Pat Hingle

Criminal kingpins The Riddler and Two-Face present a threat to Gotham that only the dynamic duo Batman and Robin can stop.

Only Batman can defend the city from total chaos as The Penguin lays twisted waste to a great metropolis. Meanwhile, the Dark Knight may have met his equal in the lethal Catwoman.

During the age of the dinosaurs, a massive famine forces several herds of dinosaurs to seek an oasis known as the Great Valley. Among these, a mother in a diminished "longneck" herd gives birth to a single baby, named Littlefoot. Years later, Littlefoot plays with Cera, a "three-horn", until her father intervenes and tells her that three-horns don't play with long-necks, whereupon Littlefoot's mother describes the different kinds of dinosaurs: "three-horns", "spike-tails", "swimmers", and "flyers". That night, as Littlefoot follows a "hopper", he encounters Cera again, and they play together briefly until a large "Sharptooth" attacks them. Littlefoot's mother comes to their rescue, but receives fatal injuries in the process. An earthquake swallows up the Sharptooth and divides Littlefoot and Cera and other dinosaurs from their herds while some die in the process, including Littlefoot's mother, who gives her son some words of advice about finding the Great Valley before she dies that night. Confused and in grief, Littlefoot meets an old "clubtail" named Rooter, who consoles him. He is then guided by his mother's voice telling him to follow the sun to the Great Valley and pass several landmarks, such as a rock formation that resembles a Longneck and the "Mountains that Burn". Later, Littlefoot meets a "bigmouth" named Ducky and a "flyer" named Petrie, who accompany him on his journey. Cera, who is attempting to find her own kind, finds the unconscious Sharptooth inside a ravine and mistakenly wakes him up. She escapes and bumps into Littlefoot, Ducky, and Petrie; she tells them that the Sharptooth is alive and pursuing them, but Littlefoot does not believe her. As Cera describes her encounter, she accidentally flings Ducky to the direction of a lone hatching "spiketail", whom she names Spike and inducts into the group. Seeking the Great Valley, they discover a cluster of trees, which is abruptly depleted by a herd of Longnecks. Searching for remaining growth, they discover a single leaf-bearing tree, and obtain food by stacking up atop each other and pulling it down. Cera remains aloof, but at nightfall, everyone including herself gravitates to Littlefoot's side for warmth and companionship. The next morning, they are attacked by the Sharptooth, but they manage to escape through a tunnel that is too small for him to follow. Beyond this, they discover the landmarks mentioned by Littlefoot's mother. Cera stubbornly decides to go another way, but Littlefoot, fed up with Cera's stubbornness, refuses, and their ensuing fight leads to a schism that divides him from the others. However, when Ducky and Spike become endangered by lava, Petrie gets stuck in a tar pit, and Cera gets ambushed by a pack of "domeheads" (Pachycephalosaurus) who are also living in the Mountains that Burn, Littlefoot returns to rescue them. Ashamed of her fear and behavior, and reluctant to admit her mistake, Cera leaves them in tears. Later, while crossing a pond, Petrie overhears the Sharptooth nearby. The group devises a scheme to lure him to the pond and drown him in the deep side using a nearby boulder. During the ensuing struggle, a draft from the Sharptooth's nostrils enables Petrie to fly for the first time. The plan nearly fails when the Sharptooth begins attacking the boulder while the group attempts to push it onto him. However, Cera reunites with the group, and she headbutts the boulder, causing the Sharptooth to fall into the water below with the boulder falling on him in the process. The Sharptooth momentarily takes Petrie down with him to his death, but he later emerges unharmed. Littlefoot, alone, follows a cloud resembling his mother, which guides him to the Great Valley. He is then joined by the others. Upon arrival, the five are reunited with their families: Petrie impresses his family with his newfound flight; Ducky introduces Spike to her family, who adopt him; Cera reunites with her father; and Littlefoot rejoins with his grandparents. The group then rejoins at the top of a hill and embrace each other in a hug.

