Mickey Rourke

High-school student Ed Wallis enters into a friendship with his neighbor, Ashby, a retired CIA assassin who only has a few months left to live. ASHBY is a coming of age/approaching death comedy drama. A seventeen-year-old kid (Ed) trying to understand who he wants to be in the world, befriends a terminally ill ex-CIA contract killer (Ashby) who is trying to make peace with his life and God before he goes. 'Making peace' might just entail killing three old bosses who have tricked him into breaching his strange moral code.

Former CIA SAD/SOG officer John W. Creasy (Denzel Washington) comes to Mexico to visit his old friend, Paul Rayburn (Christopher Walken), who runs a security firm in Mexico. Rayburn convinces him to take a bodyguard position, and he is offered one by Samuel Ramos (Marc Anthony), Mexico City automaker. His young daughter Lupita "Pita" Ramos (Dakota Fanning) requires a bodyguard for her kidnapping insurance policy to take effect. There is one kidnapping every 60 mins in Latin America and 70% of the victims do not survive. Lisa Ramos (Radha Mitchell) is Pita's mother, and she has rejected 5 candidates already. Samuel doesn't want to overspend on a bodyguard and wants Creasy hired as he comes relatively cheap due to his drinking problem. Lisa selects Creasy as he is an American. Lisa can sense the sadness in Creasy. Creasy is aloof and keeps Pita at a distance, even though she tries to talk to him. Creasy struggles with alcoholism, burnout, and guilt over his actions with the CIA. When trying to commit suicide, the bullet in his gun misfires. He eventually focuses more on his job, bonding with Pita. Noticing Pita, a swimmer, becomes startled by the starter gun at her swim meets, he begins to coach her. She learns to react to the starter gun, diving into the water without flinching, eventually winning a meet. One day, while waiting for Pita outside of her piano lesson, Creasy notices a car with two men circling the area, and two Federal Police officers block the street. As Pita emerges, he yells at her to run, but she freezes. The car pulls up and the men attempt to grab Pita, but he fires his gun in the air, causing her to run away. Creasy attempts to fend off the attackers, killing three, and wounding a fourth, but is critically wounded himself (he takes multiple bullets front on). Pita runs back to him but is then abducted by the remaining kidnappers. The police arrest Creasy for killing police officers on duty and also for being involved in the kidnapping of Lupita. While recovering from his injuries, AFI agent Miguel Manzano (Giancarlo Giannini) has Creasy relocated to a veterinarian clinic, to protect him from the corrupt police. When he regains consciousness, he is questioned by Manzano, but refuses to divulge any information. He then meets reporter Mariana Garcia Guerrero (Rachel Ticotin), who offers to help him investigate the kidnapping and expose the criminal & Police nexus. Pita's ransom drop (arranged by the Federal Police) fails when the kidnappers are ambushed by rival criminals. The kidnappers' leader, "The Voice," (Roberto Sosa) is enraged at his nephew's death during the botched drop. Holding the Ramoses responsible, he informs Pita's mother Lisa that Pita will be lost to her and Samuel forever as retribution. Creasy uses this to wage war on the kidnapping ring and police corruption responsible for Pita's apparent death. He tracks down, interrogates, and kills the getaway driver (Pita had one day noticed a car following them and taken down its registration number. Creasy gets the number from her diary in her room), followed by middleman "Jersey Boy" (Charles Paraventi) (proprietor of the rave in Neza, who was known to the getaway driver as the Guardian. Creasy gets an ATM card from the Jersey Boy, which is given to him by the Voice, and is used to withdraw $200 per week for expenses. He also reveals that a crooked cop Fuentes stole the money at the drop), and Lt. Victor Fuentes (Jesús Ochoa) (a lieutenant in the Anti-Kidnapping Division of the Federal Judicial Police and the head of the criminal "La Hermandad" syndicate), who coordinated the drop. From Fuentes, Creasy learns most of the ransom money (out of the $10 MM, Fuentes only got $2.5 MM) had been stolen before the ambush at the drop and that Jordan Kalfus (Mickey Rourke), Samuel's lawyer who suggested kidnapping insurance, loaded the money into Samuel's drop vehicle. At Kalfus' home, Creasy discovers that he is already dead and finds a fax with bank account information leading to Samuel. Creasy gives the ATM card to Guerrero to find out who is putting money in that account. Creasy confronts Samuel and Lisa. Samuel explains that Kalfus recommended