The Sun Also Rises (2 disc)
Stars: Jane Seymour, Hart Bochner, Robert Carradine, Leonard Nimoy
Stars: Jane Seymour, Hart Bochner, Robert Carradine, Leonard Nimoy
his television miniseries derives
its plot from The Sun Also Rises, the 1926 novel by Ernest Hemingway
(1899-1961). Set in France and Spain, the miniseries follows the lives of
several expatriate Americans and their acquaintances in the decade after World
War I. These expatriates -- part of the so-called lost generation of Americans
bitter about the war and disillusioned by prevailing U.S. values -- drink,
roam, ruminate, and chase women. The central character, journalist Jake Barnes
(Hart Bochner), pals up with fellow countrymen Bill Gorton (Zeljko Ivanek), an
amiable war veteran, and Robert Cohn (Robert Carradine), a novelist and
college-trained boxer, to enjoy Paris night life. Barnes runs into beautiful
and sophisticated Lady Brett Ashley (Jane Seymour), whom he romanced in England
while she was a volunteer nurse and he was recuperating from a war wound that
left him impotent. She is soon to divorce her husband to marry Mike Campbell
(Ian Charleson), a hard-drinking Scot. Still smitten by her, Barnes follows her
everywhere. So do Gorton and Cohn. Cohn falls hard for her. But Lady Brett says
she wants to live happily ever after with many men, not just one, in spite of
her betrothal to Campbell, a liaison with Cohn, and her affection for Barnes.
Such is the scope of her appetite for men. For a new diversion, bullfighting,
all of the principals -- including Campbell -- go to Pamplona, Spain. There,
matador Pedro Romero (Andrea Occhipinti) whets Lady Brett's appetite all over
again with his derring-do in the bullring. After Cohn discovers her in bed with
Romero, he beats the bullfighter livid. It is all for naught. To Lady Brett,
Cohn is an interesting toy, nothing more. The story reaches its conclusion when
Romero -- purple with Cohn's bruises -- enters the arena to challenge a bull.
$
12.00
Dazzle (3 disc)
Stars: Lisa Hartman, Cliff Robertson, James Farentino, Dixie Carter, Linda Evans, Lisa Eilbacher, Bruce Greenwood
Stars: Lisa Hartman, Cliff Robertson, James Farentino, Dixie Carter, Linda Evans, Lisa Eilbacher, Bruce Greenwood
Based on a popular novel by
Judith Krantz, this sudsy romantic drama features a prominent photographer who
heads to Gay Paree, unaware that greedy family members are plotting to bilk her
father out of his valuable ranch land. Love blossoms in the City of Light when
she encounters a fellow picture taker.
$
12.00
The Moneychangers - 2 disc
"An unprecedented cast brings to life the blockbuster book"--or so said the add copy for The Moneychangers, a four-part TV miniseries based on Arthur Hailey's novel, first telecast Dec 4-19, 1976. The drama's starting point is a power play between two bank officers, played by Kirk Douglas and Christopher Plummer. Social commentary is provided by an inner-city revolt against the bank's policies, while inside the bank's walls are played out brief scenarios of embezzlement, crooked deals, credit card counterfeiting and attempted murder. 1976.
$
12.00
I'll Take Manhattan - 1 disc
This glitzy miniseries based on the Judith Krantz novel is a wicked soap opera about sex, power, and betrayal. Valerie Bertinelli stars as Maxi, whose mother (Francesca Annis) marries her father's hated brother Cutter (Perry King) after his death. Cutter had sworn to destroy everything his late brother valued and proceeds to run his publishing empire into the ground. Maxi, who has already been through three husbands by age 29, turns over a new leaf by gathering her family and making a commitment to save the business, which she does by becoming the editor of a successful fashion magazine. Maxi lives in the Trump Tower, whose famed real-life owner appears as himself. It has some unintentionally campy moments, but King is quite good as the villainous Cutter, and fans of this sort of high-gloss '80s melodrama will want to put it on their lists.
