He was a gifted athlete whose greatest feat came not on a playing field, but in smashing the color barrier that had denied so many others a chance to compete. Jackie Robinson was a collegiate All-American in baseball, football, basketball and track. But in an era of segregation he had little chance for a career as an athlete. His dramatic entrance into major league baseball in 1947 changed ...
With a nod to Preston Sturges's classic dark comedy Unfaithfully Yours (about a man who fantasizes about murdering his possibly philandering wife), this 1980 cotton-candy-feminist-vendetta film concerns a monstrous boss (Dabney Coleman) whose more capable underlings dream of ways of punishing him. That much of the film is particularly fun, but the rest of it descends into silliness when the ...
Based on Robert Harling's play, this comedy-drama directed by Herbert Ross (The Turning Point) follows several years in the lives of women who regularly see one another at a beauty shop in their small Louisiana town. The story deepens as Julia Roberts, playing a serious diabetic and the daughter of Sally Field, goes downhill in her health. But as an ensemble piece, this is one of those ...
He is the most famous and fabled mobster of his era. But the "teflon Don" was done in by the betrayal of those who served him, and may well be the last of his breed. John Gotti climbed out of humble Bronx beginnings on a ladder of success, leaving a body behind on every rung. Once near the top, he eliminated rival Paul Castellano and assumed control of the nation's most powerful crime ...
This is an energetic, but ultimately mediocre adaptation of the play, directed on Broadway by Tommy Tune. Burt Reynolds is the town sheriff and a regular patron of a local bordello. He wages a public battle to keep it open after it is targeted as the devil's den by a television minister. Charles Durning was nominated for a Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, and there are some lively song and dance ...