Dick Van Dyke

Follow the heartwarming journey of two orphan girls whose only wish is to find a home for Christmas. With a little help from their guardian angels (Dick Van Dyke and Dame Angela Lansbury), they discover miracles can happen when you believe. Follow the heartwarming journey of two orphan girls whose only wish is to find a home for Christmas. With a little help from their guardian angels (Dick Van Dyke and Dame Angela Lansbury), they discover miracles really can happen when you believe.

A clumsy, mischievous, friendly and curious monkey named George (Frank Welker) lives in the jungles of Africa. George is a curious creature and tries to learn as much as he can about everything. His behavior amuses the other young jungle animals but angers their parents. Therefore, George is left sad and alone. Meanwhile, at the Bloomsberry Museum, Ted (Will Ferrell), a museum employee and a tour guide living in New York City, teaches schoolchildren about natural history, not realizing that his lectures bore them. Afterward, he has a talk with Maggie (Drew Barrymore), the schoolteacher, who admires him and for whom he has strong feelings. Maggie brings her class to the museum every Thursday and finds Ted's talks amazing and insightful. Later, Mr. Bloomsberry (Dick Van Dyke), the owner of the museum, tells Ted that he is pressed to close the museum by his son, Bloomsberry Junior (David Cross), who wishes to build a parking garage in its stead. Bloomsberry says that the old exhibits of the museum are simply not pulling in the crowds needed and nothing is selling from the gift shop. As such, Bloomsberry says that the museum is broke. Junior says that the parking lot would have high hourly rates and no daily maximums. Ted is enraged and says that the world needs places where kids can visit and allow their knowledge and imagination to grow. This upsets Ted, who suggests, to revive the museum's popularity, that they obtain a 40-foot statue called the Lost Shrine of Zagawa. The statue is made of twenty tons of granite, carved by a thousand craftsmen over a hundred years. Mr. Bloomsberry is too old to go as he can barely stand, but Ted quickly volunteers to make the expedition. Bloomsberry offers to share his maps and journals with Ted, to help him find the shrine in the jungle. Jealous of Ted's constant praise from his dad, Junior burns half the map to sabotage the exhibition without them knowing. Ted is tricked into purchasing a yellow safari outfit with a yellow hat and boards a cargo ship to Africa, becoming humiliated in front of other passengers. In Africa, Ted leads a group on a four-day hike to the lost shrine. Ted is led by a local guide named Edu. George spots the yellow hat and, mistaking it for a large banana, follows the group. They soon notice each other and become friends. When Ted reaches the end of Junior's sabotaged map, he encounters a miniature idol. Believing this to be Zagawa itself, he gets depressed. On the resting place of the idol was an inscription that talked about turning the idol into a beam of light to reveal further secrets, but Ted ignores it. He gets a call from Mr. Bloomsberry and sends a picture of the statue. However, the angle of the picture causes Mr. Bloomsberry to believe the idol is much bigger. Ted returns to the docks, while George quickly follows with the hat. George sneaks onto the ship and rides to the city without Ted's knowledge. Upon arrival, Ted rides home in a taxi, and George follows him all the way to his apartment. Ted returns home and finds advertisements for the shrine all over the city. In Ted's apartment building, the monkey makes his way to the penthouse and vandalizes the walls of Ted's neighbor, Miss Plushbottom, with paint. Ted is evicted for violating a no-pets rule. Upset, Ted wonders what he is going to do with George. Together, they walk to the Bloomsberry Museum, where crowds of people await to see the idol. Junior overhears Ted complaining about the tiny idol and uses this to humiliate Ted. George inadvertently destroys a dinosaur skeleton, and Junior shoves Ted out of the museum. With nowhere to go, Ted and George sleep in a park. The next morning, Ted awakes to find George gone. Ted follows the monkey into the zoo, where Maggie and her students name the monkey "George" after a nearby statue of George Washington. Ted attempts to court Maggie, but