From Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License ===== The story centers on Macario, a poor indigenous woodcutter, during Colonial Mexico, on the eve of the Day of the Dead, who lives embittered for being so poor and hungry. His economic situation keeps him and his family at the edge of starvation. After he sees a procession of roast turkeys, his dream is to eat a whole roast turkey just by himself. He announces in front of his wife and children that he will not eat until his dream comes true. His worried wife steals a turkey and gives it to Macario before he heads to the mountains to work. However, just as Macario prepares to eat the turkey, three men appear to him. The first one is the Devil in the guise of a fine gentleman, who tempts Macario in order to get a piece of the turkey. The second one is God in the guise of an old man. Macario refuses to share the turkey with either, since he believes that they both have the means necessary to get themselves what they want. When a third figure —a peasant like himself— appears to him, he gladly shares the turkey with the man. The third man is none other than Death itself. Death is unsure why Macario has shared his turkey with him and not with the Devil and God. Macario responds, "Whenever you appear, there is no time for anything else." Macario hoped to forestall what he assumed to be his imminent death by gaining the time it would take for him and Death to eat. Death is amused and as a compensation, names Macario his "friend" and gives him miraculous water that will heal any disease. If Death appears at the feet of the sick person, they can be healed with the water - but if Death appears by the person's head he or she is condemned to die. This "friendship" lasts for years, but they never speak to each other, but merely stare. Death hints that Macario will meet him later that day. Macario returns home to find his son cold from falling into the well. Macario tries the water on his son and eventually becomes known as a miraculous healer, creating such commotion that the church itself will accuse him of heresy, and even the Viceroy will ask for his services, to cure his son. He is promised freedom if he can save the boy, or to be burned at the stake otherwise. Unfortunately for Macario, Death "has to take the child," so Macario, in despair, begs and tries to escape, only to enter Death's cavern (filmed in the Cacahuamilpa caverns) and is reprimanded for turning his "gift" into merchandise. Death shows him the candles that the cavern is filled with, thousands of candles all representing a person's life. The making of the wax and length of the candle all factor into the lifespan of a given person. Death then snuffs out the candle of the Viceroy's son before Macario's eyes. When Macario sees how short his candle is, he begs Death to save it but Death refuses. In desperation, Macario snatches up his candle and runs out of the cavern, not heeding the shouts of Death behind him. The last scenes begin at twilight on the day that Macario shared the turkey with Death. He has not come home, and his wife and some villagers are looking for Macario out in the woods only to find him peacefully dead, next to a turkey divided in halves: one of which is eaten, the other being intact, as if he died not fulfilling his dream of eating a complete turkey for himself. ===== The movie begins with Kadhir (Ravi Krishna) on his way to work. People stare at him and laugh behind his back as he travels to his office. He appears distracted throughout the day and even instructs his assistant to postpone an important meeting with a big client. He then waits for someone at Marina Beach with a bouquet of flowers. His best friend, Lakshmi (Suman Shetty) sees him and asks him whom he is waiting for. Kadhir explains he is waiting to meet his girlfriend, Anita (Sonia Agarwal) for their date. In flashbacks, we are shown how Kadhir first met Anita. Kadhir belongs to a lower middle class family, living with his parents and younger sister in Rainbow Colony in Chennai. He is perceived as a good for nothing person as he skips classes, fails in exams, and gets involved in fights. Kadhir believes that his father (Vijayan) hates him and often quarrels with him, even threatening to leave the house, only to be persuaded not to do so by his mother (Sudha). Kadhir's life changes when a once well lived family moves into the same colony due to loss in business. Kadhir is attracted to the daughter of his new neighbour, Anita. Although he tries to woo her, Anita treats him with disdain. One day, Kadhir confesses to Anita that he loves her. He tells her that having always been ridiculed, he found respite in the fact that she at least bothered to look at him. He promises to wipe her thoughts out of his mind, as he is not right for her. Despite himself, Kadhir continues pursuing her. Anita realizes that Kadhir is not such a useless fellow when Lakshmi tells her that he has seen Kadhir dismantle and assemble a motorcycle within minutes each time they steal a bike to get drunk. Anita takes Kadhir to a Hero Honda dealer and asks them to give him a job. He is promised a job if he can assemble a bike. Initially, the lethargic Kadhir is disinterested and gives up the task. Anita takes him to the washroom and slaps him before revealing that she has fallen in love with him. She then tells him that they can only be together if he gets a proper job and gets his life straightened out. Kadhir then demonstrates his skill in motorcycle assembly, securing a good job with the dealer. Later that evening, Kadhir plans a treat for his friends. However, Anita confronts him and makes him break the good news to his parents first to get their blessings. However, Kadhir's father berates him as usual for getting a job instead of completing college. Then later at night, Kadhir overhears his father telling his mother how proud he is of their son since getting a job at such a prestigious company, which is not easy. The only reason the father did not openly praise Kadhir is because he feared his son might misjudge him for giving him respect, only now that he is earning money for their household. Only then does Kadhir realize his father's love for him and weeps in joy. The intimacy between Kadhir and Anita is discovered by her mother and she refuses to allow them to continue dating even as Kadhir's father tries to persuade her otherwise. Anita's family is heavily indebted to another Northern Indian family that has been supporting them since Anita's father suffered losses in his business. Anita's parents want Anita to marry the son of the family that has helped them. Using her friend's marriage as a ruse and with unwitting help of her friend's aunt Manorama, Anita escapes her home and travels with Kadhir to a tourist place near Thekkady in Kerala and they end up in a hotel room. Anita reveals that she has made the biggest decision of her life by deciding to make love to him, as he should not regret falling in love with her when she marries the man her parents chose. Though stunned by her decision, Kadhir goes with her plan and the two consummate their love. The next morning Kadhir and Anita argue when Kadhir says he wants Anita to live with him, while Anita accuses him of being attracted to her only because of the sex. They continue arguing as they exit the hotel. While crossing the road, Anita is knocked down by a truck as a helpless Kadhir watches. Kadhir is also hit by a speeding vehicle. Anita dies gruesomely on the spot and Kadhir is injured. Kadhir is heavily shocked to find the mere remains of Anita in Hospital mortuary. Though the Police want to file a murder case on Kadhir, Anita's mother refuses to name Kadhir as a murderer. Kadhir tells the Police that Anita never accepted his love, and her death was really an accident. This way, Kadhir saves Anita's dignity and her mother blesses him as she leaves. After sadly returning to Chennai, Kadhir tries to commit suicide only to be helped by a group of nuns. Kadhir then hallucinates about Anita's spirit coming to him and advising him to live life to the fullest. Back in present day, it is revealed that Kadhir has become very successful person in his life but has remained mentally damaged since Anita's death. He still believes that she is alive and always imagines talking to her. The film ends with Kadhir talking to himself at the beach, thinking that he is talking to Anita. ===== Robert Kraft (Boone) is the newly appointed chairman of a committee that oversees a large cemetery. The cemetery caretaker, Andy MacKee (Bikel), keeps a map in the cemetery office displaying the grounds and each gravesite. Filled graves are marked by black pins and unoccupied but sold graves are marked with white pins. New to the position and unobservant, Kraft accidentally places a pair of black pins where they don't belong, only to discover later that the young couple who had bought the grave sites in question died in an automobile accident soon afterwards. He believes that he marked them for death. Hoping it will give him peace of mind, Robert replaces a random white pin with a black pin. When that person dies later in the week, however, he becomes increasingly convinced that either he or the map wield some kind of dark power. Repeated experiments, undertaken upon the insistence of skeptical friends and co-workers, yield the same result. Kraft slips into deep guilt and depression and believes he is cursed. The police, who are initially skeptical, eventually begin to take notice and, in the hopes that it will reveal the cause of the deaths, ask Robert to place a black pin on the grave of a person who is known to be in France. Although he does so, Robert continues his slide into despair. That same night, he decides that if black pins give him the power of death, white pins might give him the power of life. He replaces all of the recently placed black pins with white pins. When he goes to the associated grave sites later that night, he discovers that all are open, with the bodies gone. Upon returning to the cemetery office, Robert receives a call informing him of the death of the man in France. As he hangs up the phone, the cemetery caretaker comes up behind him, covered in dirt. He reveals that he has been killing all of the marked people as revenge for being forced to retire. However, when Robert informs him of the death of the man in France, the caretaker, who couldn't have killed the man, begins to lose his mind, and collapses. When the police arrive, they find the caretaker dead and tell Robert that the news of the man's death was all a ruse to flush out the cemetery caretaker. ===== Margaret Mottershead (Victoria Wood) works as a cook at a motorway service station. She joins her colleagues on a works outing to London to see a recording of Magic Moments, a Surprise, Surprise-style television series. Pat Bedford (Julie Walters), the glamorous British star of an American soap, returns to the UK to promote her book on the show, unaware that the producers have planned to make her part of one of the surprises. During the show, Margaret is shocked to be invited onto the stage by the host Maeve (Anne Reid) and asked about her sister Patricia, whom she has not seen for 27 years. Backstage, Pat freezes in a panic when she hears the name "Patricia Theresa Mary Mottershead" and is invited on-stage to meet her long-lost sister, Margaret. Attempting to remain professional, Pat embraces Margaret and feigns happiness. Afterwards, she tries to prevent the programme being broadcast, only to discover that it was live on air. The vain, beautiful Pat rejects Margaret, ashamed of her sister and fearing further damaging revelations about her past. Margaret prepares to leave, but the coach has left without her. Unaware of Pat's true feelings, her assistant Claire (Celia Imrie), has arranged for Margaret to stay with Pat at her luxury hotel. In the morning, a Magic Moments film crew arrives to follow the pair getting to know each other, and Pat resigns herself to staged bonding for the cameras. Margaret phones her boyfriend Jim (Duncan Preston) to let him know where she is, but his disapproving mother (Dame Thora Hird) does not pass on the message. Pat tries unsuccessfully to pay off an angry Margaret, who tells Pat she doesn't want anything from her. Once the newspaper articles come out Pat realizes that they have viciously misquoted her and fears for her job. She stays though, when tabloid journalist Stella (Deborah Grant), desperate for dirt on Pat, discovers a woman she thinks is Pat's mother Vera in a nursing home in Pat's home town. Pat and Margaret talk about how horrible their mother was and Margaret agrees to help Pat. The two head North, hoping to stop Vera talking to the press. In the car, Margaret shares a bit of her life. She mentions that she was once married and, soon after losing her husband, had a miscarriage. Meanwhile, Stella digs up dirt on Pat by tracking down her old neighbours, discovering in the process that Pat had a child at the age of fifteen. She also hears insinuations that Vera had been a prostitute. The sisters find that the "Vera" in the nursing home (Joane Hall) is not their mother and continue on. Jim, believing Margaret has dumped him, has gone to London to find her. He meets Claire, and the two follow Pat and Margaret north. Stella, however, has managed to track Vera down, and after seeing photographs of her realizes she is linked to another story - a timeshare scandal. While hiding from Stella at a petrol station in the North, the glamorous Pat is accidentally hosed down with water by a power hose, leaving her soaking wet. This forces her to change out of her expensive clothes and expensive leather jacket. Having left all her luggage and credit cards and identification with Claire, Pat has to borrow a cheap tracksuit from Margaret. To add to her humiliation, Pat is unable to book into a hotel as, again, she has left all her credit cards and identification with Claire. Margaret asks her boss Bella (Lynda Rooke) to give Pat a bed for the night, but she is furious with Margaret over false claims in a newspaper article that Margaret is ditching her job and moving to L.A.. Margaret takes Pat to her bedsit where the two argue about the different paths their lives have taken. Margaret reveals that Vera was sent to prison after Pat left and she ended up being fostered around, while Pat reveals that she was thrown out because she became pregnant. Jim arrives with Pat's bag, but when he proves more worried about leaving his mother alone than about meeting Pat, an irritated Margaret ends their relationship. Pat takes Margaret to the Swiss Cottage Café where she worked as a teenager, which is still owned by her old boss, now planning to retire. Claire joins them for dinner where she gives Pat "a note from a fan", actually given to Jim by Stella. Pat is shocked to find the note is from Vera, asking to meet. Pat and Margaret are stunned to find their mother (Shirley Stelfox) has won the pools and has a large house. Vera assumes Margaret wants money; Pat angrily tells Vera she owes them, but Vera reminds Pat that there was nothing to stop her tracking Margaret down and giving her a better life, forcing Pat to admit she is hard and selfish like her mother. Vera claims she's what drove Pat to make a success of her life, and reveals she has to sell the house because of the timeshare scandal; at this point Stella appears with her photographer and Pat realizes she has been set up. Stella reveals Vera has given her an exclusive and that she knows about the baby, threatening to trace Pat's child. However, Pat turns the tables by revealing he has already traced her many years before and has no interest in being involved with the media. Margaret angrily tells Stella that Pat should be applauded for beating the odds rather than derided in the press; Stella offers to make the story a sympathetic "rags to riches" tale if all three women give her an exclusive. Margaret and Jim make up their quarrel when he decides to leave his mother and move in with Margaret. At the airport, Pat fails to persuade Margaret to move to the United States with her, but, in a surprise move, takes Vera instead, telling her "they're very big at the moment, celebrities' mums", and giving Stella a happy ending for her story. Pat leaves Margaret a goodbye letter which has a set of keys with it; the final scene shows Margaret and Jim happily clearing up at the Swiss Cottage Café, which Pat has bought for her sister. ===== Dr. Joyce Reardon, an unorthodox university psychology professor, leads a team of psychics to the massive and antiquated Seattle mansion known as Rose Red in an attempt to record data which would constitute scientific proof of paranormal phenomena. The mansion is publicly thought to be haunted, as at least 23 people have either disappeared or died there and the interior of the house appears to change or increase in size, yet only from the inside. Reardon's team awakens the evil spirit possessing the house, leading to several deaths and the revelation of the mansion's deadly secrets. ===== During the filming of a TV commercial for a "Meat for Go" campaign set in London's Smithfield Market, stuntman Steve (Dave Clark), disillusioned by the inanity of his job, absconds in an E-type Jaguar (one of the props) with a young actress/model, Dinah (Barbara Ferris). After a visit to Oasis Swimming Pools, an open-air swimming pool in central London, and a memorable scene in and around the Great Conservatory on the grounds of Syon House, they make their way across a wintry southern England toward Burgh Island, off the coast of Devon. Dinah is contemplating buying the island, presumably to escape the pressures of her celebrity as the "Butcher Girl" on the back of the TV meat advertising campaign. This act of rebellion is cynically exploited by the advertising executive behind the campaign, Leon Zissell (David de Keyser), who dispatches two of his henchmen to pursue the fleeing couple. On their journey, Steve and Dinah first encounter a group of proto-hippies squatting in MOD- owned buildings on Salisbury Plain (some of this sequence was shot in the evacuated village of Imber) and then an eccentric middle-aged married couple (Yootha Joyce and Robin Bailey) in the opulent surroundings of the Royal Crescent in Bath, Somerset. Steve also plans to visit his boyhood hero, Louie (David Lodge), whose youth club in London's East End he attended, and who has since relocated to Devon. Having fled the police and Zissell's henchmen after a fancy-dress party in the Roman Baths at Bath, Steve and Dinah (with the rest of Steve's gang and the police in pursuit) make their way toward Devon. Louie recognises Dinah instantly because of her TV celebrity, but fails to recognise Steve and misremembers his name, even after being introduced. Dinah's island also proves to be disappointing; at low tide, it is reachable from the mainland, and Zissell, who is besotted with Dinah, has already arrived. ===== The story describes the use of prisoners in the POW camp to build the bridge and how a separate team of experts from 'Force 316' based in Calcutta were sent to sabotage the bridge. Lt. Colonel Nicholson marches his men into Prisoner of War Camp 16, commanded by Colonel Saito. Saito announces that the prisoners will be required to work on construction of a bridge over the River Kwai so that the railroad connection between Bangkok and Rangoon can be completed. However, Saito also demands that all men, including officers, will do manual labor. In response to this, Nicholson informs Saito that, under the Hague Conventions (1899 and 1907), officers cannot be required to do hard work. Saito reiterates his demand and Nicholson remains adamant in his refusal to submit his officers to manual labor. Because of Nicholson's unwillingness to back down, he and his officers are placed in the "ovens"--small, iron boxes sitting in the heat of day. Eventually, Nicholson's stubbornness forces Saito to relent. Construction of the bridge serves as a symbol of the preservation of professionalism and personal integrity to one prisoner, Colonel Nicholson, a proud perfectionist. Pitted against Colonel Saito, the warden of the Japanese POW camp, Nicholson will nevertheless, out of a distorted sense of duty, aid his enemy. While on the outside, as the Allies race to destroy the bridge, Nicholson must decide which to sacrifice: his patriotism or his pride. Boulle's portrayal of the British officers often verged on the satirical, with, for example, Colonel Nicholson being portrayed as military "snob". Boulle also examines friendship between individual soldiers, both among captors and captives. The victorious Japanese soldiers cooperate with their prisoners through the construction of the bridge. ===== The film is narrated by the adult Jean Louise "Scout" Finch. Young Scout and her pre-teen older brother Jem live in the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the early 1930s. Despite the family's modest means, the children enjoy a happy childhood, cared for by their widowed father, Atticus Finch, and the family's black housekeeper, Calpurnia. During the summer, Jem, Scout, and their friend Dill play games and often search for Arthur "Boo" Radley, an odd, reclusive neighbor who lives with his father Nathan. The children have never seen Boo, who rarely leaves the house. On different occasions, Jem has found small objects left inside a tree knothole on the Radley property. These include a broken pocket watch, an old spelling bee medal, a pocket knife, and two carved soap dolls resembling Jem and Scout. Atticus, a lawyer, strongly believes all people deserve fair treatment, in turning the other cheek and to defend what you believe. Many of Atticus' clients are poor farmers who pay for his legal services in trade, often leaving him fresh produce, firewood, and so on. Atticus' work as a lawyer often exposes Scout and Jem to the town's racism, aggravated by poverty. As a result, the children mature more quickly. Atticus is appointed to defend Tom Robinson, a black man accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell. Atticus accepts the case, heightening tension in the town and causing Jem and Scout to experience schoolyard taunts. One evening before the trial, as Atticus sits in front of the local jail to safeguard Robinson, a lynch mob arrives. Scout, Jem, and Dill unexpectedly interrupt the confrontation. Scout, unaware of the mob's purpose, recognizes Mr. Cunningham and asks him to say hello to his son Walter, her classmate. Cunningham becomes embarrassed, and the mob disperses. At the trial, it is alleged that Tom entered the Ewell property at Mayella's request to chop up a chifforobe and that Mayella showed signs of having been beaten around that time. Among Atticus' chief defensive arguments is that Tom's left arm is disabled, yet the supposed rapist would have had to mostly assault Mayella with his left hand before raping her. Atticus noted that Mayella's father, Bob Ewell, is left-handed, implying that he beat Mayella because he caught her seducing a young black man (Robinson). Atticus also states that Mayella was never examined by a doctor after the supposed assault. Taking the stand, Tom denies he attacked Mayella but states that she kissed him against his will. He testifies that he had previously assisted Mayella with various chores at her request because he "felt sorry for her" – words that incite a swift, negative reaction from the prosecutor. In his closing argument, Atticus asks the all-white male jury to cast aside their prejudices and focus on Tom's obvious innocence. However, Tom is found guilty. As Atticus exits the courtroom, the black spectators in the balcony rise to show their respect and appreciation. When Atticus arrives home, Sheriff Tate informs him that Tom was killed during his transfer to prison, apparently while attempting to escape. Atticus, accompanied by Jem, goes to the Robinson home to relay news of Tom's death. Bob Ewell appears and spits in Atticus' face. Autumn arrives, and Scout and Jem attend an evening school pageant in which Scout portrays a ham. After the pageant, Scout is unable to find her dress and shoes, forcing her to walk home with Jem while wearing the large, hard-shelled costume. While cutting through the woods, Scout and Jem are attacked. Scout's cumbersome costume protects her but restricts her vision. The attacker knocks Jem unconscious but is himself attacked (and killed) by a second man unseen by Scout. Scout escapes her costume and sees the second man carrying Jem towards their house. Scout follows them and runs into the arms of a frantic Atticus. Still unconscious, Jem has his broken arm treated by Doc Reynolds. Scout tells Sheriff Tate and her father what happened, then notices a strange man behind Jem's bedroom door. Atticus introduces Scout to Arthur Radley, whom she knows as Boo. It was Boo who rescued Jem and Scout, overpowering Bob Ewell and carrying Jem home. The sheriff reports that Ewell, apparently seeking revenge for Atticus humiliating him in court, is dead at the scene of the attack. Atticus mistakenly assumes Jem killed Ewell in self-defense, but Sheriff Tate realizes the truth – Boo killed Ewell defending the children. His official report will state that Ewell died falling on his knife. He refuses to drag the painfully shy, introverted Boo into the spotlight for his heroism, insisting it would be a sin. As Scout escorts Boo home, she draws a startlingly precocious analogy: comparing the unwelcome public attention that would have been heaped on Boo, with the killing of a mockingbird that does nothing but sing. ===== Character map of Doctor Zhivago The plot of Doctor Zhivago is long and intricate. It can be difficult to follow for two reasons. First, Pasternak employs many characters, who interact with each other throughout the book in unpredictable ways. Secondly, he frequently introduces a character by one of his/her three names, then subsequently refers to that character by another of the three names or a nickname, without expressly stating that he is referring to the same character. ===== The film concerns a race of subterranean reptile-men (dubbed "slime people", due to their slime- covered skin) who create a wall of "solidified fog" around Los Angeles using a strange organic-looking machine and proceed to invade the city after they are driven out of their subterranean homes by underground atomic tests. A pilot (portrayed by Hutton) lands in Los Angeles after some flight difficulties and finds the city almost deserted. He later encounters other survivors, including a Marine separated from his unit, and a scientist and his two daughters, and the group try their best to halt the further invasion of the slime people who are attempting to use the fog to not only isolate the city but also to lower the surface temperature enough to let them function at all hours of the day. Eventually, near the end of the film, the survivors find that while the slime people are otherwise immune to conventional weapons due to their body's ability to quickly seal wounds, the creatures can be killed with their own spear weapons as they are hollow and prevent the wounds they inflict from closing properly. They also realize the reason the plane from the beginning of the film was able to land was due to the chemical making the fog reacting with the salt from the ocean water thus preventing the section near the sea from solidifying. With these facts in mind, the survivors then attempt to escape the city using several buckets of a saltwater solution to try and make a hole through the fog wall, however, when this fails due to them not having enough of the solution the group instead opts to destroy the machine generating the fog. With the machine destroyed, the fog quickly disperses allowing the military to enter the city and causing the slime people to die off from the rapid rise in temperature. ===== Hanemura is the head of a yakuza clan enjoying his last taste of freedom before starting a prison sentence. He tells the members of his 'family' to disband the clan and go straight. However, his clan 'brother' believes the clan can be saved if they arrange for James Brown to give Hanemura a private performance before he enters prison. The gang mistakenly kidnaps an American James Brown impersonator, who is himself being hunted by aides of the Japanese Prime Minister, who want to recover incriminating materials that he unwittingly brought into the country. Meanwhile, Hanemura is using his last day of freedom to track down the daughter he hasn't seen for 25 years. These plots get entangled when it emerges that his daughter runs the talent agency that had brought the James Brown impersonator to Japan in the first place. After many complications, father and daughter are reunited, Hanemura saves his daughter's company by performing a James Brown routine and his prison sentence is quashed. ===== Two teenage gangs struggle for control on the Upper West Side in New York City in the 1950s. The Jets, a white gang led by Riff, brawl with the Sharks, a group of Puerto Ricans led by Bernardo. Lieutenant Schrank and Officer Krupke arrive and break it up. The Jets decide to challenge the Sharks to a rumble after an upcoming dance. Riff wants his best friend Tony, co- founder of the Jets who left the gang, to fight at the rumble. Riff invites Tony to the dance, but Tony tells Riff that he senses something important is coming, which Riff suggests could happen at the dance. After more persuasion, Tony agrees to go. Bernardo's younger sister, Maria, tells her best friend and Bernardo's girlfriend, Anita, how excited she is about the dance. At the dance, the gangs and their girls refuse to intermingle. Tony arrives; he and Maria fall in love, but Bernardo angrily demands that Tony stay away from her. Riff proposes a meeting with Bernardo at Doc's drug store at midnight to settle the rules for the rumble. Maria is sent home; Anita argues that Bernardo is overprotective of Maria, and they compare the advantages of Puerto Rico and the United States. Tony sneaks onto Maria's fire escape, where they reaffirm their love. Krupke, who suspects the Jets are planning something, visits them and warns them not to cause trouble. The Sharks arrive, and the gangs agree to have the showdown the following evening under the highway, with a one-on-one fistfight. When Schrank arrives, the gangs feign friendship. Schrank orders the Sharks out and unsuccessfully tries to discover information about the fight. The next day at the bridal shop where they work, Anita accidentally tells Maria about the rumble. Tony arrives to see Maria. Anita, shocked, warns them about the consequences if Bernardo learns of their relationship. Maria makes Tony promise to prevent the rumble. Tony and Maria fantasize about their wedding. The gangs approach the area under the highway. Tony arrives to stop the fight, but Bernardo antagonizes him. Unwilling to watch Tony be humiliated, Riff initiates a knife fight. Tony tries to intervene, which leads to Bernardo stabbing and killing Riff. Tony then kills Bernardo with Riff's knife, and a melee ensues. Police sirens blare, and everyone flees, leaving behind the dead bodies. Maria waits for Tony on the rooftop of her apartment building; her fiancé Chino arrives and tells her what happened. When Tony arrives, he asks for her forgiveness before he turns himself in to the police. Maria confirms her love for him and asks Tony to stay with her. The Jets and their new leader, Ice, reassemble outside a garage and focus on reacting to the police. Anybodys arrives and warns them that Chino is now after Tony with a gun. Ice sends the Jets to warn Tony. A grieving Anita enters the apartment while Tony and Maria are in the bedroom. The lovers arrange to meet at Doc's, where they will pick up getaway money to elope. Anita spots Tony leaving through the window and chides Maria for the relationship with Bernardo's killer, but Maria convinces her to help them elope. Schrank arrives and questions Maria about the rumble. Maria sends Anita to tell Tony that Maria is detained from meeting him. When Anita reaches Doc's, the Jets harass her until Doc intervenes. Anita angrily says that Chino has killed Maria. Doc banishes the Jets, gives Tony his getaway money in the basement and delivers Anita's message. Tony, distraught, runs into the streets, shouting for Chino, intending to kill him. In the playground next to Doc's, Tony spots Maria and they run toward each other, only for Chino to shoot Tony. The gangs arrive to find Maria holding Tony, who dies in her arms. Maria stops the gangs from fighting, takes the gun from Chino and threatens to shoot everyone, blaming their hate for the deaths. Schrank, Krupke and Doc arrive, and the gangs form a funeral procession, with Maria following. The police arrest Chino and lead him away. ===== Eric is an accident- prone childlike man who lives with his twin sister Hattie in a terraced house, 24 Sebastopol Terrace, in East Acton. Both are unmarried. Their busybody neighbour Charles Brown often interferes, until he emigrates to Australia. The local policeman, who makes occasional appearances, is Corky Turnbull. ===== The novel is set in the mid-19th century, but flashbacks to the history of the house, which was built in the late 17th century, are set in other periods. The house of the title is a gloomy New England mansion, haunted since its construction by fraudulent dealings, accusations of witchcraft, and sudden death. The current resident, the dignified but desperately poor Hepzibah Pyncheon, opens a shop in a side room to support her brother Clifford, who has completed a thirty-year sentence for murder. She refuses all assistance from her wealthy but unpleasant cousin, Judge Jaffrey Pyncheon. A distant relative, the lively and pretty young Phoebe arrives and quickly becomes invaluable, charming customers and rousing Clifford from depression. A delicate romance grows between Phoebe and the mysterious attic lodger Holgrave, who is writing a history of the Pyncheon family. The house was built on ground wrongfully seized from its rightful owner, Matthew Maule, by Colonel Pyncheon, the founder of the Massachusetts branch of the family. Maule was accused of practicing witchcraft and was executed. According to legend, at his death Maule laid a curse upon the Pyncheon family. During the housewarming festivities, Colonel Pyncheon was found dead in his armchair; whether he actually died from the curse or from a congenital disease is unclear. His portrait remains in the house as a symbol of its dark past and the weight of the curse upon the spirit of its inhabitants. Phoebe arranges to visit her country home, but plans to return soon. Clifford, depressed by his isolation from humanity and his lost youth spent in prison, stands at a large arched window above the stairs and has a sudden urge to jump. The departure of Phoebe, the focus of his attention, leaves him bed-ridden. Judge Pyncheon arrives at the house hoping to find information about land in Maine, rumored to belong to the family. He threatens Clifford with an insanity hearing unless he reveals details about the land or the location of the missing deed. Clifford is unable to comply. Before Clifford can be brought before the Judge (which would destroy Clifford's fragile psyche), the Judge mysteriously dies while sitting in Colonel Pyncheon's chair. Hepzibah and Clifford flee by train. The next day, Phoebe returns and finds that Holgrave has discovered the Judge's body. The townsfolk begin to gossip about Hepzibah and Clifford's sudden disappearance. Phoebe is relieved when Hepzibah and Clifford return, having recovered their wits. New evidence in the crime that sent Clifford to prison proves his innocence. He was framed for the death of his uncle by Jaffrey (later Judge) Pyncheon, who was even then looking for the missing deed. Holgrave is revealed as Maule's descendant, but he bears no ill will toward the remaining Pyncheons. The missing deed is discovered behind the old Colonel's portrait, but the paper is worthless: the land is already settled by others. The characters abandon the old house and start a new life in the countryside, free from the burdens of the past. ===== The novel tells the story of an astronaut, Hal Bregg, who returns to Earth after a 127-year mission to Fomalhaut.Arcturus in the English translation Due to time dilation, the mission has lasted only 10 years for him, but on Earth he faces culture shock, as he finds the society transformed into a utopia, free of wars or violence, or even accidents. For Hal, however, this new world is too comfortable, too safe. Earth is no longer home, it is "another, alien planet". Humans themselves have changed, having undergone a procedure called betrization, designed to neutralize all aggressive impulses. Its side effect is an extreme aversion to risk.Jerzy Jarzębski, "Stanislaw Lem, Rationalist and Visionary", Science Fiction Studies, Vol. 4, part 2, No. 12, July 1977 Hal mistrusts this approach, seeing it as wrong. In particular, for an astronaut, he cannot agree with the opinion that space travel and space exploration are nothing but a youthful and dangerous adventurism. For Hal, this means that "...they have killed the man in man". He and the other returning astronauts are viewed with mistrust, seen as "resuscitated Neanderthals". They are alienated, outcasts, and subject to social pressure to undertake the betrization. The other choice is to leave Earth again and hope that once they come back, in several centuries, Earth's society is more familiar again. In time, Hal marries a local girl, Eri, and comes to see the world her way, even disapproving of his youth's love, space expeditions. When he learns that members of his former crew are planning a mission to Sagittarius, he seems not to care, content to leave the stars to others. Hal still remembers his past, recalls the moon Kereneia, a magnificent canyon "made of red and pink gold, almost completely transparent...through it you can see all the strata, geological folds, anticlines and synclines...all this is weightless, floating and seeming to smile at you". Yet he trades the chance to experience such sights and adventures for love and a peaceful, quiet life. ===== Love Mode itself is a compilation of several stories (most often short) involving various degrees of gay couples. Every one of these couples is linked to an establishment known as the Blue Boy. The Blue Boy is a gay host club where anyone wielding enough money can hire out a very attractive man either to pretty up a party or for sex. Most of the couples consist of either hosts/ex- hosts, clients/ex-clients, or both. Though all of the couples get a considerable amount of spotlight, without a doubt, the main focus of the story is the once dysfunctional Aoe family and their lovers. Aoe Reiji himself owns the Blue Boy and is the only main character to appear in all eleven volumes. ===== Marcos (Marcos Hernández) is a working class man in Mexico, employed by "the general." Marcos learns that the baby that he and his wife kidnapped for ransom had accidentally died. The remainder of the film follows a despondent Marcos, seemingly haunted by the moral and/or legal implications of his actions. Marcos stands next to his wife Berta (Berta Ruiz) at the subway as she sells clocks and sweets at a stand. He travels to the airport to meet the "general's" upper-middle class daughter, Ana (Anapola Mushkadiz) whom he has known since she was a child. Ana orders Marcos to take her to the "boutique" where she works in the sex trade. While driving, Marcos is very distracted, and at one point stalls the car. Ana recognizes that something is wrong, but Marcos claims he's distracted only because of his wife's supposed ill health. Ana invites Marcos into the "boutique" so that he can have sex with one of her "friends." Marcos is apparently not aroused by the "friend." The friend tells Ana that Marcos would prefer her instead. Ana goes to talk to Marcos, and reminds him that they have known each other since her childhood. Marcos then reveals that he and his wife kidnapped a baby but the baby died before they could collect any ransom. Ana seems to remain composed at hearing this news. Back home, Marcos has sex with his wife, Berta. They seem united in their sorrow regarding the dead baby. Marcos tells Berta that he told Ana about the kidnapped baby, indicating that the confession brought him