Ray Walston

Two itinerant farm workers, George Milton and his simple-minded friend, Lennie Small, are forced to flee armed men after Lennie rips a woman's dress while trying to feel its material. They jump on a train and arrive at Soledad, California, where they take jobs as ranch hands. As they walk, George sees Lennie is carrying a dead mouse. George throws the mouse away, causing Lennie to cry that he misses the woman who gave him mice to play with. George reminds Lennie that the woman was his Aunt Clara, who stopped getting him pets because Lennie kept killing them by petting too hard. George promises Lennie a puppy if he stops crying. At nightfall, George tells Lennie to gather firewood so he can cook some beans, and becomes irate when Lennie whines about not having ketchup. George yells that Lennie has ruined his life by always getting into trouble. A contrite and confused Lennie offers to run away and live in a cave, but George mutters that Aunt Clara would not like him wandering off on his own. That night, George recites an oft-told dream of him and Lennie buying their own ranch, with lots of rabbits for Lennie to feed. Commanding Lennie to look around and remember where they are, George instructs him to return to this spot and hide in the bushes if he gets in trouble. In the morning, they arrive at the Tyler Ranch, where they meet an old, one-handed man named Candy. He takes George and Lennie to meet the "Boss," who yells at them for being a day late. During the interview, George explains that Lennie is his cousin and was kicked in the head by a horse when he was child. After stepping out of the ranch house, George admits to Lennie he lied about the horse and being cousins. Candy shows them the bunkhouse, where they run into the boss's son, Curley, a short man wearing one black glove. Curley demands to know why Lennie is late, and orders George to shut up and let Lennie talk for himself. After Curley leaves, Candy explains that Curley is a boxer, but still has a little man's dislike for anyone bigger than he is. George warns Lennie to keep clear of the boss's son. Curley's young and attractive wife pretends to look for her husband, but it is only an excuse for her to check out the new ranch hands. Her flirting turns George away, and he warns Lennie to stay away from her. At noon, the laborers arrive, including Slim, their foreman, and another ranch worker named Carlson, who asks Slim about his dog's puppies. When Slim says he drowned three because the mother could not produce enough milk, Carlson suggests they kill Candy's old mongrel and give him one of the surviving pups. After a hard day of haying, George asks Slim if Lennie can have one of the puppies. Impressed by how hard Lennie worked, Slim agrees. However, George informs Lennie that the puppies are too young to be separated from their mother, so Lennie beds down with the dogs. The next day, a mule throws a shoe and Slim orders George to take it to the barn. He arrives to find Curley's wife waiting, but her attempt to seduce him is interrupted by the arrival of "Crooks," a hunchbacked African-American stable man, and Curley. When Curley demands to know what George is up to, he answers that he is minding his own business. Curley warns he will beat George if he ever finds him minding his own business with his wife again. That night, Carlson and Slim pressure Candy into letting Carlson put his old dog out of its misery. When Candy hears the shot, he curls up on his bunk and cries. The next day, George tells Slim he lived near Lennie's Aunt Clara, and picked on Lennie when he was a boy. One day, they were playing near a river and George ordered Lennie to jump in. Lennie did, but could not swim, and almost drowned. When George got him to dry ground, Lennie forgot it was George who told him to jump in. From that moment on, George felt responsible for his friend, and when the aunt died, the two hit the road together. That night, George tells Lennie he knows of a farm they could buy when they get a few more dollars. Candy overhears and offers $350 dollars out of the $600 they need if they take him with them, because he is getting too old to work. George agrees. When Curley accuses Slim of sleeping with his wife, the foreman threatens to beat the little man. Seeing Lennie smiling about the farm, Curley thinks he is making fun of him. He punches Lennie in the face. The large man refuses to defend himself, until George yells for him to "get him." Lennie grabs Curley's hand and crushes it. Slim orders Curley to tell the boss he got his hand crushed in a harvester, and threatens to expose what really happened if he refuses. As George cleans the blood off his friend's face, Lennie asks if he can still feed the rabbits. The next night, George goes to town with the other men and leaves Lennie with the puppies. Later, George returns and finds Lennie talking to Crooks in the barn. As he walks Lennie to the bunkhouse, they meet Curley's wife, who wants to talk to someone, but George refuses, and she runs away in tears. The next morning, Curley's wife finds Lennie crying over the corpse of a puppy he accidentally killed while petting it too hard. Instead of leaving, she talks to Lennie about her dreams of being a movie star, and how she married Curley to be free of her mother. When Lennie states he likes stroking soft things, she suggests he touch her hair, but Lennie cannot control his strong hands. As he musses her hair, Curley's wife screams, and with his attempt to silence her, he accidentally breaks her neck. Lennie runs to the stream and hides in the bushes where he earlier agreed to go in times of trouble. Candy later finds the dead woman, and informs George. He believes Curley will lynch Lennie, but George vows he will not let anyone hurt his friend. The other men form a posse, and Slim tells George he can let Curley shoot Lennie or watch his friend go to jail. George steals a pistol and goes to the stream, where he finds Lennie. Hearing dogs approaching, George stands behind Lennie and regales him with dreams of a ranch full of rabbits, then shoots him in the back of the head.

