Wilfrid Hyde-White

Jack Brown (Richard Pryor) is an unemployed newspaper reporter living in Baton Rouge, Louisiana who is in danger of losing his house to the bank since he and his wife, Angela (Annazette Chase), cannot make their mortgage. After numerous unsuccessful attempts to get a job working for the local paper, The Bugle, he becomes so desperate that he ends up taking a job as a "cleaning lady" for U.S. Bates (Jackie Gleason), an uptight and ruthless businessman who owns the paper and many other businesses in Louisiana. Jack is humiliated as he clumsily attempts to serve food at a luncheon. He is fired, but quickly lands a part-time job as a janitor in a department store owned by Bates. The following evening, "Master" Eric Bates (Scott Schwartz), the 10-year-old, spoiled-and-rotten, brat son of the boss, arrives home from the military academy where he attends and his father sends him to the store and he is told that he "can have anything he wants in the store". Amused at seeing Jack goof around in the store's toy section, Eric informs his father's long-suffering right-hand man, Sydney Morehouse (Ned Beatty), that what he wants is Jack Brown himself. Morehouse fails to convince Eric that human beings cannot be owned. Jack is literally "boxed up" and taken to the large Bates mansion that sits on the outskirts of the city. At first, Jack refuses to have any interaction with the brat Eric, but Bates offers him a deal: in exchange for a generous financial settlement, Jack reluctantly agrees to be Eric's live-in friend during Eric's one-week spring break from military school. Emotionally estranged from his father, Eric takes a liking to Jack but still manages to humiliate him with numerous pranks during the first day and night. After a particularly humiliating incident in the mansion incited by Bates' ditsy and floozy, much younger trophy wife Fancy (Teresa Ganzel), who literally introduces him at a dinner party as Eric's new "toy," Jack grows tired of the situation and leaves. The next day, Jack agrees to return only when U.S. Bates (with Morehouse as his proxy) offers Jack so much money to be Eric's live-in friend for one week, that Jack will not only pay back the bank and numerous bill collectors, but Jack will be able to pay back the entire mortgage on his house as well. Jack returns to the Bates estate, determined to teach Eric how a friend is supposed to be treated. Over the next several days, they slowly bond while participating in mini-cart racing, video games, and even fishing in a stream filled with piranha. Both Jack and Eric begin to open up to one another with stories about their personal lives. Jack tells Eric about him growing up poor and having to look out for oneself. Eric tells Jack about his mother's death when he was very young which his grumpy father tries to forget about by putting all his time in work and leaving no time for anything else while marrying again and again. Over time, Jack sees that Eric isn't the "bad seed" that he puts out to people, but just a mistreated and neglected boy who wants attention and whom is spoiled by his father. Used to getting things his way since all his father ever does is give him gifts and money (calling it love and affection) Eric throws fits when things do not go his way. Eric is so spoiled and hyper-competitive that he enjoys beating Jack at video games, mini-cart racing and board games a little too much. One day, when Jack begins winning at a two-person basketball game, Eric, seeing that he is losing, refuses to play anymore and walks off the court. When Jack scolds Eric for quitting because he is losing asks if he would like to tell Eric's father that he is a quitter as well as a sore loser. Eric replies with the most touching and dramatic line in the movie: "my father doesn't care what I am... as long as I stay out of his way." Another day later, Jack and Eric decide to start a newspaper of their own for fun. After witnessing multiple examples of Bates' cruelty to his housekeeping staff and workers, they dig up dirt on him, such as a story of how he won his elderly and long-suffering butler, Barkley (Wilfrid Hyde-White), in a game of billiards. Jack and Eric then break into Bates newspaper office after-hours as well as the factory to print their paper, but get