull, protracting their campaigns against each other without end. Word spreads of a man in one of the Northern tribes: an adept blacksmith capable of crafting far hardier, stronger, sharper, and more durable weapons than any other known to exist, with aid of a mystical element. The warlords search for the enigmatic master of weapons to no avail.
A former druid chieftain named Zhadoba, jaded by years of warfare and believing the Radiant Gods have abandoned him, learns of the identity and whereabouts of the blacksmith and his coveted weapons, more valuable than any gold in such a time. With this knowledge, Zhadoba's heart is hardened to mercy and replaced with greed and bloodlust. Bringing even the feared warlord, the Man-Eater, under his spell, Zhadoba massacres an entire people, the Clan of the Grey Hounds, including their blacksmith, and takes his legendary weapons. The only survivor of the tribe, the blacksmith's fair-haired son, witnesses the slaughter and bites at Zhadoba's tattooed hand. Instead of killing the boy, Zhadoba orders the boy to be sent into the savage mines of the Crystal Mountains and to live a life of hard labor there, in conditions which will no doubt kill the boy anyway.
Against all odds, the boy cheats death through sheer determination and will, his strength becomes powerful through many years of hard labor, scarred by violence, and his prowess honed by a hunger for revenge. For many years his only companions were disheartened, tortured slaves and a strangely intelligent bat, Ragged Wing, who is destined to become his constant companion. After killing his overseers with weapons created using his father's secret techniques and escaping the mines, he becomes a wanderer known as Wolfhound: a great and fearless warrior, as well as a true master of weapons like his father before him.
After making the long journey to the Man-Eater’s castle, Wolfhound finally conquers his archenemy. He also frees two prisoners, the sage and healer Tilorn and slave-girl Niilit. Wolfhound accompanies them to their home city of Galirad, which has been thrown into turmoil. The power-crazed forces under Zhadoba are poised to attack the city with their superior weapons at any moment. With enough bloodshed, and the right ritual involving royal blood, Zhadoba believes he can resurrect the ancient Dark Goddess Morana from the Celestial Gates and draw power from her. The King of Galirad, to save the city from destruction, is giving his daughter away in marriage to Vinitar, a young warrior-prince who promises to protect Galirad - and who also happens to be the son of the late warlord, the Man-Eater. Princess Elen must travel to the land of her husband-to-be, and asks Wolfhound to be her guard in this dangerous journey. Wolfhound agrees to serve the princess and is caught up in a whirlwind of mysterious events, as the true purpose of the journey is gradually revealed, a secret which could plunge the world into an eternal living nightmare... | pornographic | tt0328655 |
Bride of Re-Animator | Eight months after the events of Re-Animator, doctors Herbert West and Dan Cain are working as medics in the middle of a bloody Peruvian civil war. In the chaos of battle and with plenty of casualties to work on, they are free to experiment with West's re-animation reagent. When their medical tent is stormed by the enemy troops, West and Cain return home to Arkham, Massachusetts. There, they resume their former jobs as doctors at Miskatonic University Hospital, and West returns to the basement laboratory of Cain's house to continue his research.
Using parts pilfered from both the hospital's morgue and from the cemetery conveniently located next door, West discovers that his reagent can re-animate body parts by themselves. He becomes determined to create an entire living person from disparate body parts. West discovers the heart of Megan Halsey, Cain's fiancée, in the hospital morgue. With the promise to use her heart to re-animate a new Megan, West convinces Cain to help him with his project. Also stored in the morgue is the rest of the evidence from the previous "Miskatonic Massacre". Inside, pathologist Dr. Wilbur Graves discovers a vial of West's reagent and the severed head of Dr. Carl Hill. Using the reagent, he re-animates Hill's head.
Meanwhile, police officer Lt. Leslie Chapham begins investigating West and Cain. He bears a grudge against the pair, as they were the only unaffected survivors of the Miskatonic Massacre; the dead body of Chapham's wife was re-animated into a crazed zombie during the incident. Chapham suspects West and Cain were responsible. When he stops by their house to question them, he discovers West's corpse-filled lab and the two get into an ugly confrontation. A fight ensues and West ends up killing Chapham by means of cloth treated with a chemical which causes cardiac arrest when inhaled (a product of West's research into obtaining the freshest possible corpses for his experiments). West then re-animates the police officer with the intention of covering up his crime. Chapham violently wanders out of the house and into the cemetery next door.
Hill also bears a grudge against West, as West was responsible for his decapitation, the destruction of his body, taking away Megan (with whom he was obsessed), and having better theories about reanimation than himself. Using hypnotic powers, Hill commands Chapham to force Dr. Graves to stitch bat wings onto his neck, giving him back his mobility. He also extends his mental control to all of the zombie survivors of the Miskatonic Massacre.
When one of Cain's patients, the beautiful Gloria, dies, West collects the last piece he needs for his creation: her head. With a complete body stitched and wired together, West and Cain inject the re-animation reagent into Meg's heart. While waiting for the reagent to take effect, a package is delivered to their house. West retrieves and opens it. From inside, Hill's winged head flies out. Simultaneously, all of the zombies he controls break into the house. West retreats back to the basement lab, where his creation, the Bride, has awoken.
A catfight breaks out between the Bride and Cain's current girlfriend, Italian journalist Francesca Danelli, whom he met in Peru. Cain rejects the Bride's love and sides with Francesca. Heart-broken, the Bride rips Megan's heart out of her own chest and then literally falls to pieces. West diagnoses this as tissue rejection.
Hill and his zombies force West, Cain and Francesca to retreat through the wall of the lab and into a crypt in the neighboring cemetery. Inside, all of West's prior test subjects arise and make their way towards him, stopping only when Herbert commands them to. The unstable crypt begins to collapse, trapping Hill, West and the zombies. Cain and Francesca manage to escape the debris and claw their way to the surface of the cemetery together. Hill, stuck in the debris, laughs manically, while Megan's heart, still in the hand of the bride, stops beating. | comedy, cruelty, murder, cult, violence, good versus evil, insanity | tt0099180 |
12 Rounds | A sting operation to capture arms dealer Miles Jackson goes awry when the FBI's inside man double crosses them. Miles rendezvouses with his girlfriend Erica Kessen, who has a getaway car. Officers Danny Fisher and Hank Carver are dispatched to help the FBI. They look at Jackson's record and see a surveillance video of him dancing with Kessen. An encounter with them at a traffic light leads to her death and Miles being taken away. Miles swears vengeance on Fisher.
One year later, Fisher gets a phone call from Jackson, who has escaped from prison. Fisher runs outside the house looking for Jackson, and Fisher's car and house explode, throwing him to the ground. After he recovers, Jackson says he is launching a game of revenge called "12 Rounds." The house, the car, and Phil, the plumber who came to fix a pipe were "Round 1." Molly Porter, Fisher’s girlfriend is kidnapped by Jackson for "Round 2." For "Round 3," Fisher and Carver must follow a series of clues to locate the cell phone that Jackson calls, and for "Round 4" Fisher has to get to New Orleans Savings and Loan where a fire has broken out and extract two security deposit boxes within 20 minutes.
Carver has a lead on the man who helped kidnap Molly Porter and volunteers to look into that while Fisher continues with the game. FBI Special Agents George Aiken and Ray Santiago work with them to get Porter back.
For "Round 5" one of the security boxes is a bomb and the other contains a clue to the next round. Fisher discovers and disposes of the bomb.The other box contains a hotel room key. The room is raided and found empty. For "Round 6," Fisher follows a series of clues to a bus where he finds Porter on board, wearing a bomb underneath her jacket. He is handcuffed to a bar and is given an envelope with a phone number as the clue to the next round. The Feds try to get Jackson but he escapes with Porter. When Fisher is freed, he tells the Feds about the bomb. Carver shows up and tells Fisher he has located Jackson's henchman, Anthony Deluso.
In "Round 7" Fisher has to find the correct cell phone number that disarms bombs placed in different locations. Jackson answers and tells him that his call disabled Streetcar 907's brakes. Fisher and Santiago slam their car into the transformer, shutting off electricity for the whole neighborhood. They run along the streetcar, clearing people out of the way until it can slow to a halt.
A mine planted by Jackson kills Carver and Deluso. Jackson says that Porter's bomb can only be disarmed by Fisher's fingerprint. He tells Fisher to pay a visit to Erica Kessen, so Fisher, Santiago, and Aiken start for the cemetery. Another detective, Chuck Jansen calls Fisher to tell him that the numbers in the envelope were rigged to the streetcar. Jackson had cameras monitoring the elevator shaft and set off the bomb five seconds early. Fisher realizes that Willie's death in the elevator episode was orchestrated by Jackson. Santiago does a check on Willie and finds he had a second job as a Homewood Security guard. They figure out that Jackson was leading them to take out the power because Homewood Security comes in to move the unprotected cash. Jackson's grudge against Fisher was only a cover for in his scheme to steal this money.
Aiken tells Santiago to lock down the Mint, while he and Fisher go after Porter. Fisher realizes that "Round 12" is a wild-goose chase, since Jackson needs Porter, a nurse, to help him escape. Jackson, dressed as a security guard, steals the cash. He uses Porter's ID card to get to a Medevac chopper on a hospital roof, transporting the money inside a body bag. Fisher and Aiken race to the hospital roof, where Aiken is wounded. Fisher activates the touch phone-bomb and throws the switch away. Porter and Fisher jump into a pool, while Jackson is left in the exploding helicopter. | romantic | tt3517850 |
Catch Me Daddy | A young woman (Sameena Jabeen Ahmed) has run away from her Pakistani family and is living with her Scottish boyfriend. Living in a caravan, the couple get along on minimal resources with Laila working as an assistant at a local hairdresser while Aaron looks for work. Laila's brother, a gang of friends and two hired thugs track her down. When Aaron is out at a local shop, the Asian men track Laila down to the caravan. Laila's brother enters alone, and, after a struggle, he is accidentally wounded and dies, allowing Laila to escape through a window.
When Aaron receives a photograph on his phone showing his mother tied up and gagged, he and Laila decide to give themselves up. As they walk towards both cars the Pakistani group walk forward and one man repeatedly hits Aaron with an axe. The elder man of the other party, Tony, runs out of his car with a pistol, furious at the men and tells Laila to get in the car.
They drive off, Laila is returned to her distressed father and the man is paid and drives away. The film ends with Laila forced to place a noose around her neck and stand on a chair. She begs her father to let her take it off but, in a state of confusion and anger over his son's death, he sits on the floor, head in hands. The film ends leaving the audience to speculate upon Laila's fate. | murder | tt2626964 |
Spartaco | In the 1st century BC, the Roman Republic has slid into corruption, its menial work done by armies of slaves. One of these, a proud and gifted man named Spartacus (Kirk Douglas), is so uncooperative in his servitude that he is sentenced to fight as a gladiator. He is trained at a school run by the unctuous Roman businessman Lentulus Batiatus (Peter Ustinov), who instructs Spartacus's trainer Marcellus (Charles McGraw) to not overdo his indoctrination because he thinks "he has quality". Amid the abuse, Spartacus forms a quiet relationship with a serving woman named Varinia (Jean Simmons), whom he refuses to rape when she is sent to "entertain" him in his cell.
Batiatus receives a visit from the Roman senator Marcus Licinius Crassus (Laurence Olivier), who aims to become dictator of Rome. Crassus buys Varinia on a whim, and for the amusement of his companions arranges for Spartacus and three others to fight in pairs. When Spartacus is disarmed, his opponent, an African named Draba (Woody Strode), spares his life in a burst of compassion and attacks the Roman audience, but is killed by an arena guard and Crassus. The next day, with the school's atmosphere still tense over this episode, Batiatus takes Varinia away to Crassus's house in Rome. Spartacus kills Marcellus, who was taunting him over this, and their fight escalates into a riot. The gladiators overwhelm their guards and escape into the Italian countryside.
Spartacus is elected chief of the fugitives and decides to lead them out of Italy and back to their homes. They plunder Roman country estates as they go, collecting enough money to buy sea transport from Rome's foes, the pirates of Cilicia. Countless other slaves join the group, making it as large as an army. One of the new arrivals is Varinia, who escaped while being delivered to Crassus. Another is a slave entertainer named Antoninus (Tony Curtis), who also fled Crassus's service after the Roman tried to seduce him. Privately, Spartacus feels mentally inadequate because of his lack of education during years of servitude. However, he proves an excellent leader and organizes his diverse followers into a tough and self-sufficient community. Varinia, now his informal wife, becomes pregnant by him, and he also comes to regard the spirited Antoninus as a sort of son.
The Roman Senate becomes increasingly alarmed as Spartacus defeats the multiple armies it sends against him. Crassus's populist opponent Gracchus (Charles Laughton) knows that his rival will try to use the crisis as a justification for seizing control of the Roman army. To try and prevent this, Gracchus channels as much military power as possible into the hands of his own protege, a young senator named Julius Caesar (John Gavin). Although Caesar lacks Crassus's contempt for the lower classes of Rome, he mistakes the man's rigid outlook for nobility. Thus, when Gracchus reveals that he has bribed the Cilicians to get Spartacus out of Italy and rid Rome of the slave army, Caesar regards such tactics as beneath him and goes over to Crassus.
Crassus uses a bribe of his own to make the pirates abandon Spartacus and has the Roman army secretly force the rebels away from the coastline towards Rome. Amid panic that Spartacus means to sack the city, the Senate gives Crassus absolute power. Now surrounded by Romans, Spartacus convinces his men to die fighting. Just by rebelling and proving themselves human, he says that they have struck a blow against slavery. In the ensuing battle, after initially breaking the ranks of Crassus's legions, the slave army ends up trapped between Crassus and two other forces advancing from behind, and most of them are massacred. Afterward, the Romans try to locate the rebel leader for special punishment by offering a pardon (and return to enslavement) if the men will identify Spartacus, living or dead. Every surviving man responds by shouting "I'm Spartacus!" (an idea from Fast's novel, not documented by history). As a result, Crassus has them all sentenced to death by crucifixion along the Via Appia.
Meanwhile, Crassus has found Varinia and Spartacus's newborn son and has taken them prisoner. He is disturbed by the idea that Spartacus can command more love and loyalty than he can and hopes to compensate by making Varinia as devoted to him as she was to her former husband. When she rejects him, he furiously seeks out Spartacus (whom he recognizes from having watched him in the arena) and forces him to fight Antoninus to the death. The survivor is to be crucified, along with all the other men captured after the great battle. Spartacus kills Antoninus to spare him this fate. The incident leaves Crassus worried about Spartacus's potential to live in legend as a martyr. In other matters, he is also worried about Caesar, who he senses will someday eclipse him.
Gracchus, having seen Rome fall into tyranny, commits suicide. Before doing so, he bribes his friend Batiatus to rescue Spartacus's family from Crassus and carry them away to freedom. On the way out of Rome, the group pass under Spartacus's cross. Varinia is able to comfort him in his dying moments by showing him his little son, who will grow up without ever having been a slave. | violence | tt0393807 |
When Good Ghouls Go Bad | Danny Walker (Joe Pichler), and his father James (Tom Amandes), who has gotten a divorce from his wife, have just moved to the town from Chicago so his father can fulfill his dream of re-opening the family chocolate factory. Danny and James are staying with James' father, known by all as "Uncle Fred" (Christopher Lloyd). Uncle Fred is considered crazy and is a bit childish, but Danny loves him very much. Danny dislikes his new life in Walker Falls, and it seems no one likes him, especially the football coach Mike Kankel (Joe Clements) and his son Ryan (Craig Marriott), the school's biggest bully. The only person who seems to be nice to Danny is Taylor Morgan (Imelda Corcoran), the school nurse and James' childhood friend.
Danny is surprised by how few decorations are up with Halloween only a week away. The people of Walker Falls do not seem to be making any effort at all to celebrate the holiday. Sheriff Ed Frady (Alan Flower) even takes down the decorations that Danny puts up. When walking home from school, Ryan and his pal, Leo (Daniel Karr) push him into the cemetery, lock the gate, and tell him that Walker Falls does not celebrate Halloween because of the legend of a curse. Years ago, Curtis Danko (Brendan McCarthy) was an artistic boy, who was ostracized by "normal" people. When competition was held for all the eighth graders to design a sculpture of their personal hero, Curtis kept his project covered during the day, then came to school at night to work by the light of captured fireflies. On Halloween night, he went to work on his sculpture, and Mike Kankel and his friends were walking by when they saw Curtis from the window. When Kankel returned the next day, he noticed the kiln had been on all night. He opened the door and found Curtis's charred skeleton and a message in the ashes, saying that if the town ever celebrated another Halloween, he would come back and destroy them. Kankel was blind for three days after seeing Curtis' finished statue. He said it was like being face to face with the devil himself. Everyone in the town believed the legend and, since then, Halloween has never been celebrated.
Danny thinks it is a silly story, and runs home. James is rarely around, so Uncle Fred has served as a stand-in father for Danny. That night, James is planning to announce his "Halloween Spooktacular" idea to raise funds to re-open Walker Chocolates at the town meeting. Uncle Fred and Danny try to tell him that the townspeople will be too afraid to support the spooktacular because of the curse, but James doesn't listen.
At the meeting, Mayor Churney (Roy Billing) announces his campaign for re-election. Running against him is Kankel. After the announcements, it is James' turn. He is surprised to find the people of Walker Falls shudder at just the mention of Halloween. To bring the conversation back on track, his secretary passes out samples of chocolate, but the audience isn't very enthusiastic. The meeting ends after all but a few leave the town hall. Danny's father is very upset when he learns about the legend, which has completely ruined his plans. He decides to cancel the spooktacular and get funds elsewhere.
Uncle Fred then reveals why no one likes Danny. Uncle Fred was responsible for building the kiln that killed Curtis. That night, Danny dreams he is at Curtis's crypt and sees the cloth being ripped off the statue. That morning, there is a commotion outside the house. A large pile of pumpkins has been discovered in the town center. It finally looks like Walker Falls might celebrate another Halloween. But when Uncle Fred lifts a pumpkin as he says: "Happy Halloween", the entire pile rolls on top of him, killing him. Everyone in town is at Uncle Fred's funeral and Danny is very sad. As a memento, he lets his grandfather's favorite car shoot down the track and rest with his coffin.
However, because of Uncle Fred's love of Halloween, the magic in the cemetery allows him to return as a zombie. Unfortunately, that same magic awoke others from their slumber, including Curtis. The zombies begin capturing all the townsfolk and gathering them to the creepy old Victorian style house chanting the phrase "Statue." Meanwhile, Danny and his crush, Dayna Stenson (Brittany Byrnes) try to explain to James and Nurse Taylor the situation. Uncle Fred reveals his zombie self to his son and Nurse Taylor, both fainting in the process. Zombies break into the house and Uncle Fred explains that Curtis might be behind the zombies awakening and tells them to escape while he holds the other zombies off. Unfortunately, he, his son, and Nurse Taylor are all captured, one of the zombies stating that Uncle Fred was the main part of the plan.