arranging a kidnapping so he could claim the insurance payout and pay the debts his father had left him alongside a ruined auto empire (Out of $7.5 MM stolen, Jordan kept $2.5 MM and gave $5 MM to Samuel). They were promised Pita would be unharmed. When the drop went bad, Samuel blamed Kalfus for Pita's apparent death, killing him in a rage. Lisa, unaware of Samuel's involvement, angrily tells Creasy to "kill him or (she) will". He leaves Samuel a gun and the bullet he previously intended to commit suicide with. Remorseful, Samuel loads the gun and shoots himself in the head. Creasy learns from Guerrero the ATM card he recovered earlier is linked to a man living on the edge of the city. Manzano's people, acting on Guerrero's information, infiltrate his home, finding a photo of "The Voice". Guerrero runs a story in her paper, revealing the ringleader is Daniel Sanchez. The ATM card belongs to Daniel's wife Maria Rosas Sanchez (Rosa María Hernández) at the address of Daniel's brother Aurelio (Gero Camilo). Creasy breaks into Aurelio's, taking him prisoner, despite being shot in the chest in the process. He then calls Daniel, threatening to kill his family unless he turns himself in. However, Daniel reveals that Pita is still alive, and offers to trade her for his brother and him. Creasy agrees. Arriving at the overpass meeting place and seeing Pita, he crosses it on foot, meeting her in the middle. He says goodbye, assuring her he loves her before sending her to Lisa. Creasy and Aurelio get into Daniel's car, but he succumbs to his wounds in transit. Meanwhile, Manzano tracks Daniel down and kills him, stating in the official report that Daniel died during the arrest.

A Las Vegas mob enforcer travels back to his hometown to investigate his brother's mysterious death. Years ago, Jack Carter left his Seattle home to become a Las Vegas mob casino financial enforcer. He returns for the funeral of his brother Richard "Richie" after a car crash during a storm, atypical of the careful house-father. Talking to the widow, daughter Doreen, and enigmatic Geraldine, Jack suspects it was murder. Cliff Brumby, whose club Richie ran, is financially linked to porn and prostitution baron Cyrus Paice, who claims to be just a front-man for ITC tycoon Jeremy Kinnear. Someone hired goon Thorpey to make Jack return to Las Vegas. Jack's partner Con McCarty is restless, apparently about their boss Les Fletcher, whose wife had an affair with Jack. Someone breaks into Richie's home, looking for a crucial CD. —KGF Vissers Jack Carter, a mob enforcer living in Las Vegas, travels back to his hometown of Seattle for his brother's funeral. During this visit, Carter realizes that the death of his brother was not accidental, but a murder. With this knowledge, Carter sets out to kill all those responsible. —<dytch@hotmail.com>

Rudy Baylor (Matt Damon) is a graduate of the University of Memphis Law School. Unlike most of his fellow grads who get high paying jobs due to their family connections, he has no high-paying employment lined up and is forced to apply for part-time positions while serving drinks at a Memphis bar. There were just too many lawyers in Memphis. Desperate for a job, he reluctantly goes to an interview with J. Lyman "Bruiser" Stone (Mickey Rourke), a ruthless but successful personal injury lawyer, who makes him an associate. To earn his fee, Rudy is turned into a veritable ambulance chaser, required to hunt for potential clients at a local hospital. Bruiser's associates only get paid by finding cases and working them up for trial. Rudy will be paid $1000 per month, and the firm gets to keep 33% of all the awards from the cases, and Rudy gets a percentage of that. Soon he meets Deck Shifflet (Danny DeVito), a less-than-ethical former insurance assessor turned paralegal who has failed the bar exam six times. Deck is resourceful in gathering information and practically an expert on insurance lawsuits. Rudy is taking his bar exam in 3 weeks. Rudy manages to get just one case, concerning insurance bad faith against a company called Great Benefit. It could be worth several million dollars in damages, which appeals to him as he is about to declare himself bankrupt. He rents a room in the home of elderly Miss Birdsong (Teresa Wright), who in return could use some advice on what to do about greedy relatives eager to inherit when she dies. Deck finds out that Birdsong did inherit a couple of million dollars from her 2nd husband, but after lawyers and IRS, she is left with about $40,000. When Birdsong's son comes to visit, Rudy tells him that his mother got a large inheritance, and this gets him to take better care of his mother. Deck asks Rudy to sign the Great Benefit clients and