relief. Berta, upset, demands that he make sure that "the princess" does not tell anyone. The next day, Marcos visits Ana. She seems annoyed by his visit, but drives him to her place where they have sex. Ana advises Marcos to turn himself in to the police. Marcos, Berta, their son, and a few friends (including the mother of the dead baby, who does not know who took her child, nor that it has died) go out to the countryside. Marcos tells Berta that he is going to turn himself in. She asks him to wait until after the pilgrimage (which is in honor of the Lady of Guadalupe), an event that Marcos had earlier shown disdain for. Marcos seems to agree with his wife. Marcos' mental state seems to worsen. Instead of driving back with his party, he treks through the countryside. He reaches a peak with Christian crosses, overlooking a valley. Marcos buries his face in his hands. Marcos visits Ana at her home. He tells her that he will turn himself into the police that day. She gives him a goodbye kiss. Marcos leaves the apartment. He pees his pants, goes back to the apartment and fatally stabs Ana. The police become aware of both the attack on Ana and the death of the baby, and are in search for Marcos. Marcos seems to have joined the pilgrimage to the Basilica, at first on foot, and then on his knees. Someone places a hood over his face, but Marcos continues to hobble forward. The hood becomes increasingly stained with blood as he makes his way into the Basilica during the church service. Eventually the pilgrims are gone, and the Basilica is vacant. The police allow Berta to go in to see her husband. She touches him on the head and he collapses. ===== Forged in the Fire is an epic love story in which love prevails over all. When Will is sent to prison during the plague, Susanna has no way of knowing whether her beloved is alive or not. Will gets sent to jail with two of his friends for starting a fight in the streets. Whilst in jail both his friends are infested with the plague and Will becomes deathly ill. Both of his companions die but Will is bailed out by a man called Edmund who is extremely wealthy and a friend of Nat, who during the story is always at Will's side. When Susanna finally finds out where Will is located she travels at once to London. There she finds Will happy and healthy in Edmund's home with his eldest daughter. This is the one and only blow to their love but is soon overcome. The two get married in the sight of God at a Quaker meeting. The London fire is the next huge thing to happen. The city is destroyed bit by bit, and now that Susanna is with a child she and Will must leave. But Will refuses to leave until he has finished his work, so he sends Susanna, with friends, to make it out of the city and into a farm where she is to camp for many nights. Finally Will with Nat manage to get out of the city and they are reunited at last. Will also makes up with his father who has never much cared for Will and Susanna's love. He gives them some money and they live happily ever after. A few years later they have a son and life happily goes on. ===== Enter the tale of the Crusher Council, a group of rugged individuals known for assignments ranging from transportation to terraforming and everything in between. In the early days of space exploration the Crushers took on the job of destroying asteroids and defining space lanes. Because of their work, they were nicknamed "Crushers" which eventually became their business moniker. Despite the rough and ready nature of the Crushers' work, they subscribe to a few steadfast rules. Unethical and illegal assignments are taboo, and any Crusher accepting one is barred from the Union. Of course, this presents problems for shady clients who try to trick the Crushers into accepting misleading assignments. They know that once the Union accepts a case the Crushers are honor-bound to follow it through. Among the various worlds, the Crusher Council has a stunning reputation, and among the Crushers, the most elite team is the one led by Crusher Dan and his successor, Crusher Joe. ===== RAF Culverton, East Anglia, during the Second World War. Alec Whistler, a Spitfire pilot discovers a green crystal in the wreckage left by a bomb which destroyed the RAF base's Mess, killing his fiance... As a reward for his actions in The Three Doctors the Third Doctor has had his knowledge of the TARDIS's dematerialisation codes returned to him by the Time Lords. The Doctor has left Earth and is helping the rebels on the planet Xanthos. Meanwhile, back on Earth, the Brigadier has received a call from his old friend Wing Commander Alec Whistler. Culverton Aerodrome has closed and been purchased by the mysterious Legion International, led by the sinister Bliss. Black-shirted troops guard the base and have begun to terrorise the local residents, and people have begun to disappear. Investigating the base with the young Noah Bishop, Whistler is captured by Legion. Noah escapes, but is injured by a huge worm-like creature living in the marsh behind the aerodrome. Escaping from Xanthos, the Doctor returns to UNIT HQ, realising this is the closest thing he has to home at the moment, though clearly unwilling to acknowledge this either to himself, Jo or the Brigadier. The Brigadier sends the Doctor and Jo to Culverton to investigate. Arriving in Culverton, the Doctor and Jo are met by Whistler's housekeeper, Mrs. Toovey. While the Doctor investigates the base, Jo stays at Whistler's house, where she is attacked by a Legion trooper who is searching for the green crystal which Whistler has had since the War and which he regards as his lucky charm. Mrs. Toovey has concealed it in Whistler's restored Spitfire in a lead box, masking its energy signature from Bliss's sensors. The kidnapped villagers begin to reappear, but acting curiously, and all grinning inanely. They are all carrying the embryos of the alien race the Gaderene in their mouths and are being controlled by the embryos. The village fete is opened by Scotland Yard's Inspector Le Maitre (the Master in disguise) During the fete the remaining villagers are given embryos leaving the village a ghost town. The Master has worked with the Gaderene to allow their invasion of Earth and despite Bliss's betrayal, still aims to help the invasion as he wishes to see mankind wiped out. Threatening Noah's life, the Master extorts the crystal from the Doctor. The crystal is the ninth and final key which will allow the Gaderene to cross over from their dying world to the Earth. Meanwhile, Whistler has escaped from his captors. As the Gaderene ready their invasion force, the UNIT troops storm the airbase with the Doctor assisting in the borrowed Spitfire. The UNIT troops pin down the giant worm (Bliss's brother, whose genetic make-up was damaged in the crossing from the Gaderene homeworld) while the Doctor and the Master fight in the midst of the dimensional transference beam. The Master kills Bliss with his Tissue Compression Eliminator and is caught in the beam as it collapses, destroyed by Whistler's crashing Spitfire. The Gaderene are all destroyed and the Master seemingly destroyed with them. Whistler survives, having ejected from the plane just in time and is reunited with his friend the Brigadier. The villagers with the implanted embryos are released and the embryos all die. The Doctor walks away, head bowed, expressing regret about the destruction. ===== Like Goldratt’s book The Goal, Critical Chain is written as a novel, not like a project manager's how-to guide. This book is a story about a professor trying to attain his tenure at a university's business school. The plot is used to maintain interest in the subject and provide a real life feel to the book. It provides plenty of real- world examples. The plot of the novel is fourfold: # A professor trying to become tenured, # A business school's struggle to improve enrollment, # Teaching philosophy, # Applying the Theory of Constraints to project management The goal of the book is the last point, but Goldratt makes it clear that educational systems must change to better accommodate the quickly changing world of business. The book walks the reader through a series of steps to establish the principles for the discussion. It is written for someone with a modicum of project management background. The book starts by pointing out the problems with how time estimates are normally done on projects. It then provides a primer on the Theory of Constraints and an example of its implementation in a steel mill. With the foundation set, it proceeds to show how the Theory of Constraints can be applied to schedule generation, resources constraints and multiple projects. ===== Captive Andromache by Frederic Lord Leighton Act 1: Orestes, Greek ambassador, arrives at the court of Pyrrhus, supposedly to convince him on behalf of the Greeks to put Astyanax, the son of Andromaque and Hector, to death, for fear that he may one day avenge Troy. Actually Oreste hopes Pyrrhus will refuse, so Hermione will return to Greece with him. Pyrrhus refuses at first, then, upon being rejected by Andromaque, he threatens to turn Astyanax over to the Greeks. Act 2: Orestes speaks to Hermione, who agrees to leave with him if Pyrrhus allows it. However, Pyrrhus, heretofore uninterested in Hermione, announces to Orestes that he has decided to marry her, and that he will give him Astyanax. Act 3: Orestes is furious over having lost Hermione for good. Andromaque begs Hermione to influence Pyrrhus to spare her son, but Hermione, insanely proud, refuses her. Pyrrhus agrees to reverse his decision if Andromaque will marry him. She hesitates, unsure of what to do. Act 4: Andromaque resolves to marry Pyrrhus in order to save her son, but intends suicide as soon as the ceremony is over, so that she remains faithful to her late husband Hector. Hermione asks Orestes to avenge her scorn from Pyrrhus by killing him. Act 5: Hermione regrets asking for Pyrrhus' death. Before she can cancel her request, Orestes appears and announces that Pyrrhus is dead, though not at Orestes' hand - his Greeks became enraged when Pyrrhus recognized Astyanax as king of Troy. She thanks him with wild insults and runs off to kill herself on Pyrrhus' body. Orestes becomes crazed and has a vision of the Furies. ===== The townspeople of South Park are in a panic late one night when they discover that a cartoon is going to show an episode featuring Muhammad as a character. Everyone hides in the Community Center for fear of an Islamic terrorist attack and Randy announces that the cartoon is Family Guy. The next morning, everyone is thrilled to find out that there was no attack and that Fox censored the image of Muhammad. It is later announced that the Family Guy episode was just part one of a two-parter, and that part two will air the following week—without censorship. Cartman believes that this is insulting to Muslims, declaring that Fox was right to censor Muhammad. Kyle, who likes Family Guy, thinks that he is faking, but, when Cartman gives an impassioned speech about keeping people from getting hurt, Kyle is guilt-ridden and believes him. Kyle agrees to go with Cartman to Hollywood to get the Family Guy episode pulled. The people of South Park, meanwhile, decide to literally bury their heads in the sand, so as to show Islamists that they have no part in the insult. On the way to Hollywood, Kyle discovers that Cartman only wants to get Family Guy cancelled and does not care about the Muslims. Cartman decides to go at it alone, but Kyle insists he will not let that happen. The two start racing one another on their Big Wheels, until Cartman successfully loses Kyle. U.S. President George W. Bush meets with the Fox executives. The Fox president says that there is something secret about the Family Guy writers that Bush needs to know. At this point, it is revealed this is a two-part episode and that the conclusion will be given in the next episode. ===== Set in Seattle at a company called Zephyr Holdings Incorporated, the plot is centered in a drab building from which it is difficult to discern the company's type of business. The company's defining characteristic is its obscurity and its heavy reliance on corporate jargon, through which it avoids hard truths and harsh realities. Stephen Jones, a young graduate, reports for his first day in the Training Sales Department shortly after there has been a theft of a precious resource in the office, a doughnut. Among the overarching plot-lines, Roger's assumption of the role of detective in solving the mystery of the missing doughnut stretches the length of the plot. Jones is promoted from assistant to acting sales representative on the whim of his manager, over the heads of his far more experienced colleagues. As time passes and the inanities mount, Jones comes to believe in the existence of a conspiracy, given the logical fallacies of his work, selling orders to different floors of the same company. A meeting with upper management is impossible without an appointment, an appointment is impossible without the consent of mid-level managers, and managers fire anyone who ask questions outside the lines of preferred company policy. Employees are shuffled about at random or outsourced in cost-cutting maneuvers, and the theme of cost-consolidation is heavy throughout. Reaching the CEO's floor by using a locked staircase, Jones reaches the epiphany necessary to pierce the veil of the sham that is Zephyr: the CEO's floor is the empty roof, and the real work behind the scenes takes place on the unreachable floor 13. The CEO, Daniel Klausman, poses as a lowly janitor ordinarily but secretly orchestrates lab-based tests on the employees of Zephyr in order to best reach maximum efficiency in a corporate environment. A select group of people, known as the Alphas, remain in Zephyr to analyze if their strategies result in perceivable results, and Jones finds himself swept into the Alphas. The main revenue stream comes from the sale of the Omega Management System series of corporate self-help books, based on the results of the studies done on the Zephyr employees. Disgusted by its inhumanity and its dedication to impossible and cruel ideals, Jones resolves to bring down the Alpha group and thus Zephyr Holdings from within. Simultaneously, he is both heavily attracted to the beautiful Eve Jantiss and repulsed by her open cynicism towards the employees of Zephyr and her easy disregard for common ethics in the corporate environment. Left to its own ends, Zephyr Holdings continuously down-sizes in cost-saving moves, only to be confused when the company's costs rise per person since there are fewer employees. This spirals out of control until Zephyr holdings becomes a tribal battleground, with each executive seizing the best parts of the pie to control and manipulate, leaving a bloated Senior Management with absurdly small number of actual employees. Sick of the rampant ineptitude and trimming which leaves only the incompetent and corrupt working, Jones organizes a revolt with the remaining employees to force the Senior Management to resign, to which the Alpha group is powerless to respond lest it reveal its actual, devious purpose. However, although left without a head and most of its limbs, the Alpha group continues to believe that the experiment of the Zephyr Corporation does not need to be cancelled and can remain viable. In a final act of defiance, Jones links the secret floor 13 with the rest of the building so all the employees can read the files made about them and tests done to ascertain minute results. Infuriated, the Zephyr Corporation employees riot and storm floor 13, resulting in the implosion of the fake company. In the aftermath of the fall of Zephyr Holdings Incorporated, Jones and Eve meet again, finding that the two of them never really changed, with the latter bemusedly certain that Corporations would not be able to learn from their own mistakes, and the former adamant that the most essential part of the company was not its profits but the people that made up its lifeblood, the employees. ===== Mio Aio's death leaves her husband Takumi and six-year-old son Yuji to eke a living for themselves. Takumi is disorganized in household chores, suffers occasional fainting spells, and fears that his health could not fulfill his dead wife's happiness. Yuji overhears relatives gossiped that his own difficult delivery compromised Mio's health, and blames himself for his mother's death. Mio had left Yuji a picture book; in the book, Mio departs for a celestial body she calls "the Archive Star" but reappears in Japan during the following year's rainy season; turning the pages, Yuji eagerly awaits her return. On a walk in the forest outside their house, Takumi and Yuji find a woman sheltered from the rain, and immediately accept her as Mio. She has no memory or sense of identity; she comes home to live with the father and son anyway. This new Mio asks Taku how they met and fell in love, and he recounts a tale of years of missed chances, beginning in high school and when she encouraged their marriage some time later. As the rainy season draws to a close, Yuji discovers the "time capsule" he hid with his mother before her death. Mio's diary is inside, and its version of the Mio-Taku romance holds the answers to the mystery. ===== Chyna Shepherd accompanies her friend Laura Templeton to her house for Thanksgiving dinner. A serial killer named Edgler Vess invades the house and kills Laura and her parents, as Chyna hides in the killer's vehicle. When Vess stops at a gas station, Chyna escapes and asks the two attendants to call the police. Before she has time to explain, Vess returns and murders the two workers with a shotgun. Chyna then learns that he is holding a 14-year-old girl named Ariel hostage in his basement. She becomes determined to save Ariel and follows Vess back to his home. On the road she runs into a woman named Miriam and asks her to call the police. The woman does not realize that Chyna is serious about the murders until she sees the two dead bodies back at the gas station. Unfortunately, she is hysterical on the phone with the police, telling them that they 'need to save Chyna and Ariel,' which the police interpret as the ramblings of a lunatic. Upon trying to fall back to sleep, the policeman, Ethan Trevaine, remembers the name Ariel from a missing person's case and starts investigating. Trevaine starts to find clues on what type of vehicle the killer was driving, and what Miriam was talking about earlier. Meanwhile, the car Chyna is driving runs out of gas so she leaves it in the middle of the road, forcing Vess to stop and push it out of the way. While he does so, Chyna runs back into his trailer and hides, unknowingly leaving foot prints. Intrigued, Vess decides to have some fun and pretend he does not know she is there. He then kills Miriam when she tries to run him off the road and save Chyna. When they arrive at his home, Chyna attempts to free Ariel from a fortified room but is attacked and subdued by Vess. As a captive, Chyna speaks with Vess and has flashbacks to her traumatic childhood: as a little girl, she witnessed her disturbed, abusive mother and her boyfriend kill her grandparents. In turn, Vess reveals his obsession with the "intensity" of any particular experience and declares his intention to kill both her and Ariel, but offers Chyna a slightly more merciful death if she agrees to aid him in mentally torturing Ariel out of her catatonia. When Vess finally leaves for work, Chyna seizes the opportunity to free herself and Ariel. After dressing in Vess's dog-training gear and spraying ammonia in the eyes of his bloodthirsty Dobermans, Chyna attempts to flee with Ariel in Vess's mobile home, but unwittingly triggers an alarm that causes him to return home early. Before they can make their escape, an unmarked vehicle and a police car arrive. Although Chyna believes Vess to be in the unmarked vehicle driven by Trevaine, it is revealed that Vess is actually a State Trooper who emerges from the police car and opens fire on Trevaine, killing him before turning his attention to the mobile home. Chyna and Ariel manage to escape back to Vess's house, where Chyna ultimately gets the better of Vess. She sets him on fire, locks him in Ariel's old room, and watches as he burns to death. In the aftermath, Chyna visits Ariel in a psychiatric hospital but is denied custody of her in a hearing; she is told that the young girl will require extensive therapy to recover from her trauma. As Chyna prepares to leave without her, Ariel, speaking for the first time, suddenly calls out to her the name "Badger", a character from a story Chyna had told her about to help bring her courage while escaping from Vess. The two embrace, and it is implied that Chyna's custody of Ariel was granted. ===== 12-year-old Paul would like nothing more than for the magical trolls and mermaids he reads about in his favorite story to be real. He goes searching for a real troll and finally meets one named Ofoeti, who has friends like Kalotte, a mermaid, and Socrates, a talking turtle. Soon the mermaid's home is threatened by an evil bridge builder. Paul also discovers that Ofoeti is dying and has less than a day to live. Paul must see if he has what it takes to risk everything and save his new friends. ===== This novel is an imaginative reconstruction of the life of a band of Neanderthals. It is written in such a way that the reader might assume the group to be modern Homo sapiens as they gesture and speak simply among themselves, and bury their dead with heartfelt, solemn rituals. They also have powerful sense impressions and feelings, and appear sometimes to share thoughts in a near-telepathic way. As the novel progresses it becomes more and more apparent that they live very simply, using their considerable mental abilities to connect to one another without extensive vocabulary or the kinds of memories that create culture. They have wide knowledge of food sources, mostly roots and vegetables. They chase hyenas from a larger beast's kill and eat meat, but they don't kill mammals themselves. They have a spiritual system centring on a female principle of bringing forth, but their lives are lived so much in the present that the reader realizes they are very different from us, living in something like an eternal present, or at most a present broken and shaped by seasons. One of the band, Lok, is a point of view character. He is the one we follow as one by one the adults of the band die or are killed, then the young are stolen by the "new people," a group of early modern humans. Lok and Fa, the remaining adults, are fascinated and repelled by the new people. They observe their actions and rituals with amazement, only slowly understanding that harm is meant by the sticks of the new people. The humans are portrayed as strange, godlike beings as the neanderthals witness their mastery of fire, Upper Palaeolithic weaponry and sailing. All save the last chapters of the novel are written from the Neanderthals' stark, simple stylistic perspective. Their observations of early human behaviour serve as a filter for Golding's exercise in paleoanthropology, in which modern readers will recognize precursors of later human societal constructs, e.g., religion, culture, sacrifice and war. The penultimate chapter employs an omniscient viewpoint, observing Lok. For the first time, the novel describes the people the reader has been inhabiting through the first-person perspective. Lok, totally alone, gives up in despair. Restoration of Le Moustier Neanderthals (Charles R. Knight, 1920) In the final chapter, we move to the point of view of the new race, more or less modern humans fleeing in their boats, revealing that they are terribly afraid of the Neanderthals (whom they believe to be devils of the forest) and of pretty much everything around. This last chapter, the only one written from the humans' point of view, reinforces the inheritance of the world by the new species. The fleeing humans carry with them an infant Neanderthal, of whom they are simultaneously afraid and enamoured, hinting at the later hypothesis of inter-breeding between Neanderthals and modern humans. The book, particularly the last chapter, was the inspiration for the song "A Trick of the Tail" by British rock band Genesis. ===== ===== Lala Kedarnath Prasanta (Balraj Sahni) has three sons whose birthdays are on the same day. On the occasion of their birthday celebration, they are visited by a well-known astrologer, who advises Lala Kedarnath not to be proud for his past achievements and to not be too optimistic about the future as fate (kismat) plays a key role in life. Lala Kedarnath ignores the prediction and is busy making plans for an even wealthier future. Later that night, as he is proclaiming his grand plans for the future to his wife, Laxmi (Achala Sachdev), there is a sudden earthquake and the whole town crumbles. When Lala Kedarnath regains consciousness, his house has been destroyed and his family is gone. The oldest son, Raju, ends up in an orphanage, while middle son, Ravi, is found on the road by a rich couple who take him to their home to raise him as their own son. The youngest son, Vijay, who is still an infant, is with his mother. Unable to find the rest of the family, Laxmi and Vijay live in poverty. Lala Kedarnath traces Raju to the orphanage, but finds that he has run away because the orphanage manager (Jeevan) beat him. Frustrated, he kills the manager and is jailed. As the police drive away with Kedarnath, the audience sees young Raju running in the streets and turning into an adult (Raaj Kumar). Raju grows up as Raja, a sophisticated thief, who works for Chinnoy Seth. Raja falls in love with Meena (Sadhana) and decides to give up the life of crime. To his dismay, he realises that Meena intends to marry Ravi (Sunil Dutt), who is a family friend. On the night before their engagement, he decides to kill Ravi, only to realise that Ravi is his long lost brother. Before he can ask Ravi about his parentage, Meena's parents decide to break off the engagement upon discovering that Ravi is of unknown parentage and religion. Heartbroken, Ravi leaves home after an argument with his foster sister, Renu (Sharmila Tagore), over his objection to her affair with Vijay (Shashi Kapoor), who is working as a driver for Chinnoy Seth. Renu has been in love with Vijay since their college days together, but Vijay has not been able to find a suitable job in Mumbai despite having a BA degree. Laxmi has been diagnosed with cancer. To pay for her medical expenses, Vijay has no other option but to be a driver. Raja hears about Ravi's problem and decides to reveal the truth about their relationship at a party organised by Chinnoy Seth. Chinnoy Seth's employee misbehaves with Meena at the party and Raja threatens to kill him. Later that night, the drunk employee gets into a fight with Chinnoy Seth and in self-defense, Chinnoy Seth ends up killing the man. To cover up his crime, he decides to frame Raja and drags the body to Raja's house, hiding it in his closet. Vijay happens to witness this but is shut up with the promise of money for his mother's treatment. Raja is arrested and Ravi defends him as an advocate, while Vijay initially testifies falsely and then recants his statement. Lala Kedarnath also appears in court as the witness who found Raja being caught by the police. Raja is ultimately proved innocent and Chinnoy Seth is convicted after he blurts out the truth in court, thanks to Ravi. Afterward, Laxmi arrives in the court to make sure Vijay did the right thing. Lala Kedarnath sees her in the court and the family finally reunites. In the end, Lala Kedarnath and the rest of the family build a new home where they, Meena's family, and Renu's family live together. ===== Shortly after his marriage to Anastasia, Ivan Sanchin, who works as a projectionist at the headquarters of the state security service (called, anachronistically, KGB in the film), is summoned urgently to the Kremlin. Having proved his skill, he is appointed private projectionist to Stalin and his inner circle, including the head of state security Beria. This makes him proud and happy, for he venerates the dictator as if he were a god. When a Russian Jewish couple in his cramped apartment house are arrested, their little daughter Katya is left behind. Though Anastasia wants to adopt the child, Ivan forbids it because her parents are "enemies of the people”. However she secretly visits Katya at a state orphanage. As German troops approach Moscow in 1941, Ivan and Anastasia are put on a train to a safe town. Also on the train is Beria, who gets Anastasia drunk and seduces her, sending Ivan back to Moscow. For a long time he hears nothing of her until she turns up one day, pregnant and abandoned. Her experiences have unhinged her and she commits suicide. In 1953 the lonely Ivan is visited by Katya, now an attractive teenager, who treasures the memory of Anastasia's affection. Ivan offers help, but she says she wants to go her own way. Following Stalin's death, Ivan, while on crowd control duty to masses waiting to view the corpse, sees Katya being jostled in the crush. He rushes in to rescue her and, this time, she is ready to accept his protection. ===== Donaldson returns to the Land for the third series of novels based there. We are re-introduced to Linden Avery years after she first encountered Thomas Covenant and was forever changed by the experience. We journey once more to the familiar fantasy world where everything is again under threat. ===== Jonathan is a 27-year-old artist living in Paris who befriends a single mother and her six-year-old son, Serge. When Serge is eight, his mother asks Jonathan to look after him for a week, which they spend together at Jonathan's country house in southern France. Jonathan and Serge become close friends. Jonathan, smitten with the boy, is distraught when Serge returns to Paris. They meet each other again when Serge is age 10, and their sexual relationship continues. While Jonathan and Serge are separated, the sexual side of Jonathan's desires begins to dominate his behaviour. He eventually seeks out other young boys; he is rejected by some and finds no real satisfaction in sex with the others. Serge, fatherless and miserable at home with his aloof and demeaning mother, decides to run away to be with Jonathan. He sets off to find him, but becomes overwhelmed by hopelessness, and when confronted with a busy road to cross at night, commits suicide by throwing himself under a fast-moving car. Category:1978 French novels Category:Novels about artists Category:Novels set in Paris Category:Novels about ephebophilia ===== Skin & Bone is an episodic account of three Los Angeles- area hustlers, Harry, Billy and Dean, and Ghislaine, their pimp. Ghislaine (Nicole Dillenberg) constantly drives the streets of Los Angeles arranging client appointments. She relies on Harry (B. Wyatt), the most experienced member of her stable, to train new recruits, including Billy (Garett Scullin) and Dean (Alan Boyce). Harry services both male and female clients and always acts as a top; many male clients hire him to beat them. He fantasizes about a woman ("Lovely Girl" [Susannah Melvoin]) he once knew. He has convinced himself that he is not a prostitute but an "actor" providing "fantasies." In his unsuccessful pursuit of an acting career, Harry goes on a casting call for a cop movie. The casting director asks if he will do nudity, implying a casting couch scenario. Harry says he's an artist and loses the role. Billy, though experienced, is still somewhat goofy and absent-minded. He sometimes helps Harry with scenes and Harry tries to convince him too that he is an actor and not a prostitute. On several occasions, Billy picks up men only to discover that the man is not actually his client. In one case he and the man fall in love and they plan to get Billy out of the business and start a life together. Shortly thereafter, Billy mistakes a man (Michael Haynes) for a client in a public restroom and that man stabs him to death. Dean is Ghislaine's most recent recruit. While training him, Harry again tries to impart the notion that their job is just acting. Following his training and first successful trick (with a woman), Dean is humiliated when two women force him to start and stop masturbating seemingly at random. Dean then performs as a "nude cleaner" for a client. He learns that the client is an ex-Marine who was paralyzed in combat and still longs for the boy with whom he fell in love, who was killed. The client is still able to achieve an erection and Dean has sex with him. Harry is at an appointment with a regular, a uniform fetishist called "The General" (Wynston A. Jones). Usually Harry beats him, but unknown to Harry, the client has arranged for something different with Ghislaine. After showing Harry a picture of himself in which he closely resembles Harry, the General orders Harry to strip. When Harry hesitates, the General attacks him from behind, binds his hands with tape and rapes him. Harry asks his acting agent to set up an "interview" with another casting director. He lets the man fuck him. Later at Dean's place, Harry finds Dean sitting alone burning himself with a cigarette. Dean tells Harry he ran away from home after his father had him arrested at age 14 for stealing a candy bar. Dean was put in a cell with several men who took turns raping him. After allowing himself to be used by the casting director, Harry gets a small role as a cop in the film for which he had previously been rejected. On-set he impresses the producers and they offer him a part in a TV series. Ghislaine sends Harry to the local morgue with $2,500 to bribe an attendant (James Michael White). Harry sees Billy's body and realizes that Ghislaine is acquiring it for a client. He confronts Ghislaine, accusing her of arranging Billy's murder, and tells her he wants to quit and take Dean with him. Ghislaine agrees, if Harry and Dean perform one final scene. The scene is a cop/prisoner scenario which begins with the cop beating the prisoner then the prisoner overpowering the cop, binding and beating and finally shooting him. Harry plays the cop and Dean the prisoner. Bound and gagged, Harry sees Ghislaine switching his gun (loaded with blanks) for another gun, but fails to convey the danger to Dean. As Ghislaine and the client watch and the client tapes the scene, Dean pulls the trigger and kills Harry. Harry meets "Lovely Girl," who asks him how he feels being dead. Six months later, Dean is living on the streets. Ghislaine finds him and convinces him to return to work. ===== When a jovian sized, artificially-created structure enters the galaxy, a society of technologically advanced humans (capable of interstellar flight and functionally immortal) are the first to intercept and investigate it. Finding it to be an intergalactic ship, they decide to convert it into a cruise ship, inviting alien races to join them in its massive, uncharted interior as it makes a slow circumnavigation of the Milky Way . After thousands of years, with over 200 billion creatures living in its upper levels, a group of explorers discover a planet hidden in the core of the Great Ship. As they explore it, however, an ionic blast cuts them off from the rest of the ship and destroys much of their technology. Because this planet, Marrow, is slowly expanding, the explorers reason that a new bridge can be built in another 5,000 years. They thus begin a civilization on the surface of Marrow. The descendants of these original explorers come to believe that the large superstructure has been built to contain the Bleak, a race of nearly unstoppable insect-like creatures. Calling themselves the Wayward, they take over the ship when the bridge is completed and attempt to steer it towards a black hole to destroy the Bleak. One of the original explorers sees a vision of the Builders of the ship fighting the Bleak, containing them within the heart of Marrow and constructing the ship around it as a prison. The Bleak, it is concluded, have twisted the Wayward into destroying the ship so that they may escape. They stop the Wayward's plan by undermining the ship's control and command systems to divert the engines' thrust just enough to skim past the black hole . The book ends with the suggestion that, with Marrow being a prison for the Bleak and the Great Ship an extension of that prison, the universe itself could be a further layer constructed by the Builders. ===== Špela, a younger Slovene woman lives with Bosnian boyfriend Božo. She has a job while Božo is unemployed and prefers staying at home, drinking beer and watching TV. After Špela leaves Božo because of his laziness and lack of will to find a job and moves back to her parents, he asks his friend Goran for help and gets a job as a Mickey Mouse impersonator at a local fair. A chance meeting with Špela leaves her less than impressed due to the simplicity of the job which seems ridiculous to her. Reluctantly, Božo accepts Goran's offer for a job involving smuggling illegal immigrants from Slovenia to Italy. However, Goran loses his nerves and forces the immigrants to end their trip before they arrive to Italy - which doesn't go unnoticed by his boss after the immigrants are found by the police. After deceiving his boss, Goran is beaten, but he and Božo are offered a second chance: together with two thugs, they are to intimidate an innkeeper who had stopped paying protection money. Coincidentally, Špela is also there, celebrating her father's birthday. After the initial surprise she verbally attacks Božo for joining the criminals but she is immediately molested by one of the thugs. Seeing this, Božo attacks him with a bottle, causing the other one to pull out a gun and shoot Božo. Following this incident, the thugs are arrested, Božo is taken to the hospital and Goran is beaten once again. After recovering from the wounds, Božo considers committing suicide, but changes his mind. Špela returns to him and tells him she is pregnant. The film ends with Božo, Špela and their daughter who are now a happy family. ===== One Wednesday morning, children in a small fishing village of "about twenty-odd wooden houses" find a body on the beach that is covered with "flotsam" and sea debris. The children play by burying him in the sand until the adults discover the corpse and decide that it must be given a small funeral and thrown off the cliff on which their village rests. This is done because there is so little land in the village that they cannot have traditional burials. In order to do so, however, they must prepare him for burial at sea and look in neighboring villages for any surviving relatives. The men carry the body up to the village so that the women can prepare him for the funeral while they go to neighboring villages to ask if anyone can identify the drowned man. The man is too tall to fit easily into any house and, upon removing the seaweed and mud, the women observe his handsome face. The women of the village become attached to him and dream of the wonderful man he must have been. Eventually, an old woman declares that his name must have been Esteban, and after a short period of resistance from some of the younger women, they all agree. After dreaming of how powerful Esteban must have been they decide to make him clothes because no one owns anything large enough to fit him. The pants they make are too small and the buttons on the shirt burst. The women then think about how he must have had to stoop to enter doorways and how he must have felt uncomfortable in the small homes. The women feel pity and sympathy for the man, who they silently compare to their own husbands, and they begin to weep for him. They then cover Esteban's face with a handkerchief. The men are unable to find any relatives of the drowned man and they return home, where the village continues the funeral preparation as a group. The women, now attached to Esteban, place "altar decorations" on him, including a compass, holy water, and nails. The men grow annoyed and chide their wives for taking such elaborate measures for "a stranger" . Esteban's face is then revealed to the men and they too are awed by the humble character they see in his face. Women go to get flowers in neighboring villages, since none grow in their own, and women from those villages come back to see Esteban. This continues until the village grows so crowded that it is "hard to