When everyone is gathered, Curtis reveals himself to the people. As he is about to reveal his statue, he is attacked and literally torn apart by Kankel. However, because Curtis is a zombie, he manages himself to pull himself together, and scare the wits out of Kankel. As Curtis pulls off the shroud off his statue, everyone covers their eyes in fear. Surprisingly, nothing happens. Everyone uncovers their eyes and Curtis' statue is revealed to be of Uncle Fred. Curtis then shows Uncle Fred a picture of the two of them, Uncle Fred shaking Curtis' hand, as it implied that Curtis looked up to him. Uncle Fred, still guilty about Curtis' death, wonders why he was a hero to Curtis as it was his kiln that killed him. Curtis then turns to Kankel and points to him, naming him as his killer.
Kankel confesses that the night Curtis died, he was working on the statue of Uncle Fred and as a prank to scare him, Kankel, Frady, and his group pushed Curtis into the kiln and locked him in it then taunting him. Suddenly, the janitor appeared and Kankel's group ran off. While cleaning the class, the janitor accidentally turned on the kiln not realizing Curtis was in it. The next day, Kankel went inside the kiln and saw Curtis' corpse as well as the completed statue of Uncle Fred. To hide his crime, he made up the curse as pretending his eyes were burned when he saw the statue to make it seem like it was Curtis' doing. Kankel also reveals that the statue of Uncle Fred would have been voted to be put in town square, instead of Kankel's statue of his father. It's revealed that Uncle Fred donated much time and money to the town's children, promoting creativity and imagination; thus, he was loved by many children; explaining why he was called "Uncle Fred" and why much of his actions were seen as childish to some. Kankel wouldn't stand for someone to promote things that were "girly" and wanted things "manly." However, Kankel's action earns him the wrath of his father Pops Kankel (Gordon Boyd), who is among the group of zombies and is upset at what he has done. He then grabs his son's ear and drags him out to "punish" him.
By the end, the zombies and the townspeople applaud Curtis' statue. With that, Curtis has accomplished what he's done and bids farewell to the town, disappearing into the night, returning to his crypt to finally rest. Meanwhile, the other zombies bid farewell. Uncle Fred reconciles with his son, James, saying this will be the last time he will see him on Earth, but he'll always be watching him on the other side. He then leaves with his wife (Jenny Dibley) and the two join the other zombies, sharing one final dance with the fireflies, as all the entities slowly disappear dancing into the night. Danny and Dayna share a kiss, while James and Taylor hold hands as they watch the dancing zombies fade into the night.
By the end, German investors that spoke to James earlier loved the concept of Halloween and decide to support him into reopening the family chocolate factory within two weeks. On Halloween day, children are seen dressing up in costumes and going trick-or-treating as a girl from one of the Halloween groups goes to Uncle Fred's statue in town square, where they're passing by, and says: "Happy Halloween." Then, after the girl leaves, Uncle Fred's voice is heard one last time replying back: "Happy Halloween." | horror | tt0279513 |
Warpath | John Vickers has spent eight years hunting for the three men who murdered the woman he loved. He finds one, Woodson, and kills him in a gunfight, but not before learning that the other two men have joined the U.S. Cavalry.
En route to North Dakota, where Vickers plans to join the men under the command of George Armstrong Custer to continue his search, he sees a sergeant named O'Hara physically manhandling a woman. Molly Quade is grateful for his intervention, but O'Hara gets even when Vickers ends up serving under him at the fort, giving him the most unpleasant duties.
Molly has come to the fort to help her father Sam Quade run a general store. He is opposed to her attraction to Vickers. On an assignment, soldiers are badly outnumbered by a band of Sioux until being rescued by Custer and his troops. Vickers is recognized by Custer as a former Union officer and is promoted to first sergeant.
O'Hara realizes that Vickers suspects him to be one of the killers of his fiancee. An ambush attempt fails, so he deserts the Army and flees. A wagon train is formed to evacuate civilians while Custer prepares to do battle at Little Big Horn, but along the way, Molly, her father and Vickers are taken captive. O'Hara is a prisoner, too, and when he learns Custer's men will be hopelessly outnumbered and slaughtered, he tries to go warn the general and sacrifices his own life, distracting the Sioux until the others can escape.
Molly becomes aware that Sam, her father, is the third killer Vickers has been seeking. Before she can persuade Vickers not to kill him, Sam rides off to warn Custer, which will certainly lead to his own death. | revenge, violence | tt0044196 |
Hansel & Gretel | Hansel and Gretel are the young children of a poor woodcutter. When a great famine settles over the land, the woodcutter's second, abusive wife decides to take the children into the woods and leave them there to fend for themselves, so that she and her husband do not starve to death, because the kids eat too much. The woodcutter opposes the plan but finally, and reluctantly, submits to his wife's scheme. They were unaware that in the children's bedroom, Hansel and Gretel have overheard them. After the parents have gone to bed, Hansel sneaks out of the house and gathers as many white pebbles as he can, then returns to his room, reassuring Gretel that God will not forsake them.
The next day, the family walk deep into the woods and Hansel lays a trail of white pebbles. After their parents abandon them, the children wait for the moon to rise and then they followed the pebbles back home. They return home safely, much to their stepmother's rage. Once again provisions become scarce and the stepmother angrily orders her husband to take the children further into the woods and leave them there to die. Hansel and Gretel attempt to gather more pebbles, but find the doors locked and find it impossible to escape.
The following morning, the family treks into the woods. Hansel takes a slice of bread and leaves a trail of bread crumbs for them to follow home. However, after they are once again abandoned, they find that the birds have eaten the crumbs and they are lost in the woods. After days of wandering, they follow a beautiful white bird to a clearing in the woods, and discover a large cottage built of gingerbread, cakes, candy and with window panes of clear sugar. Hungry and tired, the children begin to eat the rooftop of the house, when the door opens and a "very old woman" emerges and lures the children inside, with the promise of soft beds and delicious food and a hot bath. They do this without knowing the fact that their hostess is a bloodthirsty Hag who waylays children to cook and eat them.
The next morning, the hag cleans the cage in the garden out from her previous captive. Then she throws Hansel into the cage and forces Gretel into becoming her slave. The hag feeds Hansel regularly to fatten him up, after three weeks Hansel gets nice and fat. On the final night she mutters to her self that he will be good to eat. The next day the witch prepares the oven for Hansel, but decides she is hungry enough to eat Gretel, too. She coaxes Gretel to the open oven and prods her to lean over in front of it to see if the fire is hot enough. Gretel, sensing the hag's intent, pretends she does not understand what she means. Infuriated, the hag demonstrates, and Gretel instantly shoves the hag into the oven, slams and bolts the door shut, leaving "The ungodly creature to be burned to ashes", screaming in pain until she dies. Gretel frees Hansel from the cage and the pair discover a vase full of treasure and precious stones. Putting the jewels into their clothing, the children set off for home. A duck ferries them across an expanse of water and at home they find only their father; his wife died from an unknown cause. Their father had spent all his days lamenting the loss of his children, and is delighted to see them safe and sound. With the hag's wealth, they all live happily ever after. | fantasy | tt1460002 |
Singham | Singham opens with an honest police officer in Goa, Rakesh Kadam (Sudhanshu Pandey), committing suicide because of false accusations of corruption filed by Jaikant Shikre (Prakash Raj), a don and politician in Goa running various rackets like kidnapping, extortion and smuggling. Kadam's wife Megha Kadam (Sonali Kulkarni) vows revenge but cannot find any support or help from the police or Minister Anant Narwekar (Anant Jog).
The story moves to Shivgarh, a small village near the Goa-Maharashtra border. Bajirao Singham (Ajay Devgn), an honest Maratha police inspector like Kadam, is in charge of the Shivgarh police station. He resolves most of the problems in his town informally and without filing charge sheets, thereby gaining much reputation and love from the villagers. Gautam Bhosle a.k.a. Gotya (Sachin Khedekar) is an industrialist and a friend of Singham’s father Manikrao Singham (Govind Namdeo). He comes to Shivgarh with his wife and daughter Kavya (Kajal Aggarwal). Eventually Singham and Kavya fall in love with each other. Their courtship takes place through a series of comic events where she initially hates him and then has a change of heart when she sees his honest and simple nature.
Everything seems to run smoothly until Jaikant, who is given a conditional bail for a murder he had committed, is required to travel to Shivgarh to sign the bail every fortnight. He, instead, sends one of his allies to do the formalities, much to the fury of Singham who demands Jaikant sign the bail in person. Humiliated, Jaikant reaches Shivgarh but is unable to take any revenge on Singham fearing the wrath of villagers, who threaten to finish him off. Using his political contacts, he gets Singham transferred to Goa to take revenge.
Singham, unaware of Jaikant’s hand behind his transfer, joins Colva police station. His co-workers, Sub-Inspector Dev Phadnis (Vineet Sharma), Sub-Inspector Abbas Malik (Ankur Nayyar), Head Constable Savalkar (Ashok Saraf) hate Jaikant for his crimes but are unable to take any action because of Jaikant’s political powers. DSP Patkar (Murli Sharma), Singham's senior, is on Jaikant's payroll and takes care in concealing and eliminating the evidence of Jaikant’s crime from the eyes of the law. Singham tries to take this to the notice of DGP Vikram Pawar (Pradeep Velankar)) but it turns out to be of no use as there is no evidence against Jaikant and Patkar. The local minister Anant Narvekar (Anant Jog) does not help Singham and in turn, he warns him to stay away from Jaikant's case. Defeated Singham wants to return to his hometown but is stopped by Kavya and Megha Kadam, who encourage him to fight against the evil and not run away like a coward.
Being mentally tortured by Jaikant, Singham arrests Jaikant’s top lieutenant Shiva Nayak (Ashok Samarth) in a fake case of illegally smuggling alcohol. He thwarts off DSP Patkar in full view of the public when Patkar, bounded by his duties to Jaikant, tries to protect Shiva. Meanwhile, Megha Kadam, after being ridiculed by DGP Pawar and minister Narvekar for her innocent husband’s death, seeks help from Singham to absolve her late husband from the corruption charges . Jaikant kidnaps Kavya’s younger sister Anjali (Sana Amin Sheikh) for ransom. Rescuing her, Singham successfully traces the origins of the kidnapping racket to Jaikant but is unable to arrest him as he wins an election and is set to become a minister of Goa Govt.
Jaikant sends transfer orders to Singham to go back to Shivgarh within 24 hours. That night at a police function organized for the officers with their family, Singham confronts the officers for not abiding by their duties and being dishonest and unfaithful to their profession by protecting Jaikant. At first, the officers disagree with Singham, but filled with guilt, the officers decide to help Singham fight Jaikant. Soon, the entire Goa Police Force reach his home to kill him, with DGP Pawar and DSP Patkar, now in support of Singham. Jaikant eventually escapes but after running through the city, he is arrested by the police the next morning. They bring him to the police station and shoot him dead on the same chair where Inspector Rakesh Kadam had shot himself. Then they threaten Shiva to change his statement. Jaikant and Minister Narvekar are proved guilty. At a media conference, DGP Pawar and Singham clear late Kadam of all corruption charges.
The film ends with Singham and other police officers saluting Mrs.Megha Kadam. | good versus evil, comedy, action, prank | tt1948150 |
The Ice Storm | Set over Thanksgiving weekend, 1973, the film centers around two families: the Hoods (Ben and Elena and their children, 16-year-old Paul and 14-year-old Wendy) and their neighbors, the Carvers (Jim and Janey, and their children, Mikey and Sandy).
Ben, dissatisfied in his marriage and with the futility of his career, is having an affair with Janey. Elena is bored with her life and is looking to expand her thinking but is unsure of how to do so. Wendy enjoys sexual games with her school peers, as well as both Carver boys. Paul has fallen for a classmate, Libbets, at the boarding school he attends, though his roommate Francis is also interested in her.
On the Friday night after Thanksgiving, Ben and Elena have an argument when she learns of his affair with Janey, but they go ahead with their plans to attend a neighborhood party, which turns out to be a "key party", where married couples swap sexual partners by having wives select other husbands' keys from a bowl; Jim and Janey are also there. As the party progresses, Ben becomes drunk. When Janey chooses the keys of a handsome young man, Ben attempts to protest but trips and knocks his head on the coffee table, leading Jim to realize that his wife and Ben are having an affair. Ben, in his embarrassment, retreats to the bathroom where he remains for the rest of the evening. The remaining key party participants are paired off and leave together with only Jim and Elena remaining. She retrieves Jim's keys from the bowl and returns them to him. After debating the issue, Jim and Elena leave together, engaging in a quick, clumsy sexual encounter in the front seat of Jim's car. Jim, regretting the line he and Elena have just crossed, offers to drive her home.
Wendy decides to make her way to the Carvers' to see Mikey, but he has decided to go out into the ice storm, so she and Sandy climb into bed together and remove their clothes. They drink from a bottle of vodka and Wendy tries to seduce him; however, they both fall asleep.
Paul is invited to Libbets' apartment in Manhattan, though upon arriving, is disappointed to learn that Francis was also invited. The three drink beer and listen to music; Francis and Libbets also take prescription pills found in Libbets' mother's medicine cabinet, causing them to eventually pass out. Paul decides to leave, just narrowly making the train about to leave for New Canaan.
Meanwhile, Mikey, out walking in the storm, is enchanted by the beauty of the trees and fields covered in ice. He slides down an icy hill then sits on a guardrail to rest. A moment later a power line, broken by a fallen tree, connects with the guardrail and he is electrocuted.
Jim and Elena become stuck, due to a downed tree, and return to the Carvers' house as dawn is breaking. Elena walks in on her daughter in bed with Sandy and orders her to get dressed.
Janey had also returned home earlier and curled up on her bed in the fetal position without bothering to take off her party clothes. Although it is not revealed what transpired between Janey and her 'key partner', she is visibly exhausted and sad.
Ben has sobered up by this time and begins driving home. He discovers Mikey's body on the side of the road and carries it back to the Carvers' house. The two families are drawn together by Mikey's death and Wendy hugs the shocked and numbed Sandy in an attempt to comfort him. Jim is devastated while Janey remains asleep and ignorant to the recent events. Ben, Elena and Wendy then drive to the train station to pick up Paul, who is returning from Libbets' apartment, his train delayed by the ice and the power failure caused by the downed wire. Once all four are together in the car, Ben breaks down, sobbing uncontrollably at the wheel as Elena starts comforting him. | bleak, dramatic, entertaining, atmospheric | tt0119349 |
The Hiding Place | The book begins with the Ten Boom family celebrating the 100th anniversary of the family watch and watch repair business, now run by the family's elderly father, Casper ten Boom. The business took up the ground floor of the family home (known as the Béjé). Casper lived with his unmarried daughters Corrie (the narrator and a watchmaker herself) and Betsie, who took care of the house. It seemed as if everyone in the Dutch town of Haarlem had shown up to the party, including Corrie's sister Nollie, her brother Willem, and her nephews Peter and Kik. Willem, a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church, brought a Jewish man, who had just escaped from Germany, as a guest. The man's beard had been burned off by some thugs, a grim reminder of what was happening just to the east of the Netherlands.
In the next few chapters, Corrie talks about her childhood, her infirm but glad-hearted mother, and the three aunts who once lived in the Béjé. She talks about the only man she ever loved, a young man named Karel, who ultimately married a woman from a rich family.
Eventually, both Nollie and Willem married. After the deaths of Corrie's mother and aunts, Corrie, Betsie, and their father settled down into a pleasant, domestic life. Then, in 1940, the Nazis invaded the Netherlands.
The family had strong morals based on Christian beliefs, and they felt obligated to help their Jewish friends in every way possible. The Béjé soon became the center for a major anti-Nazi operation. Corrie, who had grown to think of herself as a middle-aged spinster, found herself involved in black market operations, using stolen ration cards, and eventually hiding Jews in her own home.
Corrie suffered a moral crisis over the lying, theft, forgery, and bribery that was necessary to keep the Jews her family was hiding alive. Moreover, it was unlikely that her family would get away with helping Jews for long, as they had nowhere to hide them. The Dutch underground arranged for a secret room to be built in the Béjé, so the Jews would have a place to hide in the event of an inevitable raid.
It was a constant struggle for Corrie to keep the Jews safe; she sacrificed her own safety and part of her own personal room to give constant safety to the Jews. Rolf, a police officer friend, trained her to be able to think clearly anytime in case the Nazis invaded her home and started to question her.
When a man asked Corrie to help his wife, who had been arrested, Corrie agreed, but with misgivings. As it turned out, the man was a spy, and the watch shop was raided. The entire Ten Boom family was arrested, along with the shop employees, though the Jews managed to hide themselves in the secret room.
Casper was well into his eighties by this time, and a Nazi official offered to let him go, provided he made no more trouble. Casper did not agree to this, and was shipped to prison. It was later learned he had died ten days later.
Meanwhile, Corrie was sent to Scheveningen, a Dutch prison which was used by the Nazis for political prisoners, nicknamed 'Oranjehotel'--a hotel for people loyal to the House of Orange. She later learned that her sister was being held in another cell, and that, aside from her father, all other family members and friends had been released. A coded letter from Nollie revealed that the hidden Jews were safe. While at Scheveningen, Corrie befriended a depressed Nazi officer, who arranged a brief meeting with her family, under the pretense of reading Casper's will. Corrie was horrified to see how ill Willem was, as he had contracted jaundice in prison. He would eventually die from his illness in 1946. Corrie also learned that her nephew, Kik, had been captured while working with the Dutch underground. He had been killed, though the family did not learn of this until 1953.
After four months at Scheveningen, Corrie and Betsie were transferred to Vught, a Dutch concentration camp for political prisoners. Corrie was assigned to a factory that made radios for aircraft. The work was not hard, and the prisoner-foreman, Mr. Moorman, was kind. Betsie, whose health was starting to fail, was sent to work sewing prison uniforms.
When a counter-offensive against the Nazis seemed imminent, the prisoners were shipped by train to Germany, where they were imprisoned at Ravensbrück, a notorious women's concentration camp. The conditions there were hellish; both Corrie and Betsie were forced to perform back-breaking manual labor. It was there that Betsie's health failed. Throughout the ordeal, Corrie was amazed at her sister's faith. In every camp, the sisters used a hidden Bible to teach their fellow prisoners about Jesus. In Ravensbrück, where there was only hatred and misery, Corrie found it hard to look to Heaven. Betsie, however, showed a universal love for everyone—not only for the prisoners, but also for the Nazis. Instead of feeling anger, she pitied the Germans, sorrowful that they were so blinded by hatred. She yearned to show them the love of Christ, but died before the war was over. Corrie was later released because of a clerical error, but she was forced to stay in a hospital barracks while recovering from edema. Corrie arrived back in the Netherlands by January 1945. | christian film | tt0073109 |
Harbinger Down | In 1982, a Soviet moon lander crashes into the Bering Sea. In 2015, two biology graduate students, Ronelle and Sadie join their professor, Stephen, on an experimental tour to study the effects of global warming on whales. Sadie's grandfather, Graff, takes them to sea in his commercial fishing trawler, Harbinger, which is crewed by Bowman, Big G, Dock, Svetlana, and Atka. Sadie declines when Graff encourages her to helm the boat, as she has lost her nerve since losing her father at sea. After meeting the crew, Sadie, Ronelle, and Stephen go to sleep.