A coming of age story of a young boy, who is left to live with his grandfather. His grandfather is a famous painter and with fame comes a grand lifestyle with a lot of parties and woman. The boy learns about life, women and sex.

One evening at the Cherryvale Academy for Women in southern California, student Christine Ramsay (Phoebe Cates) reads passages from a pornographic novel to her roommate, Betsy Newhouse (Kathleen Wilhoite). Outside the neighboring window, their respective boyfriends, straight-laced Jim Green (Matthew Modine) and the leering Bubba Beauregard (Michael Zorek), from the nearby Freemount Academy for Men, form a human ladder with their nerd/intellectual classmate, Roy (Jonathan Prince), as Bubba photographs senior Jordan Leigh-Jensen (Betsy Russell) taking a shower. Jordan enters Christine's room wrapped in a towel, which Bubba reaches through the window and removes as his friends collapse beneath him. Upon returning to her own dormitory, Jordan tells roommate Rita Flugel (Kari Lizer) of her disdain for Christine, which Rita perceives as jealousy over Jim Green. Though Jordan denies the accusation, she declares her intention to seduce Jim and end his romance with Christine. Later that evening, students from both schools gather for a dance in the Cherryvale ballroom. Miss Prudence Dutchbok (Fran Ryan), the strict and prude headmistress, addresses the crowd and acknowledges the visiting Cherryvale Building Committee, a group of elderly prudish women, which is sponsoring construction of a new wing for the school. She escorts the committee to her office, where they find Bubba and Betsy making love on the couch. The next day, the committee audits Ms. Regina Copuletta's (Sylvia Kristel) sex education class as she details the mechanics of intercourse. After the class, Christine decides she is ready to lose her virginity and makes a weekend reservation for herself and Jim at Hotel D'Amour, a seaside resort for honeymooners. Later that day, during an equestrian class, Jordan tries to attract Jim by exposing her breasts, unaware that he and Christine have left to buy condoms. Jim and Christine drive to a nearby pharmacy, but Jim is so nervous about purchasing condoms that the pharmacist (Martin Mull) mistakes Jim's request for contraceptives for tooth cleaning. Christine is forced to go into the pharmacy to buy the condoms herself and runs into Ms. Regina who is trying on a gaudy face cream supplied by the pharmacist. That evening, Jim, Bubba and Roy are hanging out at a local video arcade when Jim is persuaded to call Christine to tell her that he loves her. Jim phones Christine from a payphone and while Bubba and Roy stand nearby, Jordan listens in on the extension at the school. After Jordan facetiously reciprocates Jim's declaration of love, Christine and Betsy get their revenge by sneaking into Jordan's room in the middle of the night and sabotaging their cheerleader uniforms. The next day, Christine and Betsy realize (too late) they sabotaged the wrong uniform when one of Coach Whelan's (Julie Payne) breasts is exposed during cheer-leading practice. All of the girls, as well as Jim and Bubba and the Freemount football team, have a good laugh. Miss Dutchbok implicates Jordan and Rita in the prank, as well as Christine and Betsy, restricting them to campus for the week. One evening sometime later, Jim, Bubba, and Roy dress as girls (complete with dresses and makeup) in an attempt to visit Christine and Betsy. Once inside the dormitory, they encounter Jordan, who immediately recognizes them. When Jim claims to be "Christine's sister", Jordan invites him to her room and tries in vain to titillate him. Bubba enters Betsy's room with the intention of making love, but is discouraged by her demand for foreplay. He climbs out the window and makes his way to the gymnasium shower room to look at naked girls. But he soon becomes trapped in the sauna when Miss Dutchbok arrives to take a steam bath... leaving him trapped in the sauna. Meanwhile, Jim reveals his true identity to Jordan, who play-acts offended and openly accuses him of trying to seduce her. Though Jim protests his innocence to Christine, she believes Jordan and refuses to discuss the matter. At the same time, Bubba escapes from the sauna and rejoins Jim and Roy where the three guys leave the girls dorm and quietly return to their own dorm. On Parents' Day the following weekend, Jim explains the misunderstanding to Christine's father, who promises to intervene on his behalf. Betsy also speaks to Christine and convinces her to give Jim another chance. Jordan waits impatiently for her father, who embarrasses her with his habitual lateness, while Rita's father, Frank Flugel (Richard Stahl), embarrasses her with his habitual drunkenness. Mr. Leigh-Jensen finally arrives, accompanied by his latest trophy wife, a very young woman named Bambi (Karen Chase). When Mr. Flugel accidentally pushes Miss Copuletta into the