Philip Bosco

A scheming ex-girlfriend attends a magnificent wedding determined to prevent it and win back the groom.

A hospital resident is put in the middle of a legal battle between two half-sisters on whether to pull their comatose dad's life support. But more seems to be at stake than dad's life - his inheritance. Dr. Werner Ernst (James Spader) is a young hospital resident who becomes embroiled in a legal battle between two half-sisters who are fighting over the care of their comatose father. But are they really fighting over their father's care, or over his ten million dollar estate? Meanwhile, Werner must contend with his nutty supervisor, who insists that he only care for patients with full insurance. Can Werner sidestep the hospital's legal team and do what's best for the patient? —Martin Lewison <mlewison@utk.edu>

Alyssa and Amanda are two little girls who are identical, but complete strangers, that accidentally meet one day. A rich girl named Alyssa and an orphan named Amanda are two little girls who are identical, but complete strangers who accidentally meet one day. Together they form a plan to try getting Alyssa's father, Roger, to prevent making the biggest mistake of his life: marrying an awful woman named Clarisse. —Aaron Saltzer Two identical strangers meet accidentally. One is an orphan named Amanda and the other is a rich girl named Alyssa. Alyssa's father, Roger, decides to marry a real horror named Clarisse. So the girls switch to get rid of her. In the process, Roger meets Amanda's case worker, Diane. —Janelle

Donald "Sully" Sullivan (Paul Newman) is a worn yet spry 60-year-old hustler and con-man living in the peaceful, snowy northern New York state village of North Bath. He works free-lance in the construction business, usually with his dim-witted friend Rub Squeers (Pruitt Taylor Vince) by his side. He is often at odds with Carl Roebuck (Bruce Willis), a local contractor, suing him at every opportunity for unpaid wages and disability. Sully's one-legged lawyer Wirf Wirfley (Gene Saks) is inept, and his lawsuits are repeatedly dismissed. As a way to irritate him, Sully flirts with Carl's wife Toby (Melanie Griffith) openly at every opportunity (which she enjoys). He is a regular at the Iron Horse Saloon, where he often has drinks and plays cards with Wirf, Carl, Rub, and the town sheriff. A running joke is the repeated theft of Carl's snowblower. Sully steals it to get back at Carl for his latest failed lawsuit. Carl steals it back, placing it in the yard at his construction business guarded by his doberman pinscher guard dog. Sully, after drugging the dog, steals it a second time. Carl takes it back a final time, and leaves the dog, who is now skittish due to his drugging, at Sully's childhood home for him to find. Sully is a tenant in the home of the elderly Miss Beryl Peoples (Jessica Tandy), whose banker son Clive Peoples Jr. (Josef Sommer) strongly urges her to kick him out and sell the house. Family complications of his own develop for Sully with a visit from Peter (Dylan Walsh), his estranged son who is an unemployed college professor at odds with his wife. While Peter and Sully try to reconstruct their relationship, Sully begins a new one with his young grandson Will (Alexander Goodwin). Peter's sudden everyday presence does not sit well with Rub, but Sully tells him that although Peter is his son, Rub is still his best friend. Meanwhile, Clive is on the verge of a lucrative deal to build an amusement park in North Bath. However, the deal unexpectedly falls through when the promoter turns out to be a con man, and Clive quietly skips town in shame since he used his bank's resources to help finance the amusement park. After being jailed for punching a police officer named Raymer (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) who has been persecuting him, Sully's luck seems to be all bad. But his son, Peter, bails him out of jail and both him and Sully's grandson start to warm up to him. Sully later attends the funeral of an elderly resident named Ms. Hattie (Alice Drummond), an Alzheimer's stricken elderly woman whom he frequently sees wondering the streets of the town in a daze and whom Sully always helps walk her back to her house where her children are caring for her her. Soon, Sully's fortune takes a turn for the better when his horse racing trifecta ticket wins a some of a few thousand dollars. Even the lovely Toby expresses a willingness to leave Carl, mostly due to his constant womanizing, and run away with Sully to Hawaii. Sully realizes he can't leave his grandson and thanks Toby for considering him, just before she leaves for the airport. In the final scene, Sully is pretty much back where he began, boarding at Miss Beryl's. But now he is a little richer, both financially and in his soul, he's a new dog owner, and he has become the picture of contentment.