The life of super-yuppie J.C. is thrown into turmoil when she inherits a baby from a distant relative. J.C. Wiatt is a successful New York business woman known around town as the "tiger lady." She gets news of an inheritance from a relative from another country and off the bat she suspects it's money. Well it's not money, it's a baby girl. At first she doesn't accept until the lady that gives the baby to her has to catch her flight. J.C. is now stuck with an annoying baby girl. Her boyfriend doesn't like the idea of a baby living with them and he leaves her. J.C. has enough of it and takes her to meet a family ready to adopt her. She leaves but hears the baby cry while walking away and has to go back. The baby is too attached to her now and won't let her go. Later, her baby gets into mischief which causes her to get fired. Now, she sets her eyes on an old two story cottage in Vermont to get out of the New York life. When she arrives, the house needs more help than originally thought. She gets bored one snowy day and decides to make apple sauce. Her baby loves it and she decides to sell it. Pretty soon everyone wants some of the baby apple sauce. J.C. hits it big and falls in love with a local veterinarian. Was this fate or destiny?

Montgomery "Monty" Brewster (Richard Pryor) is a second-rate minor league baseball pitcher with the Hackensack Bulls. One night after winning a game, Monty and his best friend, the Bulls' catcher, Spike Nolan (John Candy), are flirting with two women at a local bar. When they try to leave with them, they're confronted by two large men who claim they are the women's husbands. Monty and Spike are punched out by the men and a large bar brawl starts. They are later arrested and thrown in jail. Their coach, Charley (Jerry Orbach), tells them that management has decided to kick them off the team. In court, Monty tries to explain the fight to the judge, who is wholly unsympathetic. A photographer that had been following Monty (whom Monty thought may be a professional baseball scout) suddenly rises and tells the judge that he represents an unidentified party that will post bail for both Monty and Spike if they plead guilty. The photographer, named J.B. Donaldo (Joe Grifasi) takes Monty and Spike to New York City with him. At the Manhattan law office of Granville & Baxter, Brewster is told that his recently deceased great-uncle Rupert Horn (Hume Cronyn), whom he has never met, has left him his entire fortune because Monty is his only living blood relative (by way of Monty's grandmother, Rupert's half-sister), but with several conditions. Rupert's last will is on film and features the wheezy and ill-tempered Rupert himself. He relates a story from his youth where his father made him smoke a whole box of cigars to punish him for smoking just one. Rupert tells Monty that he wants to teach Monty to hate spending money. Monty will be given $30 million to spend in 30 days. If he's successful, he'll be awarded the full inheritance of $300 million. Brewster is challenged to either take $1 million upfront (as part of a "Wimp" clause), or spend $30 million in 30 days. If he chooses the former, the law firm becomes executor of the estate and divides the money among various charities (after taking a sizable fee). In the latter case, he must spend the entire $30 million within one month under the following rules: 1.) With the exception of those who witnessed the will reading, whom are the firm's two senior partners George Granville (David White) and Norris Baxter (Jerome Dempsey) and Rupert's lawyer and executor of the estate Edward Roundfield (Pat Hingle), Brewster cannot reveal to anyone the will's terms. He may only tell everyone else he inherited $30 million. Rupert doesn't want anyone directly helping Monty in his quest. 2.) Brewster must spend the money on tangible items. If anything he buys accrues value, such as an investment or property that earns money, that is considered part of the money he inherited and he must spend that as well. 3.) Directly giving away money is capped at 10%; split between 5% ($1.5 million) in gambling losses and another 5% ($1.5 million) maximum to be donated to charity. 4.) Brewster may not willfully damage or destroy anything he buys with the money. 