$
10.00
Master of The Game - 3 disc
Another of the many Sidney Sheldon novels given the CBS TV-miniseries treatment in the 1970s and '80s, Master of the Game yielded a three-part, nine-hour extravaganza, with enough corporate and romantic intrigue to fill an entire television season. Covering nearly 100 years, the story (which remained astonishingly faithful to the book) begins in the late 19th century, when ruthless young Scottish entrepreneur Jamie McGregor (Ian Charleson) emigrates to South Africa, in hopes of accumulating enough wealth and power to get even with his longtime enemy, Dutch merchant Van der Merwe (Donald Pleasence). Thanks to an extremely prolific diamond mine, the money comes quickly -- as does vengeance, when McGregor deflowers Van der Merwe's convent-educated daughter, Margaret (Cherie Lunghi). The result of this indiscretion is a daughter named Kate (Dyan Cannon), who turns out to be the "Master" of the title. Upon attaining adulthood, Kate assumes control of her father's vast financial empire, ruling her inherited international conglomerate, and her husband, David Blackwell (David Birney), with an iron fist. The story continues into the next several generations, with Kate's lily-livered son, Tony (Harry Hamlin), giving birth to twin daughters, Eve and Alexandra (both played by Liane Langland). One is good, the other evil; the evil twin threatens threaten to destroy everything that Kate has so painstakingly built up. Eventually, they both become the victims of a sneering, malevolent gigolo (Fernando Allende) with a penchant for beating young women senseless. Told in flashback, the narrative comes to a head during Kate's 90th birthday celebration, an event tainted by the efforts of a mysterious killer to wipe the domineering matriarch and her family from the face of the earth. 1984.
$
12.00
Aspen - 3 disc
Ostensibly a six-hour miniseries adaptation of Bert Hirschfield's novel Aspen, the program actually used only the title of the Hirschfield work; the plot proper was lifted from another novel by a different author, Bart Spicer's The Adversary. Set in the titular Colorado ski resort in the 1960s, the story line incorporated equal amounts of sex, greed, ambition, and murder, with the trial of accused rapist-killer Lee Bishop (Perry King) at the center of the storm, and the efforts by a gangster to grab up the local land, coupled with the amorous misadventures of a jet-setting glamour girl, taking up the slack whenever the plot threatened to lag. Despite a huge and varied cast, Sam Elliott emerged as the star of the proceedings in the role of straight-arrow attorney Tom Keating. 1977.
$
12.00
79 Park Avenue - 3 disc
The formal title for this TV mini-series was Harold Robbins' 79 Park Avenue, just in case you might mistake it for William Makepeace Thackeray's 79 Park Avenue. Originally presented in three parts, this adaptation of the Robbins best-seller stars Lesley Ann Warren as Marja Fludjicki, a Depression-era tenement girl who is accused of murdering her drunken stepfather. Part One details how Marja's "crime" was justifiable; she'd been raped by the bounder. Parts Two and Three would trace Marja's progress from teenaged prostitute to elegant, high-priced Park Avenue Madam--and mob mistress. Forced by circumstance into a life of prostitution, Marja marries Las Vegas high-roller Ross Savitch (Marc Singer). Ross is bumped off by the Syndicate, leaving Marja in the lurch. Marja rebounds from tragedy to become a federal witness against the Mob. Though all the names are changed, it isn't hard to discern the Bugsy Siegel story in this video equivalent to eating a whole box of chocolates in one sitting. 1977.