A group of young boys befriend a prostitute named V. Young Frank and his pals get an idea for the ultimate in excitement. They decide to pool their savings, bicycle to the nearby Big City, and hire some woman of the streets to strip for them. Things do not work out that simply, but they do meet V, a Hooker With A Heart Of Gold, who ends up giving them a ride home. Soon she is living in Frank's treehouse, unbeknownst to Frank's widowed father Tom, who thinks she is one of Frank's teachers. Soon, however, the evil Waltzer comes looking for V.

A special effects man helps his girlfriend's ex, a cop, with a sting operation, where the ex gets killed. Something's off and he investigates with help from an ex-cop PI friend. F/X man Rollie Tyler (Bryan Brown) is now a toy maker. Mike Brandon (Tom Mason), the ex-husband of Rolly's girlfriend Kim(Rachel Ticotin), is a cop. He asks Rollie to help catch a killer. The operation goes well until some unknown man kills both the killer and Mike.Mike's boss, Ray Silak (Philip Bosco) says it was the killer who killed Mike but Rollie knows it wasn't. Silak is involved with Mike's death, so he calls on Leo McCarthy (Brian Dennehy), the cop from the last movie, who is now a P.I., for help and they discover it's not just Silak they have to worry about. —<rcs0411@yahoo.com> Rollie Tyler (Bryan Brown) and Leo McCarthy (Brian Dennehy) team up once more to use their special effects and investigation skills (respectively), to find those responsible for the death of a cop (Tom Mason) who knew too much. —Rob Hartill

Best friends from law school to election night, their friendship is sorely tested when one learns of another's betrayal. Peter and Tim are both law students looking to get into the battleground of politics in Washington, but they both have different ideals and ethics. Tim wants to pursue a career in justice, but Peter is determined to be a big political power broker any way he can, even if that means bending the rules. As their careers push them towards political opposites, their friendship must constantly adapt to the new situation. —Murray Chapman <muzzle@cs.uq.oz.au> Peter Burton and Tim Garrity both meet when they go to law school. Tim comes from an affluent family, while Peter comes from the working class, which he is a bit ashamed of. Tim's a noble person who wants to do what is right, while Peter's willing to do whatever it takes to get ahead. And that includes blackmail and intimidation. And when his latest scheme burns Tim, Tim decides to find out if Peter deliberately betrayed him or if the man he works, John Palmeri made him do it and if so to make them answer for it. —rcs0411@yahoo.com

A rookie in the police force must engage in a cat-and-mouse game with a pistol-wielding psychopath who becomes obsessed with her. On her first day on the job, NYPD officer Megan Turner, the lone officer on the scene, shoots and kills the perpetrator of a supermarket hold-up. Since no gun was found on the perpetrator's person or at the scene and none of the witnesses could corroborate Megan's story definitively that the perpetrator was indeed wielding a gun, she is suspended from active duty. She is quickly albeit temporarily reinstated to the position of homicide detective because the spent shell casing from the bullet used in a subsequent murder had her name carved on it. This murder ends up being only the first in a series. Working on the case with fellow homicide detective Nick Mann, Megan initially has no idea who in her life could be the murderer. In short order, the murderer does show himself to her. He is commodities trader Eugene Hunt who she met immediately following her suspension and who she has since dated. He also implies to her that he was in the supermarket at the time of the hold-up and that he fled the scene with the perpetrator's gun. The supermarket shooting caused a psychotic break in him which resulted in among other things his obsession with her. However, beyond his implications only to her of being the murderer, Megan has no hard evidence that would stand up in a court of law that Eugene is indeed the murderer. Megan has to convince her colleagues, especially Nick, that she is telling the truth about Eugene, while stopping him from killing again and equally as important stopping him from his continued psychological torture of her.