walk about." They do not want Esteban buried as an "orphan" so a mother and father are chosen for him "from among the best people," as well as uncles, aunts, and cousins, until everyone is related to Esteban. Instead of burying him with an anchor they let him go without one so that he can return one day. This is when the village realizes how desolate and small their town appears. After Esteban is buried at sea, the village resolves to make their doors wider for Esteban's memory, to find springs like he would have, to paint their houses bright colors, and to plant flowers. The village imagines that one day a passing cruise ship will smell the flowers and the captain will point to their village and tell his passengers that it was Esteban's home. ===== The story begins in a jail, where a prisoner is being interrogated. The action is taking place in the background, behind bars and is blurred. The focus is on a bottle of laxative. Seems the prisoner has stolen a necklace and swallowed it. Soon, the necklace is passed. And it's not even real gold. The old jailer picks up the story, saying the prisoner is a boy named Pan from his home village. Pan is a simple country boy. In the words of the jailer, he thinks about entertainment too much and is not respectful enough of his elders. In other words, he's not too bright. Yet, he is a good singer, and the story flashes back to a village fair, where he's up on stage singing his heart out, with his lyrics being composed on the spot and directed toward Sadao, a pretty village girl who is dancing in the crowd. A local rich kid pulls up in his truck and asks Sadao to dance. Then, when the rich kid goes to the drinks stand, Pan hands his microphone over to another performer and moves to dance with Sadao. The rich kid returns, and Pan bumps into him, spilling the drinks. The rich guy, with his thuggish friends in tow, orders Pan to clean up the mess. Pan does so by spitting on the guy's shoes. A fight breaks out, but the music keeps going, with a guitarist picking up the beat and screaming a punk song as the fight intensifies. Pan and Sadao retreat to Sadao's home, where Pan breaks into another song, expressing his love. But before long, Sadao's irascible father shows up with a shotgun, causing Pan to jump into the river to escape the shotgun blasts. Pan is not easily deterred. Via his sister, he sends Sadao a pretty blue blouse, accompanied by a love note. He then shows up one day to dig a pond for Sadao's father, explaining that the man Sadao's father had originally hired was sick. He insists on calling the man Dad. "Stop calling me Dad. When did I fuck your mother," the old man cruelly admonishes Pan. The old man is complaining of various aches and pains. Pan offers to get him some folk medicine, something involving foot pollen, which because of the cultural association of the foot being the basest part of the body, gravely offends him. Pan is back in the doghouse with Sadao's father. Yet the two become married. For a present, Pan presents Sadao with a new transistor radio. They have a baby on the way and they enjoy being together. "The movie could end here," the narrator chimes in, "and you'd be heading for exits with a happy ending. But there is more to this sad tale." Pan's run of bad luck starts when he draws the wrong number in the draft lottery and must enter the army. He heads off to basic training before his wife gives birth to their child. He promises to write her a letter every day. A musical interlude depicts Pan and the other soldiers singing the mournful song "Mai Leum" ("Don't Forget) as they crawl on their backs in the mud under barbed wire, and during their haircuts. One day Pan sees a poster for a singing contest and at the urging of his army buddies, he enters. He nervously gets up on stage and says he wants to sing "The Sad Soldier". The band doesn't know the tune, so Pan sings it a cappella. Though he wows the crowd, he faints onstage when the song is complete. Along with a local girl, Dao, Pan wins the contest and without giving thought to the consequences, he's on a bus headed for Bangkok, where he hopes to become a big singing star. He ends up locked inside the music company's office, where he spends the night. The next day, he meets his new boss, a sleazy producer named Suwat, who insists Pan call him "Daddy". He lectures Pan about all the hard work he'll need to do before making it as a star. So Pan pitches in around the office, mopping floors and running errands. Months go by. He mops the floor while the other singer who won the contest, Dao, receives training as a singer. Pan keeps mopping. Soon, 27 months have gone by. He's still mopping floors. Meanwhile, Sadao is left alone to raise the couple's child. She has not heard a word from Pan and is looking careworn. The radio she was given as a wedding present is starting to wear out. Pan sleeps in a storage closet, a room he shares with an old man named Yen, who reveals that he, too, wanted to be a singing star, but it's the young women who usually get all the breaks first, he tells Pan. So Pan keeps mopping floors, washing cars and running errands. He also becomes close with Dao, whom he assists one night after she becomes ill. Finally, one night at a show, Pan gets his big break when the star male singer doesn't show up. Pan is hastily thrown into a gold lame tuxedo and pushed onstage. What he doesn't know is that out in the crowd is Sadao and her father. They have finally tracked down Pan and have come to visit him. She's brought him bottles of rainwater from the village, figuring the water in the city is dirty and unfit to drink. Pan and Sadao enjoy a brief reunion after the show, but Pan is quickly whisked away by Suwat, to Suwat's home, which is decorated with animal skins. Suwat tells Pan to relax and goes to change. He comes out with some beers, wearing just a silk bathrobe and his underwear. Suwat puts on a porn tape – it's a film of the girl singer, Dao. Suwat tells Pan to strip and has him pose for photos. Suwat becomes bolder and bolder, and eventually sexually assaults Pan. Pan reacts in surprise and confusion, pushing Suwat off of him. Suwat lands on a glass table and is killed. Pan runs out into the street. He sees a policeman. Now, not only is he AWOL from the army, he's also a murderer. He then spots a truck loaded down with other men, so he hops aboard, hoping to hop back off when the truck stops. But the truck doesn't stop until it's taken Pan to a remote sugar cane plantation, where he's set to work cutting cane in torturous conditions. Meanwhile, back in the village, a smooth-talking travelling salesman, peddling deworming medicine from his boat, is passing through. He's taken a liking to Sadao, giving her some medicine for her sick baby and inviting her to a movie screening that night. He further charms her at the screening, by demonstrating his talents as a film dubber, improvising lines to tell her how beautiful she is. Back on the sugar-cane plantation, the workers, tired of their diet of vegetables and rice, are restive. Pan has made friends with one of the workers, Siew, but Pan is also well liked by the tough boss, Yot. One night at a card game, Yot finds that Siew has won all his money. A fight breaks out. There is running through the jungle. Dead bodies are uncovered. The horror! Pan and Siew keep running, and eventually wind up in the city. Starving and their clothes ragged, they happen upon a luxury hotel where they see beggers, street cleaners and motorcycle taxi drivers – poor people – being ushered in, Pan and Siew walk in and start helping themselves to the buffet, shoving food into their pockets. It's a charity ball where the elite are dressing up as the poor, and Pan and Siew win the prize for most authentic costume. But when all the food in their pockets is discovered, they are kicked out of the hotel. Desperate for money, Pan and Siew hatch another plan. Siew snatches a woman's necklace, and, as she chases him, he passes it Pan, who is then chased by the police. Eventually Pan is caught, and this brings the story back to where it started in the jail. Pan ends up serving two years in prison, where he and the other inmates work on the prison farm, fertilizing crops with their own feces and urine. While dipping a bucket into the sewage well, Pan falls in, and is covered in the brown substance. On his release, Pan waits on the street for a ride. A truck pulls up. It is Siew, who is wearing a track suit and much jewelry and is carrying a cellular phone. With his hair dyed blond, he calls himself Peter and announces he is now a drug dealer, and has made quick money. And, to add more indignity to the situation, he's married a former singing star and porn actress - Dao. Finally, Pan returns to Sadao. She looks more careworn than ever. In addition to a little boy, there's an infant in a crib. "Whose kid is that?" Pan asks when he sees the younger baby. "His father was a dog," she explains. "They are all dogs." Pan looks around. A photo of Sadao's father is on the wall. He's died. The transistor radio lies in a corner, broken and covered with dust. The pretty blue blouse is faded and stained and crumpled on the floor in another corner. There's a final musical reprise of "Mai Leum", with all the characters in the film putting in an appearance to sing the chorus. Sadao reluctantly accepts Pan back into her life, and breaks down, weeping profusely as the couple embraces. ===== A former stewardess, widow Julie Benton (Doris Day), flying for "Amalgamated Airlines" is terrorized by her insanely jealous second husband, Lyle (Louis Jourdan). It becomes a life-or-death matter after friend Cliff Henderson (Barry Sullivan) relays his suspicions to Julie that her first husband's death may not have been a suicide. She pretends that she would have fallen for Lyle even if her first husband had still been alive, and Lyle confesses the murder to her. Julie flees with Cliff's help, but police are unable to arrest Lyle without proof. Julie and Cliff hire a car and drive north to San Francisco where Julie changes her identity, and returns to her former job with the airline. Lyle has a confrontation with Cliff, Lyle shoots him and learns where Julie can be found. With police in pursuit, Julie is warned that Lyle may be on her flight. She spots him, but Lyle pulls a gun on her, then kills the pilot before being shot himself. Julie is "talked down" receiving instructions on how to fly the aircraft. She does so successfully, and her nightmare comes to an end. ===== That lovable know-it-all knucklehead Ernest P. Worrell, who is working as a janitor at a local college, meets a history professor named Dr. Abner Melon. After discovering an antique metal plate near a construction site, Ernest shows it to Dr. Melon, who believes that it came from a giant Revolutionary War cannon called "Goliath", (named after the legendary biblical giant). Dr. Melon had previously been ridiculed by his peers for theorizing that the real Crown Jewels of England were stolen during the Revolutionary War and were actually hidden inside the long-lost cannon. They begin to search for the artifact near the construction site and eventually locate it inside an abandoned mine. They are ambushed by historical antiquity collector and Dr. Melon's colleague Dr. Glencliff whom they then lead on an action-packed chase through the countryside. Things become more complicated for them when British authorities hear about the incident and send a team of secret agents after them to retrieve the jewels. Dr. Melon's wife, Nan, on the other hand is only after him and Ernest for the jewels. While everyone is hot on their trail, Ernest develops a deep friendship with Dr. Melon. After crashing the cannon into a forest, Ernest locates the jewels, not in its barrel as the legend describes but in the gunpowder kegs. After putting the crown on his head, he finds himself unable to get it off. Dr. Glencliff shows up, abducts him, and takes him to his clinic in an attempt to surgically remove it and kill him at the same time. Dr. Melon meets up with Nan and convinces her to help him save Ernest. While at the clinic, Ernest manages to escape from the surgery room and lead Dr. Glencliff on a chase through the building. When he has nowhere else to hide, he and Dr. Glencliff have one last fight to get the crown before Dr. Melon arrives with the police. At the last minute, Dr. Glencliff takes an axe off of the wall and attempts to behead Ernest. Just as he is moments away from death, Dr. Melon bursts through the door and hits Dr. Glencliff over the head with the same antique metal plate Ernest found, knocking him out. Ernest realizes that Dr. Melon has saved his life and they both realize that they have gone from being adversaries to friends. At the same time, British authorities arrive and explain to Ernest that the crown must be taken back to its rightful home. He explains that it will not come off his head and the authorities declare that whoever wears it is King of England. Dr. Melon removes it for him by tricking him about what is on his shirt, flicking him in the face. It causes it to fall off his head while everyone laughs. This is followed by him giving Dr. Melon a noogie while they argue about who would make a better king of England. The film wraps here with a not-so-subtle moral, being that friendship is more valuable than status or material wealth. ===== The book begins with the return of a group of friends, consisting of Tanis, Sturm, Caramon, Raistlin, Flint, and Tasslehoff, who had separated to pursue their own quests and pledged to return in five years. Kitiara Uth Matar, the half sister of the twins Caramon and Raistlin, was supposed to be there as well, but only sent a mysterious note. On the eve of their reunion, the Companions discover that the village where they are meeting has been taken over by a religious order called the Seekers. They are collaborating with the Dragon Highlords, who are preparing for the conquest of the continent of Ansalon. The Companions soon discover that the Seekers are searching for a Blue Crystal Staff. When Goldmoon, a plainswoman in the same inn as the companions, heals a Seeker with her staff, the Companions are confronted by Highlord forces and are forced to flee the village. The next day, the group is attacked by Draconians, reptilian creatures that serve as foot soldiers in the Highlords' army. The Companions are driven into the woods, where they are attacked by undead and rescued by a centaur. The group is charged to go to the ruined city of Xak Tsaroth to retrieve the Disks of Mishakal, an object containing the teaching of the True Gods that will be instrumental for the restoration of the faith in the True Gods. 2000 paperback edition cover After a lengthy trip on the backs of pegasi and several encounters with the forces of darkness, the companions enter Xak Tsaroth and meet some gully dwarves, diminutive and socially awkward creatures. One of the dwarves, Bupu, leads them to the dragon Khisanth, who is killed by the holy power of the Blue Crystal Staff. When this happens, Goldmoon is consumed by its flame and presumed dead. However, they later find her resting at the foot of a statue of Mishakal (the Goddess of Healing), which now bears the Blue Crystal Staff, and Goldmoon is blessed with true clerical powers. The Companions leave with the Disks of Mishakal. Bupu gives an ancient spellbook (formerly belonging to the archmage Fistandantilus) to Raistlin. When they return to the village to regroup they find it occupied. The Companions are captured by the Highlord armies and are chained in a slave caravan along with an elf named Gilthanas, the son of the leader of the elven nation of Qualinesti. The group is freed by Gilthanas's brother, Porthios. They flee to Qualinesti, where Tanis is reunited with his childhood sweetheart, the exceptionally beautiful elven princess, Laurana Kanan. Laurana is still in love with Tanis and wants to marry him, but Tanis breaks her heart by telling her he is now in love with Kitiara. The Elven King Solostaran convinces the Companions to lead an attack on the slave-mine Pax Tharkas to free the slaves from the control of the local Dragon Highlord. The Companions journey through a secret passage underground to Pax Tharkas and devise a plan to free the slaves. Laurana, desperate to win Tanis back, secretly follows the Companions. When Tanis discovers Laurana has followed them he angrily rebukes her for acting like a spoiled child. Laurana resolves to try to prove she is more than that. The Companions infiltrate Pax Tharkas and Goldmoon heals Elistan, a dying Seeker, and converts him to the faith of the true gods. He becomes the first cleric of Paladine, and Goldmoon turns the Disks of Mishakal over to him. The Companions help the slaves break free. Laurana proves her worth in the battle by fighting bravely. The Dragon Highlord Verminaard and his red dragon Ember arrive to crush the revolt, but the insane red dragon Flamestrike kills Ember, while the Companions cut down Verminaard. A mysterious figure called "The Everman” later appears at a celebration following the freeing of the slaves, but flees after being spotted. According to Tracy Hickman, "The restoration of truth and faith are... to a great extent, the theme of this first book in the series." ===== Ernest is working as a golf ball collector at a golf range in Valdosta, Georgia, but fantasizes about being a war hero. A friend tells him that if he joins the Army, he will get to drive large vehicles and never have to go into actual combat. He enlists in the reserves, but one day a UN peacekeeping commander Pierre Gullet and the British ambassador visit Ernest's camp and demands that the entire unit including him is to be deployed to the fictional Middle Eastern country of Karifistan, where he and his fellow soldiers have to assist UN troops in the hope of saving the country from being invaded by an evil Islamic dictator named Tufuti of Aziria. Once he began, Ernest and his team investigates a dictator who was responsible for the wars in the nearby village. Suddenly, he finds a lost boy and has to keep him safe until his father is found. ===== ===== Ernest takes a job with a cleaning service at the local mall, and he soon seeks to join his co-workers' basketball team, "Clean Sweep", as they compete in the city league tournament. He is reluctantly accepted by the team, but given only a minor role as their cheerleader and mascot. In his despair, he is visited by an angel, and given a pair of magical shoes, but is warned, "Don't misuse the shoes." As a matter of fact, the shoe store's owner, Zamiel Moloch happens to be a demon in disguise. He would eventually prevent Ernest's sportsmanship with the basketball players by luring Ernest to arrogance. When an injury to a key player leaves the team desperate for a replacement, Ernest is given an opportunity to play. In the process, he discovers that the supernatural shoes have imbued him with super speed and the ability to fly. Armed with these extraordinary abilities, he leads the team to a series of victories leading ultimately to a showdown with the NBA's Charlotte Hornets. As the city league tournament champions, Clean Sweep earns the right to play an exhibition contest against the Hornets, but suffers turmoil as Ernest's teammates soon grow weary of his flagrant over- the-top ball-hogging antics. While Ernest is in the zone and the team does nothing but sit around, Ernest decides to let the team do the work and get rid of the shoes, but Ernest is needed again and scores (along with causing some mishaps) the game-winning point and the members of the team get drafted into the NBA. ===== After the fire at Susan's home, her friends try to help her to the best of their ability by clearing the remains of her home. Most of the neighborhood helps clear debris including Susan's new dentist friend Orson. The wives then recommend Susan stay with Bree since she has more than enough room for Julie and Susan. As this occurs, Edie Britt stands across the street watching as she eats a popsicle. When the insurance agent drops by to alert Susan that she will not be receiving her check, Susan asks the reason why. The broker then proceeds to tell her that the fire department ruled the fire arson and asks if she has any enemies. Susan declares she has none but then looks across the street and sees Edie with her popsicle. Hours later, Susan quietly visits Edie and asks if she was the culprit. Edie admits that she did and gloats that Susan cannot tell anyone since she has no witnesses. Susan then pays Mike a visit and asks if he can find her a wire so that Edie can confess. Mike does so and asks if she would like to move in with him as friends. Susan considers the offer but declines since it would be odd. Another reason for declining is that Susan remembers Edie's words about Susan being weak, that being the reason people help her, not because they love her. Susan then visits Edie the next day and receives the confession she had desired. Edie quickly catches on and chases Susan down the block. Edie is halted when she is stung by a nest of yellowjackets. Susan later visits Edie in the hospital where Susan offers Edie a deal to keep her out of jail. Edie declines and swears ongoing revenge against Susan. Meanwhile, Bree becomes excited when Susan and Julie move in and attempts to make Danielle feel the same. Danielle is concerned since Andrew left and that Bree is acting weird. When Danielle tells Bree that she forgot her birthday, Bree wants to throw her a 17th birthday and invite her friends. Danielle reluctantly gives in but wants Andrew's room in return. The following morning, Bree over decorates the house with balloons with the number "17". Danielle asks that Bree take them down since she wants a simple party. Bree then begins to pop the balloons by stabbing them which concerns Susan. At Danielle's birthday party, Bree comes to a melting point when one of Danielle's friends runs her finger through the birthday cake's frosting after she worked so hard to make it perfect. Bree causes a scene and embarrasses everybody, including herself. Danielle runs out of the party in tears. Danielle later finds out where Matthew is when she enters the Applewhites' basement through a cellar door. They then plan an escape when Betty returns to feed him. As Betty comes down the stairs, Danielle comes behind and hits her with a crowbar and steals the key. Danielle then writes a letter to Bree informing her that she has run away with Matthew and is unlikely to return. Bree then checks herself into a mental institution because she feels on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Lynette places the children in Mrs. McCluskey's care and follows Tom to Atlantic City. While watching his hotel from her rental car, she receives a phone call from Tom who is standing only a few feet away. Lynette is almost exposed when a car alarm in Tom's vicinity is also picked up by Lynette's cell phone. Later, Lynette follows Tom to a woman's home where he enters, is served wine, and follows her up the stairs. Lynette is devastated, believing Tom is having an affair. Lynette then returns to Fairview to gather the children and leave. Tom returns to an empty home and asks Mrs. McCluskey where his family is. Mrs. McCluskey explains that Lynette followed him to Atlantic City and knows about his woman. Gabrielle and Carlos successfully inseminate Xiao-Mei, who begins developing morning sickness from Gabrielle's perfume. Gabrielle quickly discovers that Carlos begins treating Xiao-Mei better than herself and demands an explanation. Carlos explains that because Xiao-Mei is carrying their baby that she should be in comfort thus giving up their bed and Gabrielle having to throw out her fragrances. Gabrielle objects to this and shoos Xiao-Mei out of their bedroom after spraying her perfume and hairsprays all over the bedroom. Xiao-Mei immediately becomes sickened when she next enters the room and throws up in the bathroom. Carlos learns what Gabrielle did and is angered. Carlos then goes to the couch to sleep. Xiao-Mei shortly finds him on the couch and makes him a roast beef sandwich. The two then begin to chat about Gabrielle and the pregnancy. Meanwhile, Felicia Tilman plans her final act of revenge against Paul Young. After sneaking into his home through the backdoor, Felicia searches, locates and steals the spare key to Paul's house. When she hears Paul approaching the kitchen, Felicia hurriedly grabs a bag of flour from one of the kitchen cupboards and heads towards the backdoor as he enters. She tells him that she was shouting at the backdoor for ages and that she needs to borrow flour to make Paul and Zach cookies. Upon discovering her in his kitchen, Paul instructs Zach to throw out all of their food as Felicia may have tried to poison them both. Felicia then calls the police from her home and reports that her neighbor Paul Young has been threatening her. Whilst phoning the police, she is in the process of pumping large quantities of her own blood from her body. The police inform Felicia that no action can be taken against Paul by just making threats, to which she replies that she will just have to deal with the problem herself. That following evening, Paul walks into his kitchen only to slip and discover blood on the floor and on the kitchen walls. Paul then follows the trail of smeared blood on the floor to the garage where the door is ajar. The police quickly come upon the scene and place Paul in handcuffs when they discover two of Felicia's fingers in the trunk of his car. Whilst Paul is escorted to prison, Felicia escapes to the mountains and retreats to a log cabin where she checks in under the alias of her dead sister "Mrs. Martha Huber". When the clerk of the cabin lodge hands her the keys to her cabin she accidentally drops them and when he replaces them in her hand she smiles broadly and says that "Sometimes I'm just all thumbs" whilst rubbing the keys with the remaining fingers of her left hand and experiencing the great satisfaction of finally avenging her sister's murder. ===== After World War II, Ichiro Yamada, a Japanese American male and former student at the University of Washington, returns home in 1946 to a Japanese enclave in Seattle, Washington. He has spent two years in an American internment camp for Japanese Americans and two years in federal prison for refusing to fight for the U.S. in World War II. Now home, Ichiro struggles with his parents for embracing American customs and values, and he struggles to maintain a relationship with his brother, Taro. Also, Ichiro faces ostracism from the Japanese American community for refusing to join the U.S. military and fight Japan when many in his community did. Despite his struggles with his family and some members of the community, Ichiro maintains a friendship with Kenji, a Japanese American who fought for the U.S. and badly injured one of his legs. Kenji introduces Ichiro to Emi whose husband re-enlisted and remained in Germany after the war. Ichiro even manages to meet Mr. Carrick who interviews him for a draftsman position. Perceived as disloyal to the U.S. but not fully Japanese, Ichiro struggles to find his path. Through Ichiro's story, Okada examines what it means to be American in a post-war society whose non-white communities are struggling to find their places. ===== A group of scientists are working on a serum called Death One, which reanimates the dead. When Dr. Alan Holder and his assistant Norma experiment on a human corpse, the corpse becomes a zombie, prompting Dr. Holder to resign from the project. As he prepares to surrender the serum to waiting military officers, a small group of criminals ambush the center; all but one are killed, and the surviving criminal manages to abscond with Death One. During a chase, the container with the serum is shot out of his hand and breaks; as he tries to pick it back up, he accidentally touches the serum. He flees to the Sweet River Resort and settles in Room 4. General Morton promises Dr. Holder that he and his men will capture the criminal. By the time the soldiers catch up to him, however, he has already succumbed to the disease, but not before infecting a bellhop and killing a maid before finally cutting off his own hand in a failed attempt to stop the spread of the infection. Morton orders the patrons and staff killed and buried in a mass grave, and condemns the resort; the criminal's remains are delivered to him and his two right-hand men, Sergeants Tracey and Cheney, and burned. As Dr. Holder and Norma fear, the ashes quickly disperse into the air, infecting an entire flock of birds passing by. Meanwhile, a trio of GIs on vacation are on the lookout for some girls to make out with during their holiday; they find several on a nearby bus. Among the bus's passengers are Nancy, Carol, Lia, Suzanna, Jane, Jane's boyfriend Tom, and the bus driver, Joe. Not too far away, a tourist named Patricia and her boyfriend Glenn discover the dead birds and are promptly horrified as the birds reanimate and attack, with Glenn being pecked and clawed repeatedly. The birds then assault the bus while the GIs attempt to extricate everyone from it, but not before Lia gets bitten. Patricia and Glenn stop at a nearby garage but are forced to flee when a zombie wielding a machete attacks Patricia and the garage goes up in smoke when she sets the zombie afire. The GIs and the bus party make a stop at Sweet River Resort, which is now deserted. The men find a crate full of guns left behind by the soldiers and set about fortifying the place. Carol and Bo, one of the GIs, take an abandoned car from the resort's parking lot and drive off to look for some help. When their car breaks down, Carol goes looking for some water but is attacked and mauled by the zombies. Bo tries and fails to save her and is forced to flee when more zombies emerge from the lake. He eventually joins up with Patricia and Glenn. On the way to Santa Monica Hospital, Glenn dies and reanimates as a zombie on a bridge. During the resulting confrontation with the living dead, Bo is killed, but Patricia escapes with her life. Meanwhile, Dr. Holder and his team start work on an antidote to counter the effects of Death One as Morton's men start to eradicate the zombies. Back at the hotel, Jane and Tom go to the kitchen to look for some food but are ambushed and killed by a zombie head that had been resting in the freezer. Lia reanimates, kills and devours Susanna and almost kills Nancy before being thrown off the balcony and killed. Kenny and Roger encounter Patricia as she arrives to try to break the news about Bo's demise, but the living dead start swarming the hotel. Kenny, Roger, Patricia, Nancy, and Joe kill as many zombies as they can before fleeing. The next morning after crossing the river, the survivors are met by some of Morton's soldiers, who kill Joe. The other four escape as the final stage of Morton's zombie eradication begins and Dr. Holder expresses his worries that the infection of the atmosphere may not be restricted to the island. Arriving at the nearby Santa Monica Hospital, the four encounter a pregnant woman in labor. As Nancy helps deliver the newborn, Patricia engages in a final deathmatch against the zombie Glenn and beheads him, while Kenny and Roger have another run-in with Morton's cleanup crew. Nancy is killed by the zombified newborn when it tears its way out of the mother's womb and latches onto her face. Meanwhile Kenny, Roger and Patricia escape to find more zombies waiting for the kill. They make it to a helicopter, but only Kenny and Patricia are able to escape with their lives. Roger is attacked by the zombies while trying to join them and is subsequently killed by the cleanup crew. To Patricia's horror, the zombies have taken over; Blue Heart, the DJ who provided commentary for much of the film, even dedicates his next record to "all the undead around the world", having been infected himself. Upon hearing the broadcast, Kenny decides to return to the island, assuring Patricia that he intends to save what's left of humanity from the zombies. ===== ===== Daryl Chase (Orlando Jones) is a successful investment banker who handles international accounts for a major New York City firm. Chase discovers to his surprise that one of his biggest clients, a company from Mexico, is actually a front for a cartel of drug smugglers; he realizes too late that he's been framed for money laundering and the murder of two cops, and is now wanted by the FBI. Chase is soon approached by T.J. McReady (Gary Grubbs), a CIA agent, who thinks Chase's relationship with the Mexican drug kingpins might prove useful, but when his local contact disappears, Chase has to make his way to Mexico in order to save his skin and hopefully clear his name. Needing a new identity to get out of town and across the border, Chase obtains a stolen passport— and soon learns the man whose name he's using is in even deeper trouble with the law than himself. With nowhere else to turn, Chase asks streetwise hustler Freddy Tiffany (Eddie Griffin) (in reality, an undercover FBI agent) to help him get out of town; Chase pretends to be Freddy, while Tiffany will pose as a businessman like Chase. However, Chase finds out Tiffany isn't the man he thought he was, and that his sticky situation is even more perilous and fraught with secrets than he imagined. ===== The player assumes the role of Alex Hawkfield, an ordinary young man living in a small town who finds an old man dying in the street. He takes the old man (actually God in disguise) into his home and takes care of him. As he has proven his kindness, the old man tells him he has the potential to make the world better and become king, and asks him if he would like to try his potential. Alex does not know how to answer, but the old man senses his feelings and, seeing he is ready, sends him on a trial to recover the seven fragments of a mystic stone. Each time Alex recovers a stone fragment leads to the rebirth and invention of various things in his world. ===== In 1921, Hemingway's writing career suffered a setback when his first wife, Hadley, lost a bag containing the manuscript and all the carbon copies of his first novel on a Parisian train. Since that time there has been speculation about the nature of the novel and whether the manuscript survived and may turn up one day. Seventy-five years later in 1996, John Baird, a Hemingway scholar with a completely eidetic memory, is persuaded by Sylvester "Castle" Castlemaine, a grifter in Key West, to create a fake manuscript to be passed off as one of the lost copies. Initially reluctant, he goes along with this because, with some legal trickery, it may be possible to do it without attracting the attention of the authorities. However, instead he attracts attention from an altogether different quarter. Somewhere, or somewhen, there are entities who control the paths of destiny in the multiple parallel versions of our world that exist. Anything that affects the cultural influence of Hemingway is a threat to them. We eventually learn that many of the timelines are supposed to end in 2006 with a catastrophic nuclear war when two macho superpower leaders, both influenced by Hemingway's stories, refuse to back down in a crisis. If even a few timelines fail to reach this point, then the reverberations across the Omniverse will be fatal. Baird carries out research in the Hemingway collection at the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston, and attempts to get aged paper and the exact model of typewriter that Hemingway used. He gets three surprises. First, Hemingway appears to him on a train back from Boston to Florida, and warns him to give up on the scheme. Second, the Hemingway, as he comes to call it, kills him by inducing a massive stroke when he refuses. Third, he wakes up on the same train - or is it the same? He is slightly different himself, with two sets of similar but conflicting memories. The Hemingway entity is surprised as well. Humans are supposed to stay dead. Instead this one shifted to a parallel timeline. Back in Florida, life continues roughly as before. Castle brings in a seductress to bedazzle the scholar even as he has an affair with his wife Lena. Here the themes of the novel begin to parallel those of Hemingway's own stories. Through multiple encounters with the Hemingway entity, and multiple deaths, Baird stays with the scheme, as much to defy this mysterious tormentor as anything else. Each new world, however, seems a little worse than the last, especially when it comes to Castle's personality. In the final universe, Castle is a psychotic killer whom they attempt to have arrested on an out-of- state warrant. The Hemingway entity comes to Baird and offers to show him what happened to Hadley's bag, in exchange for giving up on the hoax. Travelling back in time, they see the thief is Hemingway himself, but he speaks to Baird and the entity before vanishing. Without knowing how, Baird finds himself back in his own time, with the bag. At that point Castle, having escaped arrest, violently kills all his co-conspirators with shotgun blasts. The scholar's awareness persists, and he is able to reverse the flow of time and rearrange events so that the women survive, even as he shoots the grifter and takes a shotgun blast in the mouth, imitating the real Hemingway's suicide. Now freed from his body, Baird has become like the entity that pursued him. He experiences Hemingway's memories, backwards from the end. Reaching the point where the young Hemingway, devastated and enraged by the loss of the manuscripts, crystallizes his masculine outlook and turns to face his future, Baird's awareness separates and comes to consciousness of his abilities. He moves back in time, steals Hadley's bag, allowing himself to be seen doing it in the person of Hemingway. He drops it off for himself to find in the present, before abandoning time for the spaces between. Thus, the "Baird entity" creates himself out of Hemingway's psychic trauma, and it is implied that he actually creates all the other entities we have encountered in the story. The novel ends with Hemingway writing the short story "Up in Michigan" in Paris in the 1920s, and suddenly experiencing an odd premonition of doom. ===== In August 1967, a group of boys arrive at the USMC induction center. They include hippie and draft dodger Dave Brisbee, who is delivered in handcuffs by FBI agents. The other inductees include hardened drug dealer Tyrone Washington, naive and unassuming Billy Ray Pike, streetwise New Yorker Vinnie Fazio and mild-mannered aspiring writer Alvin Foster. Foster begins writing a journal detailing his experiences. The five boys go through boot camp together. The training is dehumanizing and brutal, designed to make them think and act in unison. Sergeant Loyce and Staff Sergeant Aqullia use a combination of extreme training, brute force, and their own combat experience to teach the recruits. Washington's leadership skills flourish and he is promoted to squad leader. The five are then assigned to the same unit and shipped to Vietnam, and as their ship docks, the shelling begins. Vietnam is a bewildering chaos: bureaucratic incompetence, callous officers concerned only with monthly "body counts" and the constant threat of death. The soldiers' first firefight occurs while they are taking "vital supplies" to an army outpost. Those supplies turn out to be crates of cigarettes, liquor and furniture being sent to a general for his birthday, and two men die in the fighting. The officers in Company C are mostly incompetents who endanger the lives of their men through blind adherence to rules or timetables; their nervous Marines open fire on anyone and anything at the slightest provocation. In January 1968, Company C is ordered by its commanding officer to throw a soccer game against a team of South Vietnamese in order to bolster the morale of their ally. The Americans are told that if they lose, they will see no more combat; if they win, they will be sent to Khe Sanh. Despite everything, the Americans win. The game ends with a Vietcong attack, during which Foster heroically throws himself on a grenade to save some children. The film concludes with the final entry in Foster's journal, written moments before his death: "...I've decided to give up writing this journal, because I don't know who'd believe it after today. We had a chance to go home, and we blew it