swimming pool, Mr. Leigh-Jensen rescues her and offers mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, which the teacher encourages. In the parking lot, Miss Dutchbok mistakes the Leigh-Jensen's chauffeur, Chauncey (Ray Walston), for his employer and asks for a donation to the school. He invites Miss Dutchbok into his limousine, draws curtains to cover the windows and seduces her. Assuming the car is empty, Bubba and Betsy make love in the front seat until they realize they are not alone. Betsy places a microphone behind the curtain and connects it to the car's loudspeaker system, broadcasting Miss Dutchbok's seduction to the party-goers. The headmistress reacts by reaching through the curtain and choking Bubba. He accidentally releases the emergency brake, causing the limousine to careen through the party and into the swimming pool. One week later, Christine and Jim leave for the Hotel D'Amour. On the Freemount campus, Bubba bets Roy and the rest of his classmates that he can persuade Jordan to remove her clothes. Expecting a rendezvous with Jim, she enters his dormitory, unaware that several boys are hidden around the room (in the coat closet, under the bed, in the bathroom, etc.). Jordan is forced to remove her dress after Bubba sprays her with red wine, and she sends him out for club soda to remove the stain. Within moments, Betsy arrives and informs Jordan of Bubba's ruse. Upon his return, the two girls beat him up and push him out the window, while the spectators emerge from their hiding places. At the hotel, Christine and Jim find the contrived ambiance of their suite not conducive to romance and go to sleep. In the morning, however, Christine joins Jim on the beach and they make love for the first time in the surf. Months later, Cherryvale's senior class graduates. Jordan rides to the ceremony with her father and his new wife, Miss Copuletta. Jim is in attendance, along with Roy, who is dressed as a middle-aged man, and Bubba, who is dressed as a woman. Mr. Flugel staggers into an adjoining seat and attempts to fondle Bubba, who knocks him unconscious. Following Miss Dutchbok's commencement speech, Betsy leads the girls in the chant, "Graduation Cherryvale, you won't forget us soon; sunny days ahead of us, we leave behind this moon," after which they expose their behinds.

Stacy Hamilton (Jennifer Jason Leigh) is a 15-year-old high school sophomore who works in the Ridgemont Mall at Perry's pizza parlor with the seemingly more sexually experienced Linda Barrett (Phoebe Cates). Mark "Rat" Ratner (Brian Backer) also a sophomore, works in the mall as "assistant to the assistant manager" at the movie theater. His friend Mike Damone (Robert Romanus), who also hangs out at the mall scalping rock concert tickets, believes himself to be both worldly and wise in the ways of women. Stacy's brother Brad (Judge Reinhold) is a semi-dorky senior but is relatively popular because he has his own car and is a low-grade supervisor at All-American Burger, a favorite after-school hang-out and a place that treats teen employees well. Brad is spending his final year in high school basking in the joy of becoming the unfettered owner of his blue 1960 Buick LeSabre ("the cruising vessel"), which has only six payments left, and obsessing over the best way to ease out of the long-time relationship with his girlfriend, Lisa (Amanda Wyss), who also works at All-American Burger. Surfer-type Jeff Spicoli (Sean Penn) is the resident stoner who begins the new school year tumbling out of a Volkswagen Microbus after hot-boxing in the parking lot as the final attendance bell rings. Spicoli tries to come into the stern Mr. Hand's (Ray Walston) history class after the final bell, but Mr. Hand has locked the door. Spicoli knocks on the door but when Mr Hand sends him to principal's office, Spicoli calls him a "dick," thus beginning a vendetta between Mr. Hand and Spicoli that lasts throughout the movie. The sexually curious Stacy initially hooks up with a much older home stereo salesman, Ron Johnson of Pacific Stereo in the mall. He provides her first sexual experiences. He dumps her a few months later, causing Stacy to wonder what was wrong with herself and seek other relationships. In addition to his brief encounters with Stacy at the pizza parlor during his breaks at the movie theater, nerdy Mark Ratner ends up with Stacy as his lab partner in biology class. Ratner receives pointers from his friend Damone, the scalper. With prodding from Damone, "Rat" goes over to the pizza parlor one evening and asks for Stacy's phone number, saying he'll call her to ask her out on a date. Embarassed, but flattered, Stacy accepts Mark's offer of a date. The date goes well despite Mark forgetting his wallet at home and the tape deck being stolen from his sister's car during their dinner at a local German restaurant. They go back to her house, where she comes on to him. Inexperienced with sex, he chickens