That night, Sadie wakes as the crew catch a load of fish. Detecting that there is whale activity in the area, Sadie unsuccessfully attempts to wake the others, then investigates on her own. She is intrigued when she finds something large under the ice, and the crew help her to recover what proves to be the crashed Soviet lander, now frozen in ice. Ronelle and Stephen are woken by the commotion, and Stephen excitedly claims ownership of the lander. Graff disputes his claim, and says the Russians will want their ship back. Sadie points out that the object was the property of the now-nonexistent Soviet Union, and therefore maritime salvage law would give them the rights to it. Graff infuriates Stephen further by declaring that it belongs to Sadie. Ronelle tries to contact her sister Tamara to tell her about what they found to no avail.
Bowman encourages Sadie to investigate the moon lander before Stephen can find a way to claim it for himself. Bowman recruits Big G to distract Stephen while Sadie sneaks off. She discovers that the Soviet cosmonaut died of an unknown infection and takes a skin sample to analyze. Stephen becomes further frustrated when he learns she has examined the shuttle before him. He threatens to destroy her career unless she signs over the discovery to him. Though Graff threatens to take the issue to the courts, Sadie gives in. Meanwhile, Sadie learns that the moon lander was carrying tardigrades, a hardy terrestial life-form that can survive in extreme conditions. However, cosmic radiation has caused them to mutate and become capable of shapeshifting.
When the cosmonaut's body goes missing, Stephen accuses Sadie of moving or hiding it. She denies this, and Bowman defends her. When Stephen becomes belligerent, Graff threatens him. While examining the lander, Stephen becomes contaminated with the mutated tardigrades. Sadie finds Stephen standing on the deck complaining that he can't breathe and sees him stripping his clothes off despite the sub-zero temperatures. The others drag him back in, after which several stalks sprout from his back and sprays the area with a strange, dark liquid. Dock is sprayed in his mouth, but Sadie confirms that they are all potentially contaminated. They make the liquid nitrogen portable by putting it into a scuba tank and proceed to freeze Stephen's body and the lander.
Dock soon shows signs of infection, and Svetlana locks him in a cage above deck in order to incinerate him using a flare gun. The others object to the plan until Dock also sprouts tentacle-like growths. The tardigrades cut the ship's power, demonstrating high intelligence, but the backup battery kicks in. As they work to restore it, the organism kills Atka, during which Svetlana is revealed to be a Russian spy. Holding Sadie, Bowman, Big G, Ronelle, and Graff hostage, she explains that the tardigrades were part of a Soviet experiment to create radiation-resistant cosmonauts. She does not want to reclaim the Soviet moon lander but instead intends to sink the boat after being picked up by a nearby Russian submarine. Before she can kill her hostages, however, the organism attacks, causing Svetlana to lose her gun. Ronelle picks up the gun, but she is grabbed by the creature, which pulls her through the narrow pipe and presumably kills her. When Svetlana tries to reason with the others, she too is grabbed by the creature.
The survivors, Graff, Sadie, Bowman, and Big G, search for several explosive charges that Svetlana hid throughout the ship. The last four are hidden in the bilge, a tight area which only Sadie has access to. As she collects the explosives, the others discover that the tardigrades have consumed and absorbed their latest catch, two tons of crab. As they call down to warn Sadie, she realizes she is standing amid the tardigrades. Although she escapes, Graff is infected. He instructs Big G to restart the ship and Sadie to pilot it before asking Bowman to kill him.
Big G restarts the ship but dies after battling Svetlana's shape-shifted and mutated body. Before Bowman can freeze Graff with the liquid nitrogen, he is abducted by the creature, and Graff instructs Sadie to scuttle the ship and save herself. She steers it toward an iceberg and escapes just as the creature bursts through the deck. Via the portable radio, the US Coast Guard alerts her that a rescue helicopter is in her vicinity. The helicopter can be heard approaching as Sadie lies motionless on the ice. | suspenseful | tt3397918 |
Society | Bill Whitney seems to have it all. His family is wealthy and he lives in a mansion in Beverly Hills, California. He's popular at his high school, looks to be a shoo-in for class president, has a cute cheerleader girlfriend and owns a new Jeep Wrangler to drive around in. Despite this, he feels as though he does not fit in with his family or their high-society friends. When his sister's ex-boyfriend Blanchard gives him a surreptitiously recorded tape of what sounds like his family engaged in a vile, murderous orgy, Bill begins to suspect that his feelings are justified.
Bill gives the tape to his therapist Dr. Cleveland to listen to. When he comes back for his appointment, Dr. Cleveland plays the tape back for Bill. The audio has now changed and now merely contains the sounds of his sister Jenny enjoying her coming out party. Bill insists that what he'd heard before was real and calls Blanchard to get another copy. When he arrives at their meeting place, Bill discovers an ambulance and police officers gathered around Blanchard's crashed van. A body is placed into the back of the ambulance, but Bill is prevented from seeing its face.
Bill attends a party hosted by his upper-class classmate Ferguson. There, Ferguson lasciviously confirms that the first audio tape Bill listened to—with the sounds of an orgy on it—was the real tape. Angry and confused, he leaves the party with Clarissa, a beautiful girl he'd been admiring. They have sex at her house and Bill meets Clarissa's bizarre, hair-loving mother.
Bill returns home the next day and confronts his parents and sister, who are all in the master bedroom dressed in lingerie. At Blanchard's funeral, Bill and his friend Milo discover that Blanchard's corpse either needed a lot of reconstructive work for display, or is not real. Bill is approached by Martin Petrie, his rival for the high school presidency, who says he must speak with Bill and agrees to a secret meeting. Bill discovers Petrie with his throat cut. He sees someone race off through the woods then runs off to get the police. When he returns with the cops, the car and the body are missing, with a different car in their place.
The next day at school, Petrie shows up, alive and well. When Bill arrives at home, he confronts his family again, but with Dr. Cleveland's help, they drug Bill. As Milo secretly trails him, Bill is taken to a hospital. Bill awakens in a hospital bed and thinks he hears Blanchard crying out, but discovers that nothing is there. He leaves the hospital and finds his Jeep waiting for him. Milo tries to warn him, but he drives back to his house.
Back home again, Bill finds a large, formal party. He is snared by the neck and Dr. Cleveland reveals all of the secrets he has been searching for. He is not really related to his family after all. In fact, his family and their high-society friends are actually a different species from Bill. To demonstrate, they bring in a still-living Blanchard. The wealthy party guests strip to their underwear and begin "shunting". The rich literally feed on the poor, physically deforming and melding with each other as they suck the nutrients out of Blanchard's body. Their intention is to do the same to Bill, but after escaping them and running about the house—seeing his family melding with each other as well—Bill manages to goad Ferguson into a fight. As the "aliens" cheer Ferguson on, Bill is subdued, but in a surprise attack, Bill manages to reach inside the pliable Ferguson and pull his head out through his buttocks, turning him inside-out. With the help of Milo and Clarissa—who is also of the alternate species but has fallen in love with Bill—he escapes, as one of the men at the party tells another he may have an "opening in Washington". | murder, cult, alternate reality, violence, psychedelic, sadist | tt0098354 |
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim | === Setting and characters ===
Skyrim is set around 200 years after the events of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, although it is not a direct sequel. The game takes place in Skyrim, a province of the Empire on the continent of Tamriel, amid a civil war between two factions: the Stormcloaks and the Imperial Legion. The player character is a Dragonborn, a mortal born with the soul and power of a dragon. Alduin, a large black dragon who returns to the land after being lost in time, serves as the game's primary antagonist. Alduin is the first dragon created by Akatosh, and is prophesied to destroy man and consume the world.
=== Plot ===
The player character is a prisoner being led to an Imperial execution in Helgen. Alduin unexpectedly interrupts the procession, destroying the town before the player can be executed. The player escapes in the chaos and journeys to the city of Whiterun to request aid against the dragon threat. After slaying a different dragon that attacks nearby, the player absorbs the dragon's soul which grants them the ability to perform a shout. The city's guards inform the player that they must be a Dragonborn. The player is summoned to meet with the Greybeards, an order of monks who live in seclusion. The Greybeards train the player in using shouts and inform the player of their role in stopping Alduin. The player learns that Skyrim's civil war is the last in a sequence of prophetic events foretold by the Elder Scrolls, which also predicted the return of Alduin.
The player later meets with members of the Blades, an order of dragon hunters. The player and the Blades travel to Alduin's Wall, a prophetic engravement, to learn that ancient Nords used a special shout against Alduin so they could engage him. To gain more information, the player meets the ancient dragon Paarthurnax, the leader of the Greybeards. Paarthurnax reveals that Alduin was cast into the currents of time by the use of an Elder Scroll in the hope that he would never reemerge. The player locates the Elder Scroll and uses it to peer through a window in time and learn the shout to combat Alduin. The player battles with Alduin, who then flees to Sovngarde, the Nordic afterlife, to gain strength by devouring the souls of deceased Nords.
The player summons and traps a dragon named Odahviing, and learns from him that Alduin has fled to Sovngarde through a portal located at an ancient fort called Skuldafn. Odahviing agrees to fly the player to Skuldafn, claiming Alduin has shown himself as weak and undeserving of leadership over the dragon race for fleeing from the Dragonborn. The player enters Sovngarde and travels to the Hall of Valor. There, they meet up with the three heroes of Nordic legend who defeated Alduin originally. With their help, the player defeats Alduin once and for all. | good versus evil | tt1814884 |
Geraftaar | The film starts off with a happy family consisting of Kapil Kumar Khanna (Satyendra Kapoor), his wife Durga (Nirupa Roy), and their two sons Karan (Master Ravi) and Kishen. Karan is a very naughty kid and usually angers their parents while at his pranks. Kapil Kumar is an honest inspector and one day, on his wife's request, takes Karan with him. While on duty, Khanna goes to arrest Vidyanath (Kader Khan) and Ranjit Saxena (Ranjit) for possessing illegal drugs. Ranjit and Vidyanath try to kill by throwing him onto the ground using machinery, when Karan, in an attempt to save his father, pulls the wrong lever and Kapil Khanna is killed. Vidyanath accuses Karan of killing his father, and his mother Durga also in a fit of rage, beats him and tells him to go away. In a wave of emotions, Karan leaves the house and runs towards the ocean. He jumps in and commits suicide. His mother is heartbroken and says she did not want him to leave her and give her such a punishment. Karan has not died, but has been saved by Hussein (Master Suresh) and brings Karan to his home where he finds a new mother (Renu Joshi)and he and Hussein become best friends, giving an example to mankind, which is later shown in this movie.
The starting credits roll on and shows Durga taking Kishen with her to another place where he grows up. On the other hand, Karan and Hussein's childhood are also shown. Now enters a grown up Kishen (Kamal Hassan), a struggling actor who is in love with Lucy (Rabia Amin), a fellow struggling actress whose father uses all her money on drinking. Kishen returns home and enacts a drama in front of his mother, then the two reconcile. When his mother asks him to get married, Kishen refuses describing the girls of today. Anuradha (Poonam Dhillon) makes an entrance, speeding on her car. While Lucy crosses the road, Anuradha slams her car into Lucy, leaving her wounded. Kishen runs after her and a chase follows where Kishen takes her to the police station and gets her behind bars. Anuradha is an arrogant girl and calls up her brother, revealed as Ranjit Saxena. The police officer refuses to accept bribe and locks Anuradha away.
Ranjit asks Vidyanath's brain to think of a way. Vidyanath sends his son Chutkiram (Shakti Kapoor) to beat Kishen up. Chutkiram has a lisp and has a crush on Anuradha, whom he lovingly calls Anu. A fight between Kishen and Chutkiram and his goons, in which the latter are beaten up by Kishen. Kishen takes him to the police station and explains that he was attacked. Just then Ranjit comes and gives the bail orders for Anu and leaves, saying that Lucy has forgiven Anu for a sum of 25 000 rupees.
Kishen confronts Lucy in hospital and Kishen tells Lucy to keep the money. Just then Lucy's drunkard father (Jeevan) comes, takes the money and leaves. Kishen slaps him and tells him to get out Lucy's life. Lucy's father reluctantly leaves, vowing revenge. Anuradha is released from jail and is planning of take revenge on Kishen, and makes a bet with her friends.
Kishen lands on a job as a chauffeur and he and his mom are very happy for his job. When he attends his first day at work, he finds out that he is Anuradha's driver, and Anuradha uses this a mean to humiliate Kishen by putting her feet in Kishen's face. He then throws her shoe away and she orders him to bring it. He then throws she shoe in her face and tries to slap him. Kishen then humiliates Anuradha and resigns from the job.
The girls then try to fool Kishen's mother by introducing themselves as social workers and tries to get close to Durga, in which she succeeds. The next day, Kishen and Durga go to a mandir, where they find Anuradha, and she being very nice to Kishen, but Kishen doesn't fall for it and taunts her. He still hates her, and Anuradha swears in the mandir that she accepts Kishen as her husband and wants to marry him, but still Kishen doesn't fall for her. She then threatens to kill herself and runs away. She is about to jump off a cliff, but Kishen stops her, and professes his love.
A song sequence occurs, and afterwards, Anuradha holds a party in which Kishen publicly professes his love for Anuradha, but Anu then shows her real face and tells him she did this for revenge. Kishen then forcibly takes her to the very same temple where she swore Kishen as her husband. Kishen then marries her. Anu's brother Ranjit, is looking for her and Kishen takes her home, and tell Ranjit that he has just married Anuradha. Ranjit is furious, but he cannot do anything. Kishen leaves saying that he is leaving his wife in Ranjit's care.
Ranjit goes to Vidyanath to help him out. Vidyanath then calls Durga and tells her that Kishen forcibly married Anuradha, and if he does not stay away from her, they will kill him. Durga collapses, and asks for Kishen to forgive her as she really wanted Kishen to marry Anuradha. She is admitted into hospital, and the doctor tells Kishen that she needs to be operated on and he needs to arrange for the money.
Vidyanath calls Lucy, and proposes to produce a play in which she and Kishen play the lead roles. Lucy and Kishen agree and meet Vidyanath, where they rehearse for the play in which Kishen fake shoots Lucy. While this is all happening, Vidyanath is secretly recording their voices and the gunshot. Vidyanath gives Kishen the money he needs for the surgery and Kishen leaves.
Lucy is practicing her dance, when Chutkiram comes and tries to rape Lucy, and Vidyanath comes and shoots her. He replaces the tape with the recorded voices of Lucy and Kishen. Lucy's father comes and hears the tape playing and steals the tape. Just as he leaves, Kishen comes in and find Lucy dead. Just then the police arrive and arrest Kishen. In court, they are unable to prove Kishen guilty and he is put in remand. Vidyanath then sends in his jailbirds to kill Kishen. A fight ensues, in which Kishen is losing and is about to be stabbed. Just then a man comes to help Kishen (Amitabh Bachchan). When Kishen asks who he is, he talks in riddles.
Here Ranjit and Vidyanath are tense as their plan flopped. Anuradha is listening to them talking and has a change of heart and truly accepts Kishen as her husband and declares this to her brother. Ranjit is furious and tries to kill her, but Vidyanath stops him. They let Anuradha go and Vidyanath reveals that they have the tape (they have found Lucy's father), and give this tape to Vidyanath's lawyer (Kulbhushan Kharbanda), who proves him guilty in court and he is sentenced to death. Vidyanath then kill Lucy's father by throwing off a high building.
In jail, Kishen plays the song ""'Aana Jaana""', the song he and Karan used to listen to in their childhood. Karan listens to the tune and immediately recognises it. They sing the song throughout the jail and finally find each other at the end of the song. They recognise each other from the fight the other day, and it is revealed that the unknown person is in fact Karan Kumar Khanna (Amitabh Bachchan), Kishen's lost older brother. Karan though, does not tell him who he is, but tells his story, from his childhood. Kishen finds a familiarity in his story and asks him to continue and he tells his story
Karan seeks blessings from Hussein's mother for his promotion, and his mother asks when he's going to marry, and tells him to go and propose to Geeta (Madhavi). He goes to Geeta, who is a fellow inspector and proposes to her.
The next day, Geeta and Hussein's mother go to a jewellery shop, where robbers come in and take Geeta and Hussein's mother hostage. Karan then takes an entry and beats the robbers, but they run off. Unfortunate for them Inspector Hussein (Rajinikanth in an extended cameo role) is waiting for them and also beats them up. Both Karan and Hussein take them to jail.
It is revealed, that Ranjit, Vidyanath, Chutkiram and their lawyer are partners in crime and want Karan and Hussein finished. The Police Commissioner's son and Geeta's brother, Vijay (Sharat Saxena) is also involved in the crime gang. Karan and Hussein go and threaten to arrest them and to stop being a criminal. Later Vijay complains to his father, Police Commissioner Sinha (Om Shivpuri). The Commissioner warns Hussein and Karan to stay in their limits.
A new case comes to Hussein and Karan and they promise to look into it. It is also Raksha Bhandhan and Hussein leaves. Geeta and Hussein follow the ritual of "Rakhi", and then Geeta tries to explain to not abuse their police uniforms. A small fight ensues and Karan is listening. They joke around for a while and Hussein's mother blesses all three of them to live happy lives.
According to the two pathans, they go to the place where they instructed, and arrest Ranjit and Vidyanath, but they get bailed out by their lawyer. They hatch a new plan, and call them to different places. Hussein and Karan fall into their trap, and Hussein is beaten up by Ranjit, and is murdered by Vijay and is burnt alive. Karan reaches too late and Hussein breathes his last in Karan's arms. Karan vows revenge. Karan delivers this bad news to Hussein mother, and she cannot bear the shock and dies of misery.
Vijay is in hiding, but Karan finds him and burns him alive in the same way he killed Hussein, thus fulfilling his revenge. As he walks out laughing, he is arrested by Geeta and is sentenced to life imprisonment. Here Karan finishes his story to Karan. At the same time, Durga comes to meet Kishen and Karan recognises her, and without revealing himself, vows to protect Kishen.
The next day Karan helps Kishen escape and is arrested for helping Kishen escape. While humorously explaining the situation, escapes himself. And while on the run, he unknowingly enters the Commissioner' house, who is now handicapped and is confined to a wheelchair. When the Commissioner is about to shoot him, Karan pleads to let him go, to prove his brother, Kishen innocent. The Commissioner does not believe him, but on Geeta's insistence, he relents.
