Comments on: 6 TV Movie Facts (Including some dirt on Steven Spielberg)

By: Wayne

Wayne — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 02:21:10 +0000

vitajex–

It was called Without Warning, I remember it aired on CBS because the fake news network logo on the bottom left of the screen was like a twisted CBS eye; and it had Sander Vanocur playing the anchor.

It aired on Halloween, CBS was trying to recreate a War of the Worlds type show like Orsen Wells did in the 1930s on radio.

By: Nancy

Nancy — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 01:26:32 +0000

I miss miniseries. Especially all the Stephen King ones from ABC; they’re fantastic!

There’s also a bad ’80′s on with Kirstie Alley as Gloria Steinem when she went undercover as a Playboy Bunny

By: Julie

Julie — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 23:09:05 +0000

The movie with the surprise bedroom luminal (end of part 1) was “In a Child’s Name”, based on the book by Peter Maas, and starring Valerie Berinelli.

One that I remember is “Sweet Hostage”, where Martin Sheen kidnaps a teenage Linda Blair. They eventually fall in love. I remember my mom complaining that “every teen age girl will be on the street wanting to be kidnapped.”

By: Lauren

Lauren — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 22:09:03 +0000

Erin- I totally remember the one where the wife was beaten with a free weight. If I remember correctly, the husband beat her on occasion and then she found an earring in his car that wasn’t hers and she confronted him saying she would leave him. Then he beat her to death. I also remember them having an infant son. Maybe I’m combing a few of them… I watch a lot of lifetime original movies. I remember seeing that years ago when I was probably 7 (I think my sisters were watching it) and it has stuck with me ever since. Every time Lifetime has an older movie on I always check to see if it is that one.

By: Vinnie

Vinnie — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 22:00:44 +0000

Flight 90: Disaster on the Potomac – based on an actual airplane crash in 1982, intercut with real-life news footage of the survivors being rescued.

Not My Kid – with Stockard Channing and George Segal as parents who send their child to drug rehab.

The Miracle of Kathy Miller – with Helen Hunt, based on a true triumph-over-tragedy story.

and some other fun ones:

Curse of the Black Widow – featuring Patty Duke Astin, Donna Mills, split personalities and a giant, man-eating black widow spider!

Twirl – Erin Moran and Lisa Welchel…as rivals in a baton-twirling championship!

The Night The Bridge Fell Down – an overlong Irwin Allen disaster flick about people trapped on a huge bridge…that falls down.

By: Michael D.

Michael D. — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 18:57:34 +0000

Here’s the opening to ABC’s “Movie of the Week” that can be seen above. Classic SF fans should recognize the film that the effect sequence was used from. It was intentional-the same equipment was used.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbY8bLtt_3g&feature=related

By: Michael D.

Michael D. — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 18:49:23 +0000

Without Warning was the alien invasion TV-movie from the early 90s that was mentioned earlier. It was great and mixed veteran journalists such as Sander Vanocur and Bree Walker with regular actors. It was released on DVD but is now out of print.

Special Bulletin, which is about terrorists who smuggle a nuclear bomb into Charleston Harbor, can be watched on Google Video.

By: Don

Don — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 18:27:39 +0000

There’s a bit of “across generations” in these comments (after 45 years of “made for TV movies,” a lot of them blend together). The ABC (Tuesday, then Wednesday) ones were the classics – “Brian’s Song,” “Duel,” “Sybill,” etc. But they were also about the last vestige of Westerns (“Alias Smith and Jones,” “The Over The Hill Gang” and the like). Most of all, I remember the theme music for the ABC Tuesday Night at the Movies; I heard it the other day and nearly teared up (sorta).

Those movies were also resurrection vehicles for just-past-teen-idol actors and just-a-little-old actors. All the Kim Darby vehicles? Post-”Flying Nun” Sally Field roles (once as a teen runaway going to Woodstock)?

I’ll take made-for-TV movies over this reality dreck any day of the week.

By: MLM

MLM — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 16:10:32 +0000

We used to call NBC’s “The Sunday Night Depression Movies” what a way to end a weekend.

By: harold

harold — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 15:13:00 +0000

Oh man! I remember way too many of these and can tell you way too much about most of them. Crowhaven Farm is the one that first springs to mind when I think of this genre. Sarring Hope Lange (right after The Ghost and Mrs Muir was mercifully cancelled) and Paul Burke (after 12 O’clock High was cancelled). It was a typical “young couple leave the city for the country only to find sinister supernatural forces afoot” plot. John Carradine was also in it and was even creepier than usual.