$
12.00
Backstairs at The White House
Based on the best-selling memoirs of Lillian Rogers Parks, the NBC miniseries Backstairs at the White House traces over five decades of American political history as witnessed from the vantage point of the servants' quarters. Played by Tania Johnson as a teenager and by Leslie Uggams as an adult, Lillian Rogers Parks served for 52 years as a maidservant at the White House. Though crippled early on with polio, Lillian diligently and loyally stuck to her duties -- and her own rock-solid set of principles and ideals -- through eight highly different Presidential administrations, often (and occasionally reluctantly) acting as friend and confidante to the First Lady of the moment. The large and stellar cast included a number of top-rank film and TV actors, obviously having the time of their lives impersonating such presidents as William Howard Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, and Dwight D. Eisenhower, and their respective wives. Also in the cast were several African-American veterans from the landmark TV miniseries Roots. 1979.
$
12.00
James A. Michener's Space - 6 disc
This CBS miniseries was based on the best-selling novel by James A. Michener. Covering the U.S.-Soviet "space race" from the end of WWII to the landing on the moon, the program stars James Garner as Norman Grant, a former war hero turned senator who tirelessly promotes the American space program despite almost insurmountable opposition. Other principal players include John Pope (Harry Hamlin), who matriculates from shavetail West Pointer to pioneering astronaut in the company of fellow space-traveler Randy Claggett (Beau Bridges); Leopold Strabismus (David Dukes), a hedonistic wheeler-dealer who hopes to capitalize on the 1947 UFO scare; German rocket scientist Dieter Kolff (Michael York), whose ideals (or lack thereof) are put to the test when he shifts his allegiance from the Nazis to the Americans; and Stanley Mott (Bruce Dern), an aeronautical engineer whose secret assignment is to make certain that men like Kolff aren't snatched up by the Soviets after the fall of Germany. 1985.
$
16.00
Mistal's Daughter - 2 disc
A French model (Stefanie Powers) poses for an artist (Stacy Keach), and they begin an affair. It doesn't last, however, and the model moves on to a married man (Timothy Dalton), while the artist has an affair with his benefactor (Lee Remick). This TV miniseries is based on a novel by Judith Krantz.
$
12.00
Once An Eagle - 3 disc
Based on the Anton Myrer novel, the series charts thirty years in the careers of two military men, from the outbreak of World War I to the aftermath of World War II. Sam Damon (Sam Elliot) is the "Gallant," a straight-arrow type who is an excellent family man and praiseworthy warrior. Courtney Massingale (Cliff Potts) is the "Goofus," a womanizing, self-aggrandizing conniver who knows how to play the angles to the top. Once an Eagle was the second of four story arcs seen on the NBC anthology series Best Sellers; it was preceded by Captains and the Kings, and followed by Seventh Avenue and The Rhineman Exchange. 1976/1977.
$
12.00
Dream West - 3 disc
A sprawling adaptation of the same-named novel by David Nevin, the three-part CBS miniseries Dream West starred Richard Chamberlain as colorful, controversial American explorer John Charles Fremont (1813-1890). The story detailed the visionary (and occasionally mercenary) Fremont's lifelong war against shortsided authority figures, beginning with his early skirmishes with the "brass" as an Army officer. In 1842, Fremont embarked upon his greatest adventure, heading an expedition to map the Oregon Trail -- the first step towards opening the entire North American continent to free and unimpeded exploration. His mission pitted Fremont against hostile Indians, the Mexican army, and the U.S. government itself. Along the way, he crossed paths with scores of historical figures, including Kit Carson, Jim Bridge, John Sutter, and President Abraham Lincoln. Alice Krige, Richard Chamberlain's vis-à-vis in the earlier Wallenberg: A Heroes' Story, co-starred as Jessie Benton, the headstrong senator's daughter who became Fremont's wife. 1986.
$
12.00
The Last Convertible - 3 disc
Based on the best-selling novel by Anton Myrer, the three-part NBC miniseries The Last Convertible chronicles the lives of five former Harvard roommates, all of whom share the titular Packard automobile. Beginning with the quintet's graduation in 1944, the teleplay by Philip de Guere, Stephen McPherson, and Clyde Ware covers an eventful 30 years, during which time the male protagonists all take turns romancing resident heroine Chris Farris (Deborah Raffin). Perry King is top-billed as Russ Currier, with Bruce Boxleitner as George Virdon, Edward Albert as Ron Dalrymple, John Shea as Terry Garrigan, and Michael Nouri as Jean des Barres. An Emmy nomination was bestowed upon Pete Rugolo's musical score. 1979.
