John Boorman

A tailor living in Panama reluctantly becomes a spy for a British Agent. John le Carré's spy thriller is brought to the big screen. A British spy is banished to Panama after having an affair with an ambassador's mistress. Once there he makes connection with a local tailor with a criminal past and connections to all of the top political and gangster figures in Panama. The tailor also has a wife, who works for the canal administrator, and a huge debt. The spy's mission is to learn what the President intends to do with the Panama Canal, but he's really in business for himself, blackmailing the tailor into spinning a fantastic tale about the canal being sold to China and former mercenaries ready to topple the current government. —John Sacksteder <jsackste@bellsouth.net>

In ancient England, warfare reigns between Uther Pendragon (Gabriel Byrne) and the Duke of Cornwall (Corin Redgrave). To bring peace, Merlin (Nicol Williamson) secures the mystical sword Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake (Hilary Joyalle) and gives it to Uther. Impressed by this symbol of power and Uther's promise of land, Cornwall relents and recognizes Uther as king. Cornwall hosts a celebration, where his wife, Igrayne (Katrine Boorman) dances. Uther cannot hide his lust and the fragile truce is broken. Uther besieges Cornwall's castle. He again asks Merlin to intervene. Merlin agrees to give him Igrayne but only if Merlin will receive the result of Uther's lust. That night, Uther's men draw Cornwall out of his castle and ambush him, killing him. Merlin transforms Uther to resemble Cornwall. Uther enters the castle, makes rough love to Igrayne and impregnates her as Cornwall breathes his last. Nine months later, Igrayne gives birth to a son. Upon seeing his son for the first time, Uther vows to become a peaceful king and secure his kingdom for his son. Merlin, who has not been seen since the night Cornwall died, appears and takes the child, as per their agreement. Igrayne is distraught and as Merlin disappears into the forest, Uther tries to stop him but is attacked by knights still loyal to Cornwall. Mortally wounded, Uther drives Excalibur into a stone, declaring no one will have the sword but him. Standing nearby, Merlin recites a spell that will keep the sword in the stone until Arthur is old enough to claim it. For the next sixteen years, no one is able to pull the sword from the stone. Annually a joust is held to see who will be able to try; if any man succeeds, he will be crowned king. Sir Ector (Clive Swift) brings his son, Kay (Niall O'Brien) and Kay's squire, Arthur (Nigel Terry). When Arthur forgets Kay's sword, he goes to the stone and draws Excalibur for Kay to use in the joust. Incredulous, the crowd sees that Arthur has removed the sword. Ector reveals that Arthur was brought to him as a baby by Merlin, who bid the man to raise Arthur and protect him. Many of the other knights refuse to recognize Arthur, who is not a knight, as their king. Only Leondegrance (Patrick Stewart) acknowledges Arthur as the rightful king. After a quick tutorial in the mystic arts, Merlin leads Arthur to Leondegrance's castle, which is besieged by the other knights. Arthur fights bravely but wins the day when he admits that he is not himself a knight and kneels to ask one of the rebel knights, Uryens (Keith Buckley) to remedy the situation. Uryens recognizes Uther Pendragon's courage flows through Arthur's veins and knights him. That night, Arthur begins his courtship of Guenevere (Cherie Lunghi), Leondegrance's daughter. Under Arthur, the kingdom is prosperous, the various fiefdoms are united, and many people flock to his gleaming castle, Camelot. The land's mightiest knights have joined Arthur's fellowship. These knights include Lancelot (Nicholas Clay), who had earlier taught Arthur an important lesson in humility: Lancelot, the best knight in the world, had defeated all of Arthur's knights; Arthur himself won only by calling on Excalibur's mystical powers. cleaving Lancelot's weapon, striking him on the chest and killing him. The sword breaks and Arthur, recognizing his sin, realizes he let his pride and anger overcome him. Remorseful, Arthur throws the sword into a nearby pond. Moments later, the Lady of the Lake offers the restored sword to Arthur and heals Lancelot, who awakens and swears his allegiance to Arthur. However, he spends little time in Camelot because of his love for Guenevere. In order to maintain his and Guenevere's honor, Lancelot stays in self-imposed exile. Arthur marries Guenevere, establishes the Round Table and peace unites the kingdom, despite Lancelot's absence at meetings of the Round Table. This fact is not lost on another of the castle's denizens, Morgana la Fey (Helen Mirren), Arthur's half-sister. As a child, she had watched Uther ravish Igrayne as her father (Cornwall) died. Now she hides a bitter plan to destroy Arthur and his kingdom. She goads Gawain (Liam Neeson) into accusing Guenevere and Lancelot of infidelity. He challenges the absent Lancelot to a joust. Lancelot's squire, Perceval (Paul Geoffrey), is knighted so he can joust in Lancelot's place but at the last minute Lancelot arrives and defeats Gawain. Then he collapses from a self-inflicted wound, incurred the night before as he wrestled with his unchaste desires for Guenevere in the forest. Merlin has grown tired from helping men forge their kingdoms and accepts that soon science and the Christian God will take the place of magic. Morgana rejects his conclusions and seduces Merlin into revealing all of his secrets, tricking him into reciting the ancient spell of "making", the very same spell Merlin had used to alter Uther's likeness to that of Cornwall. She learns the chant and uses it to imprison Merlin in his cave. Meanwhile, Guenevere has slipped into the forest to find Lancelot. They make love and fall asleep. In a scene that both Morgana and Merlin witness, Arthur finds them and, rather than kill them, drives Excalibur into the ground between them. When they awake and see the sword, the two adulterers are driven apart by grief. That night, Morgana takes the guise of Guenevere, has sex with a delirious Arthur and begets a child by him. Without Excalibur and despondent over the treachery of his queen and best knight, Arthur is an ineffective king and the land suffers. Crops fail and pestilence spreads. Arthur sends his knights on a quest to find the Holy Grail, the cup Jesus used during the Last Supper; it will heal Arthur and the land. All of the knights search for the Grail for 10 years, and most of them die. Morgana has raised her and Arthur's son, Mordred (Charley Boorman), to hate Arthur. Together they lure Arthur's knights to their lair and hang the ones that cannot be entranced from a tree. Perceval is one of those knights. As he slowly strangles, he has a vision of the Grail. It asks him "What is the secret of the Grail? Who does it serve?" Perceval is too frightened to answer the question. However, the spurs on another hanged knight's armor gradually sever the rope hanging Perceval, and he escapes. In the countryside, Perceval encounters a group of disheveled peasants who appear to be conducting a funeral for a child. He recognizes Lancelot among them, barely recognizable with long hair, a beard and dressed in a monk's robes. Lancelot is now almost insane with disaffection over Camelot. Perceval begs Lancelot to return but instead they attack him. He barely escapes with his life but finds himself at the Grail Castle from his near-death vision. This time, Perceval understands the secret of the Grail: it is the faith that sustains Arthur, and through him the land flourishes. Perceval returns to Camelot with the Grail. Arthur drinks from it and regains his health and the land next to him blooms to life. He visits Guenevere, who retired to a convent after her infidelity. Arthur forgives her and asks her forgiveness. She returns Excalibur to him, having kept it with her through the years. Mordred has challenged Arthur to the throne and has built a massive army comprised primarily of Saxons. Morgana's enchantments protect him from any man-made weapon. They also keep her artificially youthful. On the night before the battle, Arthur prays for Merlin for help. As a wraith, Merlin appears in Morgana's tent and tricks her into undoing her spells and causing her to finally age, becoming an old hag. As she ages, smoke pours from her mouth, enough to cover the camp and the battleground. When Mordred finds his mother as an old crone he strangles her. The next morning, Arthur's forces, though vastly outnumbered, meet and vanquish Mordred's army at Camlann, having the advantage of the smoke let loose by Morgana. They are aided by the timely intervention of Lancelot, who singlehandedly kills many Saxons. Lancelot, however, succumbs to the wound he'd given himself in the forest when trying to requite his love for Guenevere, and collapses. A grateful Arthur forgives him and Lancelot dies, having found peace. Only Mordred himself remains. He impales Arthur on a spear and Arthur stabs him with Excalibur, killing him. Dying, Arthur commands Perceval to take Excalibur and throw it into the nearest body of still water. Perceval takes the sword to a nearby lake but is unable to follow the command; he returns to Arthur saying that Excalibur cannot be lost again. Arthur reassures his knight that the sword will be safe and will be presented to the next worthy king. Perceval returns to the lake and casts the sword in where it's caught by the Lady of the Lake and taken beneath the water. Perceval rides back to Camlann in time to see the Fates sailing away to Avalon with Arthur's body.