off for a soccer game...I guess we'll just keep on walking into one bloody mess after another, until somebody figures out that living has got to be more important than winning."Hyams, Jay. "War Movies" (1984) ===== After a prologue set at the Inn of the Last Home in Solace, the adventure begins at an outpost near Throtl, the capital city of the Hobgoblins. The party soon meets a group of Baaz Draconians ambushing some good settlers. After the battle, a greater Aurak Draconian named Myrtani shows up, and steals an ancient book. Myrtani teleports away, ignoring the party. The party then reports the events to Sir Karl. Sir Karl realizes that the evil forces are not at all weakened as was believed, and the party sets out to investigate and defeat Myrtani and his forces. ===== The plot revolves around a professional wrestler who, after developing a terminal illness, becomes a giant squid-like creature (Osamu Nishimura). As a giant squid, he must battle to reclaim his former life both inside and outside the ring. ===== Four co-eds from snowbound Penmore College in the Northeast head to Fort Lauderdale, Florida for spring break: Carole (Lorna Luft) taking a separate vacation from her steady boyfriend Chip (Howard McGillin), winds up as a hot contender in a "Hot Bod Contest"; Jennie (Lisa Hartman) is doubly lucky, courted by both a rich classical pianist (Daniel McDonald) and a devil- may-care rocker (Russell Todd); Sandra (Wendy Schaal) looking for the Mr. Right who will finally satisfy her; and Laurie (Lynn-Holly Johnson) a sex crazed nymphomaniac dreams of a night of unbridled passion with a real he-man. Laurie ends up getting her wish, albeit through a rather unexpected source. During the week-long festivities, the girls meet Sandra's snobbish aunt Barbara Roxbury (Louise Sorel) and her friend Maggie (Alana Stewart) and get to sample much of Fort Lauderdale's nightlife. They are also invited to a formal party at Barbara's house, which ends up being crashed by hundreds of spring breakers. ===== The book follows several stories of families in a small town in eastern Colorado. Maggie is the link between many of the other characters and strands of the novel. She introduces Victoria to the McPheron brothers, and has a romantic relationship with Tom. ===== The Hardy Boys and their friend Chet go to see Rattlesnake Clem to investigate a series of robberies. They must find out whether Clem is innocent or is the one who is masquerading as King George III. This was important mainly because of a discordant letter, which threatened to kill a hostage if one were not met with a series of bizarre demands. Although the mayor was the initial recipient of the letter, he thought it logical to allow two young boys to investigate this possibly deadly case instead of authority figures. ===== The Immoralist is a recollection of events that Michel narrates to his three visiting friends. One of those friends solicits job search assistance for Michel by including in a letter to Monsieur D. R., Président du Conseil, a transcript of Michel's first-person account. Important points of Michel's story are his recovery from tuberculosis; his attraction to a series of Arab boys and to his estate caretaker's son; and the evolution of a new perspective on life and society. Through his journey, Michel finds a kindred spirit in the rebellious Ménalque. ===== The documentary begins with a slide show of an old pictorial book displaying black and white original scenes of 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago and Swamiji at the Parliament of the World's Religions delivering his famous speech starting with "Sisters and brothers of America". As the audience gives a standing ovation, a gust of wind flipped the pages to the beginning of the storybook, where pictures come to life with bright multi- colored laser animation and 3D effects. The documentary included several of the major stages in Swami Vivekananda’s life including his birth, youth, meeting with his spiritual leader Sri Ramakrishna, taking his monastic vows, traveling across India as a penniless, itinerant monk, traveling to the United States as the first Hindu monk to speak at the Parliament of the World's Religions, introducing yoga, lecturing around the United States and other countries, founding the Ramakrishna Mission, and ultimately leaving behind a huge legacy. ===== The story revolves around a mother-son relationship set in Kodaikanal. The movie commences with Rama Krishna (Jiiva) and his mother Saradha (Saranya Ponvannan), a school teacher, lying in a pool of blood. The police finds that Raam is still alive and arrests him on charges of murdering his mother. Police Inspector Umar (Rahman) works on the case. The story is narrated in a flashback. Raam is a mentally affected teenager (later diagnosed as autistic) living dependent on his mother. His overcompulsive adoration for her lands her in various problems. Raam is provoked easily and tolerates little wrongdoing around him. Next door lives Karthikayeni (Gajala), the daughter of a Sub-Inspector Malaichamy (Murali). She falls for Raam, but upon telling him how she feels, gets a blunt response from him. One day, Saradha is found brutally murdered. Umar grills each and every person connected to her and Raam. Every possible motive Raam might have for murdering his mother is explored. Raam's neighbors, Malaichamy, and his children are summoned by Umar for interrogation. The police eventually find out that it was Karthika's brother Satish (Kunal Shah) who committed the murder, fearing Saradha would tell his parents about his drug addiction. When Umar confronts Satish and forces him to surrender, Satish fatally wounds him and escapes, injuring his father in the process. On finding her brother's hideout, Karthika tries to plead with him to surrender, but he refuses to do so and ties her up. Raam, seeking vengeance, finds the hideout. A brutal fight occurs between the two, and Raam kills Satish. The film ends as the police find the hideout while Raam is meditating on a dilapidated roof. ===== Rebecca is a film actress, who is about to make her stage debut at Lincoln Center. Her husband, Tom gave up a lucrative job in advertising to take care of their young daughter. Occasionally, Tom and Rebecca have sex; once a year, they meet with their therapist, Dr. Beekman. Tom and Rebecca's best friends are her brother Tobey, a sportswriter, and his girlfriend Elaine. Elaine, who has been dating Tobey for seven years, has begun to feel the ticking of her biological clock. Tom and Rebecca each face extramarital temptations. Tom responds to a personal crisis that stems from his decision to choose kids over career by watching pornography and having an affair with a divorced mother from his son's school. Rebecca is pursued on the set by a young costar, Jasper, who would like to be able to claim that he's bedded a famous actress. ===== Luna follows the life of sixteen-year-old Regan as she keeps the secret of her older sister Luna's transgender identity. During the day, Luna pretends to be an average senior boy named Liam. But at night, Luna is allowed to be her true self: Lia Marie, a girl. Later, she changes her female name to Luna, which means "moon", to reflect that her true identity could only be seen at night. After years of ‘transforming’ only at night, Luna confides in her sister that she wants to transition into a full-time female. Luna asks Regan to help her with her transitioning and, although she agrees, she finds herself worried about Luna and her safety. The novel follows Regan as she makes sense of her sister’s decision. Other problems arise for Regan as she is attending high school. She spends most of her life avoiding other students, in fear of letting the secret slip. But a new boy at school, Chris, becomes interested in her. Although Regan enjoys attention from Chris, she draws away from him, choosing to stay focused on Luna. As Luna is coming out more, her father starts to notice differences in his child and tries to push a more masculine role onto Luna. Regan’s father confides in her that he believes Luna is gay. Meanwhile, their mother remains oblivious to the rising tension in the household. Consumed by the workload of her wedding planning business, the mother is constantly out of the house and distant from her family. Despite the tensions and the negativity weighing on her choice, Luna fights for her right to be the person she feels that she was meant to be. Alongside her, Regan learns to stand her ground, to think more of herself, and discovers the person she wants to be. ===== Shaukeen has 3 lecherous old men, played by Ashok Kumar, Utpal Dutt and A.K. Hangal. And all the three old men had one weakness i.e. Women. One day they meet up at Ashok kumar's place for drinks and decide to go away for a while on a vacation and enjoy the last years of their life before becoming completely senile. They hire a driver Ravi (Mithun Chakraborty), a friend of the son of Choudhuri (Ashok Kumar), who takes the name Sakharam. He ends up convincing them to go to Goa where his lover, who works as a singer/dancer at a local club, resides. While in Goa, the three old men get into hilarious situations with Anita (Rati Agnihotri) as they try to impress her and try to get lucky with her, oblivious to the fact that she is their driver's love interest. ===== Seeta and Geeta (Hema Malini in a dual role) are twin girls who were separated at birth. Geeta, a feisty girl is raised in a poor neighborhood and is a street performer, while Seeta is raised by her cruel aunt Chachi and meek uncle. Chachi treats Seeta like a servant, despite the fact that the family is living off her late parents' money. Seeta's only consolation is her old wheelchair bound grandmother. One day, Seeta decides life is not worth living and runs away to commit suicide. She is saved but is mistaken for her identical twin Geeta and is taken to Geeta's home. Meanwhile, Seeta's aunt and uncle are frantically searching for her and find Geeta. They attempt to force Geeta to go with them but, using some of her clever tricks, she escapes them and the police who have been searching for her. She then meets Ravi (Sanjeev Kumar) and, though he also mistakes her for Seeta, she goes home with him. Ravi is surprised by this "Seeta" and the Seeta he had met previously. Geeta realizes the cruelty that Seeta has been living under and vows to teach her aunt a lesson. Meanwhile, the real Seeta is living in Geeta's house. Her surrogate mother has attributed her new docile attitude to shock. Here, Seeta meets Raka (Dharmendra), Geeta's friend and fellow performer. Raka is also surprised by "Geeta's" sudden gentle nature and desire to do housework. When he tried to coax her into performing, she is unable to do so. Ravi meanwhile falls in love with Geeta. At home, Geeta begins to set everything on a proper course. She resumes control of the money and restores her grandmother to the head of the household, where she belongs. Raka begins to fall in love with Seeta. Trouble begins brewing when Chachi's brother Ranjeet comes to visit and sees the real Seeta in a marketplace. He follows her and discovers the truth, which leads to a showdown in the villains' den and then marriage. ===== The story is about a rich spoiled girl Leena ( Leena Chandraverkar)who does not want to get married and hires a husband. She Lives with her Uncle and Aunt who are her Wealth Guardians till she gets married as per the provisions of her Late Father's will. Being a headstrong and self willed person, Leena concocts a plan on the advise of her best friend Pushpa, to hire a fake husband under a marriage contract in order to be eligible for her wealth. While her Uncle and aunt are looking for suitable Marriage Proposals for her, She herself gives an advertisement in the news paper for an eligible bachelor willing to get into a fake marriage contract for some monetary gains. Her advertisement is answered by a Sushil Kumar, a good looking resident of Dehra Dun amongst many. She decides on Sushil Kumar along with her friend Pushpa and Conveys to Sushil Kumar that she will come to Dehra Dun to marry him by the contract. She then announces to her Uncle and Aunt that she has found a suitable life partner and she is going to Dehra Dun to marry him alone. Uncle and aunt are very upset but since Uncle has a soft corner for her, he gives her some money for the journey with his blessings. On reaching Dehra Dun, she meets Sushil Kumar at the station but on finding him obnoxious looking ( not at all like his photo) decides to hide until he goes away, hence not meeting him at all. A street smart young man who helps her in this ( Sanjeev Kumar) becomes her confidante that she is here to hire a fake husband. He helps her in finding a hotel for the night and with his fast talking street smart ways introduces himself as a candidate for the post. Stuck in corner and not wanting to go back home without a husband, She agrees to marry him and they both sign a contract that it is a fake marriage and he is to give her divorce after two days of her inheriting her wealth. On reaching her home, to her surprise, Her Uncle and aunt are very impressed with her Husband ( introduced as Sushil Kumar) and take to him very well. He is also able to win over all her friends including Pushpa. However he remains civil with her and agrees to behave as she says.She wants Uncle to hand over her wealth and then Sushil Kumar and she will get a divorce but he does not seem to want to go away from her home as he misses his train to Dehra Dun. One day he disappears for few hours and she thinks he has absconded. But he arrives home and says that he was negotiating a deal for an apple orchard to give her a present. His slick answers irritate her and she sends him with some goons to settle the orchard deal, planning that the goons should beat him up to scare him. Instead after a few hours Sushil Kumar comes back saying that he bashed up the goons himself. Seeing his cuts and bruises, Leena repents and starts to develop soft feelings for Sushil Kumar. Now Sushil Kumar starts going out to outings and clubs with Pushpa and her friends leaving Leena behind. Leena becomes jealous of Pushpa and they have a fight over Sushil Kumar. After forcefully staying 2 days at her home, Sushil Kumar says he could stay here forever and start a "Husband on Hire" business as all her friends like him. Leena panics and forbids him from meeting her friends. She then pushes her Uncle and Aunt to hand over her wealth now that she is married but Uncle says that they have kept a Reception Party to introduce her Husband to society and then she will get her wealth. On the morning of the party, Uncle and Aunt hand over her property papers, Cash and jewellery to her and Sushil Kumar, with their blessings, saying that Sushil Kumar is a joint partner in all that she owns, as they find him more sensible and capable than Leena, to handle her wealth. Leena is so upset that she does not notice Sushil Kumar putting everything in a brief case and driving away. Not able to share her concerns about Sushil Kumar robbing her, with anyone in the house; she speaks to Pushpa as she comes for the Reception party and the two friends reconcile. Every one starts to come for the party and then Sushil Kumar comes. After the Party Leena lashes out at Sushil Kumar that he has deceived her and robbed her of her wealth. Then Sushil Kumar tells her that he spent the whole day, transferring the property back in her name only, putting the cash and jewellery in a bank locker, the key to which he gives her, and getting special divorce papers made by a magistrate that they just have to sign out of court. Leena is very shamefaced. Then he changes back to his old worn out clothes and says good bye to leave her. Then Leena falls at his feet and says that she loves him and cant live without him. To this he says that he will never live on his wife's money and if she loves him she will have to live in his home in poverty. As She agrees to this, Pushpa and the original Sushil Kumar walk in. Leena is shocked and surprised but Pushpa tears off this Sushil Kummar's false beard and tells her that it was her own fiancé in disguise as Sushil Kumar to scare her at Dehra Dun station. In reality he is the manager of the real Sushil Kumar, who is this hired husband ( Sanjeev Kumar) who is a very rich landlord of Dehra Dun. The real Sushil Kumar then tells Leena that he loves her and they live happily ever after. ===== Inspector Amar Nath apprehends and arrests a notorious gangster who goes by different aliases (Deshbandhu Jagannath, Pinto, Abdul Karim), and gets him sentenced to prison for several years. Amar, who comes from a wealthy family, defies his father, Jagirdar Bishamber Nath, and marries a poor but pretty woman, Sheela Sharma (Neeta Mehta). He is asked to leave the family home. Amar and Sheela settle elsewhere and soon are the proud parents of a daughter, Jyoti. They meet with the parents of young Deepak Kumar and arrange a child-marriage of their daughter with Deepak. Pinto escapes from prison, hunts down Amar and Sheela, and kills them. Luckily, a loyal employee and chauffeur, Abdul, saves their daughter's life. He takes her to Jagirdar, who accepts her with tears in his eyes. Years later, Deepak and Jyoti have grown up. While Jyoti still lives with her wealthy grandpa, Deepak's dad has died, leaving his widow destitute. When she goes to confirm their marriage, Jyoti shuns and humiliates her. This enrages Deepak and he hits Jyoti's friend and she gives a tight slap to Deepak who then vows to make Jyoti apologize to his mother, as well as confirm their marriage. But Jyoti is already in love with wealthy Raman, and Deepak meets a famous Bollywood actress, Sandhya, who falls in love with him. Jyoti after slapping Deepak twice for teasing her to marry Sandhya expresses her love. What will happen to the promise he made to his mother? The story has similarities with Manchali and deals with an arrogant spoiled girl hiring a person to act as her husband, so that she can get her grandfather to back off. Subsequently, it is about how the hired husband makes the girl come around to falling in love with him. Guest appearances were made by Rishi Kapoor and Danny Denzongpa. ===== Seema is the only child of widowed Mohan, who is adopted by Mohan's boss, Sardar Ranjit Singh, who has no heir to his estate, as his daughter, Jamuna, eloped with a poor peasant, Gopal. Ranjit does not get along with his step-brother, Shankar. Jamuna manages to placate her dad, & he goes to her house, only to find it in flames with Gopal burned to death, and their son, Sunder, missing. Years later, Seema has now grown up and meets with a young man named Pyarelal in Ooty. She meets him a year later, but this time he introduces himself as Jhatpat Singh, a man she was supposedly engaged to in their childhood. Shortly thereafter she meets with the real Jhatpat Singh, and changes her mind about the fake Jhatpat Singh alias Pyarelal. Now Sunil knows that he was adopted and understands that he was the lost son of Gopal. He goes to Sardar Ranjit Singh and appoints to be an estate manager. There he meets Seema again and they rekindle their romance. By that time, planning to steal away property, Shankar sends his son as the lost son of Jamuna and Gopal. Ranjit Singh believes him and wants to marry seema to Shankar's son. After some misunderstandings, family finally reunites and Jamuna's sanity returns. Movie ends with the marriage of Seema and Sunil/Sunder. It is one of two films in which Music Director Rahul Dev Burman plays a role of Jhatpat Singh's assistant in the film apart from giving the music for the film, the other being Bhoot Bungla. ===== Jake Sisko is returning from a medical conference with Dr. Bashir. Although Jake intended to write an article about the doctor, he discovers he's having trouble finding anything interesting to write about. They receive a distress call from a Federation colony which has just been attacked by the Klingons. Jake sees the potential for a good story, and convinces Dr. Bashir to take him along. Jake has trouble handling the chaotic emergency room situation at the hospital, particularly triage. One of the patients, a Starfleet officer, claims to have been shot in the foot by the Klingons, but Bashir discovers that the wound was self-inflicted, intended to get him out of the fighting. Jake is disgusted by the man's cowardice. Everyone expects the Klingons will take over the settlement within days if no reinforcements arrive. On Deep Space Nine, Jake's father, captain Benjamin Sisko, takes command of the Defiant to come to aid the colony. When the power goes out as a result of a Klingon attack, Jake and Dr. Bashir attempt to retrieve a portable generator from their runabout. They come under fire from the Klingons. Terrified, Jake abandons Dr. Bashir and runs. Jake comes across a mortally wounded combat officer and is desperate to help him, but the dying officer accuses Jake of merely trying to redeem his cowardice. When Jake returns to the hospital, he claims he became disoriented and was knocked unconscious. Bashir blames himself for putting Jake in danger. Jake talks to the soldier who shot himself in the foot, and the two commiserate over the terror of battle. Jake is upset at how calm people are acting, especially their gallows humor, and has an angry outburst. Bashir tries in vain to make him open up. The Klingons attack the hospital while Jake is sleeping. As the medical team tries to evacuate everyone, Jake is attacked by two Klingons. He picks up a phaser from a dead guard and begins firing wildly, which causes a cave-in that knocks him unconscious. Because of the cave-in, the patients are able to escape. Jake survives without injury other than a few bruises. He is considered a hero. He writes the truth in his article, concluding that the line between courage and cowardice is much thinner than he had thought. He gives a copy to Bashir and another to his father, who tells his son how proud he is. ===== The unreliable narrator, Latimer, believes that he is cursed with an otherworldly ability to see into the future and the thoughts of other people. His unwanted "gift" seems to stem from a severe childhood illness he suffered while attending school in Geneva. Latimer is convinced of the existence of this power, and his two initial predictions do come true the way he has envisioned them: a peculiar "patch of rainbow light on the pavement" and a few words of dialogue appear to him exactly as expected. Latimer is revolted by much of what he discerns about others' motivations. Latimer becomes fascinated with Bertha, his brother's cold and coquettish fiancée, because her mind and motives remain atypically closed to him. After his brother's death, Latimer marries Bertha, but the marriage disintegrates as he recognizes Bertha's manipulative and untrustworthy nature. Latimer's friend, scientist Charles Meunier, performs a blood transfusion from himself to Bertha's recently deceased maid. For a few moments the maid comes back to life and accuses Bertha of a plot to poison Latimer. Bertha flees and Latimer soon dies as he had himself foretold at the start of the narrative. ===== A young girl, Rupa (Sabina), mysteriously falls to her death from the third floor of The Park hotel in Dehradun. Before her fall, she bangs on the door of a man named Rocky (Shammi Kapoor), pleading with him to let her in. Her death is assumed to be suicide by everyone at the hotel, including Rocky. A year later, Rupa's sister Sunita (Asha Parekh) reveals to her friend that Rupa had written to her, confessing that she was in love with a drummer named Rocky at The Park hotel, and implying that they had sexual relations, and she desperately needs him to marry her. Sunita, believes Rocky seduced and then jilted her sister, which led her to commit suicide. She intends to travel to Dehradun, find Rocky and avenge her sister's death. On her way to Dehradun, she meets Anil - a charming but mischievous man who flirts with her. As she checks into The Park hotel to find Rocky, she finds Anil there too, and he continues to woo her. Unbeknownst to her, Anil is Rocky. Anil finds out about Sunita's real intentions, and misleads her - making another coworker impersonate Rocky, while he continues to pursue her as Anil. He even lies about his job - telling her he is the nephew and heir of a wealthy landlord who resides in a local mansion in Dehradun. While initially Sunita rebukes him and rebuffs his advances, she eventually falls in love with him, even confiding in him about her sister's tragic death and her hatred for Rocky. Anil keeps up his charade and ends up having to entertain Sunita and her friends at his 'uncle's' mansion. His lie is almost caught when the real owner of the mansion Kunwarsahab (Prem Nath) shows up. However, Kunwarsahab plays along and covers for Anil. The two become good friends. Sunita invites Anil and his 'uncle' to meet with her father so they can begin planning the wedding. Anil requests Kunwarsahab to explain the whole truth to Sunita and her father, however, Kunwarsahab instead keeps up the pretense and agrees on the alliance. With no other option, Anil writes a letter to Sunita explaining that he is Rocky, but he never seduced her sister, and had no idea she would kill herself over him. Sunita is aghast when she reads the letter and breaks up with him. As he tries to unsuccessfully pursue and convince her, he in intercepted by a police inspector who is investigating Rupa's murder. Anil tells the inspector that Rupa relentlessly pursued him last year, despite being engaged to another man, Ramesh (Prem Chopra). This made Ramesh furious and he threatened to kill Rupa in front of Anil. On the night she fell, Rupa had called Anil, telling him she desperately wants to meet with him, however Anil had refused and did not open the door when Rupa banged on it. A few minutes later, he heard her fall. Anil suspects Ruby to be Rupa's murderer, as she had intercepted Rupa and Anil's call, and was always jealous of any other woman who came close to Anil. However, during a confrontation, Ruby is shot by an unknown assailant. The inspector takes Anil into custody, warning him that the shooter was aiming for Anil, not Ruby, because they believe Anil is getting close to discovering the real killer. He shows Anil an expensive coat button found in Rupa's hand which he believes she tore off of her killer's coat. Anil then suspects Ramesh, Rupa's rich fiance who had threatened to kill her. Ramesh denies the accusation, although he was present at the hotel on the night Rupa died, and is also seen secretly bribing someone dressed as Ruby's killer with a bottle of whisky. However, without any proof, he is let off. As Anil returns to his hotel room, an unknown woman, Meena (Laxmi Chhaya) visits him, telling him to take her car and go to a restaurant at the bottom of the hill, where he will find the conspirators. Anil does so, but finds while driving that the car has been sabotaged. He leaps out as the car plummets down a cliff. Presumed dead by everyone, he secretly visits Sunita, convinced that Ramesh killed both Rupa and Ruby and is now trying to kill him. He enlists Sunita's help, who now believes his innocence and takes him to meet Ramesh at the Park Hotel. While there, Anil spots the same woman who set him up with the sabotaged car, and pursues her. He is surprised to see her drive into Kunwarsahab's mansion. Shocked at seeing him, Kunwarsahab insists that Anil is not safe anywhere and must stay with him. He forces Anil into an old room and instructs him to stay there till morning. As he begrudgingly goes through a closet, looking for clothes to change into, Anil comes across a coat with the exact same buttons that the inspector had shown him. The coat is missing a button. Realizing that Kunwarsahab is the real killer, Anil forges an escape, just as Kunwarsahab and Meena enter his room to kill him in his sleep. Anil gets a hold of Bela while Kunwarsahab leaves to look for him, and forces her to confess the real truth. Meena divulges to the inspector that she and Kunwarsahab had an affair that his wife discovered, and tried to shoot him. Kunwarsahab tackled her, shooting her in the tussle. While they are burying her corpse, Rupa spots them as she is on her way to meet Rocky. She gives herself away and flees to the hotel, with Kunwarsahab in pursuit. She bangs on Rocky's door, but he does not open, unaware of her predicament. Kunwarsahab picks her up and throws her off the third floor. Kunwarsahab enters at the very moment and shoots Meena, killing her. He then tries to kill Anil, however, goes over the ledge of his mansion in the struggle. Anil holds onto him, asking him to surrender himself to the police, who have arrived on the scene. However, Kunwarsahab prefers to die, and lets go of Anil's hand, falling to his death from the third floor of his mansion. The film ends with Anil and Sunita going back to Delhi on the same train where they met the first time. ===== The movie starts with Rajkumar and Parvathamma Rajkumar blessings Shiva Rajkumar (as Madesha), explaining value of birth, prayers of baby for birth and parents in bit song. The film is narrated in a non-linear fashion, with the use of several multiple flashbacks. In the opening scene, a dreaded underworld don is brutally hacked to death by unknown assailants. The police arrive at the crime scene and arrest the unknown assailant revealed as the superstar hero of the movie. The murder is revealed to be the handiwork of a novice, Madesha alias Jogi who works in a roadside tea stall. In the meantime, news about the murder reaches the echelons of the underworld. A rival gang of the slain don bails out Madesha from the lock-up and requests him to be their associate. Madesha rejects their offer and returns to his tea stall. An inquisitive trainee journalist Nivedhitha (Jennifer Kotwal) is eager to know about Madesha and requests an appointment with him. Despite trailing Madesha for several days, she is unable to interview him. Subsequently, she meets an old woman (Arundathi Nag) from a remote village, who has come in search of her lost son. After listening to her story, Nivedhitha assures her that she will locate her son. In a flashback, it is revealed that the old lady's son is none other than Madesha. Madesha originally hailed from a village called Singanallur, Kollegal Taluk, South Karnataka and lived with his parents. His father (Ramesh Bhat) earned his living as a Jogi - a wandering minstrel, who went from one household to another and collected alms in return for singing. Due to the strenuous workload, he falls ill and dies. Enticed by his childhood friend, who flaunts his success, Madesha decides to try his luck in the city. However, in the city, he gets tangled with anti-social elements and ends up in jail. His anxious mother comes to the city in search of him. Jogi is misled and convinced by underworld dons that if he takes up arms, it would be easy for him to find his mother. His mother dies before even seeing her son. Jogi, who does not know this, dances in front of her dead body. When he discovers that he performed the last rites of his mother without realising it, he is completely broken. On the other hand, the underworld men (who are introduced during the course of the movie) and who wanted to hack Jogi to death, also drop arms saying, "Jogi took up arms for his mother, for what reason are we fighting?". The movie thus ends with a message of peace and love for all. ===== In 1919 Latvia, a detachment of German Freikorps soldiers is stationed in a chateau in the town of Kratovice to fight Bolshevik guerrillas. The chateau is the home of the soldier Konrad von Reval and his sister Sophie von Reval. Sophie is attracted to another soldier, a close friend of Konrad's named Erich von Lhomond. However, the reticent Erich rebuffs her advances. In retaliation, Sophie has trysts with other members of the military troop. Erich is noticeably angered by her behavior. Eventually, Sophie learns that Erich and Konrad are lovers. After this discovery, she joins the leftist guerrillas, whom she had been in contact with previously. Erich's soldiers capture her and her comrades. Sophie asks that Erich execute her himself, and he obliges. In a striking single tracking shot, we see Erich casually shoot Sophie in the head before joining in a photo with the other soldiers. As all board a train, the camera pans back to the corpses of the executed. ===== The player's spaceship crash-lands on Doom's inhospitable surface and they emerge from the wreckage to realise that, unless they can locate the necessary spare parts, their ship will corrode away in a mere 400 time units. ===== Set in Glasgow, the film tells the story of the Khan family. Casim is the only son of Pakistani Muslim immigrants to Scotland. He has a younger sister, Tahara, and an older sister Rukshana. Casim's parents, Tariq and Sadia, have arranged for him to marry his first cousin, Jasmine, and Casim is more or less happy with the arrangement. He then meets and falls in love with Roisin, an Irish Catholic immigrant (who is a part-time music teacher in Tahara's Catholic school). Roisin books a short holiday break for them both on seeing an advert in a travel agent's shop window, and while on holiday Casim tells her about the arranged marriage his family are planning for him. They then have to decide whether their love is strong enough to endure without the support of their respective communities. At the same time, rebellious Tahara struggles to find herself between the bullying of some Scottish schoolmates and her Pakistani relatives. Meanwhile, Rukhsana loses her fiancé because Casim's new relationship shames the family. Roisin loses her job because the Catholic school's direction does not accept her relationship since she is a married – though separated – woman and because she and Casim are living together. Roisin is finally moved by her hierarchy to a non-denominational school, Casim confronts his family, begging them to respect his choice before returning to her, while Tahara leaves to study Journalism at the University of Edinburgh against her parents' will. ===== There is no fixed plot running through the series, as most episodes are isolated, except for episodes 07-08 and 20-21, which are linked. In one episode, they venture around, and soon, they find themselves in "Straight" land, and in another, they chase after a falling star, demonstrating Dogtato's playful style of storytelling. ===== Frank Keane (Robert Carlyle) is a grieving baker unable to move on after his wife's suicide. Frank happens upon a car accident involving Steve Mills (John Goodman) who has suffered serious injuries. Steve was on his way to a ballroom dancing class in Pasadena to meet a childhood friend and asks Frank to go in his place. Frank reluctantly agrees. As the film progresses the story moves back and forth through the timeline of Steve's childhood, the accident scene, and the aftermath of Frank's first Lindy hop. Steve's friend does not appear at the dance class. Frank's depressive state makes him uncomfortable in an environment with so many people. However, he is drawn to shy student Meredith (Marisa Tomei). Some of the students caution him against talking to her. Meredith's partner Randall (Donnie Wahlberg), the star pupil, is an obnoxious bully who takes an instant dislike to Frank and tries to intimidate him. Frank's friends from grief therapy convince him to continue with the dance class and soon the entire therapy group has joined. As the class progresses Frank discovers a natural talent for dance that surpasses Randall's. Randall jealously slashes Frank's tires in an attempt to scare off the baker. Frank ignores the attack against the advice of others and forms a friendship with Meredith, who is revealed as Randall's stepsister and not his abused girlfriend as people assumed. Meredith defends her stepbrother's overprotective behavior, which developed in response to their father's violent physical abuse. Frank eventually scatters his wife's ashes, an act he had been unwilling to perform in the past. He begins to put his life back together. He tracks down Steve's childhood friend (Camryn Manheim) to inform her of Steve's death. She reacts as if their missed reunion means nothing, but privately she cries as she sifts through her mementos of Steve. Frank and Meredith begin a relationship, and with the other members of the dance class continue to find friendship and healing in dance. ===== The lawyer Honda visits Thailand on a business trip and encounters a young girl whom he believes to be his schoolfriend's second reincarnation. Eleven years later she travels to Japan to study and he befriends her in the hope of learning more. The main narrative takes place between 1941 and 1952. The last chapter is set in 1967. ===== ===== Margaret Hale (Daniela Denby-Ashe) and her parents Maria (Lesley Manville) and Richard (Tim Pigott-Smith) live in the idyllic town in Helstone in Hampshire. At the wedding of her cousin, Edith, Margaret is approached by Edith's new brother-in-law, Henry Lennox (John Light). Lennox visits Helstone a while later and proposes marriage to Margaret; she refuses him. Margaret's father, a clergyman, decides to leave the Church of England and become a Nonconformist when he realises his doubts of the doctrines of the Church. To avoid gossip, the family move to the (fictional) industrial town of Milton, Darkshire, in the north of England. Thanks to his friend, Mr. Bell (Brian Protheroe), Mr. Hale is able to find a house and gains employment as a private tutor. One of his pupils is local mill-owner John Thornton (Richard Armitage), who gets off to a bad start with Margaret when she witnesses him beating a worker whom he has caught smoking in the mill, thus endangering all the workers. Gradually, Margaret gets used to Thornton, but his mother Hannah (Sinéad Cusack) and sister Fanny (Jo Joyner) disapprove of her, believing her haughty and alien to the customs of the North. In the meantime, Margaret attempts to do charitable work among the working classes, and thus comes into contact with Nicholas Higgins (Brendan Coyle) and his daughter, Bessy (Anna Maxwell Martin), who contracted Byssinosis from exposure to the cotton-fibres in the mills. When Bessy became ill at Hamper's Mill, her father moved her to Marlborough Mills, Thornton's mill, because the working environment is better there. In a meeting with fellow mill owners, Thornton says he had a wheel for ventilation installed in all of the rooms of his factory in order to maintain a healthier workforce, despite the fact that it costs a great deal of money. The other industrialists had refused to install a wheel because of the expense. Margaret's mother is falling ill. Mrs. Hale desires to see her son, Frederick (Rupert Evans), before she dies. Frederick, a naval officer, was involved in a mutiny and he cannot return to England without risking his life. However, without telling her father, Margaret writes to her brother in Cádiz, Spain, to tell him that their mother is dying. Margaret calls on the Thorntons to borrow a water mattress for her mother and is trapped while mill workers riot during a strike. When the angry mob threatens John's safety as he confronts them after Margaret's goading, Margaret defends him from the rioters and is injured by a thrown stone. Margaret recovers and returns home, telling nobody about what had happened at the Mill, mainly to protect the health of her mother. When Thornton proposes to her the next day, she scorns him, thinking he believes himself superior because of the difference in their financial circumstances. He denies this and tells her that he is in love with her, but she insists that her actions were not personal. Meanwhile, Bessy Higgins dies and Thornton stops coming for lessons from Mr. Hale. As a distraction for Mrs. Hale and for herself, Margaret visits the Great Exhibition with her Aunt Shaw (Jane Booker), her cousin Edith and Edith's husband. Margaret meets Thornton at the exhibition, where he is discussing the machinery with a group of gentlemen, all of whom are listening with great respect and admiration for his simple good sense. Margaret is embarrassed to meet Thornton so soon after her rejection but defends him when Henry Lennox (John Light), Edith's brother-in-law and an admirer of Margaret, tries to belittle him for being in trade. As