Arlene Golonka

Mari and Jeff Thompson start to doubt their own marriage when every couple they know separate. Jeff and Mari Thompson have been married for fifteen years. Although their marriage is not perfect, they are seemingly happy in their married and family life. But all their married friends seem to be getting divorced or separated. These newly single friends try to convince both Jeff and Mari - together and individually - that divorce is the way to go. Even if they do decide to remarry, it will be an inevitability that that marriage too will end in divorce. And divorce can even re-energize the love in an otherwise stale marriage. In light of these assertions by their friends, Jeff and Mari do evaluate their marriage. Their friends also place each of them in potentially compromising positions, despite the fact that they still are married. Will Jeff and Mari's marriage be able to withstand all this outside pressure? —Huggo

Perhaps the the best word one could use to describe this storyline would be "serpentine," so let's dig in. We start with an armored truck marked as belonging to the US Treasury Department. The truck is hijacked in a rather clever way, but the thieves aren't looking for the money inside; instead there's something else in there that they're after, but we're not sure what it is yet. The thieves get away and one of them meets with a man named Vince, played by Peter Falk. He gives the ill-gotten gains to Vince and tells him that he needs to pay the fee for it the next day. Vince is appalled by the short timeline but promises to work something out. From there we meet a mild-mannered Manhattan dentist named Sheldon Kornpett (Alan Arkin). His daughter Barbara (Penny Peyser) is about two days away from getting married to Tommy Ricardo (Michael Lembeck). He and his wife Carol (Nancy Dussault) are going to meet Tommy's parents for the first time. All they know about Tommy's dad is that he's involved with international business deals somehow. Tommy and his parents show up late for the dinner...and we learn that his father is Vince. Sheldon is a little suspicious of Vince, because he's telling some weird stories about a nine-month stint in Guatemala that involves giant tsetse flies with beaks, and the Guacamole Act of 1917. At an introductory dinner in which Sheldon meets his new in-law Vince, he finds Vince suspicious; during the dinner, Vince tells a crazy story of a nine-month "consulting" trip to 1954 Guatemala. Vince's son and wife (Arlene Golonka) seem oblivious. At one point in the dinner Vince excuses himself to make a phone call, and he hides something in the basement. Later that night, Sheldon pleads with his daughter not to marry into the Ricardo clan, since he doesn't trust Vince, but he is talked into giving the marriage a chance. The following day, Vince appears at Sheldon's office, claiming that he wanted to say hello. He asks Sheldon for help with a five-minute errand that involves breaking into Vince's office safe. Sheldon reluctantly agrees. After retrieving a mysterious black bag from Vince's cramped office in an old Herald Square office building, two armed hit men surprise Sheldon. After a chase down a fire escape and the ensuing shootout, Vince explains to Sheldon-in the middle of a crowded diner, no less-that he has worked for the CIA since the Eisenhower administration and robbed the United States Mint of engraving plates to crack a worldwide inflation plot hatched in Central America. He also mentions that he's gone rogue, because the CIA thought the caper was too risky and turned him down. Vince claims that Sheldon is not involved. However, if Vince is caught, he will be jailed for 20 years and fired from the CIA. Vince further upsets Sheldon by mentioning he left one of the engraving plates in the basement of Sheldon's house the previous night. While taking a delivery of supplies for the wedding, Mrs. Kornpett discovers the engraving and brings it to her local bank, where she is informed by the U.S. Treasury Department that it was stolen. Sheldon arrives home to find vehicles from the Treasury Department parked out front, and he high-tails it out of there, leading to a car chase through suburban New Jersey. After shaking the Feds, Sheldon calls Vince and explains what happened. Vince tells Sheldon he wants him to accompany him to Scranton, Pennsylvania, and the whole ordeal will be cleared up by the time they return. At a small airport near Lodi, New Jersey, Vince and Sheldon board a private jet. We get a very funny scene aboard the plane involving one of the plane's crew, played by James Hong. To Sheldon's dismay, during the flight he notices they are flying over the ocean. Vince assures Sheldon they are still going to Scranton, but they need to make a brief stop along the way in Tijata, a small island south of Honduras. When they arrive, Vince is supposed to meet a corrupt member of the small country's legislature, General Jesus Braunschweiger. But shortly after they land, Jesus is shot and killed before he can greet and debrief the two. Vince and Sheldon fall under sniper fire and, using the general's car, escape and drive into town. At their hotel, Sheldon, understandably tired of the ordeal, refuses to be shot at anymore. Vince agrees to leave him out of the rest of the operation. Sheldon goes to the lobby on a pretense and calls the United States Embassy to tell the story so far. Barry Lutz, the CIA agent-in-charge (Ed Begley Jr.) tells him that Vince is a madman who was mentally discharged from the agency a year earlier . Sheldon tells this to Vince, who prevents him from escaping, assuring Sheldon that the embassy told him that specifically to get Sheldon off the trail. Sheldon is still reluctant. Leaving the hotel, Vince hails a taxi driven by one of the airport snipers. Sheldon realizes who it is and chases after it, eventually leaping onto the roof of the car. Vince takes control of the car, crashing into a fruit market. The car chase resumes, this time with Sheldon INSIDE the car. They manage to get away and they reach the general's estate. General Garcia (Richard Libertini) gives them $20 million for the plates, awards them medals, and promptly marches them in front of a firing squad. Vince stalls for time until hundreds of CIA agents, led by Barry Lutz, overwhelm the army and take Garcia into custody. Lutz reveals that Vince was telling the truth the entire time. However, Vince suddenly announces his retirement, as he has had enough and he's looking forward to grandchildren. He gives Lutz the $10 million he had agreed to deliver from the general. The general overhears this and protests that he gave them $20 million but Vince says he's clearly crazy. We next find ourselves at the wedding. Everybody's there but Vince and Sheldon. They get ready to start without the fathers but suddenly a helicopter shows up and lowers a cable with Vince and Sheldon, sitting on a plank and wearing top hats and tails. They say that the wedding can start in five minutes, once the Paramus Symphony Orchestra, whom they've hired for the day, has tuned up. The men each give their children a million dollars as a wedding gift. Suddenly a government vehicle shows up and it's Lutz. He's furious at Vince. Sheldon is about to confess, but before he can, it comes out that Lutz is only angry about not being invited to the wedding. The orchestra begins to play and the wedding goes forward.