Durga is informed by her father, that Karan is alive and Durga realises that the one who saved Kishen's life in jail, was in fact his older brother. After fleeing from the Commissioner's place, he returns home after a number of years. Mother and son reconcile and the relation between Karan and Kishen strengthens. The brothers decide to trap Vidyanath and Ranjit in their own trap, using Chutkiram as their pawn.They soon find out that Vijay has not died,but has survived.In a final battle,all the gang members are killed while Chutkiram and Vidyanath are arrested by police.The police commissioner dies because he was killed by Vijay,but Karan kills Vijay and marries Geeta in the end. | murder, flashback | tt0089194 |
Slam | Raymond "Ray" Joshua (played by Saul Williams) is a young man growing up in the Southeast, Washington, D.C. neighborhood of Dodge City, slang for a real Southeast D.C. neighborhood. Despite his innate gift for poetry and his aspiration to be a rapper, he finds it difficult to escape the pressures of his surroundings: violence and drug dealing. While participating in a drug deal gone wrong, Ray's close friend Big Mike is shot. Ray is caught by the police and sent to the District of Columbia Department of Corrections' central detention facility. He is arraigned for possession of a controlled substance at the H. Carl Moultrie Courthouse and bail is set at $10,000. When his public defender explains his options ("cop out" and plead guilty), "rock" (stand trial), or "cooperate" (serve as an informant), Ray despairs, particularly as he is being pressured to participate in a drug culture "inside" very similar to what he was a part of "outside".
Ray takes no sides, unwilling to believe that his options are limited to the choices he is being presented with. When threatened with violence in the prison yard, he retaliates with words, speaking the truths that he's witnessed in the form of a poetic rap meant to show the other inmates how their power and energy is being diverted into petty struggles with each other, rather than being directed toward the system that is keeping them down. In prison, he participates in the writing class of teacher Lauren Bell (Sonja Sohn), whom he comes to respect and admire. She advises him to pay more attention to his talents.
When Ray is unexpectedly released on bail for a few days prior to his court date by an incarcerated drug dealer whom Ray had inspired with his revolutionary ideas, he is able to convince his friends and their Dodge City crew not to retaliate with more violence for the shooting — to break the cycle instead. He explains that the "projects" where they all live and die are a government experiment and that continuing to kill each other is exactly what those who set up the experiment want them to be doing. On the outside, he also reunites with Bell, and is welcomed into her circle of friends at a poetry reading at her home. They wind up spending the night together, despite her reservations about the future. The next day, she urges him to settle his legal troubles by agreeing to serve a year or two of prison time, rather than fighting the charges and potentially being put away for much longer.
They quarrel, because Ray feels that Bell doesn't understand his situation. He leaves, but shows up that night at a poetry slam event in D.C.'s Cleveland Park neighborhood that Bell had invited him to, just in time to see her perform an extremely powerful and empathetic piece that was clearly written for him. When the crowd demands an encore, she invites Ray onto the stage to perform instead, and he delivers an impromptu dramatic poem — scrawled as he crossed the city on public transit on his way to the slam — an emotional piece about black males and the criminal justice system. When the crowd demands an encore, Ray tells Lauren he needs to get some air, then leaves again. He wanders the streets until he is drawn to the Washington Monument. | melodrama, revenge, flashback | tt1173568 |
Ido zero daisakusen | Three men (Dr. Ken Tashiro, Dr. Jules Masson, and Perry Lawton) are trapped in a bathysphere due to seismic activity. They are rescued by the crew of the supersubmarine Alpha, captained by Craig Mackenzie (Cotten), who they learn is over 200 years old (and that the Alpha was launched in the early 19th century). Mackenzie takes them to Latitude Zero to deal with the serious injuries of Dr Masson. While returning to Latitude Zero, they are attacked by a rival supersubmarine, the Black Shark, captained by Kuroi (Hikaru Kuroki), who works for a rival of Mackenzie, Dr. Malic (Romero), who is also over 200 years old and has a base at Blood Rock.
Latitude Zero is a paradise hidden fifteen miles below the surface at the intersection of the Equator and the International Date Line. Gold is plentiful there and is used for protective clothing by the island's newcomers, while those who arrived in the 19th century prefer to dress as they are accustomed, as no one ages or dies. Diamonds are very common and used only in industrial use.
Dr. Malic, however, wishes to destroy the paradise of Latitude Zero, and uses giant rats and anthropomorphic bats in addition to James Bond-style devices against the undersea kingdom. Worst of all, after a cruel experiment grafting the wings of an eagle to a lion, he removes the brain of the unsuccessful Kuroi and places her brain in the creature. This proves to be his undoing when, at a critical moment, Kuroi turns against Malic as he prepares to fire an energy cannon at the escaping visitors, causing their destruction.
Of all the visitors to Latitude Zero, only Perry Lawton (Jaeckel), a journalist, wishes to return home. He is picked up by a US Navy vessel and meets a Commander Glenn Mackenzie (Cotten again), and is put in the care of Lt. Hastings (Romero again). Horrified at whom he sees, Lawton discovers his film is ruined and when he opens the pouch where he placed his complimentary diamonds, he finds tobacco. Just as he is about to resign himself to the fact that his adventure never occurred, the ship is wired a message stating that a cache of diamonds has been deposited in his name in a safe deposit box in New York City. | psychedelic | tt0064470 |
Bug | Agnes White is a waitress at a gay bar living in a run-down motel in rural Oklahoma. Unable to move on from the disappearance of her son some years previously, she engages in drug and alcohol binges with her lesbian friend, R.C. Lately, she has been plagued by silent telephone calls that she believes are being made by her abusive ex-husband, Jerry Goss, who has recently been released from prison.
One night, R.C. introduces Agnes to Peter Evans, a drifter who says he is a recently discharged soldier. Agnes and Peter reach out to each other out of loneliness, and start a relationship. He convinces her that he was the subject of biological testing by the U.S. government while he was in the military, and says the anonymous phone calls she has been receiving were made by government agents in anticipation of his arrival. After they have sex, Peter tells Agnes that their room has become infested by bugs sent there by the government as part of their experiments.
Peter's movements and behavior become more erratic as he fights the bugs, invisible to the audience, that he claims are infesting his body. Agnes soon joins in this behavior. Over time, they isolate themselves from the outside world, sealing themselves in their room and covering it with flypaper and aluminum foil and lighting it with the glow from bug zappers. Peter, believing that a colony of microscopic bugs was implanted in one of his teeth, tears it out of his head. Using a child's microscope, he says he sees the bugs in the remains of the crushed tooth, as does Agnes.
A Dr. Sweet arrives, and tells Agnes that Peter has escaped while under treatment at a mental institution and that delusions about insects are a known symptom of Peter's mental illness. Peter kills Sweet, telling Agnes that he was a robot sent by the government. Together, Peter and Agnes elaborate upon Peter's beliefs in a conspiracy, including that Agnes' son was kidnapped by the government to lead her and Peter to meeting and that each of them is infected with bugs that are meant to mate with one another and take over the world. In order to prevent this, Agnes and Peter douse each other in gasoline and set themselves on fire.
In the end credits, the audience sees shots of the toys in Agnes and Peter's room completely intact, with no sign of the aluminium foil, and the body of Dr. Sweet, in the room covered with foil but undamaged by fire. Which shot, if any, shows "reality" is left unclear. | insanity | tt0072750 |
Are You in the House Alone? | 16-year-old Gail Osborne is a typical high school student with a passion for photography. Six months ago, she and her parents moved from New York to a smaller town due to her father Neil's claim the city was too dangerous following a burglary. Gail, a high spirited romantic, initially started dating classmate E.K. Miller, but he broke off their relationship because Gail was unwilling to sleep with him.
Now, Gail is dating Steve Pastorinis, despite her overprotective mother's objections. After a while, she receives an anonymous letter which says: I am watching you. Gail thinks the letter is creepy, but is convinced by her best friend Allison Bremer that it is a practical joke from some student. However, when another note is found saying, "I know where you are I'm watching you you tramp I'm coming after you", and phone calls from a strange man laughing in a creepy way. Gail decides to warn her principal, who informs her it could be the act of her current or former boyfriend, someone she's rejected or perhaps someone she's knows that's hanging around.
One day, Gail tries to tell her mother Anne about the stalking, but Anne is too busy to pay attention and blows Gail off. Therefore, Gail ditches school and heads to San Francisco to visit her father at work. There, she finds out her father has been fired. Back home, she confronts her mother with this, who demands her to keep silent so Neil will not feel ashamed. Gail realizes more serious matters are going on in her life and decides to no longer pay attention to the notes and phone calls. One day when she's late for class, there is another message sticking out of her locker. A black and white picture of herself that she took in photography class with the word "RAPE" all in red across her face.
One night, she is babysitting the children of Jessica Hirsch, who is dating Gail's teacher Chris Elden. She receives a phone call from her boyfriend Steve Pastorinis, and he asks if he can come over after work and spend time together. Gail, relieved, says yes, and he tells her he'll be there soon. The phone rings again, thinking it's Steve she answers, but it's the same stalker, laughing hysterically asking: Are you in the house alone? Afraid, Gail locks the door and windows all around the house.
Someone knocks on the front door. Excited to see Steve, Gail opens the door and sees it's Allison's boyfriend, Phil Lawver, who stopped by. Phil asks if Allison is around because she said she was going to come by, and Gail responds she isn't there. Phil then asks to use the phone to call Allison's house. Phil picks up the receiver and dials the number but then puts his finger on the receiving end to cancel the call, and then pretends to be on the phone with Allison's mother while pulling out a handkerchief wiping off the phone. Gail looks over and sees him wiping the phone and he looks back at her before dropping the phone on the ground.
He looks at her and says, "I really had you fooled didn't I?" Gail lets out a sigh of relief figuring he was pulling a prank on her. Phil continues saying, "Had you real scared". Gail, upset, replies "Phil, will you cut it out", showing fear. Phil then says in a raspy creepy voice "Are you in the house alone?". Phil then reveals that it wasn't a prank and that he's been stalking her, that he knows all about her, he knows what she likes, he's been watching her a long time, he's been real patient, that he's waited for her, and not to give him that "lily white virgin" stuff cause he knows she has nothing to lose. He then attacks her, forces her down on the ground and proceeds to rape her. He sits up sweaty, looks down at her beaten bloody body and runs out of the house.
Due to the trauma, Gail is hospitalized and at first refuses to say that Phil raped her, claiming it was all a blur, knowing she won't be believed, refusing to return to school. Another female officer comes in to ask if she can try to remember, and Gail continues to lie out of fear. The female officer leaves, but tells her that if she changes her mind, to call her at the station. She also mentions that if Gail doesn't give her a name, they have no case, and her attacker can do this to someone else. Fearing that some other girl might endure what she just went through, she tells the officer it was Phillip Lawver. Her father is outraged at Phil, but finds out they can not sue him because Phil's father is a close friend of the local judge. The fact Gail recently lost her virginity to Steve also plays a role.
Gail is eventually encouraged by her teacher Malevich not to be afraid any longer and she returns to school. There, she finds out another girl is receiving the same creepy notes. Determined to stop Phil, she attempts to catch him with her camera. Phil, however, is on to her and attempts to beat her up, but he is caught by Steve. In the end, Phil pleads guilty to assault but is not charged with rape. He has since disappeared, and one rumor has it he is in a boarding school in New Hampshire. | cult | tt0077174 |
Breakout | Harris Wagner (Huston) frames Jay Wagner (Duvall). In order to keep him silent, Jay is incarcerated in a Mexican prison.
Jay's wife Ann (Ireland) is unhappy at this turn of events and hires a Texas bush pilot in Brownsville, Texas, Nick Colton (Bronson) and his partner Hawk (Quaid), to fly into the prison and rescue her husband.
The first attempts don't work, so Colton quickly learns how to pilot a helicopter.
While Hawk and accomplice Myrna (North) feign a rape to distract the prison guards, Colton pilots a helicopter into the prison complex, Wagner boards the helicopter, and they escape. The group (Colton, Hawk, Myrna, Wagner) return to Texas in a four-passenger light aircraft.
Alerted to the escape, Harris Wagner orders his agent Cable (Mantee) to Texas to intercept the group. Cable, driving a Citroën SM with Washington, D.C. license plates, locates Ann Wagner and follows her Chevrolet Impala convertible, knowing she will lead him to Jay Wagner.
Cable uses false identification to lure Jay Wagner away from the group when they land. Cable nearly succeeds in kidnapping Wagner, but Colton becomes suspicious and pursues them. The film ends with a runway incursion as Cable and Colton fight among departing airplanes at Brownsville Airport. | murder | tt2314886 |
Seraphim Falls | In 1868, within the Ruby Mountains, Gideon (Pierce Brosnan) roasts hare over an open fire. Suddenly, gunshots ring out with one striking his left arm. He grabs what he can and races down the mountain. His attackers emerge from their cover to inspect his campsite. Colonel Morsman Carver (Liam Neeson), a former Confederate officer, is accompanied by Pope (Robert Baker), Hayes (Michael Wincott), Parsons (Ed Lauter) and the Kid (John Robinson); who are all engaged in a bounty operation to apprehend him.
After removing the bullet from his arm with his hunting knife at a secluded locale, Gideon leaves an open fire burning, which attracts the posse. He ends up killing Pope with his knife and then ventures out again into the wilderness. He attempts to steal a horse, but is caught by a young woman named Charlotte (Shannon Zeller) who helps him after she realizes he is injured. She redresses his wound and her family lets him sleep overnight in their farmhouse. He later offers to buy their horse and leaves before daybreak. As the group of men approach Gideon's trail, he lays an ambush using a bear trap which impales the Kid, who is then shot by Carver as an act of mercy. Later, Parsons decides to leave the other men following the discovery of a dead bank robber (James Jordan), whom Gideon had killed earlier in an act of self-defense and whose bounty money exceeds Gideon's. As Parsons is preparing to load the dead body to take to Carson City for the reward money, Carver shoots the horse - which he declares is his, leaving Parsons to walk the 30 miles back to town carrying the body.
Encountering a railroad under construction, Gideon hitches his horse and steals some food. The foreman recognizes the stolen horse and detains Gideon. Carver and his remaining man, Hayes, come upon the railroad site and search for Gideon. Meanwhile, Gideon escapes from custody and makes off with another horse. As Carver and Hayes draw closer, Gideon's horse can no longer take the strain of the heat and collapses. Gideon euthanizes the horse with his knife. When Carver and Hayes finally reach the horse's carcass, Hayes dismounts and marvels at what type of an animal would disembowel the creature. Suddenly, Gideon leaps out from the horse's belly, where he had been hiding, and grabs Hayes threatening to kill him if Carver doesn't give up his gun. Carver instead shoots Hayes with his last bullet. Confronting each other, Carver and Gideon recall the events that put them at odds. After the end of the American Civil War, Gideon was ordered to track down former Confederate officers. When he arrived at Carver's home in Seraphim Falls to interrogate him, Carver was out in a nearby field. To coerce Carver's wife (Angie Harmon) into revealing his whereabouts, and believing that their house was empty, Gideon ordered their barn to be set on fire. The blaze quickly spread to the house, as Carver returned from the cropland. While the soldiers restrained him, his wife and son ran inside the house to save their infant child who was still in a bedroom. Both men look on with horror at the unfolding tragedy; trapped by the flames, Carver's wife and children perish. Gideon, racked with guilt over the tragedy, is seen dropping his gunbelt and walking away from his men.
The two men fight, Gideon eventually getting the better of Carver. He points Carver in the direction of a town and tells him that he will get nothing but torment if he continues his pursuit. Gideon takes the horses ridden by Carver and Hayes and sets off deeper into the countryside. When Carver later catches up with Gideon, both men are on the brink of exhaustion. They confront each other again with their pistols. Gideon shoots Carver in the side but, instead of finishing him off, he offers himself to Carver. Carver decides not to shoot him and throws his pistol aside. Gideon helps Carver to his feet and the two men walk into the distance away from one another. In a final scene, Gideon takes his knife, which he has used throughout the film, and throws it into the ground.
Notable similarities have been found between the film and the 1976 revisionist western, The Outlaw Josey Wales directed by Clint Eastwood. | murder, cult, violence, flashback, psychedelic, revenge | tt0479537 |
Lego Marvel Super Heroes: Maximum Overload | The mischievous Loki challenges the Marvel Super Heroes yet again. But this time, he's cast a snowball-themed spell that has Norn Frost in it to "Overload" various villains.
At a secret S.H.I.E.L.D. base in New Jersey, Doctor Octopus raids it in order to obtain the Beta Burst Missile. Using the Norn Frost obtained by his Chitauri minion, Loki "overloads" Doctor Octopus. In Manhattan, Nick Fury calls upon Spider-Man to help defeat Doctor Octopus. Before Doctor Octopus can use the Beta Burst Missile on the trapped S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents, Spider-Man arrives and tricks Doctor Octopus into shocking himself on a nearby power generator. The next morning, Spider-Man brings a bound Doctor Octopus back to Manhattan in a truck upon running out of web fluid on the Garden State Parkway. Nick Fury takes Doctor Octopus to be locked up as Spider-Man is left walking back to Queens, New York. Loki is not pleased that his Doctor Octopus "Overload" was defeated and vows that it's not over.
Some time later, news articles are shown about the "Overloads" like the rise of the Red Skull "Overload," the Wizard "Overload" forming the Frightful Sixteen which outnumbers the Fantastic Four, and the Green Goblin "Overload." J. Jonah Jameson reports on the "Overloads" and claims that Spider-Man is behind this. Loki then uses the Norn Frost on Venom since he is a creature worth overloading. Appearing near the stand of the Hot Dog Vendor, Venom is overloaded as Loki commands Venom to attack Spider-Man. Their fight takes them through the Daily Bugle much to the dismay of J. Jonah Jameson. Spider-Man manages to defeat Venom by getting one of Venom's tendrils into the Linotype machine where Venom ends up flattened onto a bunch of newspapers. Venom's body is taken away by Nick Fury, Captain America, and Wolverine. As Spider-Man swings away from the Daily Bugle, J. Jonah Jameson rants about his newsroom getting trashed as he vows to get Spider-Man for this. Spider-Man runs out of web fluid and falls into a dumpster leaving him to walk back to Queens again.
While reprimanding his Chitauri henchman for sitting in his chair, Loki sees a helicopter carrying Mandarin flying to Tony Stark's Malibu mansion to attack it. Loki then throws the Norn Frost at Mandarin who then prepares to attack. Iron Man saves Pepper Potts by getting her into an Iron Man armor. Iron Man then begins to fight Mandarin. As Loki plans to overload Mandarin further, his Chitauri minion slips and causes the Norn Frosts to fall into the nearby crevices. Iron Man uses his left glove to knock Mandarin out of his helicopter as he is grabbed by Falcon who takes Mandarin to the Helicarrier. Iron Man is then helped out of the rubble by his left glove before leaving with Pepper to eat out somewhere. Spider-Man suddenly finds himself at an offshore oil platform wondering how he got there.
While his Scrying Mirror is getting fixed, Loki reaches out with his mind where he finds Iron Man and Iron Fist looking for Abomination. Loki finds Abomination on top of a passing airplane as he overloads Abomination. Upon Abomination breaking the airplane, Iron Man and Iron Fist rescue the passengers and land them safely on the offshore oil platform while Hulk arrives to fight Abomination. With help from Iron Fist, Hulk knocks Abomination into the ocean. When Loki plans to overload Hulk to serve him, Hulk notices his floating eyes and punches it as Loki feels the pain while getting a black eye.
