Bovie Movie

A vacationing couple makes a terrifying discovery about the motel room they have just checked into in this thriller scripted by Mark L. Smith and directed by Nimr?d Antal (Kontroll). Their car broken down and their prospects for finding a tow-truck driver at such a late hour slim to none, David (Luke Wilson) and Amy Fox (Kate Beckinsale) decide to make the best of their situation by resting out the night at a nearby motel. Left with few choices of entertainment for the evening, the pair soon settles down to enjoy one of the low-budget slasher films sitting atop their motel room VCR. Upon realizing that all of the films seem to have been shot in the very same room they currently occupy, David and Amy suddenly become the stars of a particularly sadistic fright flick. As hidden cameras track their every move, the hapless couple attempt to turn the tables on their would-be killer before they meet the same grim fate as the poor souls being butchered on television. Frank Whaley and Ethan Embry co-star in a thriller that’s sure to keep leery travelers sticking to the main highway.

Outrageously violent, time-twisting, and in love with language, Pulp Fiction was widely considered the most influential American movie of the 1990s. Director and co-screenwriter Quentin Tarantino synthesized such seemingly disparate traditions as the syncopated language of David Mamet; the serious violence of American gangster movies, crime movies, and films noirs mixed up with the wacky violence of cartoons, video games, and Japanese animation; and the fragmented story-telling structures of such experimental classics as Citizen Kane, Rashomon, and La jet?e. The Oscar-winning script by Tarantino and Roger Avary intertwines three stories, featuring Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta, in the role that single-handedly reignited his career, as hit men who have philosophical interchanges on such topics as the French names for American fast food products; Bruce Willis as a boxer out of a 1940s B-movie; and such other stalwarts as Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Christopher Walken, Eric Stoltz, Ving Rhames, and Uma Thurman, whose dance sequence with Travolta proved an instant classic.

The second of three films by co-writer/director Oliver Stone to explore the effects of the Vietnam War (Platoon and Heaven and Earth are the others), Born On The Fourth Of July tells the true story of Ron Kovic (Tom Cruise), a patriotic, All-American small town athlete who shocks his family by enlisting with the Marines to fight in the Vietnam War. Once he is overseas, however, Kovic’s gung-ho enthusiasm turns to horror and confusion when he accidentally kills one of his own men in a firefight. His downfall is furthered by a bullet wound that leaves him paralyzed from the chest down. He returns home, spends an appalling, nightmarish stint in a veterans’ hospital, and follows an increasingly disillusioned and fragmented path that ultimately leaves him drunk and dissolute in Mexico. However, Kovic somehow turns himself around and pulls his life together, becoming an outspoken anti-war activist in the process. The film is long but emotionally powerful; many consider it Stone’s best work and Cruise’s best performance. Both were nominated for Oscars, as was the film itself, but only Stone, who co-wrote the film with Kovic from the latter’s book, won for Best Director.

This crime comedy from director Craig Singer is the filmmaker’s third independent feature and his second outing with screenwriter Robert Dean Klein and star Gary Stretch, who had contributed to 2001’s Dead Dogs Lie, Singer’s sophomore effort. Stretch plays Ronnie, a hitman who, three years prior, vouched for his pal and fellow contract killer, August, played by Michael Rapaport (Zebrahead, Mighty Aphrodite). Unfortunately for Ronnie, over the years, August has gotten himself into some trouble and made a few enemies. Now, over the course of one day, Ronnie has to somehow clean up all of August’s messes or both men will be facing the consequences of their unhappy bosses. In addition to Frank Whaley and Seymour Cassel, the supporting cast boasts a bevy of 1980s artifacts including Ralph Macchio, Robin Givens, Deborah Harry, and Ally Sheedy. A Cold Day in August screened at Robert De Niro’s 2003 Tribeca Film Festival under the title A Good Night to Die.