Four mental patients on a field trip in New York City must save their caring chaperon, who ends up being taken to a hospital in a coma after accidentally witnessing a murder, before the killers can find him and finish the job. Dr. Weitzman works with patients in a sanitarium. Convinced that all that his "group" needs is a some fresh air and some time away from the sanitarium, he persuades the administration to allow him to take them to a ballgame. Unfortunately, he accidentally stumbles across a crime in progress and ends up in hospital. The group is stranded in New York City, forced to cope with a place which is often more bizarre than their sanitarium.

Set in Washington DC, Suspect centers on three disparate characters. Carl Wayne Anderson is a homeless, deaf-mute Vietnam veteran accused of murdering Elizabeth Quinn, a file clerk at the Justice Department. Kathleen Riley is the beleaguered Federal Public Defender assigned to represent Anderson. An agribusiness lobbyist who normally works on Capitol Hill, Eddie Sanger, is made a member of the jury and begins investigating the details of the murder himself, eventually teaming up with Riley to solve the case. We see some early scenes of Sanger's work as a lobbyist on Capitol Hill, including his efforts to win passage of a bill by seducing a Congresswoman. While not relevant to the movie's plot, these scenes are establishing shots giving us a sense for Sanger as a charming, though somewhat ruthless, person. The movie begins around Christmas with the suicide of a United States Supreme Court Justice, for which no explanation or context is given. We only see the Justice making a tape recording and then shooting himself. Shortly after the Justice's suicide, Elizabeth Quinn's body is found floating in the Potomac river, and Carl Wayne Anderson is arrested for the crime, based almost entirely on the fact that he was found sleeping in Quinn's car, which was abandoned in the parking lot where she worked (and was mostly deserted at night). Anderson explains that he found it unlocked and was just looking for a warm place to sleep since it was the dead of winter. But since he was homeless, had no alibi, and was found in Quinn's car, he was arrested for her murder. The establishing scenes show Riley trying to communicate with Anderson and realizing that he is a deaf-mute. Over time, she begins to penetrate his hard exterior and he tries to cooperate with her efforts to mount a defense for him. In the District of Columbia, all crimes are tried in the federal courts, so a murder trial that would normally be in state court was in federal court instead. Riley selects Sanger to be a member of her jury. Soon thereafter, it becomes clear that Sanger is intent on helping Riley with her investigation and defense of Anderson. As the investigation by Riley and Sanger intensifies, they begin focusing on Deputy Attorney General Paul Gray. Figuring that a key found on Elizabeth Quinn's body has something to do with the Justice Department (where Quinn worked), Riley and Sanger break into the file department at the Justice Department late one night and try to find what the key unlocks. They find that it unlocks a file cabinet, which contained trial transcripts from federal cases from 1968 that Quinn was in the process of transcribing. While the investigation goes on after hours, the movie shows scenes during the day from Anderson's murder trial. During the trial, we are introduced to the stern federal judge Matthew Helms (John Mahoney). Helms is rumored to be the President's nominee for a seat on the prestigious United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Judge Helms begins to suspect that Riley may be collaborating with Sanger, which would be a disbarrable offense of jury tampering, although he does not have concrete proof. One key sequence in a law library (where Riley and Sanger continue looking for the elusive case from 1968 that may be the key to the murder) brings Helms, Riley and Sanger into close proximity. Riley and Sanger narrowly avoid being caught by Judge Helms. Eventually, Judge Helms sequesters the jury to avoid further contact between Riley and Sanger. Riley and Sanger continue tracking the federal court cases from 1968. Their theory is that Elizabeth Quinn stumbled onto something during her transcription of those cases. They look for any case that might have an impropriety. As is explained to the audience, fixing a case requires participation from both the prosecutor and the trial judge. Riley and Sanger think they will find evidence that Paul Gray was a prosecutor on a rigged 1968 case, which would be his motive to murder Elizabeth Quinn if she approached Gray about what she found. Eventually, Riley goes back to Quinn's car (still impounded where it was found in a government parking lot) and finds an audiotape that the police did not uncover in their half-hearted investigation. The tape is the one we saw the Supreme Court Justice making at the beginning of the movie. In it, he confesses to conspiring to fix a case in 1968 (with a politically influential defendant) in return for an appointment from the United States District Court to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Riley assumes the prosecutor on that case was Paul Gray and goes back to the courthouse to retrieve the case book that will confirm this. As she gets to the courthouse (now deserted at night), she is pursued and attacked by an unseen figure. With the help of Sanger (who managed to get away from being sequestered by creating a diversion with a fire alarm), Riley was able to slice the right wrist of her assailant, who then fled unseen. The following day takes place in court. Paul Gray shows up in the courtroom, to the surprise of Judge Helms. Riley then tells Judge Helms that she wants him to take the stand. Irate and perplexed, Helms says that Riley cannot make him testify as he is the presiding judge. Then, in a somewhat-rushed speech, Riley reveals that Judge Helms, not Paul Gray, was the prosecutor in the fixed case in 1968. The Supreme Court Justice was the presiding judge in that case. In exchange for fixing the case, he was promoted from the District Court to the Court of Appeals. Helms, who was the prosecutor on the fixed case, was appointed to the District Court. Judge Helms then waited 17 years (from 1969 to 1986) to be promoted again to the Court of Appeals. Just as he learned he was the President's nominee, Quinn inadvertently discovered the case fixing as she transcribed the cases from 1968. She approached the Supreme Court Justice, who responded by committing suicide. By contrast, when she approached Judge Helms, he murdered her. As Judge Helms angrily bangs his gavel during Riley's accusation, his right wrist begins to bleed from where Riley slashed him the night before, confirming his identity as the killer. The movie ends with Riley reinvigorated in her job and in a relationship with Sanger.