In *Hang 'Em High*, the story begins with Jed Cooper, a former lawman, as he drives a herd of cattle across the Oklahoma Territory. His character is demonstrated as he saves a foundering calf from drowning. Suddenly, he is surrounded by a posse led by the vindictive Captain Wilson. The posse accuses Cooper of murder and cattle theft, refusing to believe his protests or examine the bill of sale he presents as proof of his innocence. Swiftly and mercilessly, they decide to lynch him. The men string him up on a tree and leave him to die, abandoning him as a symbol of their rough brand of frontier justice. Yet Cooper's fate takes an unexpected turn when he is found, still barely alive, by U.S. Marshal Dave Bliss. The marshal rescues him, cuts him down, and brings him to Fort Grant, where Cooper is determined to clear his name. At Fort Grant, Cooper appears before Judge Adam Fenton, the sole judge in the territory, known for his firm, no-nonsense approach to upholding law and order. After reviewing the facts and realizing Cooper's innocence, Judge Fenton releases him. However, rather than dismissing Cooper's grievances, Fenton sees an opportunity to recruit him as a deputy U.S. marshal, noting his skill and resilience. Fenton offers Cooper a badge and a mandate to bring criminals to justice under the law, warning him against seeking personal revenge. He urges Cooper to see this as an opportunity to channel his anger constructively, by upholding legal justice in a lawless land. Cooper, still reeling from the trauma of his near-death experience, reluctantly agrees, setting his sights on capturing the men responsible-not out of vengeance, he insists, but to see justice served. Cooper's journey as a marshal leads him across rugged terrain and into dangerous encounters as he pursues the members of the posse who wronged him. He arrests several criminals along the way, grappling with the ethical complexities of frontier justice. Some of the posse members beg for mercy, claiming they acted out of fear, while others remain defiant. His encounters reveal the fragility of law in a place where vigilante justice often prevails. At each step, Cooper is forced to confront his own sense of morality and the fine line between justice and revenge. Although tempted by the thought of exacting personal retribution, he remains committed to his role as a marshal, bringing each man in to face a trial. The tension escalates as Cooper confronts Captain Wilson and the last of his lynchers. The final showdown embodies the central conflict of the film, exploring whether true justice can ever be served in a place where life is cheap and justice often subjective. Cooper's dedication to upholding the law, despite his personal vendetta, ultimately underscores the film's message about the cost of revenge and the harsh, often flawed nature of frontier justice. In the end, *Hang 'Em High* delivers a powerful meditation on the themes of justice, morality, and the toll of vengeance. Cooper's journey is not just one of survival but of reckoning with the violent world he inhabits, as he chooses to abide by the law even when tempted to forsake it. His choice marks him as a figure of integrity in a world where such values are rare, leaving the audience with a nuanced perspective on what justice truly means in the unforgiving landscape of the American West.

Sid Caesar stars as the bumbling right-hand man of mob boss Robert Ryan, who is sent to find a corpse buried in a suit lined with stolen mob money. Sid Caesar plays a bumbling gopher to mob boss Robert Ryan, who discovers a large theft of mob money. His bookkeeper is killed shortly before he can reveal the thief. When the discovery is made, Ryan suspects Caesar as the culprit and probable murderer of the bookkeeper. Caesar spends the rest of the movie trying to find the real killer and a corpse buried in a suit lined with the stolen money. —alfiehitchie