Rudy visits the family of Dot, Buddy and their son Buddy. Dot shares all the correspondence from Great Benefit with Rudy, in which they deny Buddy's claim for Leukemia. Great Benefit claimed that Leukemia was not covered in the policy as it was a Pre-existing condition, even though they had taken all the premiums. In one of the letters, they call Dot stupid. Rudy passes the Tennessee bar exam but is not yet properly licensed to stand as an attorney. When Bruiser fails to show up for court for the Great Benefit case, Rudy attempts to argue the case, but Judge Harvey Hale (Dean Stockwell) scolds Rudy and tells him to first get his license. Defense attorney Leo F. Drummond (Jon Voight) offers to stand for Rudy as Rudy is sworn in before the judge. Drummond is a showman attorney who uses unscrupulous tactics to win his cases and heads a group of experienced and devious lawyers from a large firm. Drummond offers Rudy $75,000 to settle the case out of court. Bruiser's offices are raided by the police and FBI on suspicion of racketeering. Rudy finds that Bruiser has disappeared. Before fleeing, Bruiser gave Rudy and Deck $5000 each. Not knowing what else to do, Rudy and Deck set up a two-man practice themselves, without so much as a secretary for help. They file a bad faith suit on behalf of a middle-aged couple, Dot (Mary Kay Place) and Buddy Black (Red West ), whose 22-year-old son Donny Ray (Johnny Whitworth) is dying of leukemia but could have been saved with a bone marrow transplant, denied by their insurance carrier Great Benefit. The original judge assigned to Rudy's case, Harvey Hale (Dean Stockwell), is set to dismiss it because he sees it as one of many so-called "lottery" cases that slow the judicial process. But a far more sympathetic judge, Tyrone Kipler (Danny Glover), takes over when Hale suffers a fatal heart attack. Kipler, a former civil rights attorney, immediately denies the insurance company's petition for dismissal. While preparing his case, Rudy gets to know a young woman he met at the hospital, Kelly Riker (Claire Danes), a battered wife whose husband, Cliff (Andrew Shue), has beaten her so savagely with a baseball bat that she was hospitalized. Bruiser had sent Rudy to the hospital to sign her up as a client, but he got attracted to her instead. Cliff only spent one night in jail for his violent assault in Kelly. Kelly got pregnant at 18, got married to Cliff, and had a miscarriage probably because Cliff beat her. Rudy knew she was a loser, but wanted to protect her. Kelly still wasn't able to leave Cliff. After a particularly violent attack, Rudy persuades Kelly, to whom he is attracted, to file for divorce. Going to Kelly's home to pack her belongings, Rudy and Kelly are confronted by Cliff. After Cliff is injured in the fight, Kelly insists Rudy leave. From outside, Rudy can hear Cliff being hit with his own baseball bat. To protect Rudy from being implicated in Cliff's death, Kelly tells the police she killed her husband in self-defense. Rudy promises to defend Kelly if the case goes to trial, but the district attorney declines to prosecute, knowing Kelly would never be convicted. Donny Ray dies, but not before giving a video deposition. The case goes to trial, where Drummond preys on Rudy's inexperience. He gets Rudy's key witness, Jackie Lemanczyk's (Virginia Madsen), vital testimony stricken from the record, and attempts to discredit Donny Ray's mother (Mary Kay Place). With help from now Caribbean-based fugitive Bruiser (with whom Deck is connected by intermediaries), Jackie's testimony and the Great Benefit Employee Manual are finally admitted into evidence, to Drummond's dismay. Due to Rudy's single-minded determination and skillful cross-examination of Great Benefit's unctuous president, Wilfred Keeley (Roy Scheider), the jury finds for the plaintiff with a monetary award far exceeding all expectations. It is a great triumph for Rudy and Deck, at least until Keeley attempts to flee the country and Great Benefit declares itself bankrupt, thus allowing it to avoid paying punitive damages to the Blacks, as well as any future judgments in class-action lawsuits. There is no payout for the grieving parents and no fee for Rudy or Deck. Dot Black expresses satisfaction that at least they put Great Benefit out of business and is now unable to hurt other families like hers. Convinced his success will create unrealistic expectations for future clients, Rudy abandons his practice to instead teach law with a focus on ethical behavior instead. He leaves town with Kelly, wanting to retain a low profile and protect Kelly from any possible retribution by Cliff's vengeful relatives. He leaves the legal profession after just one successful case.