Bovie Movie

A Russian immigrant arrives in the Unites States to discover that the American dream has dampened somewhat in writer-turned-director Len Richmond’s satirical look at America’s preoccupation with all things sexual. Despite enthusiastic Alex’s (Michael York) best efforts, the only job he can find upon arriving in the United States is a low-paying stint in a sex-toy factory. When elderly factory owner Eppy (Nancy Fish) takes pity on the struggling newcomer and introduces him to has-been adult film star Catherine (Prunella Gee) in hopes of making a match, the romantic bachelor finds that true love doesn’t always arrive in the most conventional form.

The made-for-cable musical satire Reefer Madness is based on the award-winning play of the same name, which in turn was inspired by the notorious — and deliciously awful — 1936 anti-marijuana film originally titled Tell Your Children. A smarmy lecturer (Alan Cumming in the first of his three roles in the film) arrives in a typical small town of the late ’30s to warn the populace of the dangers of the “evil weed,” bringing along a lurid propaganda film to dramatize his message. In broad, unsubtle, and hilarious strokes, the movie-within-a-movie shows how even a squeaky-clean pair of highschoolers named Mary Lane (Kristen Bell) and Jimmy Harper (Christian Campbell) can become hopeless dope addicts by succumbing to the lure of marijuana. Reefer Madness is not only a savage skewering of the original black-and-white movie (some of the musical’s campiest lines are taken directly from the earlier script!), but also a devastating attack on what playwrights Kevin Murphy and Dan Studney consider to be the real reason that the 1936 movie was made: to frighten the public out of their wits in order to keep them under the thumb of an oppressive government. Thus, the musical manages to take a number of not-so-veiled swipes at xenophobia, racism, McCarthyism, the Bush Administration’s Homeland Security policy, and even the recent FCC clampdown on “offensive” TV fare (one of the film’s highlights is a garish nightclub number featuring Jesus Christ). The ebulliently staged songs include “The Stuff,” “Down at the Ol’ Five and Dime,” “Lonely Pew,” “Listen to Jesus Jimmy,” “Mary Jane/Mary Lane,” “The Brownie Song,” “Tell ‘Em the Truth,” and the title number. Officially titled Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, this film first aired April 16, 2005, on the Showtime cable service.

The Eisner Award-winning comic series Sin City comes to life in this live-action feature adaptation from director Robert Rodriguez and creator Frank Miller. Interweaving multiple storylines from the series’ history, this violent crime noir paints the picture of the ultimate town without pity through the eyes of its roughest characters. There’s the street thug Marv (Mickey Rourke), whose desperate quest to find the killer of a prostitute named Goldie (Jaime King) will lead him to the foulest edges of town. Inhabiting many of those areas is Dwight (Clive Owen), a photographer in league with the sordid ladies of Sin City, headed by Gail (Rosario Dawson), who opens up a mess of trouble after tangling with a corrupt cop by the name of Jackie Boy (Benicio Del Toro). Finally, there’s Hartigan (Bruce Willis), an ex-cop with a heart problem who’s hell-bent on protecting a stripper named Nancy (Jessica Alba). Featuring a who’s who supporting cast that includes Elijah Wood, Brittany Murphy, Devon Aoki, and Nick Stahl, Sin City promises to be one of the most direct translations from page to screen of a comic series, with shots and dialogue adapted straight from the original comic’s panels. Rodriguez quit the Director’s Guild when they refused to let Frank Miller co-direct the film, a deal hashed out after the two collaborators developed and shot the opening scene utilizing a green-screen process to harness the stark, black-and-white look of the books as a litmus test for the rest of the production. Quentin Tarantino was brought in and reportedly paid one dollar to direct an extended scene between Del Toro and Owen that amounts to one issue of The Big Fat Kill miniseries.

Written and directed by Alec Berg, David Mandel, and Jeff Schaffer, Eurotrip is a teen comedy from the Montecito Picture Company (makers of similar movies Old School and Road Trip). Mainstream teenager Scott (Scott Mechlowicz) forms an online friendship with German student Mieke in order to get a passing grade in his high school German class. When he finds out Mieke is a buxom blonde girl (Jessica B?hrs), he travels to meet her with his pals Cooper (Jacob Pitts), Jenny (Michelle Trachtenberg), and Jamie (Travis Wester). The group of randy teens head to Berlin by way of London, Paris, and Amsterdam.

Ripper 2: Letters From Within begins when Molly Keller, the last living descendant of the infamous Jack the Ripper, is sentenced to an insane asylum after some vicious murders. While there, she undergoes an experimental procedure that might cure her. Sadly, she begins to lose touch with the real world and her nefarious forefather might be able to use her to get back into the world.