Margaret observes them together, Henry's sophistication and reliance on fashionable wit and sarcasm compares unfavourably with Thornton's honesty. When Margaret returns home, her mother has taken a turn for the worse. Margaret's brother arrives just in time to see his mother, and she dies shortly after. While Frederick is in the house, Thornton comes to visit his friend Mr. Hale, but he cannot be allowed in, in case he sees Fred. Thornton interprets this as Margaret refusing to see him. The family's servant, Miss Dixon (Pauline Quirke), bumps into Leonards, a former member of Frederick's crew in Milton town, who offers to split the reward money for Frederick's capture with her. Dixon refuses, informing the Hales; it is decided that Frederick must leave at once, before he is discovered and arrested. He and Margaret are seen together at the railway station by Thornton, who mistakenly assumes that Frederick is Margaret's lover. Leonards spies on him and Margaret at the station, and in the brief scuffle Fred pushes him down the stairs. It is later revealed that he died in hospital. Margaret denies to the police that she was at the station, in order to protect Fred, but Thornton, who is the magistrate and saw her there, is morally tested, but ultimately calls off the impending inquiry for the sake of Margaret. Thornton gives employment to Higgins who seeks work to care for Boucher's children after his death, and master and hand get along surprisingly well, despite their differences. They come up with a plan to feed the workers cheaply in a communal kitchen, and Thornton comes to a greater understanding with his workers as they share ideas. However, losses faced during the strike have put Thornton's business in trouble, and he is forced to close the mill. Margaret's father visits Mr. Bell in Oxford, and dies there. With no family to keep her in Milton, Margaret leaves the north to stay with her aunt in London. After a few months living with the Shaws, Margaret visits Helstone with Mr. Bell, and meets the new vicar and his wife. Margaret is disappointed to find Helstone much changed, and realises that she has romanticised and idealised her childhood home, and starts to truly recognise the merits of life in Milton. As Margaret's godfather, Mr. Bell makes over his significant fortune to her when he finds out that he has a terminal illness and chooses to move to Argentina for the better climate. Margaret hence becomes the owner of Marlborough Mills and John Thornton's landlord. Margaret visits Milton with Henry Lennox, who is now acting as her financial advisor; she speaks with Mrs. Thornton at Malborough Mills, expressing her realisation of Mr. Thornton's true character. Meanwhile, Thornton, having discovered the truth about Fred being Margaret's brother from Higgins, goes south to see Margaret's home town of Helstone. At a railway station halfway between Milton and Helstone, Margaret and Thornton cross paths on their respective return journeys. She proposes a business deal by which the factory can be reopened; after this the two share a kiss. Margaret bids farewell to Henry, and gets on the train "home" to Milton with Thornton. ===== After Joe builds a home theater system, Peter decides to build a multiplex in his backyard out of spite. While digging, Peter finds the skull of a Native American buried in the backyard. Brian frequently urges him to return the skull to its resting place, but Peter treats it as a novelty (playing with it, urinating in it, wearing it as an athletic cup, etc.). That night the Griffins start experiencing strange paranormal activity: Stewie talks to the TV static, the chairs and refrigerator stack themselves upside down on the kitchen table, Peter rips at the flesh on his face until he uncovers Hank Hill's face, and Chris gets scared by the McDonald's clown, Ronald McDonald and he then gets attacked by an evil tree before being saved by Herbert. Lois is in denial of the events until Stewie gets sucked into his closet and disappears. To find Stewie, the Griffins hire a spiritual medium (Bruce the Performance Artist in one of his many jobs) to contact the other side, and learn that the entrance to the spirit world is Stewie's closet, while the exit is "Meg's ass". Unable to wait for Stewie to come out of the closet (he is obviously reluctant to exit from Meg's rear end), Lois enters the portal and rescues Stewie. The enraged spirits emerge and ravage the Griffin house, sucking it into their world. As the Griffins drive off, Peter dumps the Native American skull in a garbage can. Now homeless, Peter and Lois try to find a way to get their house back, and learn the Native American skull has to be put back in its resting place. After searching through the city dump, a garbage man tells them that the skull would be in the human remains bin, but it was cleaned out by Carrot Top for things to use as props. They go to Carrot Top's mansion and, after a chase through a hall of mirrors, they retrieve the skull and rebury it, thereby getting back their house and returning life to normal. At the end, Lois takes the TV and moves it outside the front door but Peter comes out, retrieves it and puts Meg outside instead. ===== While attempting to make Peter brush his teeth, Lois hears a noise from downstairs and discovers burglars have entered the house. The rest of the family awakens and flee to Peter's self-built panic room in the attic and begin to monitor what the robbers are doing through hidden cameras. Due to the room not having a telephone or an inside door handle, they cannot escape, and Peter begins to tell stories about the history of the Griffin family. The stories begin with the Big Bang, and then moves to the Paleolithic Age, where it is revealed that Peter's ancestor invented the wheel. The second story sees another Moses as a member of the Griffin family during the Bronze Age leading the Israelites to freedom and presenting the Ten Commandments. The family soon discovers that Meg can fit through the vent, so they force Meg through the vent and into the kitchen. Peter uses a loud speaker to contact Meg from the panic room, therefore alerting the burglars to the fact that somebody is in the kitchen. In order to take the family's mind off Meg being captured, Peter tells the story of Nate Griffin. Nate lived in the small African village of Quahogsuana, but was captured by a white version of Cleveland Brown from South Carolina and taken to America aboard a slave ship. He, along with Quagdingo and Joe Mama, prank the ship captain. While sleeping, they push his bed into the ocean. Nate is caught after briefly escaping and forced to work on a plantation. He falls in love with the owner's daughter, Lois's relatives, and together, they bring up a secret family. After being discovered by his lover's father, the couple and their children escape, where Nate sets up the Department of Motor Vehicles to "get back at the white man". After finishing the story, Peter carelessly aims a flare gun through an air vent, causing the sprinklers to come on. Meanwhile, Meg is trying to persuade the burglars to rape her but they are not interested. The rest of the family, still trapped in the panic room, are preparing to potentially drown from the sprinklers filling the room up with water. Peter tells the story of his ancestor, Willie "Black-Eye" Griffin, who was a silent film star in the Roaring Twenties, but whose career later faltered due to his voice (much like Bobcat Goldthwait's) not being cut out for talking pictures. Peter then tells his family about his great uncle, Peter Hitler, who was able to provide Adolf Hitler with success at his Munich speech, although annoying Adolf greatly. As the water from the sprinklers almost reaches its peak, Peter admits to the family that he did not care for The Godfather and a heated debate ensues, ending with Peter declaring his love for The Money Pit. At the last minute Joe rescues them, draining the water out of the room, thus saving their lives. Joe informs the family he has arrested the burglars, but they are pressing harassment charges against Meg. Joe warns that they will need a lawyer to combat the charges, but the family ignores him, and Joe finally gives up and takes Meg away while the family ignores her cries for help. ===== Peco (real name Yutaka Hoshino) and Smile (real name Makoto Tsukimoto) are members of Katase High table tennis club. Peco is charismatic and has a passion for the sport, while Smile is introverted. Tsukimoto's friends in the table tennis club nicknamed him "Smile" as he does not smile often. The characters have known each other, and Demon (Akuma 悪魔, real name Manabu Sakuma), since primary school. Despite Smile's greater natural talent, he sees the sport as simply a way to pass the time, and often lets less able players such as Peco beat him out of consideration for their feelings. Peco hears about a new table tennis player brought over from Shanghai, China, to beat local hero Dragon for Tsujido Academy: "China". Dragon (real name Ryūichi Kazama) plays for the fight, in search of a worthy opponent. In an informal set, China (real name Kong Wenge) completely shuts out Peco, winning 21 to 0. Peco is devastated by the loss. This is compounded at the next inter-school competition where Sakuma also beats Peco in the third round of the tournament. Smile, meanwhile, lets China beat him out of kindness for his opponent. Sakuma's team from Kaio Academy—led by Dragon, a top competitor and strict disciplinarian—wins the overall competition. Sakuma confronts Peco, telling him he lost because he was coasting. Peco jumps into a river as a symbolic rebirth and trains with Tamura to get back into his school team. In the next high school tournament, Peco beats China in the first round and Dragon in the semi-final despite an injured knee. During this match, Dragon experiences the joy of playing table tennis for the first time. Peco and Smile meet in the final. Several years later, Peco has fulfilled his dream of playing professionally in Europe, while Smile helps a young boy learn the sport. A photo behind Smile shows Peco, Smile and Dragon having taken first, second and third places respectively. ===== The novel opens in a Confederate military hospital near Raleigh, North Carolina, where Inman is recovering from battle wounds during the American Civil War. The soldier is tired of fighting for a cause he never believed in. After considering the advice from a blind man and moved by the death of the man in the bed next to him, he decides one nightfall to slip out of the hospital and return home to Cold Mountain, North Carolina. At Cold Mountain, Ada's father soon dies. The farm, named Black Cove, that the genteel, city-bred Ada lives on is soon reduced to a state of disrepair. But she is saved from destitution by a resourceful-but-homeless young woman named Ruby, who soon moves in with her. Together, they clean the place up and return it to productivity. Ruby also teaches Ada how to survive in these very difficult times. Ada shares her knowledge of literature with Ruby. Inman soon becomes aware of the Confederate Home Guard, who hunt down military deserters from the Confederacy. He meets a preacher called Veasey, whom he catches in the act of attempting to murder the woman he has impregnated. After Inman dissuades him, they travel together. They butcher a dead bull that had fallen into a creek and the bull's owner, Junior, gives them away to the Home Guard. They are put into a group of other captured prisoners and march for days before the Home Guard decides to simply shoot them because they are "too much trouble". Veasey steps forward to try to stop them and is killed. Inman is grazed by a bullet that has passed through Veasey and is thought to be dead. The Guardsmen dig a shoddy mass grave and Inman pulls himself out, helped in part by some passing wild pigs. He cannot bury Veasey, so he turns him face down and continues on. Inman's journey is rough. He faces hunger and an attempted armed robbery at a rural tavern, even though he carries a LeMat revolver for protection. Occasionally, he is helped and sheltered by civilians who want nothing to do with the war. Through cunning ingenuity, he helps one of them track and recover a hog, her only possession and source of food for the winter, which had just been seized by Union soldiers. He is also helped by a woman who owns goats, who gives him advice and medicines to finally heal his wounds. Ruby's father, Stobrod, is caught stealing corn at Ada's farm. Ruby reveals he was a deadbeat who abused and neglected her when she was very young; he is also a Confederate deserter. Nevertheless, Ruby grudgingly feeds him. Soon he returns another day with a simple-minded friend named Pangle. Together they entertain everyone by playing the fiddle and banjo. However the Home Guard, led by the sadistic Captain Teague, eventually tracks them down and shoots them. A third companion, referred to as "Georgia," escapes the killing and goes off to alert Ada and Ruby. The two women ride and find Stobrod barely alive. Ada and Ruby pitch camp to give him a place to recover. After Inman arrives at Black Cove to find it empty, he sets out to find Ada on the mountain. Unexpectedly he soon encounters her out hunting wild turkeys. Both have changed so greatly in their appearance and demeanor since they parted that it is some moments before they recognize one another. Inman takes up camp with Ada and Ruby. Ruby is afraid Ada will dismiss her now she has a husband, and Ada reassures her that she needs her as a friend and for her ideas and help. Ruby gives the pair her blessing. Later Ada and Inman make love. They happily begin to imagine the life they will have together at Black Cove and make plans for their future. However, as the party begins the trek back to the farm, they encounter the Home Guard. A shootout commences in which Inman kills all the members of the Home Guard except for 17-year-old Birch, Teague's vicious protégé. Inman eventually corners the boy against a rock ledge but is reluctant to shoot him down in cold blood. However, after attempts fail to convince Birch to lay down his arms and leave, the boy shoots and kills Inman. Ada is left a pregnant widow. She raises her daughter at Black Cove, where she lives with Ruby, who got married with “Georgia” and has three sons, and Stobrod. ===== Marcia Green (Audrey Reid) is a single mom and street vendor barely scraping by even with a financial assist from the seemingly avuncular Larry (Carl Davis), a gun-toting strongman with a twisted desire for Marcia's teenage daughter Tanya (Cherine Anderson) who he then decides to pursue. Complicating things is Priest (Paul Campbell), a murderous hoodlum who killed Marcia's friend and now is terrorizing the defenseless woman. Facing three big problems (Larry, Priest, and without money), Marcia arrives at an inspired solution: develop an alter ego, a dancing celebrity called the Mystery Lady who can compete in a cash-prize contest and put both of the men against one another. She does so and Marcia very amusingly carries out her complicated plan, with a little help from sympathetic friends. ===== An irresponsible young man (Leslie Zevo) would not take over the company and now his father is dying. In order to get his young adult son to accept his new responsibilities, the father must force him to reclaim his toy factory from a strait-laced Army general (Lt. General Leland) that he has appointed as part of a "test of maturity". ===== National video gamers Charlie and Jimmy are given a strange game in the mail. After loading a strange-looking game cartridge, the boys find themselves transported into the game. They are sucked in by an evil being known as the Critic. Now Jimmy and Charlie must fight for their lives through four Dream Worlds (Medieval, Egyptian, Prehistoric, and Future) if they hope to return home safely. Collecting nine hidden puzzle pieces from each level will take the guys to the final showdown with the Critic and hopefully back to reality. ===== The story is about two brothers, both competing for the affection of their ailing mother, the friendship of their workmates and the love of a beautiful woman. Boza, the older brother dedicates himself to hard work at the printing plant where they are both employed. His younger brother Dan slacks off and loots the factory for things to sell on the black market. He drinks with his friends at the local bar and has sex with many loose women. When Boza falls in love with a beautiful coworker, Dan makes love to her just to spite his older brother (in a very shocking sex scene). Dan's torment and cruelty to his older brother continues until it has a shocking result. Set in the dark world of Communist era Czechoslovakia, this disturbing film targets the very cruel nature of human beings to take advantage of those less fortunate. It also targets the corruption of the world in which the characters live. ===== While growing up in Oklahoma, young Lane Frost (Cameron Finley) learns the tricks of the bull riding trade at the hand of his father, Clyde (James Rebhorn), an accomplished rodeo bronco rider himself. As he enters his teenage and early adult years, Lane (Luke Perry) travels the western rodeo circuit with his best friends Tuff Hedeman (Stephen Baldwin) and Cody Lambert (Red Mitchell). He meets and falls in love with a young barrel racer, Kellie Kyle (Cynthia Geary), and they eventually marry in 1984. As Lane's legend and fame increase, so does the amount of pressure he puts on himself, to be what everyone wants him to be, and he wants to show that he is as good as they say he is. His ascent to the world championship is marred by a cheating incident, questions about Kellie's devotion, and a near broken neck. The film also follows him through the true life series between himself and Red Rock, a bull that no cowboy had ever been able to stay on for 8 seconds. It cuts the series down to three rides. In 1989, he is the second-to-last rider at the Cheyenne Frontier Days Rodeo. While riding on the bull known as "Takin' Care Of Business", he dismounts after his 8-second ride but the bull turns back and hits him in the side with his horn, breaking some ribs and severing a main artery. As a result of excessive internal bleeding, he dies on the arena floor before he can be transported to the hospital. The final scene shows Hedeman later that same year at the National Finals Rodeo riding for the world championship. After the 8 second bell sounds, he continues to ride and stays on an additional 8 seconds as a tribute to his fallen best friend. ===== Jeeva, A tribal Pathan leader attacks a rival pashtun clan harbouring a drug trafficker killing the drug lord and members of the pashtun clan. the two remaining sons of the clan pledge to take revenge for the killings. ===== One warm June night, a university student called Kirsten is viciously attacked in a park by a serial killer. He is interrupted, and Kirsten survives, but in a severe physically and psychologically damaged state. As the killer continues, leaving a longer trail of mutilated corpses, Kirsten confronts her memories and becomes convinced not only that she can, but that she must remember what happened. Through fragments of nightmares, the details slowly reveal themselves to Kirsten as she eventually finds out the truth. Interwoven with Kirsten's story is that of Martha Browne, a woman who arrives in the Yorkshire coastal town of Whitby with a sense of mission. Finally, the two strands are woven together and united in a startling, chilling conclusion. ===== The independent Earth Colony Axista Four was supposedly founded in the 2439 by Stewart Ransom, a noted humanitarian. Arriving on the colony one hundred years later, the Doctor, Zoe and Jamie find a near-civil war. 'Realists' have abandoned Ransome's 'back to basics' ideals and are raiding the remains of the colony ship to further their technological advancements. The 'Loyalists' are in danger of extinction. In a little-known underground bunker, aliens who claim to be the planet's first colonists are stirring. Hopeful colonists hope Random's daughter, Kirann, can be revived from cryogenic suspension and reunited the colony. This does not work out as expected. ===== The lovely, humble Nastya is despised by her stepmother who favors her own mean-spirited and ugly daughter, Marfushka. Her meek father is powerless to stop his wife. After forcing Nastenka to knit socks before the rooster crows (with Nastya ultimately imploring the sun to go down again so she can have more time), Nastya's stepmother gives Nastya the tasks of feeding the chickens, watering the cattle, splitting wood, and sweeping the yard. Meanwhile, Ivan finishes his chores and heads out into the woods after receiving some final words of guidance from his mother, such as not forgetting his mother, not harming the weak, and honoring those who are old. To all these pieces of advice Ivan off- handedly replies "Don't worry" repeatedly. While traveling in the woods, Ivan is accosted by a group of bandits. He quickly distracts them and tosses their wooden clubs so high in the air that he claims they won't fall down again until winter. Later, Ivan meets the elderly Starichok-Borovichok (eng. The Little Old Man - the Little Boletus), who playfully challenges Ivan to try and catch him, offering a prize if he does. Being able to turn invisible, Starichok-Borovichok soon wins and offers a contrite Ivan the prize anyway - a fine bow and quiver of arrows. However, when asked to bow before him in gratitude, Ivan boastfully declares, "The bear may bow before you, but not Ivan" and leaves. Starichok-Borovichok remarks that the bear will indeed bow before him, but it would be Ivan's back that would bend. Ivan comes across Nastya in the woods, ordered to pour water on a stump to make flowers grow in it. Taken by her beauty, he immediately asks her to marry him, citing his many accomplishments. She demurs, noting that he is too much of a braggart. Eager to prove his worth, he attempts to shoot a mother bear with her cubs. Starichok-Borovichok is watching nearby, and as the panicked Nastya puts her water bucket on his head, he changes Ivan's head into a bear. Horrified at the change, Ivan accuses Nastya of being a witch and runs off, leaving her to weep alone by the stump, her tears causing flowers to grow from it. Wandering the land, Ivan comes across Starichok-Borovichok again, who scolds Ivan over his selfish nature, and how he never acted selflessly for anyone else. Thinking that all he must do to change back is a good deed, Ivan immediately seeks out people, demanding to know how he can help them; having a bear's head only terrifies them, however, and they all flee from him. He finally comes across an old woman carrying sticks to her home and offers to carry her, despite the distance being over many mountains. Arriving at her home, the woman thanks Ivan, noting how handsome he must be; though Ivan notes he is still a bear and thinks she is mocking him, she explains that she is blind - which is why she didn't run from him. Returning to the woods where he and Nastya first met, Ivan comes across the old woman's walking stick and takes pity on her, vowing to return it. Nearby, Starichok-Borovichok is pleased at his selflessness and restores Ivan to human form. Illustration by Ivan Bilibin. Meanwhile, the evil stepmother is trying to marry off Marfushka. After dressing her up in fine clothes, covering her in makeup and attaching a false braid on to Marfushka's head, she forces Nastya to wear a rag over her head and puts mud on her face to make her ugly. A wealthy suitor comes and asks Marfushka, who has never done a day's work in her life, to prepare a meal for him. While chasing geese into a pond, Marfushka nearly drowns until she is rescued by Nastya. In the process, Marfushka's braid and makeup wash away and Nastya's beauty is revealed. The suitor and his mother choose Nastya for a bride instead. The stepmother orders her husband to leave Nastya in the woods. On the way, the father decides he's had enough of his wife's bullying and vows to bring Nastenka back home. Believing her stepmother will be even crueler to him for doing so, Nastya jumps off the back of his sleigh. There, she comes across Morozko (Father Frost) bringing winter to the woods. Touched by her kindness and unselfishness, he rescues her from freezing to death and brings her to his home. Ivan searches for Nastya, now that he's fully human again. He comes across Baba Yaga, whom he pleads for aid to find Nastya. She refuses to help, and after a battle of wills with her moving house (which the old woman loses), she animates a group of trees to kill Ivan. After nearly being cooked alive, Ivan tricks her and threatens to bake the witch in her own oven until she tells him how to find Nastya. After he leaves, the angry Baba Yaga sends her black cat to cause Nastya's death before Ivan can reach her. The enchanted sled sent by the Baba Yaga to show Ivan the way to Nastya leaves him trapped in a snowbank. While Father Frost is running some errands, the cat tricks Nastya into accidentally touching his staff, which freezes her solid. Nastya's father and dog sense that she is in trouble. The stepmother and Marfushka prevent him from leaving, but the dog escapes and rescues Ivan from freezing in the snow. They both arrive at Morozko's home to find her frozen. Ivan pleads for forgiveness for his behavior towards her. The power of love trumps the staff's power, and she is restored. To celebrate, Morozko gives Nastya and Ivan a large dowry of jewels and a horse-driven sleigh for their impending nuptials. On their way to Ivan's home, he and Nastya are accosted by the bandits he'd encountered before, this time with help from Baba Yaga. After being overpowered, they are saved when the clubs from earlier fall conveniently on the bandits' heads, and they trap the witch in her own giant mortar. They return to the village, where the father welcomes Ivan as his son- in-law but the stepmother becomes jealous and the greedy Marfushka eyes their fortune and demands the same. Unfortunately for her, when Marfushka tries to duplicate Nastya's adventure in the snowbound forest, Morozko is so horrified by her rudeness that he sends her back on a pig-driven sleigh, with a box full of crows as a dowry. The stepmother is humiliated in front of the entire village and the father finally stands up for himself and regain his place as head of the household. Nastya and Ivan have a sumptuous wedding and live happily ever after. ===== Opening scene of the game The player takes the role of a 'professional adventurer' who is 'down to his last silver piece'. His services are hired by a wizard whose castle has been taken over by a warlock. The warlock has also found the wizard's Magic Ring of Power which must be returned. The player must navigate the castle, solve problems and avoid booby traps set by the warlock in order to recover the magic ring for the wizard. The adventurer must also search for treasure and deposit it in a safe which he can then keep as payment. ===== In late-1950s New York City, WROL disc jockey Alan Freed (Tim McIntire) promotes his upcoming rock n' roll show at the Brooklyn Paramount Theater, headlined by Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis. Freed's radio program is hugely popular with teenagers, and the Paramount show is expected to sell out, despite concern that the police will shut it down as they did with Freed's previous show in Boston. Local law enforcement, led by D.A. Coleman (John Lehne), targets Freed for allegedly inciting teenagers to wild and immoral behavior by broadcasting raucous and sexually suggestive rock n' roll songs, many of them by black musicians. WROL station management also dislike Freed's unconventional programming habits, including playing songs that the station has banned such as "Tutti Frutti" by Little Richard. Freed nevertheless rejects all suggestions that he change his programming style and feature more socially acceptable musical acts, such as Pat Boone. He also refuses to sign a statement declaring that he never accepted anything in return for playing a record, on the grounds that signing it would be a lie and that all disc jockeys, including those who have signed the statement, take such bribes. Because Freed has the power to make a record a hit by playing it on his show, he is constantly besieged by record promoters and artist managers. He avoids most of these people, but takes an interest in those who share his love for rock n' roll. He repeatedly rebuffs the aggressive record promoter Lennie Richfield (Jeff Altman), but is kind to Artie Moress (Moosie Drier), a young boy who is the president of a Buddy Holly fan club, and even puts Artie on the air to talk about his idol Holly. Freed also encourages Louise (Laraine Newman), a white teenage songwriter whose parents ignore her talent and disapprove of her associating with the Chesterfields, a black doo- wop group who perform her songs. Freed himself suffers discrimination when he takes a racially mixed group of teenagers with him to look at a luxury home he wants to buy; the owner refuses to sell to him at any price. Freed's own father back in Akron, Ohio also rejects him, returning a check Freed sent him and refusing to talk on the telephone with his son. The Paramount show goes on despite Coleman's attempts to stop it, including a failed attempt at a drug bust. Louise is moved to tears after the Chesterfields, a late addition to the show, perform her songs to thunderous applause from the capacity crowd. Freed's feisty young secretary Sheryl (Fran Drescher) and his chauffeur Mookie (Jay Leno), who have constantly bickered on the job, finally bond over their shared love of Freed and rock n' roll, and begin a romance. Mid-show, IRS agents appear and seize all the proceeds from the box office, leaving Freed with no money to pay his artists. However, Chuck Berry saves the day by doing Freed the favor of performing for free. Jerry Lee Lewis, who initially had said he was not coming, then arrives at the last minute and closes the show as the police try to shut it down because teenagers are "dancing in the aisles". As the police begin clearing the theater with Lewis still performing onstage, chaos breaks out and the film abruptly ends, with an epilogue stating that this was Freed's last performance, and that he was taken off the air, indicted, moved to California, and died five years later, penniless, but that rock n' roll lives on. ===== Set during Australia's colonial era over the period 1798–1812, the series follows the life of Mary Mulvane, a daughter of an Irish school master. At 18, she is transported to New South Wales for a term of seven years after attempting to take back her family's milk cow which had been seized by the British "in lieu of tithes" to the local proctor. She endures the trial of a convict sea journey to New South Wales and years of service as a convict before her emancipation and life as a free citizen. During the journey out she makes a lifelong friend of fellow Irish convict, Polly, and in the course of the series we see their friendship continue, Polly's relationship and life with taverner Will Price develop, and Mary's relationship with Jonathon Garrett grows, leading to eventual marriage when both have served their term. Together they face the difficulties of establishing a farm and a young family in the new country, and must deal with the tyranny of the corrupt military running the colony. ===== Ga-ran and Nam-joon were classmates in elementary school. Ga-ran is a tomboy who prefers trousers to skirts, and loves taekwondo more than her piano lessons. Nam-joon on the other hand is Mr. Perfect who's got good looks, a fine brain, and is the most popular guy in school, especially among the girls. One day, Ga-ran sees Nam-joon giving away the sweet bun which Ga-ran's friend gave him, to another girl. Ga-ran throws herself at Nam-joon and beats him up, and their rivalry lasts throughout high school. A few years after college, Ga-ran and Nam-joon meet again as adults, both recovering from recent break-ups. Despite their constant bickering, they gradually realize that they're meant to be. ===== In July 1832, Italian patriots hiding out in Aix, France, are betrayed by one of their own, and Austrian agents are on their trail. One patriot, Giacomo, is dragged away and executed. His wife runs off to warn their friend, Angelo Pardi (Olivier Martinez), a young Italian nobleman in France raising money for the Italian revolution against Austrian Empire. As the agents descend on his apartment, Angelo escapes into the countryside. At Meyrargues, Angelo looks for his compatriot and childhood friend, Maggionari, and then continues on to another village, where he writes to his mother, "Always fleeing. When can I fight and show what your son can do?" His mother purchased his commission as a colonel in the Piedmont Hussars, and he's never seen battle. Angelo encounters Maggionari, who turns out to be the traitor. When the Austrian agents arrive, Angelo fights them off and escapes. The next day, Angelo enters a village ravaged by a cholera epidemic. The sight of the corpses abandoned to the scavenging crows sickens him. He meets a country physician, who shows him how to treat cholera victims by vigorously rubbing alcohol on the skin. Angelo continues north, passing a small village where corpses are being burned. He meets a young woman and two children and accompanies them to the outskirts of Manosque. The young woman, who is a tutor and lover of books, gives him a copy of Rinaldo and Armida as a parting gift. While in Manosque, Angelo is captured by a paranoid mob who accuse him of poisoning the town fountain. He is taken to the authorities, who soon abandon their posts in fear. Angelo searches for a compatriot, but encounters the Austrian agents. Angelo eludes them, and with sword in hand, fights his way through the hysterical mob and escapes across the rooftops. From his refuge above the town, Angelo watches one of the agents chased down and beaten to death, and later watches the piles of corpses being burned in the night. To escape the rain, Angelo enters a dwelling where he is discovered by Countess Pauline de Théus (Juliette Binoche). Apologizing for his presence, Angelo reassures her that he is a gentleman. Pauline offers him food and drink, and soon he falls asleep from exhaustion. The following morning, Pauline is gone and Angelo joins the forced evacuation of the town. In the hills outside Manosque, Angelo meets his compatriot, Giuseppe, who possesses money raised for the Italian resistance, but which cannot now be delivered because of the quarantine and roadblocks. Angelo agrees to deliver the money to Milan using backroads. Before leaving, he encounters the traitor, Maggionari, who attempts to kill Angelo before succumbing to cholera. Angelo and Pauline meet again, and she joins him in a daring river escape. At Les Mées, rather than head east toward the Italian border, Angelo accompanies Pauline north toward her castle near Gap. Angelo insists it is his duty, so they set off through the countryside, avoiding the plague-ridden towns. Forced to camp out in the open, romantic feelings develop between the two, but Angelo remains gallant. Asked if he comes from a military family, Angelo reveals he never knew his father, saying, "He came to Italy with Napoleon, then left." Everything he learned in life came from his mother. The next day, they travel to a heavily garrisoned village where they visit a friend of Pauline's husband and learn that he returned to Manosque to search for her. Determined to find her husband, Pauline leaves Angelo and rides off. Angelo follows, only to see her captured by the militia, who take her into quarantine at a convent. Knowing if she stays there she will die, Angelo surrenders to the militia in order to rescue her. Pauline understands he's risked his life again for her. Angelo orchestrates another daring escape by setting fire to the convent. Impressed by Angelo's bravery and intelligence, Pauline promises to trust the young Piedmont Hussard, saying, "I'll obey you like a soldier." Their mutual affection continues to grow as they make their way toward her castle at Théus. As night descends, they seek shelter from the rain in a small abandoned mansion, where they warm themselves at the fireplace and drink wine. Pauline conveys her feelings for him, but Angelo remains a gentleman. Pauline recounts how she met her husband, forty years her senior. She was a sixteen-year-old country doctor's daughter when she found him near death with a bullet in his chest. Her father saved his life, and she tended to him for days, nursing him back to health. When he recovered, he left without revealing his identity, but six months later, he returned and asked for her hand in marriage—revealing he was a Count with extensive property. Angelo prepares to leave, but Pauline decides to stay in the mansion for the night. As she climbs the staircase, she collapses showing symptoms of cholera. Angelo rushes her to the fireplace, rips the clothing from her body, and vigorously rubs alcohol on her skin—tending to her throughout the night trying to save her life. In the morning, Angelo is awakened by Pauline's frail but loving touch. Soon they are back on the road, completing the last few miles to Pauline's castle, where they are met by her husband, Count Laurent de Théus. Angelo leaves and returns to Italy to fight in the revolution. One year later, Pauline returns to Aix where everything appears as it once was—but the cholera has taken a heavy toll. She looks for the house near the Bishop's Palace where Angelo stayed. She writes letters to Angelo, inquiring after his condition. Another year passes, and Pauline finally receives a letter at the castle from Angelo. She walks off alone to read it, while the Count watches from a window, knowing Angelo's memory would not fade. Pauline looks east toward the snow-covered Alps that separate her from Italy and Colonel Angelo Pardi, the young gallant officer who once saved her life. ===== Loveless was originally about a man, Wes Cutter, who fought for the South in the Civil War and was captured. After spending time in a prison camp he comes back to his previous home of Blackwater after the North won to find the town under Union control and his house occupied. Soon after, Cutter is offered a position of sheriff in the town. The comic's early issues explore the dynamic relationship between Cutter and the people of the town (most of whom hate him), the fate of Cutter's wife Ruth, and the lingering feelings of animosity between North and South after the end of the war. Since the conclusion to its earlier issues, Loveless has become a comic of greater chronological and thematic narrative. The stories within Loveless, since its inception and especially in its later years center around racism and the grittier realities of American history. The book had been stated to last about four years by Brian Azzarello in a Broken Frontier interview. In the interview Azzarello also hinted to end the story in the 1940s or so,Sam Moyerman: Bad Azz Mojo, part 1, posted October 11 2006 but the series was cancelled with issue 24. ===== The series focuses on five children: Matthew Freeman, Pedro, Scott Tyler, Jamie Tyler, and Scarlett Adams, a group of fifteen-year-old children, five modern day teenagers with some sort of power who are expected to defeat the Old Ones and save humanity. ===== Michael "Mike" Enslin is a cynical, skeptical author who is estranged from his wife Lily after the death of their daughter Katie. Mike writes niche books evaluating supernatural events in which he has no belief. After his latest book, he receives an anonymous postcard depicting The Dolphin, a hotel on Lexington Avenue in New York City bearing the message, "Don't enter 1408." Viewing this as a challenge, Mike arrives at The Dolphin and requests room 1408. The hotel manager, Gerald Olin, attempts to discourage him. He explains to Mike that in the last 95 years, no one has lasted more than an hour inside of Room 1408; the latest count is 56 deaths. Olin attempts to dissuade and bribe Mike, but Mike insists so preparations are reluctantly made. Inside the room, Mike describes on his mini-cassette recorder the room's boring appearance and lack of supernatural behavior. The clock radio suddenly starts playing "We've Only Just Begun", a hit song by The