George starts floating away, suspended by a bunch of balloons, and Ted goes after him in the same way. Together, they fly around the city, held aloft by Ted's balloons and using a kite to control their direction. When they float over the Bloomsberry museum, Ted holds out the idol and wishes it were big, which gives him an idea. Ted visits Clovis, an inventor who built the museum's Zagawa exhibit, who has a projection machine that can create a 40-foot-tall hologram of any object. Ted takes the projector to the museum, intending to use it to display the idol. He shows it to Mr. Bloomsbury, who agrees it would save the museum. Still jealous, Junior pours coffee on the projector and frames George when the projector breaks. A defeated Ted informs the public that the museum will permanently close and that there is no idol. Ted has a falling-out with George and orders him to leave, allowing Animal Control to capture George to be returned to Africa. Ted takes a walk through the city alone and is constantly reminded of his fun with George and his mischief. He speaks with Maggie, who helps him understand what is important in life. Ted gets on the cargo ship and frees George. While he tries to explain to George that their friendship is more important than any idol, a beam of sunlight passes through the tiny statue, creating a Pictogram showing the location of the full-size idol. Ted then realizes the true meaning of an ancient writing he saw back in Africa. Ted and George therefore travel to Africa in the ship's cargo bay, to rejoin Edu, Ted's guide, and find the true idol. The real idol is displayed in the museum, which reopens with new exhibits and Ted is praised as a hero for saving the institution. During the reopening celebration, Junior gets a job as a valet and receives acknowledgment from his father, Ivan has grown fond of George and invites Ted to return to his apartment and Ted and Maggie share a romantic moment, but are interrupted by George, who has activated a rocket ship before Ted jumps in and they repeatedly circumnavigate the globe.

A racing car, which is a composite of a 1914 Overland and a 1928 Ford Model A engine, had a successful career winning races across multiple years from 1907 onward in France, Germany and other nations. In the 1909, at the British Grand Prix, the said car swerves to avoid a dog and a little girl who was bending to pick it up, loses control, crashes, and catches fire, bringing its racing career to an end. In 1910, the car ends up in an old garage owned by Mr Coggins (Desmond Llewelyn), where two children, Jeremy (Adrian Hala) and Jemima Potts, (Heather Ripley) have grown fond of it as they play in it. The kids are told by the Junkman (Victor Maddern) that he intends to buy the car, to crush it and melt it down to liquid ore. The Junkman offers 15 Shillings, but Coggins demands 30 Shillings to part with the car. The Junkman agrees and offers to pick the car up the following day. The kids beseech Coggins, who agrees to sell the car to their father, if he can match the offer of 30 Shillings. While skipping school, the kids meet Truly Scrumptious (Sally Ann Howes), a beautiful upper-class woman with her own motorcar. The kids ran on the street, and Truly swerves the car to avoid hitting them and ends up in the nearby pond. Truly brings them home to report their truancy to their father. Truly shows interest in Caractacus' odd inventions, but he is affronted by her attempts to tell him that his children should be in school. Caractacus believes that his kids are smart and that skipping school once in a while allows the other kids in class to catch up with them. The two children, who live with their widowed father Caractacus Potts (Dick Van Dyke), implore him to buy the car before the Junkman does, but he is unable to due to having no money. Caractacus is an eccentric and unsuccessful inventor, and lives with his equally peculiar father Grandpa 'Bungy' Potts (Lionel Jeffries). Bungy roams around in full military gear and served in the British army in India. Caractacus keeps tinkering with new idea such as rockets tied behind his back to send him flying through the air. He even has an elaborate machine that cooks him breakfast with toast, eggs and sausages. Caractacus does not want to disappoint his kids but has no idea how he can get 30 Shillings at such short notice. That