Loki declares that his plans are almost complete as his Chitauri minions sweep the floor. On the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, Wolverine, Captain America, and Black Widow do a roll-call on the captive supervillains Doctor Octopus, Venom, Abomination, Mandarin, Red Skull, and Wizard. Loki then commands the supervillains to arise as they all end up overloaded again while being ordered to hop. The constant hopping causes the Helicarrier to fall onto Tony Stark's rebuilt mansion. The supervillains then go on a rampage as Iron Man, Nick Fury, Black Widow, Captain America, Wolverine, and Hulk fight them. Thor arrives with Spider-Man upon finding him whining outside Avengers Tower. Spider-Man claims that he was angsting. Upon taking down Doctor Octopus, Thor traces the Norn Frost back to Loki. Thor brings Iron Man and Spider-Man to Asgard to confront Loki while the others fight the supervillains.
Upon the Chitauri minions fixing the Scrying Mirror, Loki views it and sees Thor, Iron Man, and Spider-Man approaching his lair. Upon the arrival of Thor, Iron Man, and Spider-Man, Loki eats all the Norn Frost in the possession of one of his Chitauri minions and fights them. After throwing Spider-Man into a wall, Loki states to Iron Man and Thor that he is meddling in the affairs of Earth and take the throne of Asgard (Loki whispered that part which the Chitauri minion said out loud). Upon Loki slipping, Thor throws Mjolnir at Loki as he hangs over the crevasse. Thor then demands that Loki removes his enchantment and vow to never disturb the peace of Midgard under the threat of the hammer noogie. Loki surrenders where the Norn Frost's enchantment wears off enabling the supervillains to be defeated. Thor then plans to tell Odin what Loki was doing. Loki begs for Thor not to tell their father or to tell him that he was watching the Scrying Mirror since Odin took away his scrying privelages 3 centuries ago. After Thor, Iron Man, and Spider-Man leave, Loki changes the channel on the Scrying Mirror before Hulk can do another attack on him.
On the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, the supervillains are locked up as they plan their revenge. On the deck of the Helicarrier, it was mentioned that Iron Man's mansion has been repaired and the Helicarrier is back on the air. To get the angst out of Spider-Man, Nick Fury gives Spider-Man a S.H.I.E.L.D. Security Card and a Spider-Bike. As Spider-Man rides the web line off the Helicarrier, the superheroes celebrate their victory. As the Helicarrier takes off, the web line breaks causing Spider-Man and the Spider-Bike to fall.
In the post-credits, J. Jonah Jameson is visiting the Hot Dog Vendor's cart ordering a hot dog from him. Spider-Man lands safely on the nearby streets as his Spider-Bike falls on the Hot Dog Vendor's cart. Getting mustard on him from the resulting incident, J. Jonah Jameson states that Spider-Man must be responsible as Spider-Man sneaks away. | humor | tt3322904 |
Marshal of Laredo | Oh his first day as Marshal of Larado, Red Ryder (Wild Bill Elliott) and his Indian ward, Little Beaver (Robert Blake) are summoned to duty when the town’s bank courier Barton (Tom London) is robbed. However Barton is able to fire his weapon and the fleeing robber whom he recognizes as Ferguson (Bud Geary) who tosses the money he’s stolen into a water trough where it is latter collected by his crime partner, Pretty Boy Murphy (Don Costello). Red captures Ferguson, however Murphy delivers the stolen cash to the head of the gang, saloon owner, Denver Jack (Roy Barcroft).
Denver Jack plans to use a photograph that he took of Ferguson robbing the bank in order to maintain control over Ferguson, less he talk and confess all to the Marshal of Laredo. Jack has maintained similar evidence on all of his men and considers Ferguson as no different.
Denver Jack’s continuing threat of matches around Pretty Boy Murphy, horribly scarred from a fire, continually terrorizes the henchman, demonstrating the cold cruelty of the gang-boss. Denver contacts his lawyer, Larry Randall (Jack McClendon), who tells him that if the courier fails to identify Ferguson, the gunman must be released. Denver Jack sends Pretty Boy to work Barton over and thus frighten the courier into keeping quiet. Barton refuses to identify the gangster and Red is compelled to release Ferguson. Randall is dismayed by Denver’s methods and Larry’s fiancée, Judy Bowers (Peggy Stewart), becomes furious that he is working for such a bad person as Denver Jack. Judy’s father, the banker Mel Bowers () is angry as well and orders Larry to never see his daughter again.
Randall wants to win Judy back and so breaks his ties with Denver Jack and recovers the stolen money, which is returned to the banks. Larry expresses his regrets for working with Jack and says that it is over. Bowers agrees to allow Larry to continue to see his daughter provided that he continues to honor his words and remain straight for six months. However, as they are talking, Bowers is gunned downed by Pretty Boy and Larry is arrested for murder.
Laredo’s Dr. Allen (Wheaton Chambers) tells Red Ryder that he was present at the beginning of Randal and Bowers’ conversation, and that he saw Larry kill the father. Larry is puzzled by Dr. Allen’s statement because the doctor had left before the shooting. Suddenly, he comes to the realization that Denver Jack must also be blackmailing Allen.
Denver Jack approaches Larry Randal at a later time and promises that he will get Randal released from jail if he promises to continue to work for him. Randal refuses and so later, it is Dr. Allen’s testimony that results in a conviction. In the meantime, Red Ryder has become increasingly more suspicious of Denver Jack and arranges for Larry to break out of jail. He follows Randall to Allen’s office where Larry confronts the doctor who confesses that he is being blackmailed by Denver Jack. Overhearing the admission, Red bursts into the room and orders Allen to write a confession. Unfortunately, before the doctor can finish the letter, he is shot dead by Pretty Boy, who fires through a window.
Denver Jack complains loudly to the locals that Red Ryder is in league with Larry Randall and works to stir up the gathering crowd against the Marshal. As the rowdy crowd closes in, Red, Larry and Little Beaver manage to get away. Later that evening, Red returns to Denver Jack’s office and discovers Jack’s blackmail material. Denver Jack and Pretty Boy Murphy capture Red and trap Little Beaver when Larry tries to escape. To protect the Indian boy, Larry allows himself to be returned to jail, now guarded over by Pretty Boy. Read starts a fire and escapes but not before forcing Pretty Boy to confess to the killings of Bowers and Allen.
Red manages to stop Larry’s hanging just it time and stops Denver Jack. With Larry’s name cleared and the criminals arrested, Red, Little Beaver and Red’s aunt, The Duchess (Alice Fleming), watch cheerfully as Larry Randall is once again back together again with Judy Barton. | murder | tt0037902 |
Into Thin Air: Death on Everest | The film portrays the 1996 Mount Everest disaster and the events that preceded it. The film mainly follows Jon Krakauer, the author of the book on which the film is based (Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster (1997)); it also follows the climbing teams of summit guides Rob Hall and Scott Fischer.
The film begins with Krakauer giving a monologue about the events about the disaster. The guides, Rob Hall (Nat Parker), and Scott Fischer (Peter Horton) introduce themselves, their teams, and discuss with the clients how they intend to reach the summit by the set date. Hall's group contains Doug Hansen, a mailman from Seattle, Krakauer, Yasako Namba, and several others. Fischer's group contains a New York socialite, Sandy Pittman, who will perform what Krakauer does for Hall's group, reporting and bring attention. At base camp, Hall speaks with his pregnant wife Jan, in New Zealand, about potential names for their daughter. The groups slowly make their way through camps 2, 3, and 4, and then begin their ascent for the summit. However, in camp 2, Fischer is forced to go all the way back down, so he can take a sick client, Dale Cruz, down for help. Scott refuses help, and returns exhausted and out of breath.
The ascent begins well, with both groups making steady pace. However, upon reaching the bottom of the Hillary step, they realize that there are no fixed ropes. The Sherpa there states it's a two-person job, and the other Sherpa never arrived, mostly due to being too tired and sick from dragging Pittman and all of her heavy equipment all the way up. Mountain Madness guides Anatoli Boukreev and Neil Beidelman set the fixed ropes, but by then dozens of climbers had already reached the step, and now a large jam is at the bottom. Krakauer continues up, and reaches the summit with Anatoli Boukreev, where shortly afterward they are joined by Adventure Consultants guide Andy Harris. Krakauer begins his descent, but reaches the step only the find the jam has only gotten worse, and is forced to wait it out. Meanwhile, Hall is forced to tell client Doug Hansen that they have to turn around and go back. Hansen refuses, as he failed to reach the summit the year before, and he knows he won't be able to afford a third attempt. Hall and Hansen argue before Hall finally caves in and they continue, missing Hall's 2:00 PM turnaround time. Finally, the path down the step clears and Harris begins to descend; Krakauer meanwhile begins to hallucinate from a lack of oxygen. Earlier he had asked Harris to decrease his oxygen flow, but Harris instead increased it, and Krakauer nearly falls over the side, but manages to catch himself. He makes his way down the step and to Harris, and realizes something is wrong with Harris, who thinks the completely full bottles at the oxygen drop are empty. As he descends, he runs into Hansen and Hall, and points out to Hansen that storm clouds are making their way up through the valley and up the mountain.
Shortly after 3 PM, the majority of Hall's and Fischer's groups finally reach the summit. As Krakauer continues his descent, he runs into Scott Fischer, who is completely exhausted and refuses to turn around. Shortly after 4 PM, Rob Hall and Doug Hansen finally reach the summit, where Hall remarks to Hansen that a storm is coming. As he continues to go down, and the weather starts to get bad, Krakauer runs into Beck Weathers, sitting alone by himself in snow. Weathers had eye surgery performed prior to the trip, and has lost vision in his eyes during the summit ascent. He declines to leave with Krakauer, explaining he had promised Rob Hall that he would wait for him to go down. At 4:30, Fischer and his Sherpa, Lopsang, finally reach the summit where Scott feels ill and collapses. Around 5, Krakauer finally reaches the tents at camp 4, where he goes to sleep. The weather continues to worsen, and later, Beidelman, Mike Groom, and the majority of both teams' clients stop to rest, where they run into Beck Weathers, who agrees to descend with them. Storm clouds and thick snowfall cause the guides to lose their positions and not know where they need to go. Higher on the mountain, Hall and Hansen watch as Scott Fischer is dragged by them, so weak he can no longer stand.
Night falls, and Krakauer is awoken in his tent by Rob's Sherpa, Angdorjee, who informs him that the storm is getting increasingly worse, and that Rob and majority of the clients have yet to return. The pair make an attempt to find them, but quickly turn back when they realize the conditions are too treacherous. Meanwhile, Rob attempts to convince Doug to stand up and continue descending, but Doug begs Rob to leave him, telling Rob he will die if he attempts to save him. Rob refuses to leave him behind, and they continue. Scott, suffering from edema, walks off the side of the mountain, and is only saved when his Sherpa pulls him back up with their connected short rope. Scott then begins to fall into unconsciousness, and Lopsang radios for help. Rob continues to struggle down with Doug. In the darkness, Rob slips and falls down, and becomes separated from a hallucinating Doug. He then watches helplessly as Doug, too far away to help, tumbles over the side to his death. Rob is then found by Andy, who attempts to help him up. Andy then leaves, telling Rob he is going to get help. Despite Rob's plea's, Andy continues to go. Andy disappears from view. Rob then hears him cry out, and crawls forward to find Andy's hat lying next to a large drop off, and assumes that Andy has fallen to his death. Rob, buried under snow, communicates with Krakauer attempting to get direction on where he can find oxygen. He gets direction, but then falls down again, and begins to moan. The oxygen bottles are then revealed to be less than twenty feet away from him, but he doesn't see them. Beidelman and Groom's group becomes hopelessly lost, and they take only the clients who can walk with them, dropping Yasuko, Beck, Sandy Pittman, and Charlotte Fox. Scott continues to drift in and out of consciousness, only muttering the words "I am invincible" to his Sherpa, before again losing consciousness. Anatoli Boukreev appears, and helps down Charlotte Fox and Pittman, but is unable to get a third client. Rob begins to hallucinate about seeing his wife Jan, but then snaps outs of it, to realize he is still stuck. He also begins to realize that his hands and his legs are getting extremely frostbitten, and he is having trouble moving. He then blacks out again.
Rob then awakens the next morning, to realize that he is still alive, but barely. He radios the camp, who put him onto the radio with his wife Jan. He asks her if Sarah would be an appropriate name for their daughter, and she agrees. They both tell each other they love them, and then Rob says goodbye to his wife. He dies shortly afterward from hypothermia. Beck Weathers then wakes up, somehow having survived being buried under the snow with no oxygen. Still blinded, he stumbles back to camp, where he receives help. Meanwhile, Anatoli climbs up, and finds the now frozen corpse of Scott Fischer. He says goodbye, and after pulling Fischer's backpack over his face, he leaves. Back at base camp the survivors reminisce about the friends that they have lost. | tragedy | tt0118949 |
Kings Go Forth | In the final year of World War II, units of the United States Army are in the foothills of the Alps between France and Italy, trying to dislodge a unit of German soldiers from a supply post in the middle of a small village. 1st Lt. Sam Loggins (Frank Sinatra) is in charge of a reconnaissance unit that has just lost its radioman. A truckload of fresh young soldiers arrive, one of whom, Corporal Britt Harris (Tony Curtis) admits to radio training and experience—Harris is immediately appointed the unit's radioman by Loggins.
Harris reveals himself at once as a lady's man and a schemer, acquiring girlfriends, food, and other luxury items. Corporal Lindsay (Edward Ryder), in charge of the unit's paperwork and logistics, reveals Harris' story to Loggins: Harris is the son of a wealthy textile mill owner in New Jersey—in order to avoid criminal charges of trying to bribe a member of the local Draft Board with a car, Harris has "volunteered" for combat duty in Europe. Harris does show bravery while rescuing a group of men trapped in a minefield and while attacking a German bunker single-handed, but Loggins still has his reservations about the man.
The Colonel (Karl Swenson) grants Loggins and his unit leave in the seaside town of Nice. While walking by himself on a quay, Loggins is attracted to Monique Blair (Natalie Wood) -- they go to dinner, and she explains she was born in America, but has lived in France since she was a small child. She's unwilling to go out with Loggins again. Loggins ask her to meet him in the same cafe the next week at 8PM. The next week, Loggins waits at the cafe, Monique doesn't show, and he walks out despondent, only to be asked to have a drink by an older American woman who has apparently been waiting for him. He finds out it is Monique's mother, who was checking him out, he passed, and she takes him to her palatial home to join Monique. The two spend a great deal of time together each time Loggins gets his Saturday night pass. One night he tells her he loves her, and Monique finally reveals to him that she is afraid to get involved with a US soldier because her now-dead father was a Negro, and she has seen the general bigotry all American soldiers seem to have. Loggins is confused and leaves, not sure about his feelings.
After a week of anguished consideration, Loggins decides to put aside the former prejudices he would have had about Monique's parentage, and goes to see her. She and her mother are delighted to see Loggins. Loggins invites Monique to go out on a date with him. They end up going to a smokey jazz cafe, where they are surprised to see Harris play a fantastic jazz solo on a trumpet, to the acclaim of the entire French crowd. Harris joins Loggins and Monique at their table, and Loggins is left on the sidelines as Harris and Monique are immediately drawn to each other. Harris and Monique dance closely late into the night. After Loggins takes Monique home, she asks Loggins to tell Harris about her Negro father.
Back on surveillance duty of a town where the Germans have set up, Loggins does so, and it doesn't seem to bother Harris. Then the Germans begin shelling their observation position. After three days of shelling, Loggins suggests to Harris that they should infiltrate the village on a covert mission to observe from a church tower in the middle of town; Loggins goes in to see the Colonel who says he'll pass the idea on up to Headquarters.
The next weekend, Loggins and Harris return to Nice to visit Monique. Once again, Loggins is forced to the sidelines as the handsome and smooth-talking Harris takes over. Loggins returns to his hotel room alone. Harris and Monique stay out most of the night. When Harris returns to the hotel, he tells Loggins he's asked Monique to marry him, and she has said yes. Loggins is shattered, but he puts on a brave face. He tells Harris about the paperwork he will need to fill out to get the army's permission to marry. When they return to their unit, Harris immediately asks for the marriage permission form. Two months pass, and Harris still hasn't received an answer from the army on his request to marry. On his way to report to the Colonel, while talking to Corporal Lindsay, Loggins finds out that Harris had indeed picked up the completed paperwork 3 weeks earlier. In fact, Harris had told the corporal that the whole thing was a gag. Loggins is furious when he hears this.
Thereafter, the Colonel tells Loggins that Headquarters has approved the covert operation of Loggins with Harris as his radioman—Loggins asks for a few hours leave for both of them to take care of some important personal matters in Nice, to which the Colonel agrees.
Loggins and Harris go to the Blair mansion, and Loggins forces Harris to admit to Monique that Harris is not going to marry her. Monique runs away in tears. Harris tries to explain himself to Loggins ("it was a kick"), and Loggins punches him out. Loggins then goes out to find Monique. It turns out she had tried to drown herself, but a fisherman fished her out of the water while she was still alive. Loggins tries to talk to her, but she doesn't want to talk to him.
Back at the US Army base, Loggins and Harris prepare for their mission. Soon after leaving, Loggins tells Harris he is going to kill him. Harris responds that reaction "works both ways". They eye each other suspiciously and cautiously. However, Loggins clarifies that Harris won't 'get it in the back'.
On the mission, they encounter and kill a German soldier together. The duo establishes themselves at 2 AM in the church tower, calls in, and reports their observations, especially that a hidden section of the village contains an enormous German artillery/ammo dump. Loggins sends an order back to the base to begin a bombardment at 4 AM that will certainly destroy most of the village. They leave the tower, and are soon discovered by a German patrol. Harris is shot by the Germans and dies after Loggins drags him out of the line of fire, but Loggins is pinned down. The German officers, panicking at the thought of American soldiers in the village, order an immediate evacuation. Hearing this, Loggins grabs the radio and tells the US artillery to begin firing right now. Shells fall on the village and the ammo dump, and everything blows up.
The movie ends with Loggins relating how he was found under the rubble still alive by US troops, and brought to a hospital, where his right arm was amputated. He had gotten two letters from Monique. In one of them she says that she has learned that Harris was killed. She also tells Loggins that her mother has died. When Loggins is finally released from the hospital after many months, he decides to go to Nice to visit Monique one last time before returning to the States. He finds that she is now heading up a school for war orphans. She invites Loggins to come into one of the classrooms. As a tribute to Loggins and all the American soldiers who fought to free France, the children sing a song of appreciation. During the singing, Monique and Loggins look earnestly at each other. Will their romance bloom once again? | romantic, melodrama | tt0051819 |
Fanaa | Zooni Ali Beg (Kajol) is a blind Kashmiri woman who travels for the first time with a dance group to New Delhi to perform in a ceremony for Republic Day. On her journey, she meets Rehan Qadri (Aamir Khan), a Casanova tour guide who flirts with her. Although her friends warn Zooni about him, she cannot resist falling in love. On her last night in Delhi, Rehan and Zooni spend the night together and end up in bed. As Zooni is leaving the next day on a train, Rehan comes in and takes her away with him. Her parents arrive in Delhi to marry them. Zooni has a procedure done that helps her see again, but when she comes out of surgery, she finds out that Rehan was killed in a bomb blast in the city, and is heartbroken. She is taken to the hospital mortuary, and told to identify his body. As Zooni cannot see anybody there, she is quickly made aware of the sweater that Rehan was wearing which she knitted for him covered in blood and soot.