discovered by the police. At a police station, Eric manages to create a diversion by setting off some firecrackers creating confusion and panic in which Jack and Eric quietly walk out of their jail cell, and out of the front door. Afterwards, Jack and Eric publish their paper, titled 'The Toy' and distribute free copies of it throughout the city. Morehouse finds a copy and, being the ever loyal toady that he is, shows it to Bates and he is outraged. Bates quickly calls Jack and Eric to his office to confront them both, but he keeps his anger in check. Bates orders Jack and Eric to shut down their paper which he sees as humiliating to him and the Bates dynasty. However, Eric is unapologetic and wants to continue the paper. To prove to his son that money can buy anything (including loyalty), Bates offers Jack a reporting job with his newspaper at the end of the week... which is what Jack wanted all along. When Jack accepts, Eric becomes upset and runs out of the office. Outside, Eric scolds Jack for selling out as all of the people that Bates does business with. Jack tells the boy that most men (especially disenfranchised African-American men such as himself) need jobs, just as his priority is to support himself and his wife. At the climax, an swanky outdoor party is held at the Bates estate, attended by prominent citizens who are supporters of a senator (Ray Spruell). They are unaware that members of the KKK are also in attendance. Jack's wife, Angela, tries to bring attention to this with her anti-Klan group that are camped on the Bates mansion in a protest demonstration, but Jack convinces her to leave. He learns the true reason for the party is to get the KKK Grand Wizard (Orwin Harvey) and Senator Newcomb together in a picture, which Bates would then use to blackmail the senator. Senator Newcomb's daughter Honey Russell (Linda McCann) is also in attendance at the party and is accompanied by her husband (Stocker Fontelieu) who is a local district attorney investing Bates for shady business deals and corruption, in which Bates is also hoping to get D.A. Russell a photo op with the Grand Wizard to blackmail him too to stop his investigation of his business activities. Jack and Eric team up one last time to disrupt the party and they crash the events on their mini go-carts where Jack announces to everyone about the Grand Wizard's identity. Jack embarrasses the Grand Wizard by causing him to fall into a bowl of chocolate fudge. The Grand Wizard throws a pie at Jack, but hits a policeman instead, leading to his arrest. Chaos ensues which leads to Jack and Eric driving their mini-carts around the party, knocking down tents, ruining displays, and people jumping out of the path of Jack and Eric's mini-carts into various desert trays which leads to a huge pie-throwing fight among the guests. Bates chases after Jack in a golf cart but ends up crashing into the pool. Jack saves him from drowning since Bates cannot swim, and it seems all is forgiven. That evening with the week up, Jack packs up and returns to his neighborhood to his wife, riding away on a bicycle while Eric sadly waves goodbye. The next day, while riding with Eric in a limousine to the airport to return to military school, Bates tries desperately to have a heart-to-heart talk with his son, but he is not very good at it. All Eric talks about is Jack and that he misses him. Bates tells Eric to forget about Jack. While on the runway to board Bates' private jet, Eric runs off, making his way to Jack's house. Jack refuses to let Eric live with him and gently admonishes Eric to give his father a chance. Bates shows up and offers the newspaper job to Jack again and promises Eric that next year for spring break he can spend one week with him and one with Jack, much to Eric's joy. After they leave, the senator's daughter, Honey Russell, shows up in another limo informing Jack that Fancy has recommended him to look after her son, Eugene, for a few weeks who is home from his own military academy on spring break. Eugene (Davis Hotard) peeks out from the top window and shoots Jack in the forehead with a toy dart... revealing that he is MORE spoiled and obnoxious then Eric. A crazed Jack runs away down the road in fear over this 'here-we-go-again' situation as the end credits roll.

