Tag Archives: Mary Pat Gleason

The Right To Remain Silent (1996, directed by Hubert de La Bouillerie)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

It’s one very busy night at a police station.  Everyone who is brought in from off the streets has the right to remain silent but no one exercises it.  Rookie cop Lea Thompson listens to everyone’s stories.  LL Cool J is the documentarian who thought it would be smart to put on Klan robes and a hood and try to infiltrate a demonstration undercover.  Patrick Dempsey is the drunk who killed a kid.  Carl Reiner comes in and confesses to mercy killing his wife.  Christopher Lloyd is homeless.  Fisher Stevens is a trans streetwalker.  Judge Reinhold, I don’t even know what he was supposed to be.  Reinhold actually plays two characters in this film and he’s miscast in both roles.  Amanda Plummer is a pizza delivery person who shoots someone in self-defense.  No one asks for a lawyer.  No one lies about what they did.  Instead, they just talk and talk and talk and talk some more.  Thompson listens while Robert Loggia, as the chief, growls about donuts.

The Right To Remain Silent is based on a play and that is its downfall.  Instead of being a story about a rookie cop and her first night on the job, it’s just a collection of rambling stage monologues.  Some of the actors, like Carl Reiner and Christopher Lloyd, do okay.  Most of them still seem to be acting for the folks sitting in the back row.  It ultimately doesn’t add up too much because the stories are too predictable to make much of an impression.  Everyone in this film had the right to remain silent and I wish they had exercised it.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Highway to Heaven 4.9 “Why Punish the Children?”

Posted on by Bradley Crain

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, we will be reviewing Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989.  The entire show is currently streaming on Amazon Prime, Tubi and other services!

Episode 4.9 “Why Punish the Children?”

(Dir. by Michael Landon, originally aired on November 25th, 1987)

In this Thanksgiving episode, Jonathan Smith (Michael Landon) and Mark Gordon (Victor French) take on roles as history teachers in a women’s prison. It seems a compassionate social worker named Melanie Canner (Sally Spencer) has been fighting hard to improve the lives of the women on the inside and has been getting close to nowhere with prison warden Thomas Inman (Bruce French). The first positive step that Melanie has been able to secure for the inmates from the warden are these history classes. Once on the inside, we meet inmates like Maria Rojas (Tasia Valenza), a young woman who’s just about to have her first baby, and Reba Williams (Bebe Drake), a mother of five. Both women want to straighten out their lives in order to give their children a better chance in life. It soon becomes clear that Jonathan, Mark, and Melanie are on a mission to convince the warden to open up more opportunities for the women to improve their lives and spend more quality time with their kids. The warden isn’t an easy case, as he seems convinced that the women shouldn’t be given any real favors as they pay their debts to society. As you might imagine, Jonathan has a couple of divine tricks up his sleeve.

I liked this episode of HIGHWAY TO HEAVEN even if it’s not the most realistic story you’ll ever see. Each woman we meet has 100% accepted the error of their ways and are determined to be a productive member of society if they can get just one more chance. The cynical part of me has to overcome this unrealistic element of the story, and the “women in prison” movie lover in me would have enjoyed a couple of good catfights. Alas, this is HIGHWAY TO HEAVEN and director Michael Landon is not in the business of going for complete realism or providing B Movie fan service! Rather, Landon is interested in creating a world where basically good people have done wrong, honestly regret how their choices negatively impact those they love, and vow to do better for their children. This series built its five seasons on the prospect of people turning their lives around, and I’ll admit I got pretty emotional again with this one. This episode really focuses in on a mother’s love for her children, and I certainly want to believe that these women would do anything for theirs. Each mother is given a beautiful moment, at Thanksgiving no less, and the chance that they need to be the mom their children deserve. I’m getting a little misty just thinking about it as I type these words. The character of the warden is there to learn the lesson that we all need to learn, which is to try to see situations from different points of view. He gets a little angelic help in this area, which is quite heavy handed and completely in line with the show’s expectations.

Overall, I again enjoyed this episode as a nostalgic trip down memory lane with a series I grew up watching with my mom. The fact that I got a little emotional is also no surprise because the older I get the more I cry when watching movies and TV shows. The fact that I was bawling in my office while I watched the show at work could have been a little hard to explain… luckily, nobody came by during those waterworks moments.

A Movie A Day #151: Easy Money (1983, directed by James Signorelli)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Rodney Dangerfield.  He didn’t get no respect but he did smoke a lot of weed.

