William Wyler directed this epic Western, about the clash of East and West, intellect and action. Gregory Peck stars as a sea captain who moves way out West to marry Carroll Baker and become part of the ranch owned by her father (Charles Bickford). But he discovers that daddy's top hand (Charlton Heston) carries a torch for Baker and doesn't particularly like Peck stepping into his place. Peck ...
The life of Christ got an excessively long treatment (260 minutes, later trimmed to 195) in this 1965 film directed by George Stevens (The Diary of Anne Frank). Max von Sydow does beautiful work as Jesus--his spontaneous mourning at discovering his friend Lazarus has died is not like anything in other New Testament epics--and Stevens renders the familiar tale with a handsome authenticity. ...
This winning 1990 comedy stars Arnold Schwarzenegger in an initially self-deprecating role as a grizzled, big-city cop who goes undercover as a small-town kindergarten teacher to nab a killer. One of the best films of director Ivan Reitman (Dave), this comedy (with some thriller elements) went a long way to further soften and broaden Schwarzenegger's image after Reitman worked with him in ...
The American domestic epic endured long into the post-war era, with Giant (1956) one of its last real manifestations. Director George Stevens gets real panoramic sweep in his adaptation of Edna Ferber's novel of social and economic change in rural Texas from the 1920s to the 1950s. Rock Hudson is imposing if uninvolving as rancher Vernon Reata II, constantly torn between his image and his ...
It's not quite as clever as it tries to be, but The Game does a tremendous job of presenting the story of a rigid control freak trapped in circumstances that are increasingly beyond his control. Michael Douglas plays a rich, divorced, and dreadful investment banker whose 48th birthday reminds him of his father's suicide at the same age. He's locked in the cage of his own misery until his ...