The Spike Jones Story (1988)
Genre : Documentary, Music
Runtime : 59M
Director : Don McGlynn
Synopsis
This program presents a combination of entertainer Spike Jones' personal and professional history, featuring Milton Berle and Danny Thomas, plus numerous family members and collaborators.
A trio of female soul singers cross over to the pop charts in the early 1960s, facing their own personal struggles along the way.
Two musicians witness a mob hit and struggle to find a way out of the city before they are found by the gangsters. Their only opportunity is to join an all-girl band as they leave on a tour. To make their getaway they must first disguise themselves as women, then keep their identities secret and deal with the problems this brings - such as an attractive bandmate and a very determined suitor.
When record store owner and compulsive list-compiler Rob Gordon gets dumped by his long-time girlfriend, Laura, because he hasn't changed since they met, he revisits his top five breakups of all time in order to figure out what went wrong. As he examines his failed attempts at romance and happiness, the process finds him being dragged, kicking and screaming, into adulthood.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is a remarkably talented young Viennese composer who unwittingly finds a fierce rival in the disciplined and determined Antonio Salieri. Resenting Mozart for both his hedonistic lifestyle and his undeniable talent, the highly religious Salieri is gradually consumed by his jealousy and becomes obsessed with Mozart's downfall, leading to a devious scheme that has dire consequences for both men.
Every year, thousands of Antarctica's emperor penguins make an astonishing journey to breed their young. They walk, marching day and night in single file 70 miles into the darkest, driest and coldest continent on Earth. This amazing, true-life tale is touched with humour and alive with thrills. Breathtaking photography captures the transcendent beauty and staggering drama of devoted parent penguins who, in the fierce polar winter, take turns guarding their egg and trekking to the ocean in search of food. Predators hunt them, storms lash them. But the safety of their adorable chicks makes it all worthwhile. So follow the leader... to adventure!!
Matt, a young glaciologist, soars across the vast, silent, icebound immensities of the South Pole as he recalls his love affair with Lisa. They meet at a mobbed rock concert in a vast music hall - London's Brixton Academy. They are in bed at night's end. Together, over a period of several months, they pursue a mutual sexual passion whose inevitable stages unfold in counterpoint to nine live-concert songs.
For Jimmy Smith, Jr., life is a daily fight just to keep hope alive. Feeding his dreams in Detroit's vibrant music scene, Jimmy wages an extraordinary personal struggle to find his own voice - and earn a place in a world where rhymes rule, legends are born and every moment… is another chance.
A chronicle of country music legend Johnny Cash's life, from his early days on an Arkansas cotton farm to his rise to fame with Sun Records in Memphis, where he recorded alongside Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins.
County Durham England 1984 the miners strike has started and the police have started coming up from Bethnal Green starting a class war with the lower classes suffering caught in the middle of the conflict is 11-year old Billy Elliot who after leaving his boxing club for the day stubbles upon a ballet class and finds out that he's naturally talented. He practices with his teacher Mrs Wilkinson for an upcoming audition in Newcastle-upon Tyne the audition is for the royal Ballet school in London.
Expecting the usual tedium that accompanies a summer in the Catskills with her family, 17-year-old Frances 'Baby' Houseman is surprised to find herself stepping into the shoes of a professional hoofer—and unexpectedly falling in love.
A Reno singer witnesses a mob murder and the cops stash her in a nunnery to protect her from the mob's hitmen. The mother superior does not trust her, and takes steps to limit her influence on the other nuns. Eventually the singer rescues the failing choir and begins helping with community projects, which gets her an interview on TV—and identification by the mob.
A vacuum repairman moonlights as a street musician and hopes for his big break. One day a Czech immigrant, who earns a living selling flowers, approaches him with the news that she is also an aspiring singer-songwriter. The pair decide to collaborate, and the songs that they compose reflect the story of their blossoming love.
Shane, a Jersey boy with big dreams, crosses the river in hopes of finding a more exciting life at Studio 54. When Steve Rubell, the mastermind behind the infamous disco, plucks Shane from the sea of faces clamoring to get inside his club, Shane not only gets his foot in the door, but lands a coveted job behind the bar – and a front-row seat at the most legendary party on the planet.
Following a childhood tragedy, Dewey Cox follows a long and winding road to music stardom. Dewey perseveres through changing musical styles, an addiction to nearly every drug known and bouts of uncontrollable rage.
Lyla and Louis, a singer and a musician, fall in love, but are soon compelled to separate. Lyla is forced to give up her newborn but unknown to her, he grows up to become a musical genius.
A hapless inventor finally finds success with a flying car, which a dictator from a foreign government sets out to take for himself.
The story of a virtuoso piano player who lives his entire life aboard an ocean liner. Born and raised on the ship, 1900 (Tim Roth) learned about the outside world through interactions with passengers, never setting foot on land, even for the love of his life. Years later, the ship may be destroyed, and a former band member fears that 1900 may still be aboard, willing to go down with the ship.
The embodiment of ultimate evil, a glowing orb terrorizes a young girl with bizarre stories of dark fantasy, eroticism and horror.
Director James Toback takes an unflinching, uncompromising look at the life of Mike Tyson--almost solely from the perspective of the man himself. TYSON alternates between the controversial boxer addressing the camera and shots of the champion's fights to create an arresting picture of the man.
Deloris Van Cartier is again asked to don the nun's habit to help a run-down Catholic school, presided over by Mother Superior. And if trying to reach out to a class full of uninterested students wasn't bad enough, the sisters discover that the school is due to be closed by the unscrupulous chief of a local authority.