night, while going over his bizarre inventions, many of which seem to be similar in function and form to modern appliances, such as vacuum cleaners and televisions, Caractacus discovers that one of the sweets he has invented can be played like a flute, which makes it a musical hard candy whistle. The holes in the sweets were a mistake due to fixing the wrong boiling point for the candy. He tries to sell the "toot sweet" to Lord Scrumptious (James Robertson Justice), a major confection manufacturer. Lord Scrumptious would not even meet Caractacus, but then Caractacus and the kids run into Truly, who turns out to be Lord Scrumptious' daughter. She agrees to get Caractacus to meet her father. Lord Scrumptious is very dismissive, but Truly asks Caractacus to persist and demonstrate the Toot Sweet to her father. When the factory is overrun by dogs responding to the whistle, he is thrown out. Then he takes his automatic hair-cutting machine to a carnival to raise money, but it goes haywire. He "hides" from an angry customer named Cyril (Arthur Mullard) by joining a song-and-dance act, stealing the show and earning enough tips to pay for the car. Potts brings the car home and takes it in his garage to work on it for several weeks. Potts rebuilds the car, which he nicknames Chitty Chitty Bang Bang for the noises its engine makes, and he and the children, accompanied by Truly, go for a picnic on the beach, where Truly becomes very fond of the Potts family and the other way around as well. Caractacus tells them a story about nasty Baron Bomburst (Gert Frobe), the tyrant ruler of fictional Vulgaria, who wants to steal Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and keep it all for himself: In the story, the quartet and the car are stranded by high tide, but Chitty suddenly deploys huge flotation devices, and they escape inland. The Baron sends two comical spies ashore to capture the car for him, but they briefly capture Lord Scrumptious by accident, and then kidnap Grandpa Potts, mistaking him for the inventor of Chitty. Caractacus, Truly, and the children see him being taken away by airship and give chase. When they accidentally drive off a cliff, Chitty sprouts wings and propellers and begins to fly. They follow the airship to Vulgaria, where the Baroness Bomburst (Anna Quayle) has ordered the imprisonment of all children, whom she abhors. Grandpa the "inventor" has been ordered by the baron to make another floating car and is bluffing to avoid being tortured. The Potts party is hidden by the local toy-maker (Benny Hill), who now works only for the baron. The Toymaker harbors Caractacus' group in his shop, and they disguise themselves as jack-in-the-boxes to hide in plain sight from Bomburst's Child Catcher (Robert Helpmann). Chitty is discovered and taken to the castle, while Caractacus and the Toymaker search for Grandpa, and Truly searches for food, the Child Catcher returns and traps Jeremy and Jemima. The toy-maker takes Truly and Caractacus to a grotto far beneath the castle where the townspeople have been hiding their children, and they concoct a scheme to free the children and the village from the baron. The toy-maker sneaks them into the castle disguised as life-size dolls, gifts for the baron's birthday. Caractacus snares the Baron and the town's children swarm the banquet hall. In the ensuing chaos, the baron, baroness, and Child Catcher are all captured. The family is freed and fly back with Truly to England. As Caractacus' story concludes, the children ask if the story ends with him and Truly getting married. Caractacus does not answer; later, he tries to apologize for his children when he drops Truly off at her manor, saying that the difference in their social status would make a relationship between them ridiculous, offending Truly. Returning glumly to his cottage, Caractacus is surprised to encounter Truly's father Lord Scrumptious, who is revealed to have been Grandpa Potts' former brigadier. Lord Scrumptious offers to buy Caractacus' failed candies and market them to the public as dog treats. Overjoyed that he has finally made a successful invention, Caractacus rushes off to tell Truly, but her house staff has already told her the news, and she meets him halfway. They confess their love for each other, and as they return home, Chitty flies up into the sky once again, this time without wings.