Carpenters and the digital display changes to a countdown starting from "60:00." Mike begins to see ghosts of the room's past victims, followed by flashbacks of Katie and his sick father. Mike tries to leave, but all attempts are in vain. Mike uses his laptop to contact Lily, asking for help, but the sprinkler system short circuits his laptop. The room temperature drops to subzero when the laptop suddenly begins to work again. A doppelgänger of Mike appears in a video chat window and urges Lily to come to the hotel room herself; it gives Mike a sly wink. The room shakes violently and Mike breaks a picture of a ship in a storm. Water pours from the broken picture, flooding the room. He surfaces on a beach and relives a surfing accident seen earlier in the film. His life continues from this point, and he reconciles with Lily. Assuming his experience in 1408 was just a nightmare, Lily encourages him to write a book about it. When visiting the post office to send the manuscript to his publisher, he recognizes members of a construction crew as Dolphin Hotel staff. The employees then destroy the post office's walls, revealing that Mike is still trapped in the rubble of 1408. Katie's ghost confronts him, and when the countdown ends, the room is suddenly restored to normal, and the clock radio resets itself to 60:00. The "hotel operator" calls Mike. Mike asks why he hasn't been killed yet and she informs him that guests enjoy free will: he can relive the past hour over and over again, or use their "express checkout system". A hangman's noose appears, but he refuses to give in. Deciding to quit running, Mike improvises a Molotov cocktail and sets the room on fire. The hotel is evacuated. After smoking a cigarette, Mike breaks a window, causing a backdraft. He then lies down and laughs in victory upon destroying the room. Olin, in his office, praises Mike for his actions. ===== Fourteen-year-old delinquent Matthew 'Matt' Freeman and his seventeen-year-old friend Kelvin Johnson break into an Ipswich warehouse late at night, to steal electrical products but are caught by the one security guard in the building. Matt is shocked and is about to confess, but Kelvin sneaks up behind the guard and stabs him in the back, leaving him for dead. Matt tries to get help but the police come, arrest Matt and Kelvin, and take the wounded man to a hospital. In the police station, Kelvin blames Matt for the man's stabbing and Matt is taken by police for his version of the event. A young black police detective, Superintendent Stephen Mallory, comes up and interviews him, and finds Matt to be likeable. Then, later on in the night, Mallory meets Matt's aunt, Gwenda Davis, to talk about Matt. Matt wakes up, seemingly dying of thirst. In a sudden trance, Matt stares hard at a glass jug of water, smells burning, and stares in amazement when the jug explodes, even though he is ten feet away. He is amazed for a while, but then he goes back to sleep; upon waking up the next morning, he sees no evidence to suggest that the glass exploded, leaving him thinking it was just an odd dream. In the next week, Matt is given a role in the Liberty and Education Achieved through Fostering (LEAF) Project, designed for teenage delinquents who are being reassimilated into society. Mallory is involved with the project and he introduces Matt to his new guardian, Jayne Deverill, an old, strict woman who Matt immediately dislikes. Matt and Jayne Deverill move to Hive Hall, Deverill's home somewhere in Yorkshire, and she gets him to fit in. But she seems attracted to him in a sinister way when she sees his blood fall on the floor after her cat bites his hand. Matt faints, become ill with pneumonia, and has a nightmare in which he sees Deverill and a woman who looks like her cure him with dark magic. Matt doesn't know what to believe, but he feels different and more confident following his recovery. Deverill gets him to work on her farm with her evil farmhand Noah, who is threatening and silent, as well as seeming mentally damaged. Early on, Matt is sent to Lesser Malling, the local village, to get something from the chemist, and he meets Jayne Deverill's sister, Claire, who is disfigured with a birthmark covering half of her face; it later transpires that she was the other woman Matt saw in his vision. Claire and the other villagers come out and they are revealed to be all either disfigured or insane, or both. A seemingly normal man, Tom Burgess, comes up and tries to be friendly with Matt, but he warns him to leave the village before harm happens to him. That night, Matt is woken up by a mysterious chanting in the woods. He searches the house for money, determined to leave, and then the cat attacks. He cages it in a log basket and searches for money. But he finds, to his horror, that Jayne Deverill somehow has a picture of him when he was eight years old at his parent's funeral. They died on the way to a wedding that Matt didn't want to attend. Somehow, he knew they were going to die, but he stayed at his neighbour's house and let them go to the wedding; en route, they died in a car accident, when a tyre blew out and the car ended up in a river. The photos appeared to be taken by a camera, but Matt thought that no photos were taken. He also finds a secret police report about him marked CONFIDENTIAL, stating that he has precognitive abilities. He decides to leave immediately, empty-handed and takes the bicycle that belonged to Jayne Deverill's late husband, Henry. To Matt's disbelief, each lane he takes in order to try and leave takes him back the way he came. Frustrated, he gives up and starts back on the way to Hive Hall. In the woods the following day, Matt once again meets Tom Burgess by an old experimental nuclear power station, Omega One, who tells him to come to his farmhouse the next day and he will help get him out. Burgess gives Matt a pendant with a key etched on it; Tom says it unlocks the maze of roads and it seems to do so, breaking the 'spell' on the roads in the local area. Matt goes to Burgess's farm, Glendale Farm, the next day, only to find the farmer dead, murdered by some sort of animal, and the place in a wreck with the words "Raven's Gate" painted on the bedroom wall. He runs out and finds a police car, and tries to convince the policemen in the car of what happened. They go back to Glendale Farm and, to Matt's surprise, it is all neat again. Two of the villagers, including Joanna Creevy (whom Matt had met in Lesser Malling) are in there, and she seems to have rearranged everything, erased all traces of the murder, and Tom Burgess' body has vanished completely. Frustrated, Matt leaves to go to Greater Malling, and he goes online to search about Raven's Gate. But another man named Dravid contacts him in a pop-up box, asking about him. Matt doesn't know what to say so he asks who Dravid is, then Dravid leaves the chat room. Matt meets a journalist named Richard Cole, at the offices of the town newspaper, The Greater Malling Gazette. He tells him the story of what happened, but Richard doesn't believe him either. Matt storms out of the Gazette in anger; to his shock, Jayne Deverill is waiting outside. She takes him back to Hive Hall and accuses him of fabricating his story, saying that Tom Burgess never died, and she even gets 'him' to call on the phone, even though he is dead. Matt, knowing that something weird is going on, listens to the voice of Burgess, then hangs up and goes to bed. The next day, Stephen Mallory pays a visit. Mallory says he is there to check up on him and he is shocked by how ill and thin Matt looks, as well as signs of an earlier altercation with Noah. He gets into an argument with Deverill, accusing her of breaking the law by working Matt to the bone and keeping him out of school, and says he will have her arrested and have Matt put in other care. Mallory drives back to London, but he hears unearthly whispering in his car radio, on every station, and the car speeds up by itself and topples over a motorway bridge and smashes into a lorry, killing Mallory. (In reality, Mallory had visited Hive Hall after researching Matt's case, including interviewing Kelvin before his trial and visiting the neighbour Matt stayed with when he was orphaned, and discovering that Jayne Deverill had been pursued by a drug addict and mugger on the day she was given custody of Matt; the man in question later committed suicide, unwillingly. He also heard of Matt saying that Tom Burgess had been murdered at Glendale Farm.) Matt is awoken by Deverill who tells him about Mallory's death, driving Matt into depression. Then he tries to escape when he sees that Jayne and Claire Deverill are going out. He follows them, into the woods, and sees a dark magic ritual there. He tries to eavesdrop, but triggers a security alarm and Jayne Deverill summons two black demon dogs which chase him through the woods and then he is finally trapped in a bog. But Richard Cole suddenly appears and rescues him. Richard kills the dogs by incinerating them, and he and Matt go to Richard's flat in York. Richard hears Matt's full story, and Matt thinks the villagers are witches, to what Richard laughs. Richard phones Sir Michael Marsh, a government scientist, and Susan Ashwood, a medium, who wrote about Raven's Gate. Sir Michael Marsh is ostensibly boring, and explains to Matt and Richard about how nuclear bombs and nuclear power plants work, and how the villagers could not have uranium, despite Matt thinking he saw radiation suited men and uranium boxes. Afterwards, they visit Susan Ashwood in Manchester and deduce that although she seems good, she is thoroughly mad. Finally, Richard calls Dravid himself who works at the British Museum. Dravid agrees to meet and he tells them about the villagers. Long ago, the world was ruled by the Old Ones, who were demons of pure evil. They killed many people and waged war against humanity, but were banished by five children. The children are expected to return when the Old Ones break out, and this is what Jayne Deverill and the rest of the villagers are seeking to do. Dravid also explains that Lesser Malling was home to a gate to the Old Ones' prison, and that the villagers intend to have Matt ritually sacrificed in order to bring them back and rule the world. Dravid is killed by dark magic that brings the skeletons of dinosaurs in the museum to life. Jayne Deverill captures Richard and Matt and she takes them to Lesser Malling for the sacrifice. Matt kills Noah in a brief fight and he runs out into the night. But Sir Michael Marsh drives up and suddenly betrays Matt by revealing himself as the coven leader, the man responsible for building the Omega One power station, over the site of the Stone Circle (Raven's Gate), that separates the prison of the Old Ones from our world. He takes Matt to the power station for the sacrifice. The Deverill sisters and all the villagers are there and they try to kill Matt, unleashing a portal to the Old Ones' dimension and a huge dark creature, Chaos, the King of the Old Ones, appears in the gate. Chaos tries to free himself, but Matt finally realizes the smell of burning makes his power work because of how his mother burned the toast on the day she died. Matt's power awakens and he stops Sir Michael, by causing the handle of the sacrificial knife to melt in Sir Michael's hands. Even Chaos retreats, seeing Matt's power for the first time. Matt commands Richard to come with him and frees Richard. Jayne Deverill runs after them, and she fights Richard over a tank of acid but Richard knocks her in, to a horrifying demise. The other villagers get scared and try to flee, but the power station is breaking up and they all burn in the flames. Sir Michael stands by the altar and he frees Chaos with a single drop of Matt's blood. Chaos comes out onto Earth, and he grabs Sir Michael and kills him as his reward/punishment. But Chaos is sucked back into his prison, when the radiation is sucked into his realm. Chaos is trapped again. In the next few weeks, Richard is fired from the Gazette, having not showed up for several days, and appears to be unable to get another job. A society named the Nexus, to which Dravid belonged, contacts Richard, and tells Matt that another gate is opening in Peru. A man named Fabian, from the Nexus, appears and tells Richard and Matt that they need to be in Peru to stop another gate from opening. ===== As the novel unfolds, Allington is beset by a number of difficulties, including his father's death by stroke at dinner one night, and a drinking problem that causes hypnagogic jactitation and hallucinations; Maurice compounds his problems by pursuing an affair with his doctor's wife, neglecting his daughter Amy (whose mother, Maurice's first wife, was killed in a road accident), and attempting to seduce both his current wife and his mistress into a ménage à trois, which backfires when the two women take an enthusiastic interest in each other and effectively shut him out of the orgy. During this time Maurice begins to see ghosts around the inn – a red-haired woman, presumably Underhill's wife, in the hallway, a small bird floating above his bathtub, the spectre of Thomas Underhill himself in the dining room – and yet has a difficult time communicating this to his family and friends, who assume that heavy drinking and the stress of his father's death are causing him to hallucinate. Maurice's own investigations take him to All Saints' College, a fictional Cambridge college (modeled on All Souls' of Oxford) of which Underhill was a fellow, and at which his papers are secreted. There he sees Underhill's own record of having used his black arts to entice and then ravish young girls from the village. In the meantime Maurice has discovered his own notes of a drunken, and forgotten, midnight conversation with Underhill, during which Underhill begins to enlist Maurice's help in his as yet undisclosed scheme. This involves Maurice's unearthing of Underhill's nearby grave, in which he finds an ancient silver figurine that Underhill requests be brought to another midnight meeting in the inn's dining room. That afternoon, having left the scene of the failed orgy, Maurice suddenly finds himself in a strange time warp, as it were, in which all molecular motion outside his drawing room ceases. He finds himself in the presence of a young, suave man who it comes to be understood is God himself. The purpose of the visit is to warn Maurice against Underhill and ask him to aid in Underhill's destruction, but during the conversation, Amis has the young man elaborate an interesting sort of theology, explaining the Creation and God's powers within it. The young man leaves Maurice with a silver crucifix, as a sort of counter-weight to the silver figurine. When the midnight meeting comes about, Underhill attempts to delight Maurice with a sort of holographic yet primitive pornography show; Maurice feels he is in a damp, murky cave, on the walls of which are projected bizarre sexual scenes. As the show becomes more terrifying, Maurice realises that Underhill has absented himself; when he hears his daughter crying out from the road in front of the inn, he realises Underhill's intentions. In the climactic scene, Maurice uses the crucifix to stun Underhill and runs outside, where he confronts the entity Underhill had used the figurine to conjure: the green man, a collocation of branches, twigs and leaves in the form of a large and powerful man. The thing is bent, evidently, on killing Maurice's daughter Amy. By hurling the figurine back into the graveyard Maurice saps Underhill's power and destroys the green man. Underhill's purpose had been, apparently, to have Amy killed as a sort of experiment in lieu of the sexual depredations which are now forbidden him by his lack of corporeality. A final scene wraps up the novel's loose ends: Maurice destroys the figurine, and he employs the modish, cynical and repellent parish priest (who makes God out to be, in the young man's words, a “suburban Mao Tse-tung”) to exorcise Underhill and his green man. Maurice's wife leaves him (for his mistress), but his daughter proposes, and he agrees to, a plan to move away from The Green Man and get a fresh start. Maurice is somewhat relieved, while recognising that he will remain until his death trapped in all of the faults, petty and otherwise, that constitute him as Maurice Allington. ===== Seven sorority sisters Katey, Vicki, Liz, Jeanie, Diane, Morgan, and Stevie celebrate their graduation ceremony at their sorority house, located at the far end of a sorority row. Their celebration is interrupted by their domineering house mother, Mrs. Slater, who denies the girls' plan to throw a graduation party. The girls, led by Vicki—scorned because Slater slashed her waterbed when Vicki covertly brought a boyfriend into the sorority house—devise a prank: They steal her walking cane and place it in the house's unused outdoor pool and force her at gunpoint to retrieve it. The prank goes awry when Vicki inadvertently shoots Slater, who appears to be dead. The girls agree to hide the body in the pool until their party ends, though Katey and Jeanie are reluctant. At the party, an unidentified figure stabs a man walking in the woods with Slater's cane. Meanwhile, after finding guests attempting to enter the pool, the girls realize that if the pool lights turn on, Slater's body will be revealed. Stevie goes into the basement to disable the breaker, where she is brutally stabbed to death by the killer. Later, the pool lights come on much to the girls' alarm, but Slater's body is nowhere to be found. Deciding that Slater must be alive, the girls begin searching for her after the party comes to a close. Morgan enters Slater's room where Slater's body falls on her from the attic hatch. Vicki suggests hiding the body in the old cemetery. In the attic, Katey discovers children's toys and a dead caged bird. Morgan is subsequently stabbed with Slater's cane in her bedroom. Diane goes to an outlying garage to start the van to transport Slater's body, but is murdered by the killer who breaks in through the sunroof. Shortly after, Jeanie is decapitated with a butcher knife in the bathroom. Meanwhile, Katey finds a medical alert tag on a necklace belonging to Slater. She calls the number and is put through to a Dr. Beck, who comes to the house. The two discover the bodies of Stevie, Morgan, and Diane in the pool. Meanwhile, after finding Diane missing, Vicki and Liz decide to drive to the cemetery without her to bury Slater's body. When they arrive, both girls are killed by the assailant. Dr. Beck accompanies Katey to the cemetery, where they find the bodies of Vicki and Liz, as well as Slater's body still in the back of the van. After forcibly giving Katey a sedative at the house, Dr. Beck reveals that Slater had a son named Eric who was deformed and mentally underdeveloped thanks to an illegal fertility treatment he had given her. Dr. Beck uses Katey as bait so he can capture Eric and cover up his crime. Eric arrives and hacks Dr. Beck to death while Katey searches for Vicki's gun, which does not fire. She flees to the bathroom and finds Jeanie's severed head in the toilet. Horrified, she climbs to the attic where she is attacked by Eric, now wearing a clown costume. She shoots him repeatedly, only to realize the gun is loaded with blanks. She then uses a pin to stab Eric numerous times and he falls through the attic door to the floor below. Katey believes he is dead and rests from exhaustion. However, Eric opens his eyes as the film ends, leaving Katey's fate unknown. ===== One year after the defeat of Myrtani, the party, now stationed at Gargath Outpost, has had little to do. The outpost is soon attacked by undead forces. The party's old colleague, Sir Karl, is revealed to be brought back from the grave as an undead death knight under the command of the evil Lord Soth. Soth has been raising dead, great warriors and turning them into his own evil undead forces. His primary goal is to possess the body of the legendary hero Sturm Brightblade. He and his vast undead armies now threaten the land. It is up to the party to overcome this threat. The party's ultimate goal is to storm Dargaard Keep and defeat Lord Soth. Along the way, it will travel to many towns and face numerous monsters. One particular monster, the Dread Wolf, will taunt the party many times until they finally fight the creature. The party may enlist the aid of the knight Sir Durfey at the Clerist's Tower. He will join and help the party for most of the game. There are a few optional side quests the party can undertake if desired. The party can gain some extra experience points and usually some extra treasure items can be found. ===== Sinbad Jr. (voiced by Dal McKennon and Tim Matheson) is the teenage son of Sinbad, the famous sailor, and he traveled the world in his single-masted sailboat seeking adventure and wrongs to right, fighting such villains as the Bluto-like, big, black-bearded Blubbo and the mad doctor Rotcoddam. Sinbad Jr. gained the strength of 50 men whenever he tightened his magic belt, causing the diamond-shaped buckle to flash like lightning and temporarily transform him into a mighty muscleman. Sinbad Jr.'s first mate was his feisty and funny feathered friend Salty the Parrot (voiced by Mel Blanc). ===== At the beginning of the game, the characters are summoned by General Laurana to investigate rumors of evil creatures threatening the city of Caergoth. The heroes are quickly led to travel to another distant continent of Krynn, Taladas, where the forces of evil are hatching their plans. ===== Mr. Tickle's story begins with him in bed and making himself breakfast without getting up because of his "extraordinarily long arms". He then decides that it is a tickling sort of day and thus journeys around town tickling people – a teacher, a policeman, a greengrocer, a station guard, a doctor, a butcher and a postman. The book ends with a warning that Mr. Tickle could be lurking at your door getting ready to tickle you! It is a relatively unusual Mr. Men book in that the main character is naughty and tickles people, yet there is no corrective action taken to mend his tickling ways; thus, Mr. Tickle is left free to tickle another day and learns nothing from it. ===== Ethan Jenkins (Michael W. Smith) is a pastor who enjoys working with his well-to-do congregation. At the request of his father, Ethan takes an assignment at Second Chance Church, where he meets Jake Sanders (Jeff Obafemi Carr), a pastor who lives in a completely different world from Ethan's, and spends much of his time dealing with poverty, drugs, and crime. The two different lifestyles of these two pastors cause an inevitable conflict as these two men try to bridge the divide. ===== The game is played through the perspective of an unnamed woman whose husband, Michael, suddenly inherits a large mansion in Anchorhead, Maine, from family that he wasn't aware existed. The previous owner, Edward Verlac, killed his wife and daughter before taking his own life under mysterious circumstances. The game itself is split into 4 "days", each of which contains a set of puzzles that are required before the advancement of the next. On arriving in town, the car breaks under strange circumstances, stranding them in town without contact with the outside world. Croesus Verlac, the family's founder, has been possessing many of his male heirs in sequence, and begins to possess Michael. Croesus is attempting to summon a Great Old One named Ialdabaoloth, who takes the corporeal form of a multi-tentacled comet and is heading towards Earth at alarming rate. The protagonist sabotages Croesus' machine to summon Ialdabaoloth, saving the world. An epilogue shows that the protagonist is pregnant, raising concern that Croesus may attempt to possess her child if it is a son. ===== The Riders tells the story of an Australian man, Fred Scully, and his 7-year-old daughter Billie. Scully, as he is known, and his wife Jennifer have planned to move from Australia to a cottage they have purchased in Ireland. His wife and daughter are due to arrive in Ireland but at the airport only Billie arrives, traumatised and unable to tell her father what has happened or why her mother put her on the plane alone. The story follows Scully and Billie as they travel around Europe retracing the steps of their previous travel, trying to find Jennifer and work out why she left them. ===== USS Missouri aids the player's Battalion during the Battle for Pine Valley. In winter of 1988, the Soviet Union demands aid from the West in the midst of economic ruin. Negotiations between NATO and the U.S.S.R break down, and in June of 1989, the Soviet Union invades and captures West Berlin. Several months later in late November, 1989, a few months after the outbreak of World War III, Soviet forces launch a surprise invasion of Seattle, Washington. A combination of regular U.S. Army and National Guard soldiers, led by Lieutenant Parker and Captain Bannon, counter their advances to ensure the safe evacuation of civilians, before retreating due to the strength of the Soviet offensive. Joined by Colonel Sawyer, they continue to withdraw southwards, eventually leading a successful effort to retake the town of Pine Valley, halting further Soviet advances. A month later, Soviet forces launch an offensive towards Fort Teller, a military base located within the Cascade Mountains, in order to disable the United States' Strategic Defense Initiative project, unaware that it had been a failure. The U.S. had concealed this knowledge to ensure the Soviets would not attempt a nuclear strike. Parker, Sawyer and Bannon, joined by Captain Webb, engage in a series of delaying battles en route to the town of Cascade Falls near the Fort, before forming a defensive line within the town. Learning that the advance is not stopping, Sawyer orders the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the area, then launches a tactical nuclear missile at the town. Bannon, remorseful over mistakes made earlier in the war and seeking redemption, sacrifices himself and his company to pin down Soviet forces, allowing Sawyer to withdraw the rest of his forces. The resulting nuclear blast eliminates Bannon and his company, along with the Soviet forces in the town, successfully halting the assault. Months earlier at the outbreak of the war, after diplomatic efforts from both sides had failed, Sawyer, Parker, and Bannon served in France as part of a NATO counteroffensive against a Soviet invasion near Marseille. Although successful, Bannon's negligence during a major operation results in the death of their French liaison, Commandant Sabatier. Following their success in France, Sawyer receives orders to take Task Force Raven, a special unit of NATO troops, to penetrate deep into Soviet territory to retrieve intelligence from a crashed prototype B-2 bomber, and then destroy the wreckage. While withdrawing from the area with the pilots from the downed bomber, Bannon accidentally kills surrendering Soviet civil- defense volunteers, leading Sawyer to reprimand him for his conduct and discipline. NATO forces then launch an assault on a Soviet naval yard in Murmansk detailed in the intelligence, in order to destroy submarines intended for an attack on U.S. Navy bases along the East Coast. The operation is a partial success, with only one submarine escaping due to Bannon's incompetence; it is later sunk by the U.S. Atlantic Fleet. Returning to the U.S., Sawyer relegates Bannon to a support duty, while Parker assists U.S. Army Rangers in a counter-offensive against a surprise attack by Spetsnaz troops in New York City, who had taken control of several islands in the New York Bay. Parker's forces successfully prevent the Soviets from using chemical weapons against the city, while also saving the Statue of Liberty from destruction. Sawyer later sends Parker home to Seattle for leave, while reassigning Bannon to work at a National Guard depot there, just a few days before the surprise Soviet invasion. Returning to the present after the nuclear strike on Cascade Falls, Parker and Webb regroup with stragglers and soon reunite with Sawyer, whereupon they learn of news that the People's Republic of China has declared its intention to enter the war as a Soviet ally. The U.S. President, learning that a Chinese invasion fleet has been launched to reinforce the Soviet beachhead in Seattle, orders all U.S. forces in Washington to spearhead an assault to recapture the city, while also ordering a nuclear strike against the city, as a backup plan should this fail. Sawyer, desperate to avoid another Cascade Falls, orders his forces to attack before the Chinese can land, refusing to back down. After successfully breaking through the Soviet Army's defense perimeter around Seattle, and capturing Puget Sound to secure Soviet anti-ship missile launchers for use against the Chinese fleet, the reinforced U.S. battalions launch their counterattack. While Webb is injured during the conflict, Sawyer and Parker manage to hold out in the battle, effectively ensuring that the U.S. forces retake Seattle from the Soviets before the Chinese fleet arrives. Dealt a decisive blow by the outcome of the battle and unable to launch an amphibious assault of their own, the fleet consequently returns to China. As American soldiers rest from the intense battle since the invasion, Sawyer states that the war isn't over, and that they may still be recalled to fight in other theatres. ===== Adam Chance (Peter Mark Richman), works for an American agency, H.A.R.M. (Human Aetiological Relations Machine). He is assigned to protect Dr. Jan Steffanic (Carl Esmond), a recent Soviet defector who has developed a new weapon which fires spores that upon contact with skin slowly eat the body away. Following Dr Steffanic's arrival in the US he is taken into protective custody by H.A.R.M. and is placed in a beach house along with his niece and Agent Chance to develop a spore antidote. Here he reveals the communists' real plan, which is to dust all of the American crops with these deadly spores. During their time at this house Chance falls for Steffanic's niece Ava Vestok (Barbara Bouchet), who is later revealed to be a communist spy. After the flat is attacked, Dr Steffanic is kidnapped by European spies and taken to a warehouse. Chance eventually rides in and a gun fight ensues in which Steffanic is exposed to the deadly spores in a valiant sacrifice, and dies. Afterwards, Chance re-appears at the beach house and arrests Ava for good. ===== Nicolas is a 24-year-old Londoner, a witty wastrel and the novel's archetypal anti-hero. He hates his job in his late father's glass-making business, where he works under the odious Nimek in anticipation of making full partner one day. He dreams of inheriting untold riches from his Uncle Bela in Vancouver, which will put an end to his current servitude. His bossy Irish girlfriend Maura continually presses him to make something of himself. His one true love is his car, an MG, which he bought on an impulse, and its maintenance keeps him in permanent hock to the garage owner "Ratface" Ricketts. A note arrives from a lawyer called Stephen Cunliffe, stating that his Uncle Bela has died in Canada and left him a fortune. He goes to see Cunliffe, who forwards him a sum of £200 to tide him over until such time as he can begin to enjoy the fruits of his new estate. However, Nicolas manages to spend this allowance in a matter of days, and returns to Cunliffe's office to request a further advance. However, Cunliffe now declares that Uncle Bela is very much alive; that he, Cunliffe, is in fact a moneylender, and that Nicolas owes him £200, with the MG as security. The distraught Nicolas is told that he can discharge his debt if he is willing to carry out a simple assignment in Prague. He is to bring back a formula for a glass-making process from a glass factory that used to belong to Pavelka, an associate of Cunliffe's who also happens to have been a wrestler in the past. Nicolas travels to Prague. It is the city of his childhood, and he stays in a plush hotel on Wenceslas Square. He is given a tour of the Czech glass-making industry, and spends the night with his guide Vlasta Simenova. He takes with him a "Norstrund" guidebook, which he is to leave on a desk in the glass factory during his tour. The formula is hidden inside the book, which he collects at the end of his tour. Returning to England, Nicolas's debt is written off and he is paid a further £200. However, Cunliffe informs him that the formula is incomplete and requests him to make a second trip. He takes a new Norstrund. On the second trip, Maura gives him another Norstrund as a present, so he has two. He tours the glass factory as before, and returns to his hotel. His waiter Josef attempts to drug him, and while Nicolas pretends to sleep, Josef finds one of the Norstrunds and starts to cut it open. Nicolas "wakes", and Josef leaves. Nicolas sees that there is a document made of rice- paper hidden in the spine of the book. Reading it, he sees that it concerns British nuclear secrets, and he realises that he has been a patsy. Instead of smuggling glass-making secrets out of Prague, Cunliffe is using Nicolas as a courier to smuggle British nuclear secrets out of England. On the second trip, Nicolas left the wrong Norstrund in the glass factory, which was empty. Josef then attempted to retrieve the document from Nicolas's room. In a panic, Nicolas flushes the document down the toilet. He leaves the hotel and tries to get to the British embassy. However, he realises he has left his wallet and passport in the hotel room. He returns to the hotel where he is beaten up by StB agents, who think he has given the document to someone else. He cannot reveal that he has destroyed it, otherwise they would kill him. Nicolas escapes, and hides out in Prague. He stays with Vlasta, but realises she is an StB agent because she has knowledge of him that he had not revealed to her. Eventually he is able to get to the British Embassy disguised as a milkman. In the Embassy, he is interrogated and debriefed for ten weeks, and finally made to sign the Official Secrets Act. His knowledge allows the British to capture the Czech network in Britain, and Nicolas is sent home in a prisoner exchange for Cunliffe. Finally, Nicolas receives a letter from his Uncle Bela, who is dying and wants Nicolas to take over his business. Category:1960 British novels Category:Thriller novels Category:British novels adapted into films Category:Victor Gollancz Ltd books Category:British spy novels Category:1960 debut novels ===== Each show made a habit of creating outrageous plots out of mundane tasks and settings. For example, after a fun weekend of playing, Ned exclaims he cannot wait for the next one. Newton then comes up with the idea that, rather than wait for next weekend, they can build a time machine and travel back to Friday, and relive the weekend. After they build the time machine out of a bunch of household objects, they accidentally travel back to the age of the dinosaurs and end up changing the future. In another episode, in an effort to raise money for charity, Ned's friend Doogle digs a hole and stumbles across a race of subterranean trolls secretly planning domination of the world's "metropolises- es". Ned takes Newton with him everywhere and makes sure to keep some Zippo food with him at all times, just in case Newton turns back into a normal newt. Newton's powers almost always make things worse, mostly due to the fact he has a poor understanding of society. Thus, when Ned explains to him that Newton has made a terrible mistake (such as giving 3.5 million dollars to some passersby), Newton and Ned must work together to put things right. And although they usually succeed in doing so, Newton invariably changes back to newt form just in time to avoid being seen, and just in time for Ned to get into trouble. The series made extensive references to famous faces and popular culture at the time, relying heavily on Harland Williams's experience as a comedian and impressionist. Newton shifts into "newt-versions" of many celebrities in each episode, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Humphrey Bogart and Clark Gable for comic effect. Several running gags also span the episodes of all three seasons, such as Mrs. Flemkin finding a crow hiding in the kitchen, Newton's solution to various problems involving a rubber ducky and a bicycle pump which he never gets to use, or the appearance of quahogs usually in a barrel which begin to sing M-O-T-H-E-R by Howard Johnson. Newton also frequently broke the fourth wall, especially in season three, even going so far as to comment upon how poorly his belly-button was drawn, or whether newts should have belly-buttons at all. For the final four episodes of season three, Harland Williams was replaced by Ron Pardo as the voice of Newton. In Season 3, episode 8 ("Rear Bus Window") Newton proclaims that he is a member of the genus Triturus, which are crested or marbled newts native to Europe. Newton also mentions the species name vittercensis, which is not a catalogued member of the genus. ===== Sondra Wolf Dearborn is a junior operative in the Office of Form Control. Her job is to monitor questionable and illicit form change techniques, enforce the Humanity Test, and prosecute illegal mods. She is a recent addition to the force, arriving just three years after the retirement of the legendary Bey Wolf, one of the greatest form change experts alive. She is assigned to a strange case by her superior Denzel Morone: several instances in which the Humanity Test has been successfully applied, but the "infants," if they could be called that, are feral monsters. Knowing that there is no way the specimens could have (or should have) passed the test, and also aware of her own limitations and inexperience, Sondra seeks advice from Bey Wolf, her distant relative. Bey Wolf resides on Wolf Island, a private resort he chose for the name and the isolation it provides. Having retired, he is pursuing his own research in animal Form Change, a fairly taboo subject. Sondra Wolf Dearborn arrives unannounced and uninvited, and he berates her before sending her off, telling her to visit the distant colony and inspect the Humanity Test equipment herself for possible flaws. He is ready to put her out of his mind when he receives another unwelcome visit, this time from Trudy Melford, president of BEC: Biological Equipment Corporation, the manufacturer of all Form Change tanks for the last 150 years. Trudy Melford is one of the richest and most powerful people alive, and a personal visit to a remote island is evidence of great urgency and need on her part. Bey Wolf, annoyed by Trudy's interruption, is nonetheless intrigued by her offer of a position at BEC to work on revolutionary new forms. However, his natural cynicism and detective's instincts tell him that the two visits in such a short time are connected somehow. Sondra Wolf Dearborn takes Bey Wolf's advice, after some initial stonewalling by her superior Denzel Morone, and heads for the outsystem. Generally regarded by Earth as a sparsely populated backwater, the Cloudlanders (referring to the Oort Cloud) have an inverse view of themselves as the pinnacle of human civilisation, with Earth and the inner system a spent and tired cesspool of humanity. Sondra enlists the help of Bey Wolf's friend Aybee, a physicist and administrative genius, to further investigate the malfunctions and charter a flight to the Fugate colony, site of the first Humanity Test failure. Upon arriving at Fugate, Sondra is unnerved to find that Fugates are tens of meters tall, a form designed to allow cerebral growth unrestricted by the constraints of the mother's pelvis. The Fugates guide Sondra to the supposedly flawed equipment, then leave her alone at her request. Sondra performs every test she can imagine on the suspect Form Change tank, but is unable to find any software problems. She also rules out hardware flaws after inspecting the unbroken BEC seals. Having concluded her investigation, she suddenly realises that she has been locked in the tank chamber and the atmosphere is becoming dangerously thin and cold. With no alternative, she sets up an emergency form change regimen in one of the tanks to put her in a cold-tolerant coma, and reluctantly steps inside. Meanwhile, Trudy Melford successfully lures Bey Wolf to Mars, the new headquarters of