After receiving wedding pictures from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, entertainment attorney Walter Fielding (Tom Hanks) complains to his girl friend, concert musician Anna Crowley (Shelley Long), about his newly married scofflaw father, Walter, Sr. (Douglass Watson). His father might be starting a new life, but he stole the firm's money and ran away to Brazil, and left him and the law firm in debt. The next morning, Walter comments that his father's much younger Filipino new wife, Florinda (Tetchie Agbayani), looks underage. When Anna tells him not to be so conventional, he admits he wants a house in the suburbs, and a wife. When he asks Anna to marry him, she asks for more time to make her decision. Her first marriage to Russian music conductor, Max Beissart (Alexander Godunov), was a disaster, and she is not in a rush to marry again. Suddenly, her former husband's associate, Shatov (Yakov Smirnoff), barges into the bedroom and informs Anna that "Maestro" is returning home, and reclaiming his luxury apartment. Walter and Anna are both broke, and cannot afford to relocate elsewhere in New York City. They decide to contact their friend, real estate broker Jack Schnittman (Josh Mostel), for help. Meanwhile, Max conducts his first rehearsal back in town, and criticizes the orchestra for their mediocre performance. While jogging, Jack Schnittman proposes that Walter gather $200,000 in cash by the end of business Friday because the owners of a $1 million property are willing to sell for less. Walter is suspicious, but feels pressured, and agrees to consider the deal. At dinner, Max tells Anna his life is meaningless without her, and he wants to get back together. Anna insists she loves Walter, and Max only loves himself. Anna goes with Walter to inspect the house Jack recommended. The owner, Estelle (Maureen Stapleton), shows them the property, and explains that Israeli Intelligence arrested her longtime husband, Carlos, for being Hitler's "pool man." If Estelle can sell the property and the furnishings, she might raise enough money to pay the lawyers. Walter and Anna want time to make a decision, but Estelle claims that Carlos is facing extradition, and she must sell immediately. She offers to include an antique Lincoln car in the deal. Walter cannot resist a bargain and convinces Anna to buy the house. She sells valuables from her divorce to raise her share of the money. Walter persuades his client, a successful boy singer named Benny (Billy Lombardo), to loan him the $200,000 in cash to pay for the new house. As soon as Walter and Anna move in, their house falls apart. When the front door is stuck shut, Walter receives an electrical shock as he rings the doorbell. Upstairs, Anna tries out the four-poster bed they acquired with the house, and becomes trapped when the mattress collapses around her. When Walter knocks to get Anna's attention, the front door falls down. He turns his attention to repairing the staircase, but his hammering loosens the ceiling plaster upstairs. In the bathroom, Anna is revolted when she turns on the bathtub faucet, and gooey, rusty water spurts out. Walter assures her that all houses need maintenance, and encourages her to be more positive. As Anna hangs her clothes in the bedroom closet, the rod and shelving collapse. Outside, Walter repairs the front door. He tests it three times and goes inside, but within seconds, the door frame separates from the structure, falling to the ground. Upstairs, when Anna pulls the dumbwaiter ropes, a raccoon emerges and attacks. Walter hears Anna's screams, but as he races up the staircase, it collapses around him. Walter is convinced the house is "a lemon," and that Estelle swindled them into buying that faulty house, but Anna will not let him quit. However, a rainstorm reveals that there are several leaks in the roof. The next morning, a carpenter named Art Shirk (Joe Mantegna) arrives to do an estimate on a new staircase, and declares that the front door has dry rot. Art's plumber brother, Brad (Carmine Caridi), arrives, and insists on a $5,000 upfront check without even inspecting the house. He claims to have seen the