5.) After 30 days, he must be penniless and may not own any assets that are not already his (in other words, nothing but "the clothes on his back"). If any one of these five rules are violated, the challenge is forfeited. Also, if Brewster fails to meet the 30 day challenge to spend the $30 million, any remaining money that he has after the 30 day deadline (regardless if it's a few dollars or a few million dollars) will go to the law firm and Brewster will inherit nothing. Despite the tempting offer just to "wimp out" and walk away with a one-time payment of $1 million, especially after the law firm reveals that they already did a background check on him and showed that the highest annual salary he ever earned was $11,000-a-year while a member of the Toledo Mud Hens, Monty decides to take the $30 million challenge. After leaving the offices, Monty goes to a bank across the street where the money is waiting for him in cash. He appoints Spike as the vice president of an investment corporation he's building and hires one of the bank's security guards as his personal guard for the next month. He also asks to rent the bank vault where the cash is stored and is granted a 30-day lease and refuses an account that will earn him interest. On the street, Monty hires a Russian taxi driver (Yakov Smirnov) to be his personal driver. He has the cabbie rent a fleet of limousines and other drivers. He takes everyone in earshot out for an expensive dinner in Manhattan. At dinner he talks with the accountant that Granville and Baxter have assigned to him, Angela Drake (Lonette McKee), an attractive woman and law student clerking in the firm, who Monty is instantly smitten with. Monty tries to convince her that he's not another newly rich snob and asks her out, thinking he can hire someone to do her work for her. He is coldly rebuffed by Angela, who has a fiance, Warren (a junior partner at the law firm). Monty rents a large penthouse in the Plaza Hotel and a large amount of office space in the same building, beating the rental fee proposed by another client. He has also hired a couple of high-priced tailors to make custom suits for him, renting the clothes themselves. With the salary that Monty is paying him, Spike fixes himself up. Down in the new office that Monty is renting, he meets Angela's boyfriend Warren (Stephen Collins) and his former wife Marilyn, whom Monty has hired to redecorate the office space. (Over the next few weeks, Monty changes his mind several times regarding the stylistic choices Marilyn presents to him, thereby using up more of his inheritance.) In Monty's office over the next few days are hundreds of people looking to either do business with Monty or scam him. One man has an investment offer; a large iceberg will be outfitted with giant engines and be sailed to the Middle East where the ice will be used to supply water to the farmers in the region. Monty is also allowed to gamble 5% of his $30 million, so he hires a bookie to bet on every long shot racehorse he can and even puts down a sizable amount on the field hockey team of Drake's alma mater, Loyola University. Monty calls his old Bulls coach and tells him he plans to fix up their old playing field in Hackensack and that he'll arrange a three-inning exhibition game where the Bulls will play the New York Yankees. Monty continues his spending campaign for a few weeks. One night he's inspired by an idea from Spike to invest in expensive items like stamps. Monty goes to a fine collectibles store and asks to see the most expensive stamp the owner has. The stamp is the infamous Inverted Jenny which Monty buys for $1,250,000. Granville and Baxter read the story in the newspaper, thinking Monty has flagrantly violated the terms of the will. Baxter finds a postcard in the daily mail that has a photo of the Hackensack Bulls and a bland message from Monty. After a few moments, Baxter realizes that Monty has used the Inverted Jenny stamp to mail the card, thereby making it their property and devaluing it. Both men are furious and have a private meeting with Warren where they show him the will (the conditions of not revealing the $30 million spending plan in 30 days does not apply to the others of the will reading). They then order him to cause a small error in bookkeeping amounting to $20,000 that will be discovered at the last moment. They promise Warren that he'll be made full partner and that Monty's real $300 million inheritance will go to the firm. Spike and the rest of Monty's friends and associates become very worried about Monty's frivolous spending and try to convince him to curtail it. They go so far to trick Monty into meeting Spike's financial adviser, Eugene (David Wohl), who tells Monty that he'll only require a modest fee of any earnings that pay off. Monty hires him on the spot and shows some resentment toward Angela for tricking him. When Monty finds out that the iceberg investment has turned out to be lucrative, he immediately wants to sell his stock in it. Moments later, the bookie he hired storms in and furiously tells him he's won a large amount of money on all the long shot bets he placed and that he's banned from any more gambling in New York. Monty decides to donate the money he won to charity. Note: the amount that Monty wins, ($1,500,000) is all of the 5% of the $30 million that he can be allowed to donate. Spike and Eugene, both rush into Monty's office one day with