BEC. Bey is astonished to find that the entire Melford Castle (her family's personal estate) has been moved to Mars brick by brick, ostensibly for tax purposes. Trudy, acting as the gracious host, treats him to a lavish dinner and all but promises her body to him, if he will only accept a position at BEC. She even opens up her database to Wolf, giving him full access to all of BEC's past, present, and future undertakings. Fascinated, Bey spends hours browsing through theoretical form change research efforts currently in progress. This experience heightens his suspicions; the BEC engineers are ingenious, what problem could possibly be so important and so intractable that it warrants Trudy Melford's personal recruitment efforts towards him? Bey Wolf is beginning to realise that a very complex mystery is unfolding around him, and he has a hunch that the Humanity Test false positives are involved. He contacts Aybee and asks the Cloudlander to keep an eye on Sondra Dearborn, and even places a call to Roger Capman, another brilliant form change expert who has adopted a Logian Form: a supersentient methane breathing human form. Roger Capman, along with all other Logians, lives in floating cities deep in the atmosphere of Saturn. Logians have a stated policy of noninterference in human affairs, although Roger Capman maintains a special relationship with Bey. Roger expresses great interest in the situation but offers little information. Bey investigates further, and makes contact with the Mars Foundation, an organisation founded by the original Mars colonists and continued by their descendants. Their goals are lofty: the terraforming of Mars, and their resources are truly enormous. For the past hundred years they have been shuttling comets to Mars and smashing them into the equator, gradually increasing the humidity and thickening the atmosphere. Their hope is that humans will eventually be able to walk on the surface of Mars without a suit. They think Melford has recruited Bey Wolf to help her perfect the new "surface forms" that have been spotted recently on Mars; humans who vaguely resemble kangaroos, and are already able to live unassisted on the Martian surface. The Mars Foundation's request is simple: snub BEC, refuse the contract, and they would match Trudy's offer. Bey had already discussed the surface forms with Trudy, and she had admitted that BEC was not behind the design, but she was interested in the possibilities (and profit) they presented. Assuming Trudy was telling the truth, there was a third party behind these new forms. Bey takes his leave and decides to venture out onto the surface, where he meets Georgia Kruskal, the genius behind the new Martian form. Bey recognises in her intellect and ingenuity a kindred spirit, and he immediately asks Georgia for permission to contribute to her project. Aybee arrives at Fugate colony to discover Sandra in the form change tank. He and a puzzled Fugate revive her, and she claims to have survived a murder attempt. Her attempts to explain this to her supervisor back home fall on deaf ears, and he orders her back to Earth. Aybee encourages Sondra to make a stopover at Samarkand, because he has found a curious anomaly in the system traffic while looking for clues as to the identity of Sondra's attempted murderer: Trudy Melford's personal yacht recently paid a visit to Samarkand, a reclusive asteroid colony which has outlawed all form change. Why would the president of BEC visit a colony vehemently opposed to form change technology? Back on Mars, Bey is also the target of a murder attempt. A helical escalator is sabotaged and he falls thirteen meters, breaking a leg and an arm. He barely manages to summon help before passing out, and is brought back to Melford Castle. He persuades Trudy to send him back to his home on Wolf Island, where he programs a dangerously rapid regeneration procedure into his customised Form Change Tanks; in just under a week, he'll be out and walking again. He's now convinced a major conspiracy is underway, and all signs point to Trudy Melford. Sondra is of the same mind, and she manages to arrange a meeting with Trudy herself. Sondra and Bey confront Trudy, and they learn that she bore a child several years ago which failed the humanity test. Unable to relinquish her son to the organ banks, Trudy instituted a massive coverup and faked his death during a boating accident. She moved her corporation to Mars, not for the tax breaks, but to provide a safe and isolated haven for her illegal son. The visits to Samarkand were a diversionary tactic; if anyone got too close and suspected the truth, they would waste their efforts in a futile search of Samarkand's population. Trudy's ultimate goal was to undermine the legitimacy of the Humanity Test itself, by engineering defects into BEC equipment so that obvious non-humans would occasionally score a false positive. The murder attempts on Sondra and Bey were coordinated by her misguided underlings, attempting to win favour. Bey promises Trudy that he will reveal to the whole system that the Humanity Test is flawed. In fact, both he and Roger Capman nearly failed the test when they were infants. The Test apparently rejects those with a certain psychological profile. For generations, the human race has been culling what could have been some of its most brilliant minds! The revelation of Trudy's motives leaves another mystery unsolved: the enormous financial resources of the Mars Foundation. It is at this point that Bey Wolf confronts Roger Capman, who admits that the Logians have been interfering with human affairs after all. They have financed the whole terraforming operation on Mars to keep the human race from fragmenting and undergoing speciation. They foresee a time not far in the future when humans evolve into separate subspecies through isolation of populations. Bey realises that this same fear has been at the back of his mind for years, but he had been unable to articulate it. Roger Capman makes another attempt to convince Bey Wolf to join him in Logian Form, but Bey Wolf realises that he has many more years of life left to him as a human, and he intends to enjoy them and continue to contribute to human society. ===== The short film is set within the Matrix universe, shortly before the discovery of "The One" (in The Matrix). It tells a story of two rebels, Dante and Medusa, operating out of a ship called the Descartes, and of their fateful mission onto the virtual world of the Matrix. The film opens with the insertion of Dante and Medusa into the Matrix. They materialize inside a machine-shop and quickly move across the city while talking to their Operator, who is guiding them on their mission. The night's objectives are simple: Medusa is to break into a high-security building in order to steal important data. Dante is to provide a distraction so the Matrix will not discover Medusa's presence. Dante heads for a particularly rough nightclub populated with cyberpunks and goths. After dispatching the two bouncers, he quickly picks a fight with two goths who mock Dante's "normal" appearance. The Operator - who is in constant contact with Dante via his cellphone - helps coordinates the fight so it coincides with Medusa breaking into the high-security building and taking out a team of security officers. The nightclub brawl culminates with Dante delivering a superhuman kick to one of goths, which alerts the Matrix. The system promptly dispatches an Agent to take care of the situation and it begins chasing Dante. He leads the Agent on a dangerous wild goose chase cross the city, keeping Medusa free to carry out her work. Unfortunately things suddenly go wrong. A security officer, missed by Medusa during her entry, discovers her presence and hits the alarm, meaning she has to flee. Dante's goose chase now becomes a frantic dash to get to an exit point - the nearest being the machine shop they first appeared in, but he is unable to shake the Agent from his tail. Dante is trapped and Medusa is out of time. He realizes he must fight the Agent - even though it means certain death - in order to buy time for Medusa to escape with the information she's hacked. He tells the Operator to get Medusa out and then, chanting the mantra "free my mind" to himself, he throws himself at the Agent. During an epic kung-fu fight he is able to hold off the Agent until he sees an opportunity to escape. He decides, though, to not race to freedom, but continues the fight until he is eventually thrown against the machinery and his chest is pierced by a steel pipe, killing him. As Dante dies, Medusa makes it back to the car and to safety - unaware of Dante's immense sacrifice for her own life. ===== ===== ===== 200px In a Manhattan radio studio, a broadcast is being made by crime reporter Lawrence Lawrence (Bob Hope)—"Larry" to his friends, as well as his enemies, who are many in number among the local underworld. Listening in on the broadcast is pretty brunette Mary Carter (Paulette Goddard), whose high-rise hotel room goes dark as a violent thunderstorm causes a citywide blackout. In the near darkness, a knock comes at her door. It is Mr. Parada (Paul Lukas), a suave, vaguely sinister Cuban solicitor. He delivers the deed to her inherited plantation and mansion, "Castillo Maldito", on a small island off the coast of Cuba. Despite Parada's discouragement, she impulsively decides to travel to Cuba by ship to inspect her new property. During Parada's visit, Mary receives a telephone call from Mr. Mederos (Anthony Quinn), an even more sinister gent who warns Mary not to sell the newly inherited property to Parada. Mary agrees to meet Mederos later. Meanwhile, after Larry Lawrence has finished broadcasting the evening's exposé of a local crime boss, he receives a telephone call from the crime boss, Frenchy Duval (Paul Fix). Frenchy invites Larry to his hotel to discuss the broadcast so he can "give it" to him straight. Coincidentally, Frenchy is living in the same hotel where Mary Carter lives. Mederos arrives on the same hotel floor as Larry. However, Mederos is looking for Parada. Mederos confronts Parada and Parada shoots and kills him. Larry hears the shot and fires his gun at random. In a mix-up in the still-darkened building, Larry sees the body and believes he's killed one of Duval's henchmen. In the confusion he finds himself in the rooms of Mary Carter, who is already busy packing for her journey. Believing that he is being pursued by Duval's men, Larry hides in Mary's large open trunk. Unaware of Larry's presence, Mary locks the trunk and arranges for its transport to the harbor. Later at the dock, Larry's valet Alex (Willie Best) searches among the luggage bound for loading and finds Larry among them. Although not in time to prevent the trunk's transfer to the ship's hold, Alex manages to get on board, hoping to extricate his employer before the ship sails. Once in her stateroom, Mary is surprised to unpack Larry along with the rest of her belongings. Larry and Alex decide to remain on board, partly to act as bodyguards to the plucky beauty, but also to keep out of reach of Frenchy Duval and the police. As Larry and Mary strike up a flirtation, they run into an acquaintance of Mary's, Geoff Montgomery (Richard Carlson), a young professorial type who regales them with tales of the local superstitions of their destination, particularly voodoo, ghosts and zombies. Upon reaching port in Havana, Mary, Larry, Alex go to the island. En route they find a shack occupied by an old woman (Virginia Brissac) and her catatonic son (Noble Johnson), whom they believe is a zombie. The imposing plantation manor proves to be a spooky edifice indeed. They begin to explore the long-abandoned, cobweb-ridden mansion, and discover a large portrait of a woman who is nearly an exact likeness of Mary—most certainly an ancestor. Soon they are terrorized by the appearance of a ghost, and the reappearance of the zombie. Are these real, or are they a ruse to frighten Mary away from her inheritance? ===== Nasim, a poor Afghan refugee in Iran, gives a demonstration in his town's square where he rides his bicycle without stopping for seven days and seven nights, with the aim of raising money for life-saving surgery for his dying wife. In the end, even after seven days, he continues to pedal endlessly, too fatigued to hear his son's and the crowd's pleas to get off his bicycle. One scholar analyses the film as an allegory which parallels the exploitation that Afghan refugees suffer from in Iran and from which they are unable to escape. ===== Mr. Peabody is a gifted anthropomorphic dog who lives in a penthouse in New York City and raises his adopted human son, 7-year-old Sherman, and tutors him traveling throughout history using the WABAC, pronounced "way back", a time machine. They visit Marie Antoinette in Versailles during the French Revolution in 1789. Getting caught in the Reign of Terror, Peabody is nearly sent to the guillotine to be executed by Maximilien Robespierre, but escapes with Sherman through the Paris sewers. In the present day, Sherman attends the Susan B. Anthony School on his first day, while Peabody struggles to come to terms with Sherman’s growing maturity as he fears of losing his bond with him. Sherman’s knowledge of the apocryphal nature of the George Washington cherry-tree anecdote leads to a fight with one of his classmates, a bossy girl named Penny Peterson, in the cafeteria where she puts him in a choke hold, accusing of him of being a dog due to the fact that he was raised by Peabody. Peabody is called in by Principal Purdy as Sherman had bitten Penny in self-defense, and also confronted by Ms. Grunion, a Child Protective Services agent, who suspects that Sherman's behavior is due to being raised by a dog and plans to visit to their home to investigate whether or not he is an unfit parent. Peabody invites Penny and her parents, Paul and Patty, over for dinner to reconcile before Ms. Grunion arrives. Penny calls Sherman a liar for claiming first-hand knowledge of history. Despite Peabody's contrary instructions, Sherman shows Penny the WABAC to show proof and takes her into the past, where she stays in Ancient Egypt in 1332 BCE to marry King Tut. Sherman returns to get Peabody's help. Peabody hypnotizes the Petersons and heads to Egypt to stop the wedding. Penny initially refuses to leave, hoping to achieve Tut’s riches after he dies, until she is informed that she as well will be killed alongside Tut during the wedding and escapes with Peabody and Sherman. While trying to return back, the WABAC runs out of power, so they stop at Renaissance Florence in 1508 where they meet Leonardo da Vinci and Lisa del Giocondo, pioneering Mona Lisa's famous smile. Penny and Sherman explore da Vinci's attic and find his flying machine. Penny goads Sherman into flying it, which he manages to do before crashing. Da Vinci is thrilled the device works, but Peabody is upset that Sherman was almost killed, while also having destroyed a historical artifact. When they resume their journey, Sherman learns of Ms. Grunion’s plot to take him away and enters a fight with Peabody. As they feud, a black hole in time forces them into an emergency landing during the Trojan War in 1184 BCE. Upset about Peabody not trusting him, Sherman runs away and joins the army of King Agamemnon in the Trojan Horse, but reconciles with him during the battle. During the final parts of the Trojan War, Penny and Sherman are trapped inside the Horse as it rolls towards a ravine. Peabody saves them but presumably dies during the attempt. Believing Peabody to be dead, Sherman breaks down in tears over his apparent death while Penny comforts him. Feeling bad for his actions, Sherman decides to go home and pilots the WABAC to a few minutes before they left in the present to get Mr. Peabody's help to fix everything, despite Peabody’s earlier warnings to never return to a time when they existed. As Sherman and Penny try to explain the situation, Sherman's earlier self shows up. When Grunion arrives, Peabody tries to conceal from the Petersons the presence of two Shermans; but the second Peabody arrives back from Ancient Troy, complicating the situation. Troy Peabody reveals he survived the crash, much to Sherman's relief. Grunion attempts to collect both Shermans, but they and the Peabodys merge back together, causing a massive cosmic shockwave. Grunion grabs Sherman to take him away for good, to which an enraged Peabody reverts to his natural dog instincts and furiously bites Grunion in retaliation, who then calls the New York Police Department. Peabody, Penny, and Sherman race to the WABAC, but cannot time-travel due to a rip in the space-time continuum caused by the merger of their cosmic doubles. The collision caused a portal to appear above New York and historic objects and figures rain down everywhere in the city. Mr. Peabody crash-lands the WABAC in Grand Army Plaza at the base of William Tecumseh Sherman's statue. Historical figures and police officers quickly surround them, while Grunion calls in animal control to arrest Peabody. Sherman explains that everything was his fault, but Grunion contends that it is all because a dog cannot raise a boy. Sherman counters Grunion by saying that if being a dog means being as loving and loyal as Peabody is, then he is proud to be a dog, too. Penny, her parents, the historical figures, and others all make the same pledge. George Washington grants Peabody a presidential pardon which is supported by Abraham Lincoln and Bill Clinton. When larger objects such as the Sphinx, the RMS Titanic and the Florence Cathedral begin falling through the rip, the people of the present and the past are forced to brainstorm ideas to prevent disaster. To close the rip, Peabody and Sherman take off in the WABAC, travel into the future for a few minutes, and undo the damage. The historical figures are dragged back to their respective times, with Agamemnon abducting Grunion back to his own time as she vows revenge on Peabody. Sherman returns to school, having become great friends with Penny. History, meanwhile, is contaminated with modern traits, with Tut throwing a New York-themed party, da Vinci and del Giocondo pioneering pop art, Washington and Benjamin Franklin competing over the value of the banknotes with their respective faces on them, Albert Einstein going into a rage upon being unable to solve a Rubik's Cube, Robespierre failing to use a taser properly, and Grunion and Agamemnon getting married in the Trojan Horse by Odysseus. ===== In 1973, during the Yom Kippur War, an Israeli warplane carrying a nuclear bomb is shot down. In 2002, a Syrian scrap collector uncovers a large unexploded bomb buried in a field in the Golan Heights. He sells it to a South African black market arms trafficker named Olson, who recognizes it as the nuclear bomb that was lost during that war. He then sells it to a neo-fascist group led by Austrian billionaire Richard Dressler, whose aim is to start a war between the United States and Russia that will devastate them both, and leave a united fascist Europe to rule the world. CIA analyst Jack Ryan is summoned by CIA Director William Cabot to accompany him to Moscow to meet Russian President Nemerov. There, Cabot and Ryan are allowed to examine a Russian nuclear weapons facility as prescribed by the START treaty, where Ryan notices the absence of three scientists listed on the facility's roster. After receiving reliable intelligence from a confidential secure informant inside the Kremlin, codenamed "Spinnaker", Cabot sends operative John Clark to Russia to investigate. Clark tracks the missing scientists to a former Soviet military facility in Ukraine, where Cabot suspects they are building a secret nuclear weapon that Russia could use without any method to trace it back to them (relations between the U.S. and Russia are strained due to the latter's war in Chechnya). Ryan and his colleagues discern that a crate from the facility in Ukraine was flown to the Canary Islands, then sent to Baltimore on a cargo ship. Ryan warns Cabot, who is attending a football game in the city with U.S. President Fowler, about a bomb threat. Fowler is evacuated before the bomb (at the stadium) detonates, but the stadium is destroyed and Cabot is mortally wounded. Further worsening matters, a corrupt Russian Air Force general who has been paid by Dressler (unbeknownst to the U.S.) sends warplanes to attack a U.S. aircraft carrier, heavily damaging it and leading the U.S. to believe that Russia perpetrated the nuclear bombing. Ryan learns from a radiation assessment team that the isotopic signature from the nuclear blast indicates it was manufactured in the U.S.; evidence which seems to exonerate Russia. In Syria, Clark tracks down Ghazi, one of the men who found the bomb, now dying of radiation exposure. He tells Clark that he sold the bomb to Olson, who lives in Damascus. Ryan's colleagues at Langley infiltrate Olson's computer and download files that implicate Dressler as the person who bought the plutonium and who is behind the nuclear attack. Ryan is able to reach the National Military Command Center in The Pentagon and get a message to Nemerov, saying that he knows that Russia was not behind the attack, while also asking Nemerov to stand down his forces as a show of good faith. Nemerov agrees to do so as Fowler follows suit. The participants in the conspiracy, including Olson and Dressler, are assassinated. Fowler and Nemerov announce new measures to counter nuclear proliferation in joint speeches at the White House, as Ryan and his fiancée Dr. Catherine Muller listen in. Spinnaker, who is revealed to be Grushkov, gives them a present for their engagement, which they notably had not yet announced to anyone. ===== Couples Joel and Sophie, Sam and Sammie and Isaac and Claudia are dining with writer Art Witz. The latter talks about his new book, in which he argues that monogamy is a lie and that people are by nature alienated. The three couples react furiously and insulted by Art's views, end the dinner. The next day, Isaac buys a wedding present for his wife Claudia in an antique shop and has sex with the salesgirl. Claudia searches for Art and ends up in bed with him, admitting that she and Isaac have been polygamous for a long time, but hides it from their friends. Jewish lawyer Joel misses an erotic massage in an illegal massage studio and suffers from his guilty conscience. He is plagued by nightmares and decides to tell his wife Sophie the truth, although his brother Reuben, a geeky ne'er-do-well with a penchant for obese women, advises against it. Medical student Sophie meets secretly with her medical professor dr. Lionel Taft and sleeps with him, but then realizes that she loves her husband. Joel confesses the event to Sophie, while she keeps her affair secret. Sam, a chef working for a tony catering company, is about to marry his pregnant fiancé Sammie. He's a fan of pornography, which he keeps secret from his fiancée. When she discovers that, she fears that he can cheat her as well and hires a private investigator, who in turn decides to use a woman as bait for Sam. He, however, resists the woman's charm, which Sammie registers with great relief. The film ends with a scene depicting Sam and Sammie's wedding, which their friends attend as guests. ===== The film tells the tragic story of British noblewoman Fanny Horn (Edit Szalay) and Jesuit priest Heredia (Jan Englert) against the backdrop of the Spanish Civil War. A rich young aristocrat who has spent her preceding years in a decadent lifestyle, Fanny falls in love with Heredia; however, although the priest feels the same, he places his fanatical devotion to his faith above their attraction. Fanny follows Heredia to a typhus outbreak at a camp near Pena Ronda and volunteers to work as a nurse under his command and to finance the camp. Nevertheless, the conditions at the camp are appalling and deteriorate sharply as the civil war begins. Fanny gradually becomes increasingly desperate with the fanatic and inhumane behaviour of Heredia, who turns out to be deeply involved in the plotting of the anti-republican side in the civil war. As Heredia continues to reject her love, and as she eventually witnesses his fanaticism take several human victims, Fanny shoots him. Her psychological breakdown has led her to begin taking morphine, which will eventually lead to her own demise. ===== An oddball animal biologist local field researcher named Marshall Clarke (Simon Bossell) is investigating the disappearance of local wildlife, and finds slimy residue on a fence post. Meanwhile, a woman named Amy Harding (Pamela Gidley) moves into her old cabin in the woods of Langdon, where she spent her family holidays as a child, along with her cat, Frankie, and two goldfishes. In the morning, Amy cleans, and fixes up her cabin. She goes to eat some cake, and discovers that something has been in it. Outside, she meets Mr. Peterson (Norman Forsey), looking for his dog Florence, which was killed by an unseen creature, he tells her to get out of Langdon. She goes to the general store owned by Mrs. Miller (Helen Moulder), Amy asks her for some mouse traps, but she says that they are out of stock. She buys some groceries, and insect spray. Back at the cabin, she discovers that Frankie's bowl is empty, and she gives him canned food. As she takes a bath, the lights goes out and she goes to her shed to check the generator. While there, slimy residue falls into her hair and she goes to wash it out. She tells Frankie to guard the cabin, as she goes to the general store again. She buys all the mouse traps for $22.00, and a poison sprayer that Mrs. Miller loans to her. She meets Marshall, who drives her to her cabin when her car breaks down. As they get back to the cabin, they search the kitchen and something bites Amy's hand. Marshall discovers the remains of Amy's cat Frankie on the bathroom floor during the search. He discovers foot prints on the fish tank, and he shows Amy that he caught one of the creatures what appears to be a lizard. As Marshall and Amy talk, she sees a lizard crawling around. Marshall tries to catch it but Amy sprays it with the poison sprayer, and kills it. Marshall says the creature is a mutant gecko that can spit blinding venom to paralyze its prey. He and Amy go outside, where it has begun snowing and drive away but crash. Amy tells Marshall that Mr. Peterson lives down the road. When they arrive at Mr. Peterson's cabin, they find his dead body being eaten by the lizards. Amy lights some matches, throws them into an oven, and blows the cabin up. Amy and Marshall see Mr. Peterson's truck blow up as well. They make it back to the cabin, and a rest on the couch in the living room. Marshall looks into his backpack, and discovers that the lizard has escaped. Amy goes to fetch her rifle from her bedroom and hands it to Marshall. Suddenly, a tree branch breaks through the window and Marshall shoots it multiple times. Amy hammers a table onto the window to prevent the cold from getting in. She smells something burning and finds a lizard underneath the heater. Marshall picks it up, and takes into the kitchen to examine it. He discovers that the creature has been eating the local wildlife and was pregnant. They start looking for the eggs, and Marshall accidentally breaks the handle on the poison sprayer. Amy fetches a water gun from her bedroom and attaches the sprayer's hose to it. They go into the bedroom and discover tracks under the bed. A lizard leaps out of the closet with Marshall chasing it into the living room, firing multiple rounds at it. Amy grabs the gun from him and wait for the lizard to come out from underneath the couch, shooting it in the head. They go to bedroom again and find an egg. Amy throws it on the floor and stomps on it. Marshall says that there are two lizards left. They wait in the living room, where they notice the lizards are up in the attic. Marshall uses a ladder and water hose to lure the lizards out. Amy hears the lizards moving in the walls. Marshall grabs the gun and puts three holes in the wall with the butt of the gun. He uses the water hose to flush them out, causing a lizard to break out and Amy fires three rounds at it to no effect. The lizard charges at them, leaping onto Marshall, causing him to fall to the floor, with the lizard biting and scratching him. Amy grabs the water hose and blasts it off him. Marshall grabs a chair and the lizard spits venom in his eyes, but he manages to crush it multiple times. Amy takes Marshall into the kitchen and bandages his wounds, putting gauze over his eyes. She uses a piece of chicken as bait for the last lizard with a piece of string tied to it. The lizard takes the chicken, but the string breaks. Amy runs out of the closet, grabs it, and throws it into the fish tank where it eats the fishes. Its tail starts to attack her and she stomps on it. When the lizard starts to grow gills, Amy throws a lamp into the tank and electrocutes it. She goes up into the attic and, finding more eggs, smashes them with a hammer. Amy and Marshall, believing they've won, fall asleep. In the morning, Marshall wakes up to music coming from a car and meets Amy's ex-boyfriend Uri Romanov (Valery Nikolaev) outside. Uri grabs Marshall by the nose and orders him to leave. Marshall tries to stop him, but Uri leaves him unconscious on the ground. When Amy wakes up, she sees lizards hatching inside the closet and crushes them with a shoe. When she runs out of the bedroom, she finds Uri and grabs a kitchen knife, attempting to kill him. Uri grabs her, and forces her down on the kitchen counter, asking where is his money. Suddenly Marshall shows up with the rifle in his hands. Uri pulls out a pistol and tells him Amy's real name is Alex Langdon. Amy tells Uri that the money is in the bedroom closet, but when he goes into bedroom, he discovers that she tricked him. He forces them to the bed, and prevents them from leaving. Suddenly, lizards attack but Uri kills them with his guns. He again asks Amy where is the money; she replies that it is in the attic. Marshall goes up to fetch the money belt and throws it down to the floor. Uri picks it up, complaining it as wet and a bit light. Amy sprays him in the face with insect spray. They shove him into the fireplace and eggs fall on his head. A lizard breaks out of his mouth, and Amy shoots him in the face repeatedly. She gives Marshall the pistol for protection while he goes to pour gasoline in the bedroom and kitchen, where more lizards appear. When Amy looks in the money belt, a lizard pops out and she screams. Marshall throws the gas can into the oven and, on the third shot hits the can. His clothes catch on fire; Amy extinguishes his flaming clothes but the money also burns. They both escape in Uri's car as the cabin burns. The car starts to breaks down and Marshall goes to look under the hood, where he finds eggs hatching in it. Suddenly, lizards start pop out of various places inside the car, attacking Amy. Marshall tells her to unlock the door after she accidentally locked it in her panic. He takes the cigar she had lit while he was looking under the hood and throws it into the gas tank, blowing up the car while simultaneously killing the lizards. Marshall carries an unconscious Amy through the snow to the general store and meet up with Mrs. Miller. While trying to warm Amy with electric blankets, he finds a lizards' tail sticking out of her leg. He grabs a pair of scissors, and uses matches to heat them up. He sticks the scissors into her leg, creating a larger opening. He tells Mrs. Miller to put out the scissors and as she does so, Marshall pulls the lizard out of Amy's leg causing Amy to scream. He looks around the store with a shovel (since Mrs. Miller does not sell guns in her store) and accidentally knocks out the lights. Mrs. Miller goes to fetch a flashlight and is killed by the lizard. Marshall, upset about Mrs. Miller's death, puts on sunglasses and sets fire to a lighter fluid-soaked push broom. As he goes looking for the lizard, it again spits venom at him but instead hits the glasses and he takes them off. The lizard tries to jump on him but instead lands on the broom and Marshall pushes it into a corner. He pours more lighter fluid on the lizard as it burns. As he is walking away, the lizard spits more venom and puts the fire out. The lizard starts to come after him again, when he finds a flare gun. Before he can finish loading it, the lizard sends him to the floor, scratching and biting him. Suddenly, Amy shows up and grabs the flare gun, shooting the lizard in the mouth. Sent flying, the lizard hits the wall and explodes. Amy and Marshall collapse on the floor and kiss. ===== The movie loosely follows the plot of Huxley's novel, but adds a coda to the end. Just as Bernard Marx is about to take over the job of Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, replacing the disgraced previous director, Lenina informs him that she is pregnant with his child. She conceived it the night that John Savage fell to his death. She did not use her birth control that night. Bernard suggests that she say it was an accident and have an abortion, but she makes it clear that she will not, and so prefers banishment. Bernard lets her go – secretly – and takes the job he has aspired to throughout his career, but he is soon unhappy, and no amount of Soma can change that. He has seen and learned to appreciate genuine emotions and human experiences thanks to knowing John, as has Lenina. As a result, Bernard follows Lenina into exile from society. Director Mustapha Mond looks for Bernard at their scheduled meeting, and is handed a note. The messenger explains that Bernard got away from society by authorizing a trip for himself. Mond laughs out loud to himself, indicating that he will not pursue them. The final scene shows a beach with Lenina and Bernard. They appear to be playing with their natural born daughter on the shore. ===== The novel concerns the life of Georges, the son of a wealthy mulatto plantation owner named Pierre Munier, on Mauritius. While part-black, Georges is very light-skinned, if not white. As a child, he witnesses the British invasion of Isle de France. Because Georges' father is a mulatto, the other plantation owners refuse to let him fight alongside them. Instead, Georges' father leads the blacks and delivers a crushing blow against a British column. Refusing to acknowledge that a man of colour saved them, M. Malmédie and the other white plantation owners ignore the accomplishment. M. Malmédie's son Henri mocks Georges because of this, resulting in a fight between the two. Afterward, worried about any retaliation from M. Malmédie, Georges' father sends Georges and his older brother Jacques to Europe to be educated. In Europe, the brothers are separated when the older brother gets a job on a sailing ship. Georges becomes cultured, deeply educated, and popular in Parisian circles. Through numerous tests of will Georges overcomes his weaknesses and becomes skilled in a variety of fields, ranging from hunting to the art of seducing women. Upon his return, he finds that the plantation owners have forgotten who he is. In little time he becomes the toast of society, and a beautiful woman falls in love with him. He also discovers that his brother has become the captain of a slave-ship. However, Georges cannot tolerate the injustice of slavery, so he conspires to lead a slave revolt. When this revolt fails, he is incarcerated and condemned to death. While Georges is being brought to be executed, Jacques and his men save him, Sara, who has married Georges, and Pierre. They then sail off, pursued by the British Royal Navy. After a naval engagement the British ship is sunk and they escape. ===== Edwina "Eddie" Ferguson, an attractive but clumsy nurse, who often accidentally injures potential suitors, cannot find romance at the 4077th—or anywhere else, for that matter, as she confides to Margie Cutler. The other nurses at the Double Natural discuss her problem and agree to put their romantic relationships with the doctors and corpsmen on hold until someone agrees to date Eddie. Eventually, to end the romantic drought the doctors draw straws to be her date for an evening, and Hawkeye draws the short straw. Hilarity ensues as his best smooth operator technique collides head on with Eddie's innate klutziness. ===== Hawkeye and Trapper conspire to take down Colonel Buzz Brighton, a West Pointer who has accumulated twice as many casualties while only gaining half as much ground as other commanders. (This was the first of several such attempts by Hawkeye.) In an effort to have the colonel relieved of command, they convince him that Frank Burns is a homosexual and that Henry Blake is an alcoholic who is having a sordid affair with the promiscuous Margaret Houlihan. These stories achieve the purpose of rendering Hawkeye and Trapper the only two people in camp Buzz can be sure are trustworthy. A little manipulation and some conveniently timed events add some apparent proof to these claims. For example, when Buzz is drinking with them in the Swamp, they leave a pair of gold high-heeled shoes by Frank's bed. Later, Frank tries to check Buzz's leg to see if it is healing properly, and he is rebuffed by Buzz, who suspects that he has romantic or sexual intentions. When Margaret becomes suspicious, Hawkeye and Trapper tell her that Buzz is suffering from low self- esteem and hint that he needs intimate contact with a woman to prove he is still a man. While he is alone with Margaret, the Swampmen get Henry Blake very drunk, give him a pistol (telling him that he needs to take a firearms qualification test), arrange for him to walk in on Buzz and Hot Lips, and encourage an angry, drunken response from Henry. Throughout the episode, they undertake more subtle measures to try to convince him that, among these people he cannot trust, he is going mad. Such measures include switching his tent, leaving him confused about whether it has been there the whole time; and telling him to drink his glass of milk that he so fervently asked for despite his never having asked for a glass of milk. At the end, convinced that there must be something wrong with him, Buzz is shipped back stateside. In this episode's tag, Hawkeye makes a reference to "the Dick Haymes look." Haymes was a handsome pop singer in the 1940s and '50s, primarily remembered for his appearance in the 1945 film State Fair. ===== Frank Burns throws his back out while dancing with Hot Lips in her tent. While recuperating in post-op, he puts himself in for the Purple Heart. Margaret justifies it by claiming that since the injury was sustained at a front-line unit (due to a "slip in the mud on the way to the shower"), technically that makes it battle-connected. Hawkeye's old friend Tommy Gillis (James T. Callahan) appears at the 4077th. A reporter in civilian life, he is a combat soldier working on a book about life on the front lines called You Never Hear the Bullet. The book is intended to show how death in battle can be sudden and not surrounded by any prior drama, unlike how it is often depicted in the movies. Tommy leaves for his unit just as wounded arrive at the compound. While operating on a Marine with appendicitis (played by Ron Howard), the doctors remark on how young he looks. Later, recovering in the hospital ward, the Marine asks Hawkeye how soon he can get back to the front and boasts about killing enemy soldiers. Hawkeye discovers that the Marine is in fact only 15 years old, having used his older brother's ID to enlist and go to Korea to win back his ex-girlfriend. Hawkeye gives the Marine some sage advice about women. Later in the episode, Tommy himself shows up as a casualty on the operating table, having been shot by the enemy on the front lines. Just before being anesthetized, he weakly tells Hawkeye that he in fact had heard a bullet just before being hit, just like in the movies. Hawkeye, close to tears, suggests that Sometimes You Hear the Bullet is a better title anyway, and tries frantically to save Tommy's life. Unfortunately, Tommy dies on the table and Henry Blake orders Hawkeye to move away and help Trapper. Hawkeye is later seen crying for his friend, but wonders why he never cried for any of the other men he has seen die while in Korea. Henry consoles him by remarking "There are certain rules about a war. Rule Number One is: Young men die. And Rule Number Two is: Doctors can't