house several years earlier, and does not expect the plumbing problems have been resolved. Later, electrical fires occur when too many appliances are used. The blender and the popcorn popper explode, and the stove doors burst open. The turkey is propelled out one window and bursts through a second floor bathroom window. As Anna and Walter pour buckets of lukewarm water in the bathtub, the rotting floor gives way, and it crashes onto the floor below. The next day, Brad Shirk's foreman, Curly (Philip Bosco), arrives with a crew that looks like a gang of Hell's Angels. Curly encourages Walter and Anna to leave while they work on the house. Walter returns to find piles of debris everywhere after the group had trashed the house even more. Since Walter was not available to sign building permits, Curly and his crew went as far as they could. He promises to return when Walter has his permits approved. The "permit man," Mr. Shrapp, agrees to return if Walter pays a cash bribe. Soon, Walter falls into a hole in the floor concealed by a throw rug. Mr. Shrapp arrives, and believes he hears Walter laughing instead of answering the door. Angered by Walter's rudeness, Mr. Shrapp rips up the permits and leaves. Anna calls Walter to be picked up at the train station, but he cannot answer the phone. She hitches a ride with a truck driver, and finds Walter stuck in the floor. When she attempts to rescue him, he plummets to the floor below. That evening, when Walter puts another log in the fireplace, the chimney comes crashing down, and snuffs out the fire. Four months later, the house is still under repair as a more competent work crew fixes all the damages and patches up the holes in the floor, walls, and ceiling. Walter complains that Curly estimated the job would be done in two weeks. However, things are looking up. A new staircase and running water in the kitchen are the latest improvements, but accidents continue to occur. At an orchestra rehearsal, Max persuades Anna to have dinner at his apartment. Although she claims she will not sleep with him, they drink too much, and in the morning, Max tells her they made love, and she is consumed with guilt. Later, Anna tells Walter that Max took orchestra members to dinner after a brilliant rehearsal. When Walter wants to know if she spent the night with Max, Anna insists he will have to trust her. They argue as Anna lies about her indiscretion. When she finally confesses, Walter spends the night downstairs. In the morning, the fight continues. Walter want to kick her out of the house and refund her money. The workers listen in as she claims the house belongs to her just as much as it belongs to him. Finally, they agree to stay together until the repairs are done, sell the house, divide the money, and split. Anna retreats to the bedroom and sobs. Later, Max makes a surprise visit, and learns that Anna and Walter have decided to break up. He suggests that Anna should rekindle their relationship, but that is not part of her plan. Max confesses they did not sleep together, but lied to sabotage her relationship with Walter. When he sees how much she actually cares for Walter, Max decides to play matchmaker. He warns that it would be a mistake for Walter to throw away his relationship with Anna. Another few days later, when the house is finally renovated and restored, Walter and Anna are confused about where to take their relationship. Walter confesses he will get over Anna's one-night stand with Max. Anna tears up as she reveals she never slept with Max. They fall into each other's arms and kiss. Anna and Walter throw a wedding in their new home and Max conducts a full orchestra as part of the entertainment. Despite the repairs to restore their new house cost more than the $200,000 in cash that they used to purchase it, Walter and Anna are finally happy and that their "money pit" of a house is finally livable and everything is great. In Rio de Janeiro, the crafty con artist Estelle and her partner-in-crime Carlos (John van Dreelen) resurface where they offer to sell a house to Walter, Sr. insisting it must be a cash deal... and the vicious cycle is about to start all over again.