Dick Van Dyke and Debbie Reynolds star as a suburban couple who learn that not even divorce can solve all their problems. After 17 years, life has become too predictable and stale for Richard and Barbara Harmon. They argue, they visit a marriage counselor, and a drunk Richard visits a prostitute. They split up. After meeting other people, they are reunited at a nightclub where they realize that their marriage was better than their divorce. With two teenage children, Richard and Barbara Harmon, both from working class backgrounds, have hit a rough patch in their 17-year marriage. Richard cannot understand why Barbara isn't happy while he feels he has slaved for years, just within the last few years finally to become a business success and good breadwinner. Barbara feels he doesn't communicate well or understand her emotional needs, and that he has changed ever since he became that business success which is more important than her in their marriage. Their sexual dry spell is difficult on both, as neither has even contemplated being unfaithful. Taking advice from others, they take measures to protect their individual selves, in the process exacerbating the issue of divorce, which had not even been a possibility before these measures. As they work toward divorce, they must figure if they truly want a future without each other. Adding to the complicated situation is long-divorced couple Nelson and Nancy Downes, the former who is trying to marry off the latter so he won't need to pay alimony anymore and can get back on his feet. Nancy does want to remarry because she's lonely, but it must make economic sense. For Nancy, Richard fits the love side of the equation, but not the economic side as long as he must pay Barbara alimony. So Nelson and Nancy go on a mission to get Barbara remarried to someone else.

A rock singer travels to a small Ohio town to make his "farewell" television performance and kiss his biggest fan before he is drafted. Conrad Birdie is the biggest rock & roll star of the 60's ever to be drafted. Aspiring chemist and song writer Albert is convinced he can make his fortune and marry his girlfriend Rosie if he gets Conrad on the Ed Sullivan show to kiss a high school girl goodbye. Albert's mother will do anything to break him up with Rosie. Kim and Hugo, the high school steadies, live in Sweet Apple, Ohio where most of the action takes place. —Lisa Grable <grable@unity.ncsu.edu> Conrad Birdie, arguably the biggest rock and roll superstar in the world, has just been drafted, which brings his legion of teen-aged female fans marching in the streets in protest. One other person not happy about Birdie being drafted is struggling songwriter Albert F. Peterson, a mama's boy of a man who was finally going to hit the big time when one of his songs was to be featured in a Birdie movie. Rosie DeLeon, Albert's long suffering secretary and fiancée of six years, pitches an idea to Ed Sullivan: have Birdie appear on his television program, The Ed Sullivan Show (1948) kissing one of his fans as a symbolic goodbye to all his fans, while he sings a yet to be written song by Albert to be called "One Last Kiss". Sullivan buys the idea. Rosie is hoping that this move will bring financial security to Albert, who will then be able to support his mama, ex-vaudevillian Mae Peterson who wanted Albert to go into show business instead of his want to become a bio-chemist, and marry her (of course if Mama allows the marriage, she who doesn't even know they're engaged). The fan chosen is Kim McAfee of Sweet Apple, Ohio. Up until being chosen as the recipient of Birdie's kiss, Kim's sole focus in life was being pinned by her boyfriend, Hugo Peabody. Birdie's presence in Sweet Apple brings up many issues which may thwart Rosie and Albert's plans, including a jealous Hugo, an exasperated Harry McAfee (Kim's father), and a ballooning line-up on the show, all these problems which Rosie and Albert try to manage. The ultimate problem may be outside of Rosie and Albert's control, except for a little assistance of some bio-chemistry hopefully to solve the problem. Regardless, Rosie, in the end, may only be able to take so much of Albert siding with Mama instead of her. —Huggo When the draft selects rock star Conrad Birdie (Pearson), his fans are devastated, but none more than struggling songwriter Albert Peterson (van Dyke), whose song Birdie was just about to record. Albert's longtime girlfriend, Rosie (Leigh), pushes Albert to write a new tune that Birdie will perform on television to a fan selected in a contest. The scheme works, with young Ohio teenager Kim McAfee (Ann-Margaret) declared the winner, but no one has counted on the jealous wrath of her boyfriend. None-too-successful songwriter Alberto Paterson hatches a plot with his secretary - and long-suffering girlfriend - to get rock-and-roll phenomenon Conrad Birdie to sing one of his songs on the Ed Sullivan show. The pop star would then symbolically sing goodbye to a young man chosen at random from the country's manhood, this being his last appearance before being drafted. Complicated to start with, things get more tricky as everyone including Alberto's clinging mother descend on the small town where the chosen man lives. Even Alberto's biological inventions come in useful. —Jeremy Perkins {J-26}