Michael Lehmann directed this post-modernist hash of To Catch a Thief and The Naked Gun starring Bruce Willis as Hudson Hawk, a cat burglar who wants to go straight, but the circumstances won’t allow it. The story begins in a pre-credit sequence that takes place in the renaissance. Leonardo Da Vinci (Stefano Molinari) is rushing through his Mona Lisa painting to work on his latest invention — a machine to turn lead into bronze. But Da Vinci makes a mistake and, instead of bronze, the machine turns the lead into gold. Realizing the danger of his invention if the contraption gets into the wrong hands, he hides three parts of the apparatus inside three of his other works. Four hundred years later, Hudson Hawk, the world’s greatest cat burglar, is being released from jail after pulling a ten-year stretch. He wants to retire from the profession of cat burglary and drink some cappuccino, but two screwball billionaires — Darwin and Minerva Mayflower (Richard E. Grant and Sandra Bernhard) — won’t let him. Their nefarious plot is to steal the three Da Vinci works, restore Da Vinci’s gold-making machine, and destroy the world’s monetary system. They blackmail Hawks into working with them to steal the Da Vincis by threatening the life of Hawks’s pal Tommy Five-Tone (Danny Aiello). Along with the power-mad billionaires, Hawks has to deal with the CIA, in the person of George Kaplan (James Coburn), breathing down his neck. He also has Vatican art restorer Anna Baragli (Andie MacDowell) falling for his smirk.

The life and sordid, untimely death of Hogan’s Heroes star Bob Crane are explored by director Paul Schrader in this biopic, which marks one of the few times the filmmaker has not scripted his own film. Auto Focus chronologically traces the meteoric rise of Crane’s show business career, beginning with his early success as a jokey deejay on Los Angeles morning radio in the early ’60s. A devout family man, Crane lives in Southern Californian comfort with his wife Anne (Rita Wilson) and their young children, relishing the modicum of celebrity his job provides him. His life begins to change, however, when his agent Lenny (Ron Leibman) proposes that he take a breakthrough role on the CBS POW-camp sitcom Hogan’s Heroes. Initially reluctant to take the job, Crane signs on with the production and, to his and everyone else’s surprise, the show becomes a smash hit. With celebrity comes a new set of friends, and Crane falls in with audio-visual guru John Carpenter (Willem Dafoe), a Sony sales rep who spends his days setting up home entertainment systems for the Hollywood elite, and his nights cruising strip clubs for anonymous sexual encounters. Already a pornography buff, Crane starts using his fame to secure him and Carpenter an endless parade of affairs, which they videotape and then obsessively review. It isn’t long before Anne demands a divorce, and Crane marries his Hogan’s co-star Patti Olsen (aka Sigrid Valdis, here played by Maria Bello), who’s more accepting of his escapades. When the sitcom is canceled, however, Crane has trouble securing acting jobs, and recedes further and further into his life of amateur porn with Carpenter. Auto Focus premiered at the Telluride and Toronto Film Festivals before its art-house run in the fall of 2002.

Tom Hanks stars in this raunchy teen comedy from veteran screenwriters Pat Proft and Neil Israel, who had previously collaborated on the amusing sketch film Tunnelvision (1976) and the disappointing Americathon (1980). Bus-driver Rick Gasko (Hanks) is engaged to wealthy Debbie Thompson (Tawny Kitaen), much to the chagrin of her father (George Grizzard), who considers Rick a loser. To keep an eye on her future groom, Debbie and her friends dress as prostitutes to attend his bachelor party, which quickly turns into a bacchanal of smutty debauchery. Familiar faces in the cast include action stars Michael Dudikoff and Ji-Tu Cimbuka, pin-ups Monique Gabrielle and Rosanne Katon, and teen-movie regulars Adrian Zmed and Wendie Jo Sperber. It’s an occasionally hilarious excursion into bad taste, although one which two-time Oscar winner Hanks would probably like to forget.

They’re beautiful, they’re brilliant, and they can kick your butt — the most glamorous private eyes in the world are back in action in this big-screen adaptation of the popular ’70s television series. Natalie (Cameron Diaz) is the smart but silly one, Dylan (Drew Barrymore) is the tough but fun-loving one, and Alex (Lucy Liu) is the classy but hard-as-nails one, and they work for a man named Charlie (voice of John Forsythe), who never meets his employees face to face. Along with their helper Bosley (Bill Murray), the Angels are sent into action when electronics genius Eric Knox (Sam Rockwell) is kidnapped, with the nefarious Roger Corwin (Tim Curry) as the prime suspect. But they soon learn even bigger danger is afoot — the kidnappers have gotten their hands on Knox’s latest invention, a system that can monitor voice communication from anywhere in the world, virtually ending the notion of private conversation. Charlie’s Angels also stars Crispin Glover, Luke Wilson, Kelly Lynch, and Tom Green.