Meanwhile, Malini Tyagi (Tabu) is a special intelligence agent brought in to assess the threat of the bomb blast and the group responsible, an independent organization fighting for an independent Kashmir known as IKF. She believes it is the work of one man who is helping IKF. It is revealed that the man is Rehan, who placed the bomb blast in motion, then faked his death so Zooni wouldn't come looking for him. He privately admits that he loves Zooni, but also concedes that he can never see her again because of his dangerous life.
Seven years later, Rehan is on an Indian army camp on another mission for the IKF. IKF has acquired a nuclear weapon but needs to get hold of the trigger, which is in the army's possession. Rehan manages to steal it, but Tyagi has figured out his plan and sends forces to stop him. In the ensuing shootout, Rehan is injured severely. He makes his way to a remote house looking for help. The door opens, and it turns out to be Zooni's house. It's also revealed that Zooni had given birth to Rehan's son after Rehan's supposed death. Zooni and her father manage to save Rehan, though neither knows his real identity. Though initially distant from them, Rehan develops an affection for his son and becomes friendly towards Zooni and her father.
Rehan eventually reveals his true identity to them. Initially hurt, Zooni refuses to let Rehan leave her again, and the two of them are married by her father. Tyagi has a report published about Rehan, warning the public that he is a dangerous terrorist. Zooni's father sees this report, and realizes that it's Rehan. He holds him at gunpoint, but Rehan thwarts him and manages to get the trigger back. In the process, though, he accidentally throws Zooni's father off a ledge, killing him. He radios the IKF from an army officer's house describing his position. However, the officer discovers Rehan, who then kills the officer.
Zooni finds her father's body later, and when she tries to tell Rehan, he covers. However, Zooni later sees the news report, and finds the trigger. She takes her son and the trigger, and goes to the officer's house. When she finds blood there, she radios for help, and gets in touch with Tyagi, who tells her to stop Rehan at any cost. Rehan arrives at the house the next day, and tries to convince Zooni to hand over the trigger. He takes it from her, saying the IKF will kill her and their son if he doesn't. Zooni, though, follows him outside and shoots him in the leg. Rehan draws his gun on Zooni, but can't bring himself to shoot her. Zooni shoots him again to stop him. Tyagi arrives and stops the IKF from shooting Zooni. Rehan dies in Zooni's arms.
Zooni and her son later visit the graves of both her father and Rehan, who are buried next to each other. When the son asks if his father was wrong, Zooni tells him that his father did what he thought was right. Both tell Rehan that they love him before leaving. | tragedy, romantic, murder | tt0439662 |
Neverwhere | Richard Mayhew, a Scot living in London, encounters an injured girl named Door on the street one night. Despite his fiancée's protests he decides to help her; upon doing so he ceases to exist on Earth and becomes real only to the denizens of 'London Below', whose inhabitants are generally invisible and non-existent to the people of 'London Above'. He loses his house, his job and nearly his mind as he travels London Below in an attempt to make sense out of it all, find a way back, and help Door survive as she is hunted down by hired assassins.
In London Below the various familiar names of London all take on a new significance: for example Knightsbridge becomes "Night's Bridge", a stone bridge whose darkness takes its toll in human life; The Angel, Islington is an actual angel. London Below is a parallel world in and beneath the sewers. Its inhabitants are the homeless, but also people from other times, such as Roman legionaries and medieval monks, as well as fictional and fantastical characters.
=== Characters and cast ===
Richard Mayhew (Gary Bakewell) – a young businessman, who discovers the world of London Below one day after helping the injured Door recover in his flat.
Door (Laura Fraser) – A young woman from London Below, the daughter of a noble family who were all murdered shortly before the beginning of the story. She possesses her family's innate ability to "open" things (and not just doors).
The Marquis de Carabas (Paterson Joseph) – The Marquis is arrogant, cunning and very self-confident. Though very much the trickster, he is a loyal friend of Door and her family. This character was inspired by Puss in Boots. Gaiman stated this as the starting point for the character, and imagining "Who would own a cat like this?"
Mr. Croup (Hywel Bennett) – The talkative half of the pair of assassins, the Messrs. He is short, fat, and speaks in a pompous and verbose manner. Like his partner, Mr. Vandemar, he seems to be able to simply move from one place to another very quickly despite his ungainly appearance. He is the brains of the pair and seems be the one calling the shots, and he apparently has a taste (literally) for fine china. Much of the imagery used to describe him is that of a fox.
Mr. Vandemar (Clive Russell) – Dull-witted, tall, and gangly, Vandemar is Croup's polar opposite. He does not speak much, and when he does, his statements are often laconic and blunt. He is quite brutish and seems to enjoy nothing more than killing and destroying things (even practising his golf swing with live toads). He also has a tendency to eat live animals. The descriptive imagery likens him to a hound or a wolf, and he even howls at one point when catching up with his mark.
Old Bailey (Trevor Peacock) – An old friend of the Marquis, he keeps the company of pigeons on the rooftops and wears clothing made of feathers. He became indebted to the Marquis long ago, and so is charged with keeping a portion of his life safe for him.
Hunter (Tanya Moodie) – A warrior of London Below; her feats are legendary. Her lifelong obsession is to slay the great Beast of London. The imagery used to describe her likens her to a lioness.
The Angel Islington (Peter Capaldi) – An angel dwelling in the sewers of London Below. Its duty is to watch over London Below, though (or maybe because) it failed at its previous task: guarding the city of Atlantis.
Lamia (Tamsin Greig) – The leader of a group of vampire-like seductresses, dressed in dark velvet, who "suck the warmth" from their victims.
The Abbott (Earl Cameron) – The leader of a group of armed black friars guarding a special key at Blackfriars.
The Earl (Freddie Jones)
=== Episodes ===
Neverwhere was first broadcast on BBC Two from 12 September 1996. There are six half-hour episodes:
Door
Knightsbridge
Earl's Court to Islington
Blackfriars
Down Street
As Above, So Below | alternate reality, fantasy | tt0282792 |
The Marseille Contract | Set in the mid-1950s, the story is about the "Wormsley Common Gang", a boys' gang named after the place where they live. The protagonist Trevor, or "T.", devises a plan to destroy a beautiful two-hundred-year-old house that survived The Blitz. The gang accepts the plan by T., their new leader, and executes it when the owner of the house, Mr. Thomas (whom the gang call "Old Misery"), is away during a bank holiday weekend. Their plan is to destroy the house from inside, then tear down the remaining outer structure. Mr. Thomas returns home early, however, and the gang locks him in the outhouse. T. refuses to stop until the destruction job is complete, because even the facade is valuable and could be reused. Inside, they find a mattress filled with money—which they burn. The final destruction of the house occurs when a lorry pulls away a support pole from the side of the house. Mr. Thomas is released from the outhouse by the lorry driver to see the rubble of what once was his home. When the driver finds the situation funny Mr. Thomas is incensed, but he is still unable to stop laughing. | murder | tt0071412 |
Beauty and the Beast | A widower merchant lives in a mansion with his six children, three sons and three daughters. All his daughters are very beautiful, but the youngest, Beauty, is the most lovely, as well as kind, well-read, and pure of heart; while the two elder sisters, in contrast, are wicked, selfish, vain, and spoiled. They secretly taunt Beauty and treat her more like a servant than a sister. The merchant eventually loses all of his wealth in a tempest at sea which sinks most of his merchant fleet. He and his children are consequently forced to live in a small farmhouse and work for their living.
Some years later, the merchant hears that one of the trade ships he had sent off has arrived back in port, having escaped the destruction of its compatriots. Before leaving, he asks his children if they wish for him to bring any gifts back for them. The sons ask for weaponry and horses to hunt with, whereas his oldest daughters ask for clothing, jewels, and the finest dresses possible as they think his wealth has returned. Beauty is satisfied with the promise of a rose as none grow in their part of the country. The merchant, to his dismay, finds that his ship's cargo has been seized to pay his debts, leaving him penniless and unable to buy his children's presents.
During his return, the merchant becomes lost during a storm. Seeking shelter, he enters a dazzling palace. A hidden figure opens the giant doors and silently invites him in. The merchant finds tables inside laden with food and drink, which seem to have been left for him by the palace's invisible owner. The merchant accepts this gift and spends the night there. The next morning, as the merchant is about to leave, he sees a rose garden and recalls that Beauty had desired a rose. Upon picking the loveliest rose he can find, the merchant is confronted by a hideous "Beast" which tells him that for taking his most precious possession after accepting his hospitality, the merchant must die. The merchant begs to be set free, arguing that he had only picked the rose as a gift for his youngest daughter. The Beast agrees to let him give the rose to Beauty, but only if the merchant or one of his daughters will return.
The merchant is upset but accepts this condition. The Beast sends him on his way, with wealth, jewels and fine clothes for his sons and daughters, and stresses that Beauty must never know about his deal. The merchant, upon arriving home, tries to hide the secret from Beauty, but she pries it from him. Her brothers say they will go to the castle and fight the Beast, but the merchant dissuades them, saying they will stand no chance against the monster. Beauty then agrees to go to the Beast's castle. The Beast receives her graciously and informs her that she is now mistress of the castle, and he is her servant. He gives her lavish clothing and food and carries on lengthy conversations with her. Every night, the Beast asks Beauty to marry him, only to be refused each time. After each refusal, Beauty dreams of a handsome prince who pleads with her to answer why she keeps refusing him, to which she replies that she cannot marry the Beast because she loves him only as a friend. Beauty does not make the connection between the handsome prince and the Beast and becomes convinced that the Beast is holding the prince captive somewhere in the castle. She searches and discovers multiple enchanted rooms, but never the prince from her dreams.
For several months, Beauty lives a life of luxury at the Beast's palace, having every whim catered to by invisible servants, with no end of riches to amuse her and an endless supply of exquisite finery to wear. Eventually, she becomes homesick and begs the Beast to allow her to go see her family. He allows it on the condition that she returns exactly a week later. Beauty agrees to this and sets off for home with an enchanted mirror and ring. The mirror allows her to see what is going on back at the Beast's castle, and the ring allows her to return to the castle in an instant when turned three times around her finger. Her older sisters are surprised to find her well fed and dressed in finery. Beauty tries to share the magnificent gowns and jewels the Beast gave her with her sisters, but they turn into rags at her sisters' touch, and are restored to their splendour when returned to Beauty, as the Beast meant them only for her. Her sisters are envious when they hear of her happy life at the castle, and, hearing that she must return to the Beast on a certain day, beg her to stay another day, even putting onion in their eyes to make it appear as though they are weeping. They hope that the Beast will be angry with Beauty for breaking her promise and eat her alive. Beauty's heart is moved by her sisters' false show of love, and she agrees to stay.
Beauty begins to feel guilty about breaking her promise to the Beast and uses the mirror to see him back at the castle. She is horrified to discover that the Beast is lying half-dead from heartbreak near the rose bushes from which her father plucked the rose, and she immediately uses the ring to return to the Beast.
Beauty weeps over the Beast, saying that she loves him. When her tears strike him, the Beast is transformed into the handsome prince from Beauty's dreams. The Prince informs her that long ago a fairy turned him into a hideous beast after he refused to let her in from the rain and that only by finding true love, despite his ugliness, could the curse be broken. He and Beauty are married and they live happily ever after together. | romantic, fantasy | tt1202150 |
Mughal-E-Azam | Emperor Akbar (Prithviraj Kapoor), who does not have a male heir, undertakes a pilgrimage to a shrine to pray that his wife Jodhabai (Durga Khote) give birth to a son. Later, a maid brings the emperor news of his son's birth. Overjoyed at his prayers being answered, Akbar gives the maid his ring, and promises to grant her anything she desires.
The son, Prince Salim, grows up to be spoiled, flippant, and self-indulgent. His father sends him off to war, to teach him courage and discipline. Fourteen years later, Salim returns as a distinguished soldier (Dilip Kumar) and falls in love with court dancer Nadira, whom the emperor has renamed Anarkali (Madhubala), meaning pomegranate blossom. The relationship is discovered by the jealous Bahar (Nigar Sultana), a dancer of a higher rank, who wants the prince to love her so that she may one day become queen. Unsuccessful in winning Salim's love, she exposes his forbidden relationship with Anarkali. Salim pleads to marry Anarkali, but his father refuses, and imprisons her. Despite her treatment, Anarkali refuses to reject Salim, as Akbar demands.
Salim rebels and amasses an army to confront Akbar and rescue Anarkali. Defeated in battle, Salim is sentenced to death by his father, but is told that the sentence will be revoked if Anarkali, now in hiding, is handed over to die in his place. Anarkali gives herself up to save the prince's life, and is condemned to death by being entombed alive. Before her sentence is carried out, she begs to have a few hours with Salim as his make-believe wife. Her request is granted, as she has agreed to drug Salim so that he cannot interfere with her entombment. As Anarkali is being walled up, Akbar is reminded that he still owes her mother a favour, as it was she who brought him news of Salim's birth. Anarkali's mother pleads for her daughter's life. The emperor has a change of heart, but although he wants to release Anarkali he cannot, because of his duty to his country. He therefore arranges for her secret escape into exile with her mother, but demands that the pair are to live in obscurity, and that Salim is never to know that Anarkali is still alive. | tragedy, romantic | tt0054098 |
La dolce vita | Based on the most common interpretation of the storyline, the film can be divided into a prologue, seven major episodes interrupted by an intermezzo, and an epilogue (see also Structure, below). If the evenings of each episode were joined with the morning of the respective preceding episode together as a day, they would form seven consecutive days, which may not necessarily be the case.
=== Prologue ===
1st Day Sequence: A helicopter transports a statue of Christ over an ancient Roman aqueduct outside Rome while a second, Marcello Rubini's news helicopter, follows it into the city. The news helicopter is momentarily sidetracked by a group of bikini-clad women sunbathing on the rooftop of a high-rise apartment building. Hovering above, Marcello uses gestures to elicit phone numbers from them but fails in his attempt then shrugs and continues on following the statue into Saint Peter's Square.
=== Episode 1 ===
1st Night Sequence: Marcello meets Maddalena by chance in an exclusive nightclub. A beautiful and wealthy heiress, Maddalena is tired of Rome and constantly in search of new sensations while Marcello finds Rome suits him as a jungle he can hide in. They make love in the bedroom of a prostitute to whom they had given a ride home in Maddalena’s Cadillac.
1st Dawn Sequence: Marcello returns to his apartment at dawn to find that his fiancée, Emma, has overdosed. On the way to the hospital, he declares his everlasting love to her and again as she lies in a semiconscious state in the emergency room. While waiting frantically for her recovery, however, he tries to make a phone call to Maddalena.
=== Episode 2 ===
2nd Day Sequence: That day, he goes on assignment for the arrival of Sylvia, a famous Swedish-American actress, at Ciampino airport where she is met by a horde of news reporters.
During Sylvia's press conference, Marcello calls home to ensure Emma has taken her medication while reassuring her that he is not alone with Sylvia. After the film star confidently replies to the barrage of journalists' questions, her boyfriend Robert (Lex Barker) enters the room late and drunk. To Sylvia's producer, Marcello casually recommends that Sylvia be taken on a tour of St Peter's.
Inside St Peter's dome, a news reporter complains that Sylvia is "an elevator" because none of them can match her energetic climb up the numerous flights of stairs. Inspired, Marcello maneuvers forward to be alone with her when they finally reach the balcony overlooking the Vatican.
2nd Night Sequence: That evening, the infatuated Marcello dances with Sylvia in the Baths of Caracalla. Sylvia's natural sensuality triggers raucous partying while Robert, her bored fiancé, draws caricatures and reads a newspaper. His humiliating remark to her causes Sylvia to leave the group, eagerly followed by Marcello and his paparazzi colleagues. Finding themselves alone, Marcello and Sylvia spend the rest of the evening in the alleys of Rome where they wade into the Trevi Fountain.
2nd Dawn Sequence: Like a magic spell that has suddenly been broken, dawn arrives at the very moment Sylvia playfully "anoints" Marcello's head with fountain water. They drive back to Sylvia's hotel to find an enraged Robert waiting for her in his car. Robert slaps Sylvia, orders her to go to bed, and then assaults Marcello who takes it in stride.
=== Episode 3a ===
3rd Day Sequence: Marcello meets Steiner, his distinguished intellectual friend, inside a church playing Bach on the organ. Steiner shows off his book of Sanskrit grammar.
=== Episode 4 ===
4th Day Sequence: Late afternoon, Marcello, his photographer friend Paparazzo, and Emma drive to the outskirts of Rome to cover the story of the purported sighting of the Madonna by two children. Although the Catholic Church is officially skeptical, a huge crowd of devotees and reporters gathers at the site.
3rd Night Sequence: That night, the event is broadcast over Italian radio and television. Blindly following the two children from corner to corner in a downpour, the crowd tears a small tree apart for its branches and leaves said to have sheltered the Madonna. Meanwhile, Emma prays to the Virgin Mary to be given sole possession of Marcello's heart.
3rd Dawn Sequence: The gathering ends at dawn with the crowd mourning a sick child, a pilgrim brought by his mother to be healed, but trampled to death in the melee.
=== Episode 3b ===
4th Night Sequence: One evening, Marcello and Emma attend a gathering at Steiner’s luxurious home where they are introduced to a group of intellectuals who recite poetry, strum the guitar, offer philosophical ideas, and listen to sounds of nature recorded on tape. An American woman, whose poetry Marcello has read and admired, recommends that Marcello avoid the "prisons" of commitment: "Stay free, available, like me. Never get married. Never choose. Even in love, it's better to be chosen." Emma appears enchanted with Steiner's home and children, telling Marcello that one day he will have a home like Steiner's.
Outside on the terrace, Marcello confesses to Steiner his admiration for all he stands for, but Steiner admits he is torn between the security that a materialistic life affords and his longing for a more spiritual albeit insecure way of life. Steiner philosophizes about the need for love in the world and fears what his children may grow up to face one day.
=== Intermezzo ===
5th Day Sequence: Marcello spends the afternoon working on his novel at a seaside restaurant where he meets Paola, a young waitress from Perugia playing Perez Prado's cha-cha Patricia on the jukebox and then humming its tune. He asks her if she has a boyfriend, then describes her as an angel in Umbrian paintings.