Somewhere in pastoral New England, an idealistic young teacher, James Leeds (William Hurt), is appointed to the faculty at a state school for the deaf. Given his three years in the Peace Corps and deep interest in his students' lives, in comes as not much of a surprise when he starts getting involved in the life of Sarah Norman (Marlee Matlin). He first sees Sarah working as a janitor and yelling (via sign language) at a cook, and subsequently learns that Sarah is a bit of an outcast at the school. The teachers don't know what to do with her, but James tries to build a relationship with her anyway. James slowly manages to crack Sarah's icy façade, and she finally accepts a dinner invitation. It becomes quickly clear that Sarah is highly resistant to speaking aloud, despite James' encouragement to do so. Although she claims that it's because she already uses sign language, James suspects a deeper reason. James gets a chance to talk to Sarah's mother, Mrs. Norman (Piper Laurie) and learns that Sarah and her sister Ruth were once popular with their male classmates, but simply because these boys wanted only sex. Because of this impersonal treatment, Sarah now mistrusts any hearing man, and would rather not deal with anyone in general. James claims he isn't like the others, but Sarah doesn't trust him. Everything changes when James finds Sarah swimming naked in the school pool; he joins her in the pool and quickly begin a romantic relationship. Soon they are living together, which causes the school dean to warn James that this relationship will ultimately fail. James disregards this advice and continues on with Sarah. Hurdles begin to arise for them, however. For example, James arranges for his students to perform a choreographed dance, which for some unknown reason makes Sarah angry. Sarah later reveals that this is due, in part, to her thinking that James despises her for not speaking. Despite some emotional bonds, James' focus on getting Sarah to speak begins to annoy Sarah, and - again - she feels like he's looking down on her for not speaking. In short, between Sarah's angst and childhood traumas, and James's fundamental inability as a hearing person to appreciate the life of a deaf person, the couple reaches a breaking point in which Sarah finally speaks (her only spoken line in the film), basically saying, "Here! I'm finally speaking! Is that what you wanted?" (See the movie quotes for the actual quote). Sarah goes to live with her mother and in the process rebuilds that long-estranged relationship, and finds a job as a manicurist in the meantime. James continues to pursue her but she rebuffs all his attempts. Finally, Sarah and James reunite in a pivotal scene in the school gym. We are left with the impression that they're going to try this relationship again, this time with new knowledge about the other that will help make it successful.