Terror on Highway 91 (1989) TV Movie

In this police drama, a rookie cop finds his idealism nearly destroyed when he discovers that most of the officers in his new precinct are corrupt. This is based on a true story. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi



Terror on Highway 91 (1989)TV Movie
Cast: Bonnie Johnson, Brad Dourif, Chuck Bibby, George Dzundza, Lara Flynn Boyle, Michael Burgess, Richard Brooks, Rick Schroder

To My Daughter with Love (1994) TV Movie

TV REVIEWS : 'To My Daughter' Is Rigorously Candid
January 24, 1994|RAY LOYND

"To My Daughter with Love," starring Rick Schroder as a newly widowed dad, is pretty unblinking in its depiction of the rigors of single parenthood (tonight, Channel 4, 9 p.m.).

It's also unusually lachrymose and downbeat for a movie presented under the banner of Disney Family Classics. Sure, it's predictably heartwarming at the fade-out, but the rest of the story is too rigorously candid to be cheerful. Sentimentality takes a holiday in a script (by Michael de Guzman) that almost feels autobiographical.

Schroder, now in his early 20s and no longer Rick-y, is still boyish enough to mirror a husband and father who's barely out of boyhood himself when his life takes a tragic turn. His almost-perfect wife (Megan Gallivan) suddenly dies, leaving him classically ill-prepared to cope with a young daughter in primary school grappling with great adjustments of her own.

Schroder's character, a construction worker with few prospects who likes to go bowling with the boys, is in over his head merely making his daughter's peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches or arriving for appointments on time.

But his major struggle is the girl's over-solicitous grandparents ("Dallas's " Linda Gray and Lawrence Pressman) who live in a big cozy house and weave an agenda to bring up the little girl themselves.

The girl (Ashley Malinger) is wisely directed by Kevin Hooks to be not so much cute and sweet as a real troubled little girl painfully missing her mom and quick to hurt everybody around her.

Lending dimension is Gray's elitist grandmother, a snobbish figure chillingly rendered, and Khandi Alexander as another single parent who befriends the fast-maturing Schroder character without, refreshingly, becoming a romantic interest. It's rare enough in movies to find an eligible, not to mention attractively interracial couple who are happy just being platonic buddies.

Choosing not to be saccharine, the movie opts to be tougher than expected.

To My Daughter with Love (1994) TV Movie

Cast: Ashley Malinger, Eric Hull, Joseph Burke, Khandi Alexander, Lawrence Pressman, Linda Gray, Nealla Gordon, Rick Schroder

1st Annual TV Guide Awards (1999) (TV)

Hosted jointly by Christina Applegate and French Stewart with some able assists from a lofty group of presenters including (but weirdly absent from the imdb cast listing) the enigmatic Lisa Nicole Carson.


1st Annual TV Guide Awards (1999) (TV)
Cast: Christina Applegate, Tim Allen, Lara Flynn Boyle, Drew Carey, Shannen Doherty, David Duchovny, David James Elliott, Calista Flockhart, Faith Ford, Dennis Franz, Kelsey Grammer, David Hyde Pierce, Dylan McDermott, Debra Messing, Patricia Richardson, Ricky Schroder, Jane Seymour, French Stewart

Stranger Within, The (1990) TV Movie

Rick Schroder has, before our eyes, grown into a skillful, intriguing actor. This former child star used his doughy baby face to portray a naive cowpoke in "Lonesome Dove", and, earlier this year, he was convincing as the brave oldest brother in a family of orphans in "Too Young the Hero". Now, in "The Stranger Within", Schroder uses his wide-eyed innocence to become a scary psycho. He plays a teenager who shows up on the doorstep of Kate Jackson ("Charlie's Angels, Baby Boom"), claiming to be her son. Sixteen years earlier, as we see in a flashback, Jackson's baby boy was snatched in a supermarket while her head was turned. Now she has to figure out whether Schroder is telling the truth. And pretty quickly, she hopes to heaven he isn't, because this kid is given to insanely jealous rages and worse: During one of Schroder's fits, Jackson's boyfriend (Chris Sarandon) meets his end in the grisliest ice-fishing scene you've ever seen.

Eventually, Schroder begins menacing Jackson as well, but by then the movie has become hokey and overwrought. Still, director Tom Holland proved with 1989's "Child's Play" that he knew how to make an unsettling horror film. With "The Stranger Within", he proves he can cut back on the gore and still make you jump. B
Reviewed by Ken Tucker | Nov 23, 1990

The Stranger Within (1990) TV Movie

Cast: Rick Schroder, Kate Jackson, Chris Sarandon, Clark Sandford, Peter Breitmayer

Too Young the Hero (1988) TV Movie

The true story of Calvin Graham who at the age of twelve succeeded in joining the navy during World War II. Good story with adequate historical accuracy.

Too Young the Hero (1988)TV Movie

Cast: Carl Mueller, David Frisinger, David Gianopoulos, James Eric, Kevin Draine, Markus Flanagan, Mary-Louise Parker, Mert Hatfield, Penny Hayes, Randell Haynes, Rick Schroder