exciting news. Spike had invested a large amount of Monty's money in a venture and earned Monty's company $10 million. Monty becomes upset, realizing that he's "right back where he started" and orders everyone out of his office. On television, he sees a news commentary about New York's upcoming mayoral election. The reporter says that his news station has chosen not to endorse either of the sleazy, possibly mob-funded candidates. Monty enters the race himself, declaring a ticket called "None of the Above" where he wants to buy the votes of New York. The campaign involves a large amount of advertising, staffing and televised ads and drains much of the $30 million in a short amount of time. Monty is unabashed in attacking his opponents openly, insulting them publicly in media spots and public appearances. When Monty's two opponents, Heller and Salvino, figure out that Monty's campaign could defeat them both, they both agree to sue him for libel. Monty settles out of court for $4 million. Meanwhile, Angela has grown increasingly cold toward Monty, thinking he's foolish for spending the $30 million so rapidly. Earlier, Monty had tried to give her a new Aston-Martin convertible -- a violation of the will that Monty can't tell Angela about. While he talks to her on the street, he's overseen by both Warren and Marilyn, who mistakenly assume Monty and Angela are having an affair. The day of the big Bulls vs. Yankees game arrives. At the game, the Bulls start out doing very well against the Yankees, until the Yanks battle back and defeat the Bulls early in the third inning, hitting a grand slam home run off Monty. Defeated, Monty leaves the game. In the locker room, Roundfield approaches Monty in the locker room and tells him that he is actually leading the election for mayor at the polls, but that if he wins the election, the $60,000 annual salary given to him as mayor could be considered an asset in accordance with the will. Monty announces to the crowd that he's withdrawing from the election. He also invites everyone to a final party which he'll pay for with his last $38,000. At the party, Monty plans to get very drunk. Spike and Melvin take up a small collection to give to Monty so he won't be flat broke. Monty refuses the money, knowing it would also violate the conditions of the will. Spike suggests that he and Monty buy a nice sports car and leave New York for a new life. Monty still turns him down. The next morning (on the 30th day), the landlord for Monty's offices and penthouse politely evicts him. The tailors take back all the clothes he rented and he finds his old Chicago Cubs jersey in the closet. He checks in on Marilyn, who'd finished the latest iteration of interior decorating of Monty's offices; she orders everything to be taken back when Monty tells her he approves of the work. Monty leaves the Plaza in his old street clothes and wanders off into Manhattan... alone. That evening, the local newscaster Chuck Fleming (Peter Jason), wondering where Monty has vanished to after declaring that he is now flat broke, announces that the mayoral race will be held again in a run-off election after primary election results showed that Monty's campaign had worked to sink the campaigns of Heller and Salvino, with the voters indeed voted for "none of the above". The run-off election will be held in a few days with neither of Monty's opponents running for office ever again. At 11:50 pm, Monty reappears at Granville & Baxter to finalize the will, not a dime to his name. Before he enters the meeting with the two, he's stopped by Warren who eagerly gives him the $20,000 he'd withheld. Monty is immediately upset, believing he'd lost and, with the clock about to strike the midnight deadline, agrees to sign whatever paperwork the two men have. While Warren watches, Angela suddenly appears. Warren discloses the conditions of Monty's will and shows her the furniture company receipt she'd missed for the money he'd given Monty. Angela is furious and rushes in to stop Monty from turning over the money to the firm, saying that Warren had cheated him, drawing an immediate termination from her bosses. Warren tells Monty and Angela that he'd suspected they'd been having an affair all along and Angela tries to hit him. Monty stops her and punches Warren himself, which Warren promises to sue him for. When offered an out-of-court settlement for the money he'd been given, Warren refuses. Monty suddenly decides to hire Angela on retainer for $20,000. She frantically writes him a receipt by the stroke of midnight and Roundfeld declares Monty's inheritance complete. He also promises to investigate Granville and Baxter for any wrongdoing for revealing to Warren the terms of the will. Monty and Angela leave the office together where they agree to talk about his legal options and of his new inheritance.

Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton), a young seminarian, leaves his religious studies and returns to his family home in Rancho Palos Verdes, an affluent peninsula in southern California. He reunites with his friend from childhood, Daulton Lee (Sean Penn). Daulton is a drug smuggler and dealer and is in trouble with the law. He asks Chris to partner with him in the drug business; Chris is not interested and declines. Charlie Boyce (Pat Hingle), Chris's father, pulls strings to get Chris a job at RTX, a large telecommunication company. Chris's polite nature and obvious intelligence at work bring him to the attention of executives Larry Rogers (Macon McCalman), Tony Owens (Jerry Hardin), and Eddie (Nicholas Pryor). After a security review, Chris is assigned to the Vault, a classified area of RTX that is responsible for transmitting encrypted messages among CIA agencies worldwide. Chris soon learns that he and his fellow vault employees, Laurie (Mady Kaplan) and Gene (Dorian Harewood), have free reign in their secret workspace, where they drink, play board games, and generally goof off. In the RTX vault, Chris reads some of the CIA transmissions. By reading and talking to Eddie, Chris learns that the CIA infiltrated Australian labor unions to the CIA's benefit. Chris tells Daulton that he thinks it's wrong for the CIA to get involved in the economy and politics of an ally. He suggests to Daulton that he steal top secret documents from the Vault and that Daulton deliver the documents to the Russian embassy in Mexico. Chris wants to weaken the American intelligence community. Originally, Daulton tells Chris he's a patriot and wants nothing to do with selling secrets to the Russians. However, when he is arrested for dealing by the DEA and facing serious jail time, Daulton decides to jump bail and move to Mexico, avoiding jail. Selling stolen documents will give him a revenue stream and he tells Chris he's interested. Chris photocopies classified documents related to the CIA satellites at RTX and gives them to Daulton. He tells Daulton never to reveal Chris's name to the Russians or else they will no longer need Daulton and then Daulton could be in danger. At the Russian Embassy in Mexico City, Daulton connects with a middle-aged official, Alex (David Suchet). Later, Daulton calls Chris at a pay phone with the code "My uncle says hi" which indicates that the Russians were interested in the documents. Inside his apartment, a shaken Chris calls home and speaks briefly to his mother, who is happy to hear from him and tells him she loves him but she has to run. Chris declines to talk to his father. Daulton continues to meet Alex in Mexico City in various locations, using spy tradecraft to exchange cash for documents. The Russians tell Daulton to get a special spy camera instead of using a copier to copy documents. At first, the deals go smoothly and Daulton is pleased with the cash. In the meantime, Chris meets a young woman, Lana, (Lori Singer) at a pet store. She moves in with him but Chris doesn't tell Lana what he's doing with the classified documents from RTX. Over time, Chris notices that Daulton is destabilizing. He's using heroin regularly and making mistakes, bragging at a party and telling a girl he's a spy. The Russians are getting tired of working with Daulton, because he is not delivering the satellite frequencies they desperately want. At RTX, the Vault is subject to a security inspection by the NSA with only a minute's notice. Chris, Laurie, and Gene frantically work to hide alcohol empties, sloppy work, and dope. The NSA inspector checks surfaces, phones, drawers, and other areas of the vault but finds nothing out of place except one binder. He asks Chris about it and he deflects to Gene. Chris wants to stop stealing the RTX documents and selling them, saying it's made no difference in the balance of power. Daulton, however, wants to grow the business, expand to smuggling drugs on top of documents. He tells Chris that this is his livelihood now and that if Chris refuses to supply more documents to sell, Daulton will tell Chris's father what they've been doing. Chris surprises Daulton by showing up at his hotel in Mexico City. They meet with the Russian handler, Alex, and depart to the embassy. At the embassy, Daulton, agitated, tears the room apart looking for a listening device. Alex tells Chris that he should continue to spy for Russia; he encourages Chris to go to school and then work for the government. Chris says he's not interested in any spying at all anymore and leaves with Daulton. At the airport, Daulton starts to break down, crying and saying he doesn't know who his friends are anymore. Christopher urges him to come back to the U.S. with him, but Daulton pulls himself together and remains in Mexico. At his apartment, Christopher has packed up all of Lana's belongings. He tells her to move out because he doesnt love her anymore. At RTX, Christopher takes secret photographs of the Pyramider Project, a defunct project that has little significance. He signs off from RTX as it's his last day at work. He enters his apartment, only to find his parents and colleagues have thrown him a surprise party. Christopher tells Daulton he wants to make one last delivery for $100,000. The friends agree they're finished with delivering secrets after this last one. Chris admits he was wrong, that the Russians are just as paranoid and manipulative as the U.S. Daulton tells Christopher he agrees; he's finished and he'll do jail time for his crimes if he has to. He says its too dangerous for Christopher to make the drop and travels to Mexico on his own. Daulton is denied entrance into embassy. Suddenly, he is arrested by Mexican police officers for the murder of a police officer; he is very confused and disoriented. He tries to bribe the police office arresting him but only makes the officer angrier. The police interrogate Daulton and torture him to get him to confess to the killing of a police officer. He refuses and is jailed. Eventually, he is released and given the choice of being deported to the U.S. or the Soviet Union. He chooses America. In California, Christopher is trying to reach Daulton by phone on his hotel and is unnerved when another man answers the phone in Daulton's room. He hangs up silently. At the airport, Christopher is trying to get a flight to a country that doesn't have an extradition agreement with the U.S. He sees various people looking at him and suspects they are with the police. He leaves the airport quickly. He senses they police are circling him and that he'll be arrested at any moment. Christopher finds Lana at her job at a movie ticket booth. He tells her that the police are going to ask her a lot of questions and that he really did love her. Mexican officials drop Daulton at the border, where he is immediately apprehended by heavily armed U.S. Marshalls. Christopher has taken his falcon Fawkes to an open field. He removes her jesses and tells her she's free. He watches as she spirals up in flight, then stops on a high branch. At that moment, multiple police vehicles arrive and arrest Christopher, calling him a traitor and knocking him roughly on the ground. Chris goes willingly, watching Fawkes. Christopher is debriefed by FBI agents in a government room. He stays composed and tells the truth over multiple days of interrogation. "What was once a legitimate intelligence gathering agency is now being misused to prey on weaker governments," he says by way of explanation. He thinks back to the day he left the seminary. At the Boyce home, Larry Rogers from RTX is talking about Christopher's case with Charlie Boyce, who tells Larry he doesn't want any favors made for his son. Christopher and Daulton are in shackles as they are brought from their sentencinl. Their parents watch as Chris and Daulton walk, chained, down a long hallway. We see images of the boys during their Confirmation and high school graduation ceremonies. Fawkes flies free in a perfectly blue sky. Andrew Daulton Lee was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. Christopher Boyce was found guilty and sentenced to 40 years imprisonment.