out, leaving her there with nothing but a robe on. This leads Stacy to confide in Linda that she believes (mistakenly) that Mark does not love her. Back at school, Spicoli continues to annoy Mr. Hand, including one episode in which Spicoli arranges for a pizza delivery in the middle of class by a less-than-thrilled "Pizza Guy" delivery man (Taylor Negron) only to have Mr. Hand take the pizza away and distribute it to his favored students. Meanwhile, Brad loses his cherished job at All American Burger one day in a dispute with an unsatisfied and rude customer (Sonny Carl Davis) who demands his money back (clearly a yuppie con artist), where after the rude customer insults Brad and Brad insults the rude customer back, the stern boss, Dennis, approaches and instantly fires Brad for it and falls for the con artist's ploy and refunds his money. Brad feels betrayed when all of his co-worker friends don't have the courage to stand up for him to their dictator of a boss out of fear of losing their jobs too. As a result, Brad never speaks to any of his friends ever again. Brad is forced to take a new job at "Captain Hook Fish and Chips," a Long John Silvers-styled fish restaurant. Employees are forced to wear pirate uniforms, and after being laughed at by a beautiful woman (Nancy Wilson) while on a delivery, Brad quits in disgust while tossing all the "Catch of the Day" boxes out into the street. At a pep rally before the football game with Lincoln High, Brad meets up with his girlfriend Lisa. In a complete turnabout from his plans to go solo during the summer, Brad bares his troubled soul to Lisa, telling her that he needs her now more than ever. But Lisa dumps him, saying she wants to see other people before she heads to college, the perfect culmination to Brad's personal annihilation. As Brad's life crumbles as he now has no friends or job, Stacy and Linda are sitting by the pool discussing men. Meanwhile, Damone convinces Mark to give it another shot with Stacy. Damone leads Mark to Stacy's house, where Damone crashes the girl chat. Brad comes home, dejected, and goes into the house. The teens all comment on how Brad is so depressed after losing his job at All America Burger. Brad heads for the bathroom and starts to masturbate as he fantasizes about Linda approaching him in her bikini and undoing her top (in a now near-legendary scene set to The Cars' song "Moving in Stereo"). Linda jumps into the pool and gets water in her ear. She makes her way to the bathroom for a Q-tip and is shocked as she catches Brad masturbating, which ruins the pool party. Later that evening, Spicoli is seen drinking beer, smoking marijuana, and lost in his own world as he joyrides in a 1979 Chevrolet Camaro Z28 owned by Charles Jefferson (Forest Whitaker), an ill-tempered, hulking jock who is the star of the Ridgemont football team. The car is a gift from a grateful alumnus, and Jefferson's little brother, along for the ride, freaks out as an unconcerned Spicoli drives like a maniac through the crowded city streets. Spicoli eventually wrecks the car when he swerves to avoid an oncoming car, and crashes into a concrete wall. Spicoli promises to Jefferson's brother that he can fix it. The next day at school, a large crowd gathers around the front entrance--where Jefferson's totaled car is covered in anti-Ridgemont graffiti. Spicoli has apparently made it look as if the rival high school, Lincoln High, destroyed it as a prank. Jefferson takes out his anger on the Lincoln football team that night, winning the game single handily and sending Lincoln's quarterback out of the game on a stretcher. Over the next several weeks, Stacy grows attracted to Mark's friend, Damone. Stacy meets Damone after school and Damone drives her home. Damone asks if Stacy has any iced tea and then he wants to go for a swim. She brings him into the changing booth near the pool. Instead of swimming, the two have clumsy, unsatisfying sex in the changing booth. Later, Stacy tells Linda that she is pregnant. Stacy tells Damone and they decide that an abortion is the only solution. She asks Damone to pay for half the abortion ($150) and give her a ride to the clinic. Damone agrees. A little later, Damone and Ratner get into an argument over Stacy in the locker room after Ratner hears that Damone has been with Stacy. After Damone and Ratner almost get into a fistfight, they cut ties with each other. Damone has a hard time coming up with his half of the money to pay for the abortion. Damone desperately and unsuccessfully attempts to collect from past "clients" who owe him money. It is only then that Damone finally discovers how little power and popularity he has with the other teens. Ashamed, Damone does not show up to drive Stacy to the clinic and avoids her phone calls. Stacy catches a ride with Brad to a nearby bowling alley under the pretense that she is meeting some friends there. Brad sees Stacy leave the bowling alley and enter the