A naive monk, named Brother Ambrose (Marty Feldman), is sent by the abbot on a mission to raise $5,000 in order to save their monastery from closing. He goes to Hollywood where he encounters a number of eccentric characters. He is at first robbed and later befriended by con artist Dr. Sebastian Melmoth (Peter Boyle), and meets a prostitute named Mary (Louise Lasser) who lets him stay at her apartment. Mary grows to care for Ambrose and seduces him while he is taking a cold shower to try to alleviate his lustful thoughts about her. While he is in Hollywood, he visits several churches including a service at the Church of Divine Profit, performed by the televangelist Armageddon T. Thunderbird (Andy Kaufman) in which he sees the focus of the sermon being a request for money in exchange for salvation. Ambrose is angered by this message and tries to meet a number of times with Thunderbird, being ejected each time. Dr. Melmoth and Ambrose travel the city in a modified schoolbus, in which they hold church services for donations. During one service, the brakes of the bus release and the bus rolls downhill into a river. The passengers escape safely in the river and are shown on the local news being baptized by the pair, which catches Thunderbird's attention. He prays to G. O. D. for guidance and it tells him to work with Ambrose to make more money because Ambrose is an innocent and has a clean image. Thunderbird has his minions kidnap Ambrose and bring him to his office where he outlines a plan for his own brand of church on wheels. He says he will pay Ambrose the $5,000 the monastery needs if he assists him. While they are talking, Thunderbird mentions that G. O. D. (Richard Pryor) audibly talks to him when he prays to him and Ambrose is surprised because he himself has never heard from God in this way. Ambrose agrees to work with Thunderbird and they go across the country from town to town holding services in their own bus. One day at Thunderbird's headquarters, Ambrose overhears Thunderbird praying to G. O. D. in his private chamber and when he hears G. O. D. speak back to him, he is intrigued. When Thunderbird leaves, he sneaks into the chamber and discovers that G. O. D. (General Organizational Directivatator) is a sophisticated master computer, linked to all of Thunderbird's finances and operations. He talks with G. O. D. and reads the Bible to it, giving it morality and a conscience. G. O. D. decides to give all of Thunderbird's money away and tells Ambrose what to do to accomplish this, which results in bags of money being poured out of the office's window. Thunderbird discovers someone has been interfering with the computer and rushes back to headquarters where he tries to capture Ambrose and destroys the computer. Ambrose grabs the paid monastery mortgage certificate from Thunderbird's office and escapes in a chase through the city. While Mary and Dr. Melmoth look for Ambrose during his escape, she learns that Melmoth is the father that left her family when she was a child, due to a distinctive tattoo she sees on his leg. They eventually find Ambrose and rescue him from the people chasing him. Ambrose goes back to the monastery and gives the abbot the mortgage certificate, then leaves and marries Mary, who is pregnant from their single night together. The end titles show Melmoth's bus traveling down the road, saying they "all lived happily hereafter".

Young Tracy Richards (Louanne) and her neighbor, Shingo (John Louie), shoot basketballs until Tracy's divorced father, Don Richards (David Birney), arrives in his red Jeep to take her on an outing. Don's ex-wife and Tracy's mother, Paula (Suzanne Pleshette), tells Don to have Tracy back at the regular time. As father and daughter eat Chinese food, Don complains about the plot from a science fiction movie that they saw, but Tracy talks about the importance of believing in supernatural things. As Don leaves to make a phone call, Tracy opens a fortune cookie that reads: " Meet me in the lounge. - God." A second fortune cookie says, "I mean you, Tracy. - God." In the lounge, a man's voice beckons her through a red lacquer door, introduces himself as God, and asks for help. At first, Tracy thinks her father is playing tricks, but when other people cannot hear God's voice, she is convinced. God also says that He was impressed when she talked about the importance of believing in things that cannot be seen. Then, the voice goes silent. On the ride home, Tracy says she had a daydream although vague on the details, but Don, an advertising art director, assures her that it happens to people all the time. He then leaves her in the parked car while retrieving work from his office. This time, God appears in the backseat as an elderly man (George Burns) wearing a gray jacket, black-rimmed glasses, and a red shirt. When Tracy said she expected a Deity to wear a crown and a flowing robe, God tells her that she has confused him with the actor Charlton Heston. God complains that people do not believe in Him anymore, so Tracy suggests that He needs an advertising slogan to spread His