The San Francisco police sends detective Harry Callahan to a Northern California town where he uncovers a string of murders and resolves to bring the perpetrators to justice.

A clumsy chauffeur is hypnotized by a cult to kill the father of his fiancée, a congressman who's suing the cult for fraud, and encounters several weird characters during the days leading up to his wedding. Limo driver John Bourgignon is engaged to Nancy Reese. Her father, Congressman Ed Reese, is running for president and crusading against cult leader Sun Yi. Misadventure and intrigue stalk John and Nancy's path to the altar. —Anonymous

A hard but mediocre cop is assigned to escort a prostitute into custody from Las Vegas to Phoenix, so that she can testify in a mob trial. But a lot of people are literally betting that they won't make it into town alive. In Phoenix, Arizona, alcoholic and mediocre Detective Ben Shockley (Clint Eastwood) is assigned by Chief Commissioner Blakelock (William Prince) to bring witness Gus Mally (Sondra Locke) from Las Vegas, Nevada for a minor trial. Shockley travels to Las Vegas and finds that Gus Mally is an aggressive and intelligent prostitute with a college degree and she tells him that the odds are against her showing up in court. Shockley learns that she will actually testify against a powerful mobster, and the mafia is chasing them, trying to kill them both. He calls Blakelock and requests a Police escort from Phoenix to protect them. But soon, he discovers that someone is betraying him in the Police Department. Now, Shockley and Malley hijack a bus and Shockley welds thick steel plates and transforms the cabin in an armored bus trying to reach the Forum. But they will need to drive through a gauntlet of Police Officers armed with heavy weapons.

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.

A half-Native American/half-Caucasian young man evolves into a hardened killer as he tracks down the men who murdered his parents. Nevada Smith is the young son of a Native American mother and white father. After his parents are killed by three men over gold, Nevada sets out to find them and kill them. The boy is taken in by a gun merchant who shows him how to shoot, to shoot on time, and to shoot straight. Everything that Nevada does goes to killing those three men. He learns to read and write just to find their location. He pays people to tell him where they're at. He even goes to prison to kill one of them. While the movie is a Western and has plenty of action, it also takes a deep look into vengeance and how one can change after a haunting incident. —Chase Ard <Bullitt357@aol.com>

In New Mexico, a Confederate veteran returns home to find his fiancée married to a Union soldier, his Yankee neighbors rallied against him and his property sold by the local banker who then hires a gunman to kill him. When Confederate soldier Matt Weaver returns to town after the Civil War, he finds that his home has been sold by town boss Sam Brewster. Brewster hires gunfighter Jules Gaspard d'Estaing to deal with Weaver, but d'Estaing's independent approach settles the town's problems in a very unorthodox manner. —<JeanneArmintrout@juno.com> In the aftermath of the costly Civil War, the veteran Confederate Army soldier, Matt Weaver, returns to his hometown of New Mexico and his dusty ancestral farmhouse, only to discover that his property has been confiscated and resold by the immoral town boss, Sam Brewster. As the hamlet's only Rebel trooper attempts to repossess his ranch, an unfortunate complication will have the suave Creole gunslinger, Jules Gaspard d'Estaing, hot on his trail, paid by the crooked land baron to kill Weaver. Nevertheless, right from the start, the mysterious hired gun seems to have plans of his own. Will Jules finish what he got paid for? —Nick Riganas

