Trailers/TV spots

Rock historians and hard-core Buddy Holly fans can and do take issue with director Steve Rash's 1978 biopic of the Lubbock, Texas, rocker's life: the script liberally juggles details from Holly's brief but blazing career, replacing producer Norman Petty and Holly's original bassist and drummer with fictionalized composite characters. Yet the core of the film, and the reason it's definitely worth a look and listen, is Gary Busey's lusty performance in the title role, triumphing against what might have seemed miscasting.

Mel Gibson stars on both sides of the camera, playing the lead role plus directing and producing this brawling, richly detailed saga of fierce combat, tender love and the will to risk all that's precious: freedom. In an emotionally charged performance, Gibson is William Wallace, a bold Scotsman who used the steel of his blade and the fire of his intellect to rally his countrymen to liberation.

Mel Brooks scored his first commercial hit with this raucous Western spoof starring the late Cleavon Little as the newly hired (and conspicuously black) sheriff of Rock Ridge. Sheriff Bart teams up with deputy Jim (Gene Wilder) to foil the railroad-building scheme of the nefarious Hedley Lamarr (Harvey Korman). The simple plot is just an excuse for a steady stream of gags, many of them unabashedly tasteless, that Brooks and his wacky cast pull off with side-splitting success.

Nothing equals The Birds for sheer terror when Alfred Hitchcock unleashes his foul friends in one of his most shocking and memorable masterpieces. As beautiful blonde Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) rolls into Bodega Bay in pursuit of eligible bachelor Mitch Brenner (Rod Taylor), she is inexplicably attacked by a seagull. Suddenly thousands of birds are flocking into town, preying on schoolchildren and residents in a terrifying series of attacks.

Tom Hanks won raves for his Oscar nominated performance (1988, Best Actor) as a twelve year old boy trapped inside a thirty-year-old body in director Penny Marshall's winning comedy. At a carnival, young Josh Baskin (Hanks) wishes he was big - only to awake the next morning and discover he is! With the help of his friend Billy (Jared Rushton), Josh lands a job at a toy company. There, his inner wisdom enables him to successfully predict what children want to buy, making the awestruck, naïve Josh irresistible to a beautiful ladder climbing colleague (Elizabeth Perkins).

While its sequels were formulaic and safe, the first Beverly Hills Cop set out to explore some uncharted territory, and succeeded. A blend of violent action picture and sharp comedy, the film has an excellent director, Martin Brest (Scent of a Woman), who finds some original perspectives on stock scenes (highway chases, police rousts) and hits a gleeful note with Murphy while skewering L.A. culture. Good support from Judge Reinhold and John Ashton as local cops not used to doing things the Detroit way (Murphy's character hails from the Motor City).

Could you spend $30 million dollars in 30 days and have nothing to show for it? Montgomery Brewster (Richard Prior) is a down-and-out baseball player who discovers that he's the only living relative of an eccentric multi-millionaire. Monty stands to inherit $300 million, but only if he can spend $30 million in a single month without acquiring any assets. If he fails, it's back to zero again. But he can't tell his best friend, catcher Spike Nolan (John Candy), or the accountant keeping track of his expense, Angela Drake (Lonette McKee), the truth… and everything he tries seems to backfire!

In the world of 1930s Negro League baseball, a spirited team of renegade players travels around the Midwest looking for that one big score. Richard Pryor, Billy Dee Williams and James Earl Jones star as three barnstorming ballplayers who take on prejudice and their own League's unfair rules while stealing cars, food and home base - anything to prove that they're the best team around. It's a showdown of brains over booby traps and sportsmanship over racial segregation as Bingo Long's All-Stars swing their way to a winning season.

Ever want to be someone else? Now you can - as long as it's Being John Malkovich! Craig, a struggling puppeteer, accidentally discovers a portal leading into the brain of John Malkovich. For 15 minutes, he experiences the ultimate head trip-HE is being John Malkovich! Then he's dumped onto the New Jersey turnpike!

While vacationing in Rio, a befuddled older fellow finds himself involved in a comedic affair with the teenage daughter of his best friend. Michael Caine is perfect as the man in a doubful marriage, who is hit on suddenly by his best friend's daughter, Jennifer, played by the voluptous and pretty Michelle Johnson. Caine's chemistry with Joseph Bologna (who can portray the archetypal cynic as well as anyone) gives the film enough comic thrust to overlook the somewhat pedestrian performances of some of the other principal actors. Overall, it's a great movie to look and laugh at.