message. He asks her to create one that children will understand. Later, Don gives Tracy some pointers on ways to devise a slogan. Back at home, Tracy asks Rosa (Alma Beltran), the housekeeper, if she talks to God. Rosa admits to praying everyday, but says that Tracy's imagination is running wild when Tracy confesses to her experience with God. Later, Tracy tells Shingo about her adventure with God, but he does not believe her either. When Tracy angrily throws a basketball at the hoop and makes a perfect shot, Shingo wonders if she really is telling the truth. At school, Tracy's teacher, Miss Hudson, accuses her of being inattentive in class and not turning in her homework, but Tracy is unable to explain her lack of interest. Back at home, Tracy studies television commercials obsessively, trying to figure out an appropriate slogan for God. As she watches The Johnny Carson Show, God appears on the television, and then, suddenly materializes in Tracy's living room. After listening to Tracy's material, God gives the girl another week to create a winning slogan. He encourages her to bounce ideas off of Shingo, with whom she and he eventually come up with "Think God." At a local McDonalds the next day, Tracy presents the slogan to God; He tells her that the next step is to spread the word. Tracy is worried that the extra responsibility will make her fall farther behind in her schoolwork, but God is persuasive. Tracy rallies her schoolmates, who post signs and leave chalk messages all over town. However, Paula Richards confronts her daughter after receiving a letter from Miss Hudson. When Tracy explains that God has visited her, Paula does not believe her. Tracy is pressured to catch up on her schoolwork, while Shingo enlists his cousins to help spread the word. Later, Tracy complains to God that spreading His slogan has gotten her in trouble with both her parents and friends, and He calms her fears by finishing her math homework. Another time later, Don and Paula question their daughter, but Tracy sticks to her story about God. Don wants Tracy to see a psychiatrist or a minister, but Paula wants to handle Tracy's situation by herself without outside interference. The parents decide to watch Tracy's behavior for a few more days. Back at school, the principal, Mr. Benson, arranges a meeting with the Richardses because Tracy refuses to stop her God campaign. When Paula tells her daughter that she will be expelled from school if she continues, Tracy says she will stop on the condition that God agrees to the plan. When the school psychologist learns that Tracy's relationship with God started in a Chinese restaurant with a fortune cookie, the principal suspends Tracy and the psychologist tells the parents that their daughter needs professional help. Meanwhile, Tracy's school friends picket in front of the school for Tracy's return. Soon, Don and Paula take Tracy to see Dr. Jerome Newell (Anthony Holland) who examines Tracy and puts her through a series of psychosis tests. After the tests are done, Dr. Newell tells Don and Paula that he theorizes (wrongly) that Tracy has created a "fantasy father figure" as a substitute for her real father, whom she sees on a limited basis since her parents' divorce. Dr. Newell concludes that there is nothing medically wrong with Tracy, but she is suffering from a psychosis. He suggests that she enter a mental treatment facility in Santa Barbara, California. Before Tracy is taken away to be admitted, she searches for God in several churches and even a synagogue, but cannot find Him. Tracy decides to run away, and Shingo helps her hide at his grandparents' house. Later, Tracy runs away to Union Train Station after Shingo warns her that he had to reveal her whereabouts when Don confronted and threatened him. There, God finally appears and convinces Tracy that running away is not the answer, and drives her home in a motorcycle sidecar. Two policemen see the motorcycle (with no one riding it) and chase after it, but God manages to lose the policemen. When Tracy's parents find their daughter in bed, Tracy explains that God brought her home. Meanwhile, the news reports that Tracy's slogan has spread internationally. In court, a judge asks that a panel of psychiatrists convene to determine Tracy's mental health. Based on their findings, the judge says he will rule on whether or not Tracy goes back to school. As the doctors' panel rules that Tracy can start treatment, God arrives and introduces himself as Dr. Stevens, a psychiatrist. Demonstrating His supernatural power, God makes a chandelier disappear and reappear, and turns day into night. He then turns to leave and vanishes; the door opens and closes by itself. The panel is left speechless, so the Richards take their daughter home. Tracy and her family celebrate at the Chinese restaurant. Tracy receives a message from the fortune cookies and goes to the lounge. There, God thanks her and her friends for their wonderful campaign. Although Tracy is sad that she may never see God again, He promises to call on her if He needs help with a big problem.