=== Episode 5 ===
5th Night Sequence: Marcello meets his father (Annibale Ninchi) visiting Rome on the Via Veneto. With Paparazzo, they go to the Cha-Cha-Cha Club where Marcello introduces his father to Fanny, a beautiful dancer and one of his past one-night stands (he had promised to get her picture in the paper, but failed to do it). Fanny takes a liking to his father. Marcello tells Paparazzo that as a child he had never seen much of his father, who would spend weeks away from home. Fanny invites Marcello’s father back to her flat, and two other dancers invite the two younger men to go with them. Marcello leaves the others when they get to the dancers' neighborhood. Fanny comes out of her house, upset that Marcello's father has become ill.
4th Dawn Sequence: Marcello's father has suffered what seems to be a mild heart attack. Marcello wants him to stay with him in Rome so they can get to know each other, but his father, weakened, wants to go home and gets in a taxi to catch the first train home. He leaves Marcello forlorn, on the street, watching the taxi leave.
=== Episode 6 ===
6th Night Sequence: Marcello, Nico, and other friends met on the Via Veneto are driven to a castle owned by aristocrats at Bassano di Sutri outside Rome. There is already a party long in progress, and the party-goers are bleary-eyed and intoxicated. By chance, Marcello meets Maddalena again. The two of them explore a suite of ruins annexed to the castle. Maddalena seats Marcello in a vast room and then closets herself in another room connected by an echo chamber. As a disembodied voice, Maddalena asks him to marry her; Marcello professes his love for her, avoiding answering her proposal. Another man kisses and embraces Maddalena, who loses interest in Marcello. He rejoins the group, and eventually spends the night with Jane, an American artist and heiress.
5th Dawn Sequence: Burnt out and bleary-eyed, the group returns at dawn to the main section of the castle, to be met by the matriarch of the castle, who is on her way to mass, accompanied by priests in a procession.
=== Episode 3c ===
7th Night Sequence: Marcello and Emma are alone in his sports car on an isolated road. Emma starts an argument by professing her love, and tries to get out of the car; Marcello pleads with her not to get out. Emma says that Marcello will never find another woman who loves him the way she does. Marcello becomes enraged, telling her that he cannot live with her smothering, maternal love. He now wants her to get out of the car, but she refuses. With some violence (a bite from her and a slap from him), he throws her out of the car and drives off, leaving her alone on a deserted road at night. Hours later, Emma hears his car approaching as she picks flowers by the roadside. She gets into the car with neither of them saying a word.
6th Dawn Sequence: Marcello and Emma are asleep in bed, tenderly intertwined; Marcello receives a phone call. He rushes to the Steiners' apartment and learns that Steiner has killed his two children and himself.
6th Day Sequence: After waiting with the police for Steiner’s wife to return home, he meets her outside to break the terrible news while paparazzi swarm around her snapping pictures.
=== Episode 7 ===
6th Night Sequence: An unspecified amount of time later, an older Marcello—now with gray in his hair—and a group of partygoers break into a Fregene beach house owned by Riccardo, a friend of Marcello's. To celebrate her recent divorce from Riccardo, Nadia performs a striptease to Perez Prado's cha-cha Patricia. The drunken Marcello attempts to provoke the other partygoers into an orgy. Due to their inebriated states, however, the party descends into mayhem with Marcello throwing pillow feathers around the room as he rides a young woman crawling on her hands and knees. Riccardo shows up at the house and angrily tells the partiers to leave.
=== Epilogue ===
7th Dawn Sequence: The party proceeds to the beach at dawn where they find a modern-day leviathan, a bloated, stingray-like creature, caught in the fishermen's nets. In his stupor, Marcello comments on how its eyes stare even in death.
7th Day Sequence: Paola, the adolescent waitress from the seaside restaurant in Fregene, calls to Marcello from across an estuary but the words they exchange are lost on the wind, drowned out by the crash of the waves. He signals his inability to understand what she is saying or interpret her gestures. He shrugs and returns to the partygoers; one of the women joins him and they hold hands as they walk away from the beach. In a long final close-up, Paola waves to Marcello then stands watching him with an enigmatic smile. | murder, cult, psychedelic, philosophical, satire | tt0053779 |
True Grit | Mattie Ross's father was murdered by Tom Chaney when she was 14 years old. While collecting her father's body in Fort Smith, Arkansas, Mattie asks the local sheriff about the search for Chaney. He tells her that Chaney has fled with "Lucky" Ned Pepper and his gang into Indian Territory, where the sheriff has no authority, so she inquires about hiring a Deputy U.S. Marshal. The sheriff gives three recommendations, and Mattie chooses Rooster Cogburn. Cogburn initially rebuffs her offer, not believing she has the money to hire him, but she raises the money by aggressively horse-trading with Colonel Stonehill.
Texas Ranger LaBoeuf arrives in town, pursuing Chaney for the murder of a Texas State Senator. LaBoeuf proposes joining Cogburn, but Mattie refuses his offer. She wishes Chaney to be hanged in Arkansas for her father's murder, not in Texas for killing the senator. Mattie also insists on traveling with Cogburn but he leaves without her, having gone with LaBoeuf to apprehend Chaney and split the reward.
After being refused passage on the ferry that conveyed Cogburn and LaBoeuf, Mattie crosses the river on horseback. LaBoeuf expresses his displeasure by birching Mattie with a stick, but Cogburn eventually allows Mattie to accompany them. After a dispute over their respective service with the Confederate States of America, Cogburn ends their arrangement and LaBoeuf leaves to pursue Chaney on his own. Cogburn and Mattie meet a trail doctor who directs them to an empty dugout for shelter. They find two outlaws, Quincy and Moon, and interrogate them. Quincy insists they have no information about the Pepper gang, but eventually Moon divulges what he knows; Quincy fatally stabs Moon, and Cogburn shoots Quincy dead. Before dying, Moon says Pepper and his gang will be returning for fresh horses that night.
LaBoeuf arrives at the dugout and is confronted by the Pepper gang. Cogburn, hiding on the hillside with Mattie, shoots two gang members and accidentally hits LaBoeuf, but Pepper escapes. However, Cogburn and LaBoeuf argue the next day, and the latter departs again. While retrieving water from a stream, Mattie encounters Chaney. She shoots him, but he survives and drags her back to Pepper, who forces Cogburn to leave by threatening to kill her. Pepper leaves Mattie alone with Chaney, ordering him not to harm her or he will not get paid after his remount arrives.
Chaney tries to knife Mattie, but LaBoeuf appears and knocks Chaney out. They watch from a distance as Cogburn fights the remaining members of Pepper's gang, killing two and wounding Ned before his horse is shot and falls, trapping his leg, whereupon LaBoeuf snipes Pepper. Chaney regains consciousness and knocks out LaBoeuf, but Mattie seizes LaBoeuf's rifle and shoots Chaney in the chest. The recoil knocks her into a deep pit, where she is bitten by a rattlesnake. Cogburn cuts into her hand to suck out as much of the venom as he can, then rides day and night to reach a doctor, carrying her on foot after her horse collapses from exhaustion.
Mattie's left forearm is amputated due to gangrene from the snakebite. Cogburn stays until she is out of danger, but leaves before she regains consciousness. She never sees Cogburn or LaBoeuf again, despite writing a letter inviting Cogburn to collect the money she owed him. Twenty-five years later, she receives a note from Cogburn inviting her to a travelling Wild West show where he now performs. She arrives, only to learn that he died three days earlier. She has his body moved to her family cemetery. Standing over Cogburn's grave, she reflects on her decision to move his remains, and about never having married. | murder | tt0078422 |
Blood and Chocolate | Vivian (Agnes Bruckner) is a nineteen-year-old werewolf born in Bucharest, Romania to American parents who then moved back to America. When Vivian was nine years old, her parents and two siblings were killed by two hunters who then proceeded to burn down their house. She then moved back to Bucharest to live with her aunt Astrid (Katja Riemann), who was the mate of the pack's leader, Gabriel (Olivier Martinez) at that time. To Astrid's distress, Gabriel left her after seven years in accordance with pack law to choose a new mate. The culmination of another seven years is only a few months away and Gabriel wants the reluctant Vivian as his.
This is not, however, what she wants. She begins a romance with a graphic novelist Aiden (Hugh Dancy) who is researching for his latest book. Though he is human, he knows much about her kind, the Loups-Garoux (werewolves). Their romance is closely watched by her cousin Rafe (Bryan Dick) and his friends Ulf (Chris Geere), Gregor (Tom Harper), Finn (John Kerr), and Willem (Jack Wilson), together known as The Five. Believing that she is telling him all their secrets- as seen by a drawing he did of her and wolves because he knew her as "The Wolf Girl"- and may grow to be a danger to their pack, Rafe tells Gabriel of them. Gabriel then tells Rafe that Aiden must leave or he must be dealt with.
Rafe lures Aiden to an abandoned church with the ruse that Vivian wanting to reconnect and attempts to scare him away. When this doesn't work, Rafe attacks and underestimates Aiden who defends himself and forces him back into a table where he cuts himself. Aiden, who did not know prior what Vivian and her friends were, sees the golden glow of the Loups-Garoux and realizes what he's been dating. The two fight, with Aiden attacking Rafe with a silver pendant and Rafe turning to a wolf, until Aiden eventually gains the upper hand and sends both over the rail, killing Rafe.
Afterwards, Aiden confronts Vivian about what she is, tempting her with his blood. She does not give in but is hurt that Aiden would think she was such a monster. Not long after, Aiden is captured by the pack to answer for killing Rafe, Gabriel's son. He is made to run through the forest while being chased by the pack. If the pack catches him, he dies. If he makes it to the river and crosses it, he lives. Vivian is scared for him and changes into her wolf form, a white wolf, to save him from the rest of the pack. Aiden makes it to the river by confusing the pack, using his blood to spread his scent and make it harder for the pack to track him. Gabriel, however, is angry that Aiden made it to the river and attempts to follow him anyway, to kill him. Vivian helps to protect Aiden by throwing Gabriel off. Aiden, not realizing that the white wolf is Vivian, strikes her with a silver knife causing her to slowly die unless she gets an antidote.
After hiding from the pack, Aiden and Vivian find the pharmacist who has the antidote for the silver poisoning and steals it from him, but not before he calls the rest of the pack. After being chased, Vivian tells Aiden to save himself and is captured by the pack. She is held in a cage and taunted by the rest of the five while Gabriel attempts to curve her to his way of thinking. Aiden comes to Vivian's rescue and in the end Vivian has to kill Gabriel.
Aiden and Vivian go towards the age of hope. Driving past other Loups-Garous, the wolves are shown to bare their necks in respect to Vivian and Aiden, showing Vivian to possibly be the new leader of the pack. | revenge, horror, murder, romantic, flashback | tt0397044 |
Khaleja | A remote village named Pali in Andhra Pradesh is hounded by an unknown disease, and several villagers loose their life each month. The village Tantric (Rao Ramesh) predicts that a powerful man will come to their rescue as God. He assigns his assistant Sidhappa (Shafi) the duty to find a man with such unknown supernatural power, and bring him to their village.
Meanwhile, Alluri Seetarama Raju alias Raju (Mahesh Babu) is an eccentric Orange Cab driver lives in Hyderabad, with his grandfather (Kota Srinivasa Rao), who is a teacher. Raju is currently in Rajasthan in search of the family of a man named Bilavar Singh. In his journey, He meets a Gemini TV television reporter Baabji (Sunil) who comes to Rajasthan to shoot a travel documentary.
Raju introduces himself to Baabji and tells him the reason for him being in Rajasthan. He describes a woman named Subhashini (Anushka Shetty), whom he considers brings bad luck to him. Previously he encountered her in various occasions in which she damages his taxi due to her reckless driving. Raju lands in hospital one day when Subhashini mixes epsom salt laxative intended for someone else, in Raju's coffee thinking that it meets her at a coffee shop to collect the compensation for his taxi's damages from her. For this reason, he considers her a bad luck.
One day, he drives two men, Geology Scientist Dr. Paranji and his assistant Bilavar Singh, to their destination the Geological Survey of India. But he sees them getting gunned down by some hench men and Bilavar falls out of a window and lands straight on Raju's taxi, completely destroying it. Since Bilavar has insurance, Raju's boss tells him to deliver the insurance check of Rs. 5,00,000 to Bilavar Singh's family in Girdwala, Rajasthan and get Rs. 1,00,000 in return to pay for his car damages.
Meanwhile, Subhashini's father, business magnate Durga Prasad (Tanikella Bharani), brings her a match, another business magnate GK's (Prakash Raj) son. The main reason for the proposal is to establish a strong business partnership. GK's son takes her to Rajasthan for a date. But Subhashini runs away after she sees a condom packet drop from his pocket and realizes his true intentions. GK finds out about it and informs Durga Prasad and promises to bring Subhashini back. He sends his henchman, Govardhan (Subbaraju) to Rajasthan in search of Subhashini. To Raju's dismay, Subhashini finds Raju and Baabji and learns that she is in Rajasthan. Subhashini, Baabji, Raju, and a botanist Tom (Ali) find Girdwala and hand over the check to Bilavar Singh's family, but Raju refuses to ask for the Rs. 1,00,000 when he sees the family's poverty. Tom remains in the village as the villagers want to punish him for cutting a sentimental plant, Baabji goes away with his shooting team, but does not offer them a ride as he is scared of Subhashini's reckless behavior.
As Raju and Subhashini return, Govardhan's men attack, stab Raju, and take Subhashini after knocking her unconscious. But Raju survives, fights and kills almost all of Govardhan's men, while Govardhan escapes from the scenario leaving Subhashini behind. Just as Raju goes unconscious, Sidhappa finds him and believes he is the God after seeing the omens. Sidhappa and Subhashini take Raju to Pali, where the villagers treat his wounds. After waking up, he finds all of the villagers praising him as Man God. He finds out from Subhashini that they are in Pali, and that the villagers see him as the supernatural man God that the village Tantric was describing about, and who will rescue the village. Initially reluctant to help them out, he escapes to Hyderabad where he hands over Subhashini to her father. After realizing that Tom and Siddappa followed him to Hyderabad, Raju puts fate to test and when he understands the concept of deityhood and god, he makes it a goal to solve the mystical series of deaths in the village. After tracking down a doctor (who works for GK), the dean of the medical college run by GK (who set up the medical camp in Pali), Govardhan and Miriyam (Brahmanandam), GK's lawyer, Raju discovers that the plastic factory in Pali deposits it's wastes in the driking water source nearby, thus contaminating and killing the villagers. While Tom and Siddappa think this is the end of the story, Raju suspects that there is more to the story, that so many villagers are dying due to the plastic factory waste that is being contaminated with drinking water, and GK actually wants the villagers in Pali to die, which was why GK had the Government's medical camp removed periodically. He finds GK's assistant (Archana) and suspects that she has something to do with GK's plan as she did not get into his taxi along with Geologist Paranji, indicating that she knew beforehand that he was going to be killed. Raju inquires her about GK's intentions, who reveals that Paranji discovered earlier that there is a large Iridium deposit under Pali, which is worth billions, and informed GK about it.
Despite GK's warning to Paranji of not revealing it to anybody else, he tries to inform the Geological Survey of India about the deposits, which was why he and Bilavar Singh, who was with him, were killed that day. GK suspects that Raju might also know about the Iridium deposit because he was with Paranji when he was killed which was why GK sent Govardhan to kill him, not to retrieve Subhashini. Raju was lured to Girdwala under the cover of delivering the insurance check to Bilavar Singh's family (GK had the insurance documents planted) and was attacked by Govardhan. GK needs the strong plastic glass from the plastic factory to pack the Iridium. He wanted the Pali villagers to vacate (to dig the Iridium ore without trouble) on their own to avoid suspicion, which was why he poisoned Pali's environment using the plastic factory's waste.
GK kills his assistant because she revealed everything to Raju. GK then heads to Pali to kill all of the villagers before the truth goes out to the public. The village head warns GK that Raju is their God and that Raju will bring death to GK and keep the Pali's population at 534 and not let anyone die in the wrath of GK. Raju arrives at Pali along with Sidhappa. GK immediately shoots Sidhappa and kills him, reducing the population to 533. Raju angrily kills all of GK's goons, and severs GK's palm. A terrified GK starts escaping with Raju in pursuit. Raju catches up to him, and GK dies when a religious knife hanging from a nearby tree falls and stabs him in the neck. The village head finally reveals that Raju fulfilled his mission as God to save the village as, although Sidhappa was killed, another baby was born to keep the village's population at 534. | violence, murder | tt1582519 |
The One That Got Away | Luftwaffe fighter pilot Franz von Werra (Hardy Krüger) is shot down during the Battle of Britain and captured. He wagers with his RAF interrogator (Michael Goodliffe) at the POW reception centre, Air Defence Intelligence, located at Trent Park in Cockfosters, near Barnet in Hertfordshire, that he will escape within six months.
Initially, von Werra is sent to No 1 prisoner-of-war (POW) camp Grizedale Hall in the Furness area of Lancashire. His first escape attempt results in his recapture after an intense manhunt.
Subsequently, von Werra is sent to a more secure POW camp (based on the Hayes Conference Centre) near Swanwick, Derbyshire. He and four others escape through a tunnel. The others pair up, but von Werra continues alone. Reaching Codnor Park railway station, he impersonates a Dutch pilot and claims his Wellington bomber had crashed while on a secret mission. He telephones the nearest airfield, RAF Hucknall, and tricks the duty officer into sending a car. When his story starts to fray, von Werra creeps away and tries to steal an experimental Hawker Hurricane, only to be caught at the last moment.
Along with many other POWs, von Werra is sent by ship to Canada. On the train ride across the country, while the guards are distracted, he escapes near Smith's Falls, Ontario, by jumping from a window. Making his way south, von Werra crosses the nearly frozen St Lawrence River in a stolen rowboat and reaches Ogdensburg, New York, in the then still-neutral United States to claim asylum. The RAF interrogator receives a postcard from von Werra featuring a photograph of the Statue of Liberty, informing him that he has lost his bet.
The epilogue states:
Despite the efforts of the Canadian Government to obtain his return, and of the United States Authorities to hold him, von Werra crossed the border into Mexico. Travelling by way of Peru, Bolivia, Brazil and Spain, he reached Berlin on 18 April 1941.
On 25 October of the same year, while on patrol, his plane was seen to dive into the sea. No trace of von Werra was found. | anti war, violence, murder, flashback | tt0117250 |
Silent Hill 2 | === Setting ===
While not a direct sequel to the events and characters of the first Silent Hill game, Silent Hill 2 takes place in the series' namesake town, located in the northeastern United States. Silent Hill 2 is set in another area of the town, and explores some of Silent Hill's backstory. The town draws upon the psyche of its visitors and ultimately forms alternative versions of the town, which differ depending on the character. The concept behind the town was "a small, rural town in America"; to make the setting more realistic, some buildings and rooms lack furnishings.