Kansas, 1928 Wilma Dean "Deanie" Loomis (Natalie Wood) is a teenage girl who follows her mother's advice to resist her desire for sex with her boyfriend, Bud Stamper (Warren Beatty), the son of one of the most prosperous families in town. In turn, Bud reluctantly follows the advice of his father, Ace (Pat Hingle), who suggests that he find another kind of girl with whom to satisfy his desires. Bud's parents are ashamed of his older sister, Ginny (Barbara Loden), a flapper and party girl who is sexually promiscuous, smokes, drinks, and has recently been brought back from Chicago, where her parents had a marriage annulled to someone who married her solely for her money. Rumors in town, however, have been swirling that the real reason was that she had an abortion. Being so disappointed in their daughter, Bud's parents "pin all their hopes" on Bud, pressuring him to attend Yale University. The emotional pressure is too much for Bud, who suffers a physical breakdown and nearly dies from pneumonia. Bud knows one of the girls in high school, Juanita (Jan Norris) who is willing to become sexually involved with him, and he has a liaison with her. Some months later, depressed because of Bud ending their relationship, Deanie acts out by modeling herself after Bud's sister, Ginny. At a party, she attends with another boy from high school, "Toots" Tuttle (Gary Lockwood), Deanie goes outside with Bud and makes a play for him. When she is rebuffed by Bud, who is shocked, since he always thought of her as a "good girl," she turns back to "Toots," who drives her out to a private parking spot by a pond that streams into a waterfall. While there, Deanie realizes that she can't go through with sex, at which point she is almost raped. Escaping from "Toots" and driven close to madness, she attempts to commit suicide by jumping in the pond, being rescued just before swimming over the falls. Her parents sell their stock to pay for her institutionalization, which actually turns out to be a blessing in disguise, since they make a nice profit prior to the Crash of 1929 that leads to the Great Depression. While Deanie is in the institution, she meets another patient, Johnny Masterson (Charles Robinson), who is working out anger issues targeted at his parents, who want him to be a surgeon. The two patients form a bond. Meanwhile, Bud is sent off to Yale, where he fails practically all his subjects. While at school, he meets Angelina (Zohra Lampert), the daughter of Italian immigrants who run a local restaurant in New Haven. Bud's father travels to New Haven in an attempt to get the dean to not kick Bud out of school in October 1929. While in New Haven, the stock market crashes, in which Ace loses everything. He takes Bud to New York, where he commits suicide. Bud has to identify the body. In 1931, Deanie returns home from the asylum after two years and six months, "almost to the day." Ace has lost everything, and his wife has gone to live with relatives; whereas Bud's sister has died in a car crash. Deanie's mother wants to shield her from any potential anguish from meeting Bud, and so pretends to not know where he is. When Deanie's high school friends come over, her mother gets them to agree to feign ignorance on Bud's whereabouts. However, Deanie's father refuses to coddle his daughter, and says that Bud has taken up ranching and now lives on the old family farm. Her friends drive Deanie out to meet Bud. He is now married to Angelina, and they have an infant son, "Bud Jr.," and Angelina is expecting another. Deanie lets Bud know that she is going to marry John, who is now a doctor in Cincinnati. During their brief reunion, Deanie and Bud realize that both must accept what life has thrown at them, as Bud says, "What's the point? You gotta take what comes." They each relate that they "don't think about happiness very much anymore." As Deanie leaves with her friends, Bud only seems partially satisfied by the direction his life has taken, and he takes the moment to reassure Angelina, who he notices has realized that Deanie was once the love of Bud's life. Back in the car with her friends, they ask her if she is still in love with Bud. She realizes that she still loves him warmly, but that they can never recover that blazing love of youth which they once had. She does not answer her friends, but Deanie's voice is heard reciting four lines from Wordsworth's poem: "Though nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, glory in the flower, we will grieve not; rather find strength in what remains behind."