Four years after young Regan was possessed by a demon, she is still recovering. But the protegee of the priest who exorcised her believes the demon has not finished with her yet.

Four city men on a canoe trip pit their nerve against the churning waters of a wild Georgia river, which soon becomes a fight for survival against nature and the brutality of man.

Lee Marvin plays Walker, a man who loses his share of $93,000 when he's double-crossed on a heist. His old pal Mal Reese (John Vernon) filled him with bullet holes and left him to rot, presuming he was dead or would die soon anyway. Reese needed all the money to pay back his debts to the Organization. Walker's wife also came along for the ride, but she didn't know what was going to happen. The job took place at the dark and dreary old prison, Alcatraz, where money pick-ups are made. After being shot up, Walker apparently made it out alive. During this sequence, and throughout the film, there are flashbacks to provide the backstory. They help convey Walker's thoughts and feelings, even if it seems like he doesn't have them anymore. He is portrayed as austere, terse, and slightly aloof. Now all Walker wants to do is get his money back. At the inception of this storyline we see Walker stomping down a corridor, his footsteps loud, repetitive, pounding. Walker is fiercely determined, a man on a mission. Walker does a lot of walking throughout the movie, going from one place to another until he finds justice. That's the only thing on his mind. Shots of his wife getting out of bed, going out, and coming back home play while the pounding of his footsteps overshadow it. Since his wife is the person closest to him, and because she had an affair with Reese, Walker goes straight for her first. As the sound of footsteps come to a halt, we see Walker uninhibitedly barge in his wife's front door with a gun in hand, knock her down, and head right for the bedroom-blasting away several rounds at the bed. Reese wasn't there as he'd hoped. Now it's up to Walker to hunt down Reese through his connections. Reese is a top man in the syndicate this time around, so getting to him is not easy. Walker enlists the help of his wife's sister (Angie Dickinson). Since Reese wouldn't give him the cash, Walker disposes of him and move to the next guy in line. The bill gets passed down. Walker simply holds the whole Organization accountable. He won't relent until his gets the money. It all comes down to Walker going back to the place that haunts his memory: Alcatraz. That's where his money will be dropped. Once again, an act of treachery is in the works. Walker is set up to be hit by a sniper. He observes the drop-off point from overhead, waits it out, and makes the men believe he didn't show up. At the last moment, all you see is Walker dissipate into the darkness like a ghost. The ending doesn't fill in the blanks. Will he retrieve the money? Has this all been a dream from the beginning when he was left to die? The answers are left up to the viewer.