=== Letter from Silent Heaven ===
James Sunderland (Guy Cihi) is the protagonist of the main scenario of Silent Hill 2. He comes to the town after receiving a letter from his wife Mary (Monica Taylor Horgan), who died of an illness three years before. While exploring the town, he encounters Maria (also Monica Taylor Horgan), who strongly resembles Mary except for her different personality and clothing; Angela Orosco (Donna Burke), a teenage runaway searching for her mother; Eddie Dombrowski (David Schaufele), another teenage runaway who was somehow brought to the town; and Laura (Jacquelyn Brekenridge), an eight-year-old who has met and befriended Mary.
After arriving in Silent Hill, James decides to search a local park, where he meets Maria, who claims that she has never met or seen Mary. As she is scared, he allows her to follow him. While looking for Laura inside a hospital, James and Maria are ambushed by the monster Pyramid Head, and Maria is killed by him just as James escapes. He resumes his task of finding Mary, and chooses to search a local hotel where he and Mary spent their vacation. On the way, James finds Maria alive and unharmed in a locked room. She claims ignorance of their previous encounter and discusses elements of James' and Mary's past that only Mary would know. James then sets off to find a way to release Maria from the room and eventually returns to find her dead again. Later on, he rescues Angela from a monster; she confesses that her father used to sexually abuse her, and a newspaper clipping James can find implies she killed him in self-defense before coming to Silent Hill. He also confronts Eddie, who admits to maiming a bully, and killing a dog, before fleeing to Silent Hill. Attacked by Eddie, James kills him in self-defense. At this point, it is revealed that in Eddie's version of Silent Hill all the monsters experienced by James are experienced by Eddie as people laughing and taunting him to violence.
At the hotel, James locates a videotape which depicts him killing his dying wife. At this point in the game, the letter from Mary is shown to have been a blank piece of paper the entire time. In another room, a final meeting with Angela sees her giving up on life as she is unable to cope with her trauma and guilt any longer. She walks into a fire and is not seen again. At this point it is revealed that in Angela's version of Silent Hill the town is always on fire.
James later encounters two Pyramid Heads, along with an alive Maria, who is killed again. James realizes that Pyramid Head was created because he needed someone to punish him, and all the monsters have been manifestations of his psyche. The envelope from Mary disappears and both Pyramid Heads commit suicide. James heads to the hotel's rooftop; depending on choices made by the player throughout the game, he encounters either Mary or Maria disguised as her.
Silent Hill 2 features six endings, all presented as equally possible; Konami has kept their canonicity ambiguous. In "Leave", James has one last meeting with Mary, reads her letter, and leaves the town with Laura. "In Water" sees James commit suicide by driving his car off a cliff. The "Maria" ending sees Mary as the woman on the rooftop, who has not forgiven James for killing her. After her defeat, James dismisses her as a hallucination and then leaves the town with an alive Maria, who briefly coughs, suggesting she will become sick just as Mary did, and the cycle will repeat. The other three endings are only available in replay games, including "Rebirth", in which James plans to resurrect Mary using arcane objects collected throughout the game, and two joke endings: "Dog", where James discovers that a dog has apparently been controlling all the events of the game, and "UFO", where James is abducted by extraterrestrials with the help of the first game's protagonist, Harry Mason.
=== Born from a Wish ===
Born from a Wish is a side-story scenario in the special editions and re-releases of the game in which the player takes control of Maria shortly before she and James meet at Silent Hill. After waking up in the town with a gun and contemplating suicide, she resolves to find someone. She eventually encounters a local mansion, where she hears the voice of its owner, Ernest Baldwin. Ernest refuses to let Maria into the room he is in and will only talk to her through its closed door. After Maria completes tasks for him, Ernest warns her about James, whom he describes as a "bad man". After Maria opens the door to Ernest's room and finds it empty, she leaves the mansion. At the conclusion of the scenario, Maria contemplates suicide once more, but ultimately resolves to find James. | insanity, violence, murder, flashback | tt0282975 |
Get Carter | Newcastle-born gangster Jack Carter has lived in London for years in the employ of organised crime bosses Gerald and Sid Fletcher. Jack is sleeping with Gerald's girlfriend Anna and plans to escape with her to South America. But first he must return to Newcastle and Gateshead to attend the funeral of his brother Frank, who died in a purported drunk-driving accident. Unsatisfied with the official explanation, Jack investigates for himself. At the funeral Jack meets his teenage niece Doreen and Frank's evasive mistress Margaret. It is later implied that Doreen might actually be Jack's daughter.
Jack goes to Newcastle Racecourse seeking old acquaintance Albert Swift for information about his brother's death, however Swift spots Jack and evades him. Jack encounters another old associate, Eric Paice, who refuses to tell Jack who is employing him as a chauffeur. Tailing Eric leads him to the country house of crime boss Cyril Kinnear. Jack bursts in on Kinnear, who is playing poker, but learns little from him; he also meets a glamorous drunken woman, Glenda. As Jack leaves, Eric warns him against damaging relations between Kinnear and the Fletchers. Back in town, Jack is threatened by henchmen who want him to leave town, but he fights them off, capturing and interrogating one to find out who wants him gone. He is given the name "Brumby".
Jack knows Cliff Brumby as a businessman with controlling interests in local seaside amusement arcades. Visiting Brumby's house Jack discovers the man knows nothing about him and, believing he has been set up, he leaves. The next morning two of Jack's London colleagues arrive, sent by the Fletchers to take him back, but he escapes. Jack meets Margaret to talk about Frank, but Fletcher's men are waiting and pursue him. He is rescued by Glenda who takes him in her sports car to meet Brumby at his new restaurant development at the top of a multi-storey car park. Brumby identifies Kinnear as being behind Frank's death, also explaining that Kinnear is trying to take over his business. He offers Jack £5,000 to kill the crime boss, which he flatly refuses.
Jack has sex with Glenda at her flat, where he finds and watches a pornographic film where Doreen is forced to have sex with Albert Swift. The other participants in the film are Glenda and Margaret. Overcome with emotion, Jack becomes enraged and pushes Glenda's head under water as she is taking a bath. She tells him the film was Kinnear's, and that she thinks Doreen was 'pulled' by Eric. Forcing Glenda into the boot of her car, Jack drives off to find Albert.
Jack tracks Albert down at a betting shop. Albert confesses he told Brumby that Doreen was, indeed, Frank's daughter. Brumby showed Frank the film to incite him to call the police on Kinnear. Eric and two of his men arranged Frank's death. Information extracted, Jack fatally knifes Albert. Jack is attacked by the London gangsters and Eric, who has informed Fletcher of Jack and Anna's affair. Jack shoots one of them dead. As Eric and the others escape they push the sports car into the river with Glenda trapped inside. Returning to the car park Jack finds Brumby, beats him senseless and throws him over the side to his death. He then posts the pornographic film to the vice squad at Scotland Yard in London.
Jack abducts Margaret at gunpoint. He telephones Kinnear in the middle of a wild party, telling him he has the film and makes a deal for Kinnear to give him Eric in exchange for his silence. Kinnear agrees, sending Eric to an agreed location; however, he subsequently phones a hitman to dispose of Jack. Jack drives Margaret to the grounds of Kinnear's estate, kills her with a fatal injection and leaves her body there. He then calls the police to raid Kinnear's party.
Jack chases Eric along a beach. He forces Eric to drink a full bottle of whisky as he did to Frank, then beats him to death with his shotgun. As Jack is walking along the shoreline, he is shot through the head by the hitman with a sniper rifle. | revenge, comedy, murder, violence, flashback | tt0208988 |
Blood Bath | In Venice, California, student Daisy (Merissa Mathes) leaves a club alone after having an argument with her beatnik boyfriend Max (Carl Schanzer). Walking through the deserted streets, she stops to admire some gruesome paintings in a gallery window painted by artist Antonio Sordi (Campbell), who coincidentally also comes by to look in on his "lost children." After a friendly conversation, Sordi convinces the young woman to pose nude for him that night. At his bell-tower studio, Sordi is possessed by the spirit of a long-dead ancestor and suddenly transforms into a vampiric monster who hacks the screaming Daisy to death with a cleaver. Afterwards, he lowers her mutilated corpse into a vat of boiling wax.
Sordi, in his vampire form, stalks Venice in search of victims; he is able to do so freely at all hours. In the middle of the day, he chases a young woman into the surf at a beach and drowns her. At night, he kills a prostitute in a car while pedestrians stroll by, all of them assuming the pair are lovers sharing an intimate moment. Another victim is approached at a party, chased into a swimming pool, and drowned there after the other guests have moved into the house. The murdered women are carried back to Sordi's studio and painted by the artist, their bodies then covered in wax.
Max wants to make up with Daisy but cannot find her anywhere. Learning that she has posed for Sordi and become the subject of the latest in the artist's series of "Dead Red Nudes," he visits her sister Donna (Sandra Knight) to ask her forgiveness. Donna tells Max she hasn't seen Daisy for days, and is concerned about the recent rash of disappearances. She reads Max the legend of Sordi's 15th-century ancestor Erno, a painter condemned to be burned at the stake for capturing his subjects' souls on canvas. Unable to convince Max that Antonio Sordi might also be a vampire, she confronts the artist at his studio and asks him if he has seen Daisy. He angrily brushes her off. That night, he later follows her through the streets and murders her as she tries to escape from him on a carousel.
The "human" Sordi is in love with Dorian (Linda Saunders), an avant-garde ballerina and Daisy's former roommate. At first he tries to protect her from his vampiric tendencies, warning her his studio is a cheerless place and at one point breaking a date with her to spend time gaining control of his feelings for her. When she turns up at the studio unannounced, he believes she is the reincarnation of Erno Sordi’s long-dead mistress Melizza (also played by Linda Saunders), a witch who had denounced him to the ecclesiastical courts in order to protect herself from prosecution, and traps her in a net. He is about to slash her throat with a razor when Max and his beatnik friends finally realize Sordi is a murderer and successfully free her from the tower. Melizza, seen in a painting that Sordi keeps concealed behind a curtain, brings three of Sordi's victims back to life and they dispatch him by forcing him into the boiling wax. | haunting | tt0074222 |
One Spy Too Many | The film opens with Alexander (Rip Torn) stealing a chemical weapon from a military base. The weapon causes an enemy’s troops to lose the will to fight, thereby making conquest in battle far easier. This is part of Alexander’s dual goal: to conquer the world in the manner of Alexander the Great and to break each of the major moral codes in so doing (which essentially means the ten commandments as detailed throughout the movie).
U.N.C.L.E. becomes involved after the theft of the weapon and agents Napoleon Solo (Vaughn) and Illya Kuryakin (McCallum) are assigned. Also searching for Alexander is his estranged wife Tracey (Dorothy Provine), although her motive is to serve him with divorce papers. Through a series of coincidences (and Tracey’s focused efforts to trail the U.N.C.L.E agents to find her husband), Solo, Kuryakin, and Tracey end up joining forces. As a result, they are at various times captured, tortured, left to die in an elaborate way in an Egyptian tomb, and otherwise thwarted by Alexander throughout the film.
Alexander believes that if he is able to assist a military junta in the takeover of a small country (implied to be Vietnam) that he can use that country as a base for world conquest. By careful planning, he combines his final violation of a commandment - killing the country’s leader - with the takeover of the country and the start of his march toward global domination. Intervention by U.N.C.L.E. prevents the assassination, and during his escape Alexander is killed by his own accomplice Kavon (David Opatoshu). | violence | tt0060783 |
Exterminator 2 | Following from the previous film, it shows Eastland walking freely on the streets of New York, without any hint that his dual identity was compromised. He meets up with another old army buddy, Be Gee (Faison), who owns a garbage truck. As seen at the beginning of the film, Eastland wears a welders' mask and wields a flame thrower, while listening to a police scanner for possible crimes to stop. Slaying the brother of a gang leader named X (Van Peebles), the Exterminator gains the gang's enmity. Coincidentally, his army buddy happens to see the gang during a robbery of an armoured car, and scares them away with his truck. However, they get the truck's plate numbers, and vow revenge. Following the truck one night when the buddy loans it to Eastland, they follow Eastland to his home, and, not having seen who the driver of the truck was the night it scared them away, they presume Eastland was the man behind the wheel that night. They attack Eastland's girlfriend in the park, crippling her. Later, they break into her apartment and kill her.
Then Eastland and his buddy interrupt a drug deal between X's gang and the mob, stealing the narcotics in the process, though the army buddy dies. Having earlier captured one of the gang members, Eastland allows him to escape to draw X into a confrontation, with the drugs as bait, in a closed up industrial site. Curiously, X seems to be aware of the Exterminator's real name in this final battle. Eastland triumphs, but was shot when last seen, and is seen walking away. | cult, revenge, murder, violence | tt0087229 |
The American Ruling Class | The film stars Lewis H. Lapham, who plays himself as editor of Harper's Magazine. Lapham opens the film with the question of whether or not America has a "ruling class," a circle of wealthy and powerful families that run the banks, businesses, and government, essentially controlling everything in America.
To answer this question, Lapham devises a fictional scenario following the post-graduation paths of two young Yale graduates, themselves from opposite economic beginnings. The paths they take gradually clue them, and the audience, into the reality posed by the question.
Caton Burwell plays "Jack Bellami," a recent Yale graduate who comes from a rich family. Unlike his family or his friends, Jack seems unsure of what he wants to do with his life and wonders how he could make a difference in the world. Jack ultimately decides to become a banker, working at Goldman Sachs. He chooses the job after coming to the conclusion that the banking industry controls the world and that it would be easier and more effective to become a part of the system in order to change it from within.
Paul Cantagallo plays "Mike Vanzetti," another recent Yale graduate who is best friends with Jack Bellami. Unlike his friend, Mike is from a middle-class background, meaning he isn't wealthy like his friend Jack. Mike wants to change the world from outside the system. He decides to become a writer and goes headfirst into the character, renting a studio apartment and getting a job as a waiter. He refuses to "sell out" by way of writing for a major newspaper or by "pandering to the masses" by writing "lowest-common-denominator" material.
Mike's story takes center stage in the second half of the film, after Jack's decision to join Goldman and his subsequent success there. A run-in with Mike leads Jack to offer him a job at the company, an offer Mike initially rejects. As his student-loan bills start piling up, however, Mike begins to resent his lack of money and low-paying job, as well as the inability of his writing to enact change. Mike's girlfriend, Taylor, invites him to a wealthy friend's party, at which she encourages him to continue his work. A short time after the party, Lapham invites Mike to take a trip to a "space that used to be called, in another age of man, Mexico." This land was Texas. In Texas, Lapham shows Mike how the powerful control the government, and how money, in the end, trumps any effort by the non-wealthy to alter society.
Ultimately, Mike decides to abandon his writerly dream and takes up Jack's job offer. During a visit to Taylor's mansion home, Mike plays a game of tennis with his girlfriend and they discuss his decision. Taylor is horrified with his new defeatist attitude. Mike lectures his girlfriend on his new worldview: that money is all that matters, and that, as society goes to hell, wealth is one's only defense against the routine abuses and corruption of the ruling class.
The film then splits with two endings. The first shows Mike during his first day as a banker, zooming in on him at an initiation program: His panic and displeasure are evident as he immediately regrets what he has done.
The second ending (which an on-screen graphic claims was filmed after test audiences reacted poorly to the first ending) has Mike sidetracked when he agrees to watch a stage show. It is being rehearsed by the lead singer of "THE WHATS?" and a group of children. The song they play discusses the themes of the film. The film ends with Mike in the woods, leaving the viewer in the dark on the question of whether Mike makes it to work or has his mind changed by the song. | satire | tt0455906 |
The High and the Mighty | In Honolulu, a DC-4 airliner prepares to take off for San Francisco with 17 passengers and a crew of 5. Former captain Dan Roman (John Wayne), the flight's veteran first officer known for his habit of whistling, is haunted by a crash that killed his wife and son and left him with a permanent limp. The captain, Sullivan (Robert Stack), suffers from a secret fear of responsibility after logging thousands of hours looking after the lives of passengers and crew. Young second officer Hobie Wheeler (William Campbell) and veteran navigator Lenny Wilby (Wally Brown) are contrasts in age and experience.
Stewardess Spalding (Doe Avedon) attends her passengers, each with varying personal problems, including jaded former actress May Holst (Claire Trevor), unhappily married heiress Lydia Rice (Laraine Day), aging beauty queen Sally McKee (Jan Sterling) and cheerful vacationer Ed Joseph (Phil Harris). Spalding befriends the terminally ill Frank Briscoe (Paul Fix) after being charmed by his pocket watch. A last-minute arrival, Humphrey Agnew (Sidney Blackmer), causes the crew concern with his strange behavior.
After a routine departure, the airliner experiences sporadic sudden vibrations. Although the crew senses that something may be wrong with the propellers, they cannot locate a problem. When a vibration causes Spalding to burn her hand, Dan inspects the tail compartment but still finds nothing amiss.
After nightfall, as the aircraft passes the point of no return, Agnew confronts fellow passenger Ken Childs (David Brian), accusing him of having an affair with Agnew's wife. The men struggle and Agnew pulls out a gun, intending to shoot Childs, but before he can do so, the airliner swerves violently when it loses a propeller and the engine catches fire. The crew quickly extinguishes the fire, but the engine has twisted off its mounting. In mid-ocean, the crew radios for help and sets in motion a rescue operation. Dan discovers that the airliner is losing fuel from damage to a wing tank and that as a result, along with adverse winds and the drag of the damaged engine, the plane will eventually run out of fuel and be forced to ditch.
Unassuming José Locota (John Qualen) disarms Agnew and confiscates the gun, compelling him to sit quietly. Gustave Pardee (Robert Newton), who up until now has made no secret of his fear of flying, inspires calm in his terrified fellow passengers. Dan calmly explains the situation, trying to lessen their anxiety, but warns that their chances of making the coast are "one in a thousand." The passengers rally around each other and find changed perspectives about their existing problems. They toss luggage from the airliner to lighten its load, with May Holst literally kissing her mink coat goodbye.
In San Francisco, Manager Tim Garfield (Regis Toomey) comes to the airline's operations center but is not sanguine about their chances. A favorable change in the winds raises the crew's hopes that they have just enough fuel to reach San Francisco but Wilby discovers that he made an elementary error in navigation and their actual remaining time in the air is inadequate.
Dan's experience tells him that their luck would be better trying to make land than ditching in the rough seas at night. Sullivan panics and prepares to ditch immediately, but Dan slaps him back to his senses. Thinking clearly again, Sullivan decides not to ditch. As the airliner approaches rain-swept San Francisco in the middle of the night and at a perilously low altitude, the airport prepares for an emergency instrument landing. The plane narrowly surmounts the city's hills and breaks out of the clouds with the runway lights dead ahead, guiding them to a safe landing. As the passengers disembark, Garfield watches their reactions as they are harried by inquisitive reporters. After the tumult dies down, he joins the crew inspecting the damaged airliner and informs Dan that only 30 gallons of gas remained in their tanks. Dan acknowledges the gamble they took and walks away, limping and whistling. "So long...you ancient pelican," Garfield mutters to himself. | flashback | tt0047086 |
Subsets and Splits