The world's richest man and his adopted hobo son set out to test the limits of human vanity and greed through a series of "money games". Sir Guy Grand adopts homeless bum Youngman to be heir to his obscene wealth, and immediately begins bringing him into the intricacies of the family business, which is to prey upon people's greed by use of the vast holdings of the Grand empire. They leave no stone unturned as sporting events, restaurants, art galleries, and traditional pheasant hunts turn into lurid displays of bad manners and profiteering. Things climax at the social event of the season, the inaugural voyage of the new pleasure cruiser, "The Magic Christian". —Ed Sutton <esutton@mindspring.com>

Henry Higgins (Rex Harrison), an arrogant, irascible professor of phonetics, boasts to a new acquaintance, Colonel Pickering (Wilfrid Hyde-White), that he can teach any woman to speak so "properly" that he could pass her off as a duchess. The person whom he is shown thus teaching is one Eliza Doolittle (Audrey Hepburn), a young woman with a horrendous Cockney accent who is selling flowers on the street. After overhearing this, Eliza finds her way to the professor's house and offers to pay for speech lessons, so that she can work in a flower shop. Pickering is intrigued and wagers that Higgins cannot back up his claim; Higgins takes Eliza on free of charge as a challenge to his skills. Eliza's father, Alfred P. Doolittle (Stanley Holloway), a dustman, arrives three days later, ostensibly to protect his daughter's virtue, but in reality simply to extract some money from Higgins, and is bought off with £5. Higgins is impressed by the man's genuineness, natural gift for language and especially his brazen lack of morals (Doolittle explains, "Can't afford 'em!"). Eliza goes through many forms of speech training, such as speaking with marbles in her mouth and trying to recite the sentence "In Hertford, Hereford, Hampshire, hurricanes hardly ever happen" without dropping the 'h', and to say "The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain" rather than "The rine in spine sties minely in the pline". At first, she makes no progress (due to Higgins's harsh approach to teaching), but just as she, Higgins, and Pickering are exhausted and about to give up, Higgins softens his attitude and gives an eloquent speech about the beauty and history behind the English language. Eliza tries one more time and finally "gets it"; she instantly begins to speak with an impeccable upper class accent. Higgins takes her on her first public appearance to Ascot Racecourse, where she makes a good impression with her stilted, but genteel manners, only to shock everyone by a sudden and vulgar lapse into Cockney; "C'mon Dover, move your bloomin' arse!". Higgins, who dislikes the pretentiousness of the upper class, partly conceals a grin behind his hand, as if to say "I wish I had said that!" The bet is won when Eliza successfully poses as a mysterious lady of patently noble rank at an embassy ball, despite the unexpected presence of a Hungarian phonetics expert trained by Higgins. Higgins's callous treatment of Eliza afterwards, especially his indifference to her future prospects, leads her to walk out on him, leaving him mystified by her ingratitude. When she is gone however, he comes to the horrified realization that he has "grown accustomed to her face." Putting aside his resentment about the intrusion on his life and toward women in general, Higgins finds Eliza the next day and attempts to talk her into coming back to him. During a testy exchange, Higgins's ego gets the better of him, and his former student rejects him. Higgins makes his way home, stubbornly predicting that Eliza will be ruined without him and come crawling back. However, his bravado collapses and he is reduced to playing old phonograph recordings of her voice lessons. To Higgins' great delight, Eliza chooses that moment to return to him.

At the time of the invasion of Normandy, an American soldier is asked to impersonate a British general in order to confuse German spies and assassins in London. American GI Ernie Williams (Danny Kaye), admittedly weak-kneed, has an uncanny resemblance to British Colonel MacKenzie (Danny Kaye). Williams, also a master of imitation and disguise, is asked to impersonate the colonel, ostensibly to allow the colonel to make a secret trip east. What Williams is not told is that the colonel has recently been the target of assassins. After the colonel's plane goes down, the plan changes and Williams maintains the disguise to confuse the Germans about D-Day. —Jerry Milani <jmilani@ix.netcom.com>