$
12.00
The Sophisticated Gents - 2 disc
The Sophisticated Gents covers 25 years in the lives of a group of close friends. Nine African-American members of a sports club gather for a quarter-century reunion. As they reminisce over the high and low points of their lives, some of the members await the arrival of the group's troublemaker with less than enthusiasm. The story comes to an out-of-left-field conclusion involving an escaped killer (Melvin van Peebles) and a pursuing cop. The nine "gents" of the title are played by Ron O'Neal, Thalmus Rasulala, Bernie Casey, Dick Anthony Williams, Raymond St. Jacques, Robert Hooks, Rosey Grier, Paul Winfield...and the aforementioned Melvin van Peebles. Based on John A. Williams' novel The Junior Bachelor Society. 1981.
$
12.00
Chiefs - 3 disc
This TV miniseries concerns a Southern village where the murder of a boy has puzzled three different police chiefs since the 1920s. By the time that a black sheriff (Billy Dee Williams) takes over in 1962, he might have just enough evidence to find the culprit. Stars: Keith Carradine, Billy Dee Williams, Charlon Heston, Stephen Collins, Tess Harper, Brad Davis, Paula Kelly.
$
12.00
World War III - 2 disc
World War III is an ambitious if unnecessarily protracted speculative TV movie. Set in a "future December," the film prophesies an American grain embargo levied on Russia. US President Rock Hudson is entreated by the Soviet higher-ups to drop the ban; meanwhile, a group of renegade Russian military officers begin sending expeditionary forces into Alaska. While the countdown to Doomsday begins, the film insists upon cutting back to several expendable romances in both the American and Soviet camps. Boris Sagal, the original director of World War III, was killed in a freak helicopter accident while on location. To make up for lost time, the production was moved to the soundstages of Zoetrope Studios and overseen by ultra-efficient TV director David Greene. Part Two finds novice American president Rock Hudson trying to effect an honorable peace with Soviet premiere Brian Keith. But insurgent military officers endeavoring to seize the Alaska Pipeline as a bargaining chip continue to escalate the hostilities. It develops that the fate of the world may rest in the hands of American colonel David Soul. Also appearing is Cathy Lee Crosby, endearingly miscast as an intelligence officer. A heart-stopping surprise twist brings World War III to a close. While the film has its moments of genuine suspense, one can't help but feel that World War III would have been better an hour or two shorter--or at least with a few of the subplot romances removed. 1982.
$
12.00
Last Days of Pompeii - 1 disc
The ABC broadcast of The Last Days of Pompeii was arguably more faithful to its source than any of the earlier film versions -- and inarguably the most expensive version of all, boasting a 19,000,000-dollar budget and a truly spectacular cast. In recounting the events leading up to the cataclysmic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 A.D., the film, like the novel, introduces a veritable coliseum full of colorful fictional characters: stalwart Athenian Glaucus (Nicholas Clay), religious-zealot Egyptian Arbaces (Franco Nero), and mighty gladiator Lydon (Duncan Regehr), all of whom vie for the affections of high-born Ione (Olivia Hussey) and lowly, sightless slave girl Nydia (Linda Purl). Also around and about are Ned Beatty as wealthy merchant Diomed, Lesley-Anne Down as belly-dancing courtesan Chloe, and a handful of theatrical stalwarts like Laurence Olivier and Anthony Quayle. Mercilessly drubbed by the critics, who chortled at such dialogue as "Turn the other cheek, Christian lover!" and "Christians. They're everywhere I go. They're spreading through the empire like a pox!," The Last Days of Pompeii nonetheless garnered healthy ratings when it aired. 1984.
$
10.00