clinic. After the procedure is finished, Brad is waiting for Stacy outside and talks to her about what happened, though Stacy will not tell him the identity of the father. Stacy's sibling bond grows with Brad when he shows a brotherly act of kindness by not pressing the issue. Linda, however, is not so charitable. After Stacy tells her of Damone's deception, Linda goes after Damone by scrawling "Prick" in spray paint on his car door and "Little Prick" in marker on his school locker. Another month or two later, Stacy and Mark are fated to be together again when they go on a biology class field trip to observe an autopsy performed by their flaky biology teacher Mr. Vargas (Vincent Schiavelli). Spicoli tags along with the class (despite that he does not take biology) just for the excursion. When Mr. Vargas starts to rip organs from the corpse, Stacy feels sick and Mark helps her out of the procedure room. Stacy is grateful to Mark for staying with her and says he's "a nice guy." School is coming to an end. Mr. Hand takes some revenge on Spicoli by visiting him at his home on the night of the graduation dance and administering an impromptu American History lesson long enough to delay Spicoli until well after the prom has started. Surprisingly, Spicoli does well with Mr. Hand's questioning and the two are actually amiable by the end of the session. Still, the teacher relents on the question of whether or not he will flunk Spicoli, telling the stoned surfer he'll probably "squeak by." Mike Damone and Mark Ratner speak to each other at the prom. A tenuous bond is reformed, but Damone knows he no longer has power over "Rat." In the closing scenes, Stacy, still working at the pizza joint, sees Mark at his station across the mall at the theater. She waves him over and gives him a demure photo of herself. She makes it clear she'd like to begin seeing him again. Mark is at first tentative, but Stacy playfully nudges Mark and eggs him on. He looks at Stacy for a moment, smiles and then says he'll call her. Meanwhile, Brad is working at his new job, the bottom rung on the high school scale of after-school employment: a convenience store called Mi-T-Mart. Spicoli walks in and tries to make a purchase while fumbling with pocket change. He then asks to use the bathroom. As soon as Spicoli walks away to the restroom, a car pulls up to the front of the store, a robber exits the car, walks in the door, sprays the security camera, pulls out a pistol and tells Brad to give him all the money in the wall safe. Brad gets very nervous, and cannot open the safe. But when the armed robber threatens to shoot and kill Brad for stalling, Brad's fear suddenly turns into anger as he mouths off to the armed robber, wishing that he would just die.... as Brad sees this as just another rotten episode in his further disintegrating life. Just then Spicoli walks out of the bathroom complaining that there are no paper towels and he inadvertently distracts the thief for a few seconds, just long enough for a furious Brad to grab and throw a pot of hot coffee in the robber's face, jump over the counter, take his gun away and captures the would-be thief as the criminal's getaway car peels out the parking lot, making Brad a local hero... at least in Spicoli's eyes. Before the end credits roll, the characters' futures are shown: Brad Hamilton: Made manager of Mi-T-Mart, June 12. Mike Damone: Busted for scalping Ozzy Osbourne tickets. Now working at 7-Eleven. Mr. Vargas: Switched back to coffee. Linda Barrett: Attending college in Riverside. Now living with her Abnormal Psych professor. Rat & Stacy: Having a passionate love affair. But still haven't gone all the way. Mr. Hand: Convinced EVERYONE is on dope. Jeff Spicoli: Saved Brooke Shields from drowning. Blows reward money hiring Van Halen to play at his birthday party.

Two unlikely prospector partners share the same wife in a California gold rush mining town. A Michigan farmer and a prospector form a partnership in the California gold country. Their adventures include buying and sharing a wife, hijacking a stage, kidnaping six prostitutes, and turning their mining camp into a boomtown. Along the way there is plenty of drinking, gambling, and singing. They even find time to do some creative gold mining. —David J. Kiseleski <davidk269@aol.com>

Norman Phiffier works as a store clerk in a large department store. Clumsy and inept, he can't do anything right. Boy are they in trouble! Barbara is a very rich girl who falls in love with Norman Phiffier, a poor young man. She doesn't tell him who she really is and prepares to marry him. But, Mrs. Tuttle (Barbara's mother) doesn't want her daughter to mary such a poor man. So, she hires Norman at one of her big stores, and gives him the most difficult and disgusting works. She hopes that seeing Norman humiliated, Barbara will finally leave him. But things don't work exactly this way... —Chris Makrozahopoulos <makzax@hotmail.com>