It’s true.  Rodney first lit up in 1942 when he was a 21 year-old struggling nightclub comic.  According to his widow, the moment meant so much to Rodney that, decades later, he could still remember the room number — 1411, at the Belvedere Hotel in New York City — where he and fellow comedians Bobby Byron and Joe E. Ross smoked that first joint.  That was back when Rodney was performing under the name Jack Roy.  (His was born Jacob Cohen.)  Rodney’s first comedy career went so badly that he quit and spent the next twenty-two years as an aluminum siding salesman until he found the courage to return to the stage.  However, whether he was selling or performing, Rodney never stopped smoking marijuana.  When he was working on his autobiography, he wanted to call it My Lifelong Romance With Marijuana.  His wife convinced him to go with a different title:  It’s Not Easy Bein’ Me: A Lifetime of No Respect but Plenty of Sex and Drugs.

There’s plenty of drugs in Easy Money, which is a problem for baby photographer Monty Capuletti (Rodney, of course).  Monty likes to gamble, drink, and smoke pot, much to the disapproval of his wealthy mother-in-law (Geraldine Fitzgerald).  When she dies, she stipulates in her will that if Monty goes for a year without indulging in any of his vices, he and his family will receive 10 million dollars.  Sounds easy, right?  The only problem is that Monty really likes to eat, drink, gamble, and get high.  His best friend (Joe Pesci) doesn’t think he can do it.  His mother-in-law’s former assistant, Quincy Barlow (Jeffrey Jones), is determined to catch Monty slipping back into his old ways so that he can inherit the money.  Monty’s determined, though, to win the money for his family, especially now that his daughter (Jennifer Jason Leigh) has married the bizarre Julio (Taylor Negron).

The episodic plot is really just an excuse for Rodney to be Rodney, spouting off one liners and making snobs like Quincy look foolish.  Rodney and Joe Pesci were a surprisingly effective comedy team.  The scene where they get stoned and try to drive home without damaging the huge wedding cake in the back of the van is a hundred times funnier than it has any right being.  Even though it is hard to imagine her being, in any way, related to Rodney Dangerfield, Jennifer Jason Leigh is always a welcome presence.  Like many comedies of that era, Easy Money is uneven, with as many jokes failing as succeeding but, for Rodney Dangerfield fans, it is a must see.

What Horror Lisa and the Snarkalecs Watched Last Night #106: Finders Keepers (dir by Alexander Yellen)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Last night, the Snarkalecs and I watched the latest SyFy original film, Finders Keepers!

FK

Why Was I Watching It?

I had been watching Big Driver over on Lifetime but that film proved to be unusually disturbing and I really wasn’t in the right mood to deal with it.  Sometimes, you need to just be entertained and SyFy original movies are always entertaining!  So, after watching an hour of Big Driver, I turned over to SyFy and watched Finders Keepers.

What Was It About?

Recently divorced writer Alyson Smith (Jaime Pressly) moves into a nice, old house with her daughter, Claire (Kylie Rogers).  At first the house seems ideal but soon, cracks start to appear on this perfect fantasy of home ownership.  Claire starts to act strangely.  A crazy old cat lady (Marina Sirtis) keeps coming by the house.  Alyson does some research and discovers that the reason the house was empty was because, years before, it was the scene of a brutal mass murder.  And, of course, Claire finds a creepy doll in her bedroom and becomes extremely attached to it.

Soon, everyone who knows Alyson and her ex-husband (Patrick Muldoon) is turning up dead.  Could it be that the doll is evil or could it all be a coincidence?

Actually, there’s really no question.  That is one messed up doll…

What Worked?

SyFy hasn’t been showing as many original movies this year as they did last year.  Fortunately, the ones that they have shown have all been excellent and Finders Keepers keeps the streak going.  Finders Keepers is an effectively creepy horror film, featuring excellent performances from Jaime Pressly and Patrick Muldoon, atmospheric direction from Alexander Yellen, and a clever script from Peter Sullivan.

Incidentally, Finders Keepers probably featured one of the bigger body counts that I’ve ever seen in a SyFy film.  Nobody’s safe from that doll!

What Did Not Work?

Over the course of the film, two cats and a crazy old cat lady are killed.  As most of you know, I am about 40 years away from becoming a crazy old cat lady so that was a little bit difficult for me to deal with.

“Oh my God!  Just like me!” Moments

So, beyond the crazy old cat lady and her two cats, this film also featured a vivacious, 20-something redhead who ended up being murdered by the evil doll.  And then, once the redhead and the cat lady had been dispatched, we were introduced to an incredibly efficient office administrator and guess what happened to her?  That’s right — murdered by the crazy doll.  Speaking as a vivacious and efficient redheaded office administrator and future crazy cat lady, I really have to wonder just what exactly this film had against me!

Lessons Learned

Do not let your daughter keep any creepy old voodoo dolls that she just happens to find in her bedroom.  If she won’t get rid of the voodoo doll, consider giving her up for adoption because, seriously — voodoo is nothing to mess with.