change Rule Number One." Not wanting to see another young man die needlessly, Hawkeye immediately reports the underage Marine to Major Houlihan and the MPs, sending him back to America and safety. The young Marine tells Hawkeye he will hate him as long as he lives and Hawkeye says he hopes it's a very long healthy hate. While initially furious, the young man forgives him when Hawkeye presents him with a medal — the Purple Heart that Frank was to be awarded (but was not entitled to).Wittebols, pp. 161-166 ===== Hawkeye writes to his father again about several crazy events that take place at the 4077th, including his bet with Trapper John that he could walk into the mess tent naked and nobody would notice (he loses), the arrival of Captain Adam Casey (portrayed by Alex Henteloff), a Demara-esque fraud masquerading as a doctor, Frank becoming drunk, and Margaret's attempt to sing "My Blue Heaven" at the camp "No-Talent Show". ===== Excitement runs high in the camp on the day of the Army-Navy football game, with several members of the 4077th putting money into a betting pool. As the game starts, the unit comes under enemy attack, causing some damage and injuries. When a bomb falls into the compound but does not detonate, the entire camp is thrown into a panic. Lt. Col. Blake starts calling various branches of the military, trying to find out who dropped the bomb, but the people he talks to are more interested in following the game. He eventually learns that the bomb was dropped by the CIA, then sends Hawkeye and Trapper out to defuse it. However, the poorly written defusing instructions cause them to accidentally start the timer on the bomb – which explodes and fires hundreds of propaganda leaflets into the air. As life in the camp settles down, Father Mulcahy wins the football pool, having placed the only bet on Navy. ===== The episode opens in a poker game. When it is interrupted by incoming wounded, Hawkeye and Margaret operate on a patient and Hawkeye insults Frank. However, Hawkeye's patient fails to improve after surgery. Hawkeye becomes overly concerned with the case, to the point of attacking Frank over comments at lunch, sleeping in post-op, snapping at Trapper for playing poker too loudly, and moving out of the Swamp to the supply tent. While Hawkeye retreats to the supply tent to reflect on the case, he is interrupted by his date (whom he turns away), Trapper (whom he turns away as well), two other soldiers, and Henry. Henry implies that Hawkeye is concerned more about his ego than about his patient. Hawkeye replies with a glib remark about Henry's intelligence, which ultimately insults Henry and allows Hawkeye some peace and quiet. While pondering the case outside the supply tent, Hawkeye encounters Margaret and she theorizes that they made a mistake during surgery, eliciting extreme doubt from Hawkeye, who in turn insults her. During the night, Hawkeye has an epiphany and reopens the patient to find a small piece of shrapnel damage behind the sigmoid colon, at which point Frank states that "anybody could have missed that." Hawkeye responds with a sincere "Thanks, Frank." ===== After witnessing Frank's berating of nurse Ginger Bayliss for no reason, Hawkeye and Trapper console Ginger and set Frank up for one of their "getting even" pranks. This latest scheme succeeds where no other one has, as Frank finally demands that he be transferred to another unit. But when another prank embarrasses both Frank and Margaret over the P.A. system, she also demands a transfer. Hawkeye and Trapper are glad to be rid of the pair at first, but then learn that they will have to work double shifts until replacements arrive. To trick Frank into staying, the two surgeons lead him to believe that large deposits of gold can be found near the camp. His greed gets the better of him and he withdraws his transfer request, after which Hawkeye and Trapper humiliate him again by driving past him in a jeep that they have painted gold. ===== News of a ceasefire has reached the 4077th. Everyone celebrates and says their good-byes, except Trapper, who remains skeptical. The ceasefire does, of course, turn out to be a rumour, but not before Hawkeye tells three of his lovers he is married (which is a lie), shows the camp embarrassing pictures taken of General Clayton and Major Houlihan, forgives $1,500 worth of gambling debts, and gives away all of his possessions. Final appearance of Patrick Adiarte as Ho-Jon. ===== A USO show is held at the 4077th, consisting of a stand-up comic and a female singing trio backed by a small band. The performance is juxtaposed with scenes from everyday life in the camp. Henry's wife gives birth to a son. Though Henry is depressed by not being able to see his new baby, Radar cheers him up by arranging for one of the camp's laundry workers to let him hold hers. The camp dentist receives his discharge orders and takes great pains to avoid injury and illness before he starts his trip home, only to crash his jeep and end up in traction. Frank plays a series of practical jokes on Hawkeye, sabotaging the still to spray him in the face, causing a bucket of water to fall and soak him, and rigging the showerheads to malfunction when he tries to take a shower. Hawkeye gets the last laugh by collapsing the officers' latrine tent on top of Frank while he is using it. ===== The book is set just before the outbreak of the First World War. It is an account of how the lives of the main characters were interwoven with the success or failure of secret naval talks between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Russian Empire. In these, Britain had to win the support of Russia in order to make any headway with its navy. As a result, Tsar Nicholas’s nephew Prince Alexei was sent to London for high-level bilateral talks. Lord Stephen Walden is married to Lydia, a Russian aristocrat. The young visiting Prince is her nephew and Walden was one of the people taking part in the talks. When Prince Alexei arrived in London, his presence aroused the interest of not only the establishment, but tragically that of Feliks, an anarchist. Feliks, also a Russian, decided to assassinate Prince Alexei so that the Anglo-Russian negotiations would collapse. Having failed once to shoot the Russian prince, Feliks looked for alternative methods. Eventually, he learned that Lydia, his ex-lover, was married to Walden. He visited the Waldens’ home and was able to get details of the Prince’s whereabouts. But his plot was foiled when Lydia, guided by her intuition, realized that Feliks had evil designs and told her husband about Feliks’s visit. As the drama unfolded, Walden’s daughter Charlotte got to know the effervescent Feliks. It was through her that he discovered once more about the hiding place of the Russian prince. It was about this time that Charlotte learned that her true father was not Walden, but Feliks. Lydia had been pregnant for two months before marrying Walden but this fact was unknown to Walden himself. The story moved up to a crescendo with the Russian prince being hidden in the country home of the Waldens. Yet again, Feliks, the assassin, wheedled this piece information from Charlotte. With her active support, Feliks hid himself right in the Walden home while the Special Branch was combing the entire village for him. At this point, Feliks decided it was time to make his move. He set the house on fire, which forced the prince to emerge to escape the flames. When the prince came out, Feliks shot him dead. But he himself lost his life in his attempt to save Charlotte who was trapped in the house by the inferno. When Walden later learnt of the paternity of Charlotte, he took it in his stride. For Feliks, it was a case of poetic justice. In the final chapter, Winston Churchill - at the time First Lord of the Admiralty and having recent experience as Home Secretary - arrives on the scene and formulates a comprehensive plan for damage control: Disposing of Feliks' body, hiding that such a person ever existed and regretfully informing the Czar that his nephew died in the fire but had already signed the treaty. Thus - in common with the conventions of Secret History - the whole affair remains hidden from public scrutiny and the First World War breaks out on schedule, and goes on with its four years of mass bloodshed. Category:1982 British novels Category:Historical novels Category:British historical novels Category:Thriller novels Category:Novels by Ken Follett Category:Secret histories Category:Novels set during World War I Category:Novels set in the Russian Empire Category:Novels set in the United Kingdom Category:Cultural depictions of Nicholas II of Russia Category:Cultural depictions of Winston Churchill Category:Novels set in the 1910s Category:Hamish Hamilton books ===== Robin's 30 episodes focus on the titular unemployed Swedish bachelor, in his early 20s and his best friend Benjamin. While neither seem to do anything constructive with their lives, they are involved in several misadventures, mostly resulting in a non sequitur ending. The following episode will feature no mention of previous encounters. The pair (or frequently, Robin alone) will have run-ins with the law, encounter drunks, flashers and other odd characters. ===== Jeremy is a 28-year-old man working at the summer camp where he spent a childhood summer and where he found a true sense of family after the death of his father. Jeremy now works at the camp as an assistant director. He becomes infatuated with Max, a disturbed 14-year-old. When Max confides in him that he has been sexually abused by the camp director, who was a victim of sexual abuse himself, Jeremy realizes just how close he came to actually committing the same crime. ===== * Imprisoned Sandra (Elpidia Carrillo) has an emotional breakdown when the broken telephone in her cubicle prevents her from communicating with her daughter on visiting day. * Diana (Robin Wright Penn) and Damian (Jason Isaacs), two former flames now married to others, unexpectedly have a poignant reunion in the aisle of the local supermarket. * Holly (Lisa Gay Hamilton) returns home to confront her sexually abusive stepfather and dissolves into gun-waving hysteria. * Feuding married couple Sonia (Holly Hunter) and Martin (Stephen Dillane) have an emotional meltdown while visiting their friends Lisa (Molly Parker) and Damian (Jason Isaacs) in their new apartment. * Teenaged Samantha (Amanda Seyfried) is torn between her non-communicative parents Ruth (Sissy Spacek), and Larry (Ian McShane), each of whom questions her about everything the other one has to say. * Divorcée Lorna (Amy Brenneman) must cope with her ex-husband Andrew's (William Fichtner) sexual desire for her during his second wife's funeral. * Ruth (Sissy Spacek), primary caretaker for her wheelchair-using husband, becomes increasingly guilt-ridden during a tryst with drunken widower Henry (Aidan Quinn) in a hotel. * Camille (Kathy Baker) is facing breast cancer surgery and uses her waiting time to lash out at her quietly supportive husband Richard (Joe Mantegna). * Maggie (Glenn Close) discusses life with her daughter Maria (Dakota Fanning) during a picnic in the cemetery and realizes how much she needs the little girl's loving comfort. ===== The story begins in a small town in western Montana where New Jersey based bank robber Frank Salazar has been hiding out from the law after a series of bank robberies in Newark. Upon realizing that the local bank contains a large amount of cash, Salazar recruits four former accomplices to come to town and help him rob the bank. Among them are Nick Bartkowski, a nervous and possibly alcoholic safecracker; Max Green, an old school explosives expert with a heart condition; Ray Forgy, a young, wisecracking auto thief and getaway driver; and Carlos Barrios, a well-manicured lookout and weapons expert. Before they can arrive, however, two New Jersey detectives (George Denver and Bill Lonigan) catch up with Salazar, arrest him, and extradite him back to New Jersey. But Salazar soon escapes and becomes hopelessly lost in the Montana wilderness as he flees Denver and Lonigan's custody. Unaware of Salazar's arrest and escape, the four accomplices arrive and realize that he is nowhere to be found. They finally decide to take down the bank on their own but must go through several humorous ordeals before they can complete their plan. The four successfully rob the bank and escape. Salazar is caught shortly thereafter and accused of the robbery, despite having not taken part. Learning that his police bail has been set at $1 million, three of the four (against Bartkowski's wishes) decide to use their loot to rescue Salazar. ===== Possessing a reputation for bringing criminals to justice, ready-to-retire bounty hunter Jonathan Corbett (Lee Van Cleef) is summoned to a party by a Texas railroad tycoon by the name of Brockston (Walter Barnes), whose daughter is getting married. Brockston plants the seed that Corbett should consider a run for the Senate, but not before doing one last bounty hunt. Brockston offers Corbett his political backing in exchange for tracking down a 12-year-old girl's accused rapist and murderer, who goes by the name of Cuchillo (Tomas Milian), a Mexican who is fleeing back to his native land. Cuchillo means "knife" in Spanish, which is the rascal’s weapon of choice. Corbett expects it to be easy, even offering to do it as a wedding gift. Corbett sets out in pursuit of Cuchillo, who is not as dumb as he acts, and who is rather crafty at vexing Corbett at every turn. Corbett pursues Cuchillo into Mexico, where he is arrested when a fight starts in a brothel. Brockston pulls strings to free Corbett from jail and intercepts him, hiring a gang of mercenaries to find Cuchillo. Corbett learns that Cuchillo is innocent and in fact the witness that Brockston's alcoholic son- in-law, Chet Miller (Ángel del Pozo), was the rapist. Corbett misleads the mercenaries to confront Cuchillo with Chet himself. In the final showdown, Corbett provides a knife to Cuchillo to kill Chet, then killing Brockston himself. The two ride together from the scene before parting ways. ===== In the summer of 1938, the young Paul Moreaux, who lives in a town outside of Boston called Monument, discovers he can "fade", becoming invisible. His family has had this ability generation after generation; it is somehow passed down from uncle to nephew. Bewildered and then thrilled with the possibilities of invisibility, Paul experiments with his "gift". He sees things that he should not witness. His power soon overloads him, shows him shocking secrets, pushes him over the edge, and drives him toward some chilling and horrible acts for which there is no forgiveness, no forgetting, and no turning back. Paul discovers how cruel, evil, and disgusting the world can be, and how the ability to fade becomes a nightmare. ===== The game chronicles a young girl, who may be considered a tomboy, named Pepper, and her pit bull dog Lockjaw. Pepper's evil Uncle Fred has created a time machine, whose portal Lockjaw is accidentally tossed into. Hoping to save her dog, Pepper is pulled in with him. Now separated, they have both been sent back to Philadelphia in 1764. Time has been altered, however; many elements of the 1960s American counterculture are combined with the life and times of Benjamin Franklin. Through generous use of artistic licence, he has been transformed into a "flower child", or "hippie". Via humorous dialogue and interaction with both the townspeople and Franklin, Pepper is responsible for ensuring that history unfolds the way it should, as well as first locating and subsequently reuniting with Lockjaw. The player does have the opportunity to learn valid historical facts throughout the game; this is facilitated by a "truth" icon and multiple-choice quizzes at the conclusion of each act, or section of the game. ===== Peter Cottontail is a young Easter Bunny who lives in April Valley where all the other Easter Bunnies live and work, making Easter candy, sewing bonnets, and decorating and delivering Easter eggs. Colonel Wellington B. Bunny, the retiring Chief Easter Bunny, names Peter his successor, despite his boasting and lying. Peter, who has dreamed of being the Chief Easter Bunny almost his entire life, gladly accepts. Only one bunny objects to the Colonel's decision; January Q. Irontail, an evil, reclusive rabbit villain, who lives alone in a craggy old tree, except for his bat assistant Montresor and his pet spider. Irontail also wants to become Chief Easter Bunny, only so he can ruin Easter for children as revenge for the loss of his tail, which was previously run over by a rollerskating child and replaced with an iron prosthetic. Irontail demands that Colonel Bunny hold a contest between himself and Peter to see who delivers the most eggs, as the Constitution of April Valley reads. Peter accepts the challenge, but stays up all night partying with his friends. Although he tells his rooster Ben to wake him up at 5:30 in the morning, Irontail sneaks into his house and feeds the rooster magic bubblegum, sealing his beak and Peter sleeps on, not hearing the crows from the popping bubbles. Though Irontail tries all day to deliver eggs with unsuccessful results, he is only able to deliver one egg to a sleeping hobo. However, it's still one egg more than Peter delivered. Therefore, Irontail becomes the new Chief Easter Bunny, passing laws to make Easter a disaster such as: Painting eggs brown and gray, ordering the candy sculptors to make chocolate tarantulas and octopuses instead of bunnies and chicks, and having Easter galoshes instead of bonnets. Meanwhile, Peter, ashamed that his bragging and irresponsibility led to this tragedy, leaves April Valley until he meets Seymour S. Sassafras (the narrator), an eccentric peddler and inventor, who supplies April Valley with the colors to paint the eggs with from his Garden of Surprises, like Red, white, and blue cabbages, purple corn, striped tomatoes, and orange string beans. Sassafras then lets Peter use his Yestermorrowbile, a time machine, piloted by a caterpillar named Antoine who will take Peter back to Easter to deliver his eggs, win the contest, and defeat Irontail. Unfortunately, Irontail finds out about Peter's plan and sends his spider to sabotage the Yestermorrowbile's controls, allowing Peter and Antoine to go to any holiday but Easter. Since the contest's rules don't specifically say the eggs must be delivered only on Easter, Peter tries to give his eggs away at other holidays without success. On the Fourth of July, he lies to two boys by painting his eggs red, white, and blue and tries to pass them off as firecrackers. When that fails, they crash land on Halloween where Peter meets a witch named Madame Esmeralda and gives her a Halloween egg as a gift, making the score a tie. When she calls the other Halloween inhabitants, Irontail sends Montresor out to steal Peter's eggs. After getting the eggs back, Peter tells Antoine they have to get back to Halloween, but they can't go back since Antoine has to land the craft to fix it. After failing to give any of his eggs away on Thanksgiving, they go to Christmas Eve where Peter, dressed as Santa Claus, tries to give his Christmas eggs on the streets. But the streets are deserted. Then Peter hears sobbing from a hat shop nearby, where he meets Bonnie, a talking Easter Bonnet from April Valley. Bonnie is sad because nobody wants to buy her. So Peter tells the shopkeeper that he'll trade her his Christmas eggs for Bonnie. Unfortunately, Irontail steals them again and Peter and Bonnie go after him, accidentally leaving Antoine behind. During the chase, Irontail and Montresor crash into Santa's sleigh where Santa demands Irontail give the eggs back to Peter. Santa returns the eggs, but Peter is too sad to say thank you since they left Antoine behind. Afterwards, Peter and Bonnie land on Valentine's Day where Peter meets a beautiful female bunny named Donna and he gives her a Valentine egg. However, Irontail finds the eggs and casts a spell on them, turning them all green, inside and out. As such, nobody wants the eggs anymore; even Donna gives hers back. After failing to give the green eggs away on Washington's birthday, saying he chopped down the lime tree, Peter vows to be more responsible and they land in the middle of St. Patrick's Day where he finally gets to give the eggs away and wins the contest, becoming the official Chief Easter Bunny. Antoine returns as a butterfly, and Irontail becomes the April Valley janitor while Peter leads an Easter parade with all the characters from the story, including Irontail and Montresor. ===== The game takes place somewhere within the timeline of the third season of The X-Files series. The story follows a young Seattle-based FBI agent named Craig Willmore (played by Jordan Lee Williams) who is assigned by Assistant Director Walter Skinner to investigate the disappearance of agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, who were last seen in the Everett, Washington area. In order to follow their trail, Agent Willmore must use a variety of tools along the way, including night vision goggles, a digital camera, PDA (an Apple Newton), and lock picks, as well as law enforcement gear such as an evidence kit, standard-issue handgun, handcuffs, and even his badge. During his assignment he is partnered with a Seattle Police Department detective named Mary Astadourian (played by Paige Witte), and a minor romantic subplot involves a relationship developing between the two. Several of the actors from the TV series reprise their roles in the game, including David Duchovny (Mulder), Gillian Anderson (Scully), Mitch Pileggi (Skinner), Steven Williams (X), Bruce Harwood, Tom Braidwood and Dean Haglund (The Lone Gunmen) and—very briefly and depending upon the outcome of the game—William B. Davis (The Smoking Man). The game is set and was filmed in Seattle. The TV series actors filmed their relatively brief appearances in the game just before entering production on the feature film. The game's plotline involves aliens taking over the bodies of humans and contains many references to the show's extraterrestrial mythology. During the course of the game the "present day" date of April 1996 is displayed alongside certain locations, placing this "episode" after the season three episode "Avatar" and before "Wetwired" , which take place March 7 and April 27 respectively. This time is also after the first incident with the alien black oil in the episode "Piper Maru" of the third season. The screenplay for The X-Files Game was written by Richard Dowdy, Greg Roach and Frank Spotnitz, from a story by Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz. ===== Jerry is sitting in a mouse-sized chaise lounge reading Good Mousekeeping and eating cheese he is pulling off a mousetrap that has been set just in front of his mousehole. When his doorbell rings, he opens the door but does not see anyone; Nibbles zips through the door under his nose. Jerry shrugs in confusion, but then turns to see Nibbles pulling on the cheese in the mousetrap. He whisks him away just before it springs. Jerry then finds a note pinned to Nibbles red scarf (which matches his cap, both trimmed with white fur). Nibbles is the orphan who Jerry had agreed to host for Thanksgiving. A postscript on the note warns: "He's always hungry". Jerry's cupboards are empty, so he carefully leads Nibbles to a big bowl of milk in front of where Tom is sleeping peacefully. Jerry warns him to be quiet, and holds him over the bowl. Nibbles takes a nice loud slurp, awaking Tom just as Jerry pulls Nibbles back into hiding. Tom does not see anyone, so he slurps his milk and goes back to sleep. Jerry holds Nibbles out to catch the last big drop that falls from Tom's whisker, but the bowl is now empty. Then Nibbles sees Mammy Two Shoes place a large turkey on the already laden table. Jerry climbs up to the table, and drops a long piece of spaghetti, which Nibbles slurps his way up. Nibbles begins to eat three bites of all kinds of food (and a candle), but Jerry again saves him from disaster when, bouncing off a gelatin or Jello, he almost lands in piping hot soup. Jerry takes decorations from the table and dresses himself as a pilgrim with a hat and blunderbuss, and Nibbles follows his example. Nibbles then takes a whole orange in his mouth, swelling his head, but Jerry hits Nibbles on the back of the head, causing the orange to fly out of Nibbles, and into a sleeping Tom's mouth, then rebounding back and forth in his guts, thoroughly waking him up. Tom, seeing the mice getting into the Thanksgiving dinner, puts on a feather duster, first as a general camouflage, but then as a Native American headdress. Tom approaches Nibbles, who points his toy blunderbuss at Tom. Tom points to his chin, implying Nibbles should go ahead and shoot. Jerry obliges by popping a champagne cork, which shoots out to give Tom a sharp womp in the face. Tom then grabs Jerry, but Nibbles, purposefully this time and carrying a fork, ricochets off the jello and stabs Tom in the hind end. Tom howls in pain and then uses the fork to catch Nibbles, and Jerry, perched on a candelabra, whacks Tom in the face with a large spoon, knocking him back. Sneaking back to the table, Tom sets a bowl of cattails on fire one at a time, throwing them like spears. The cattails burn or melt the various hiding places Jerry and Nibbles find. With the third one, Jerry lifts a hemispherical lid and the cattail reverses back toward Tom. Then Tom throws a knife into the turkey and Jerry runs into it, at his throat, and falls unconscious. Nibbles now launches an all-out attack: he bends back a knife handle to launch a pie; using the string between the turkey legs he slingshots a candle; and cutting a cork off a champagne bottle, it begins to rocket at Tom, ultimately making Tom and the room into a terrible mess. A white surrender flag comes up from the pile of dishes Tom has fallen under. Finally, all three, with Tom bandaged, and order on the table restored, sit down to dinner. All bow their heads while Jerry says grace. But just as Tom and Jerry pick up their cutlery, Nibbles goes through the entire turkey like a buzz saw, and the bones clatter to the plate. Nibbles, now finally full, pats his huge stomach in delight. ===== The story is widely thought to be based upon Crowley's own drug experiences, despite being written as a fiction. This seems almost conclusively confirmed by Crowley's statement in the novel's preface: "This is a true story. It has been rewritten only so far as was necessary to conceal personalities." Crowley's own recreational drug use and also his personal struggle with drug addiction, particularly heroin, is well documented. Crowley made a study of drugs and their effects upon the body and mind, experimenting widely himself. Many of his conclusions are present within this novel. Diary of a Drug Fiend encapsulates much of Crowley's core philosophy concerning Thelema and his conception of True Will. ===== Nathan is an intelligent but shy teenage boy who wants to escape from his abusive and violent father, and fantasizes about a relationship with Roy, the boy who lives next door. Roy is a senior at the same high school as Nathan, and he drives the school bus. Gradually their relationship deepens and becomes sexual. Drunk one evening, Nathan's father tries to molest him. This is clearly not the first time it has happened and helps explain Nathan's desire to escape from his family. His mother avoids the issue, although she knows what is going on. Nathan is accepted into Roy's social circle and is invited to go on a camping trip with Roy and his friends Randy and Burke. During the trip, they discover an abandoned and possibly haunted plantation house and Nathan and Roy are discovered in a compromising situation. Burke later on rapes and hits Nathan with a chair handle. The blow is clearly fatal and Nathan "dies" yet is still inside his body and aware of his surroundings. The book ends with Nathan leaving the abandoned house and finding Roy. ===== The White House staff is being called into work early to deal with the press fallout after President Josiah Bartlet has crashed his bicycle into a tree. As the staff try to perform damage control, Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman makes a gaffe when, after provocation by Christian activist Mary Marsh on a televised debate, quips "Lady, the God you pray to is too busy being indicted for tax fraud." Also, Deputy Communications Director Sam Seaborn spends an evening with Laurie (Lisa Edelstein), unaware that she's a call girl, and then tells Chief of Staff Leo McGarry's daughter, Mallory O'Brien, about it before he knows whose daughter she is. While Lyman and Marsh are discussing a proposed public debate on one of several religious wedge issues, President Bartlet enters and corrects one of the attendees on a theological point. He explains that he crashed his bicycle while distracted by anger after discovering that his granddaughter, after expressing herself as pro-choice during a magazine interview, was mailed a Raggedy Ann doll with a knife stuck in its throat. The doll was sent by an extremist group whose activities the attendees, to his displeasure, have not denounced. He tells them that not only will there be no debate, but that they'll denounce the extremists publicly, and are barred from the White House until they do so. Bartlet implies to Lyman that he will be allowed to keep his job despite the gaffe. ===== While President Josiah Bartlet delivers a speech priding the inevitable passage of a gun control bill in the House, his staff learns that said passage is in jeopardy. Chief of Staff Leo McGarry calls an emergency meeting in which he instructs C.J. Cregg to play up the release of the staff's financial disclosure report to provide cover for them to work on getting the votes. Sam suggests using the Vice President, but Leo shoots down this idea. When Leo finally arrives home, he finds his wife still awake, having expected Leo home hours before. He also realizes he has completely forgotten it was their wedding anniversary. The disclosure report brings with it a number of comical revelations (including a valuable smoking jacket given to Josh from an ex-girlfriend). It also brings with it some trouble—the report reveals that a stock Toby invested in went from $5,000 to over $125,000, soon after he had arranged for a friend to testify before Congress about stocks. Toby insists he had no idea what his friend was going to testify about, and it was an innocent coincidence. Nevertheless, with the report being made public, there is concern he may be indicted on federal charges of manipulating the stock market. President Bartlet says that Toby will avoid any potential legal and political landmines by cashing out his stocks the next day, leading a stunned Toby to tell the rest of the senior staff that he feels "like I just got screwed with my pants on." Josh manages to strong arm one of the five defecting Congressmen into getting back in line by threatening that the President will not endorse him in the Midterms. This action prompts two other defectors to switch their votes back. Josh then meets with Congressman Christopher Wick, an old college fraternity buddy, whom he angrily confronts about going against the President. Wick replies that he broke ranks to prove he's not on a leash, but he'll change his vote again for a photo op with the President. Josh, disgusted by the Congressman's motives, nonetheless complies with his wishes. Leo again vetoes the suggestion of using Hoynes to speak with Texas Congressman Cal Tillinghouse. Instead, Leo approaches Congressman Mark Richardson, an African American, with an appeal that the gun ban will save African American lives. The Congressman rebuffs Leo, saying the law has no teeth and is nothing more than for show. Leo reluctantly must now turn to the Vice President. He schedules the meeting for late, wanting to spend most of the evening with his wife to make up for his lapse the night before; he had spent the day planning an in-house dinner for the two, at one point buying her a pearl choker by Harry Winston. When he arrives home, however, he finds Jenny, with her bags packed. She announces she's leaving him, that she can no longer bear the life they have. Leo, distraught over the thought of her leaving him, still insists his job is more important than their marriage. Shaken, Leo meets with Hoynes, who immediately realizes something is wrong. Leo confides in Hoynes, and the VP tells Leo about a secret AA meeting he hosts with several other prominent politicians and administrators, inviting him to come. He also says he will be happy to speak with Tillinghouse. The following day, Hoynes makes good on his promise, convincing Tillinghouse to go along with the bill as a personal favor to him, stating directly that the Congressman would be wise to do what he asks because "one day I'll be President...and you won't be." He also encourages Tillinghouse to speak with the four other Congressmen who were compelled to vote yes (all of whom are looking for a little political retribution). After the bill is signed, all five of the Congressmen pile the credit upon the Vice President, making the victory more hollow for President Bartlet. Most of the staff are upset with this result and realize that asking Hoynes would lead to a PR sacrifice, however Leo ends by saying that it was hubris on the part of the President and his staff. Josh later congratulates Hoynes on a game well played. The episode ends with Leo attending the AA meeting. ===== A retired judge, Shigekuni Honda, adopts a teenage orphan, Tōru Yasunaga, whom he believes to be a dead schoolfriend's third successive reincarnation. ===== The film opens with a quotation from Vladimir Lenin: > The strength of the working class is organization. Without organization of > the masses, the proletarian is nothing. Organized it is everything. Being > organized means unity of action, unity of practical activity., 1:10 ;На заводе всё спокойно / At the factory all is quiet Using typography, the word "но" (but) is added to the title of the chapter which then animates and dissolves into an image of machinery in motion., 1:58—2:06 The administration is spying on the workers, reviewing a list of agents with vivid code names., 6:45 Vignettes are shown of them. Conditions are tense with agitators and bolsheviks planning a strike prior to the catalytic event., 17:45 ;Повод к стачке / Reason to strike A micrometer is stolen, with a value of 25 rubles or 3 weeks pay., 20:03 A worker, Yakov, is accused of the theft and subsequently hangs himself., 22:42 Fighting ensues and work stops. The workers leave the milling room running and resistance is met at the foundry. The strikers throw rocks and loose metal through the foundry windows. Then locked within the gates of the complex, the crowd confronts the office. They force open the gates and seize a manager carting him off in a wheel barrow dumping them down a hill into the water., 32:40 The crowd disperses. The shareholders discuss the workers' demands ;Завод замер / The factory dies down The chapter begins with footage of ducklings, kittens, piglets, and geese., 34:40 A child then wakes his father for work ironically with no work to do, they laugh and frolic. The factory is shown vacant and still with birds moving in. The children act out what their fathers had done, wheelbarrowing a goat in a mob. The owner is frustrated by orders arriving and the frozen plant. Demands are formulated: an 8-hour work day,, 39:23 fair treatment by the administration,, 39:34 30% wage increases,, 39:43 and a 6-hour day for minors., 41:14 The shareholders get involved with the director and read the demands. They discuss dismissively while smoking cigars and having drinks. Presumably on the orders of the shareholders, the police raid the workers,, 43:30 and they sit down to protest. At their meeting the shareholders use the demand letter as a rag to clean up a spill,, 45:40 and a lemon squeezer metaphorically represents the pressure the stockholders intend to apply to the strikers. ;Стачка затягивается / The strike draws out Cover of the DVD Scenes are shown of a line forming at a store which is closed, and a baby needing food., 49:05 A fight occurs at a home between a man and a woman, subsequently she leaves. Another man rummages through his home for goods to sell at a flea market, upsetting his family., 50:52 A posted letter publicly shows the administrators rejection of the demands. Using a hidden camera in a pocket watch, a spy named "Owl" photographs someone stealing the letter., 57:04 The pictures are transferred to another spy. The man is beaten, captured, and beaten again., 101:11 ;Провокация на разгром / Provocation and debacle The scene opens with dead cats dangling from a structure., 1:05:55 A character is introduced, "King" whose throne is made of a derelict automobile amidst rubbish, and who leads a community that lives in enormous barrels buried with only their top openings above ground., 1:08:30 After a deal with a tsarist police agent, "King" hires a few provocateurs from among his community to set fire, raze, and loot a liquor store., 1:13:38 A crowd gathers at the fire and the alarm is sounded. The crowd leaves to avoid being provoked but are set upon by the firemen with their hoses regardless., 1:18:30 ;Ликвидация / Extermination The governor sends in the military. A child walks under the soldiers' horses and his mother goes under to get him and is struck., 1:24:18 Rioting commences, and the crowd is chased off through a series of gates and barriers heading to the forge, then their apartments. The crowd is chased and whipped on the balconies. A policeman murders a small child., 1:29:52 The workers are driven into a field by the army and shot en masse., 1:33:00 This is shown with alternating footage of the slaughtering of a cow. ===== Punk Farm tells the story of five farm animals—Sheep (lead vocals), Pig (electric guitar and backing vocals), Goat (electric bass guitar and backing vocals), Chicken (electronic musical keyboards and backing vocals) and Cow (drum kit and backing vocals)—who are an underground punk rock band called "Punk Farm". They perform a punk rock cover of "Old MacDonald Had a Farm" while Farmer Joe is asleep. ===== Rabbi Jacob (Marcel Dalio) is one of the most loved rabbis of New York. One day, the French side of his family, the Schmolls, invite him to celebrate the bar mitzvah of the young David. Rabbi Jacob boards a plane to leave America for his birthland of France after more than 30 years of American life. His young friend Rabbi Samuel comes with him. In Normandy, the rich businessman Victor Pivert (Louis de Funès) is also on his way; his daughter (Miou-Miou) will be married the next day. Pivert is a dreadful man: bad-tempered, rude and a bigot, with a well-honed racism against blacks, Jews, and pretty much all foreigners. He and his driver, Salomon (Henri Guybet), have a car accident in which Pivert's car (carrying a speed boat) flips upside-down into a lake. When Salomon, who is Jewish, refuses to help because Shabbat has just begun, Pivert fires him, much to Salomon's content. Arab revolutionist leader Mohamed Larbi Slimane (Claude Giraud) is kidnapped by killers who are working for his country's government. The team, led by Colonel Farès, takes him by night to an empty bubble gum factory... the same place where Victor Pivert goes to find assistance. Pivert involuntarily helps Slimane to flee, leaving two killers' corpses behind them. The police, alerted by Salomon, find the bodies and accuse Pivert of the crime. The next day, Slimane forces Pivert to go to Orly airport to catch a plane to Slimane's country (if the revolution succeeds, he will become President). However, they are followed by a number of people: the jealous Germaine, Pivert's wife, who thinks her husband is going to leave her for another woman; Farès and the killers; and the police commissioner Andréani (Claude Piéplu), a zealous and overly suspicious cop who imagines that Pivert is the new Al Capone. Farès and his cohorts manage to kidnap Germaine, and they use her own dentist equipment to interrogate her. Trying to conceal his and Pivert's identities, Slimane attacks two rabbis in the toilets, stealing their clothes and shaving their beards and their payot. The disguises are perfect, and they are mistaken for Rabbi Jacob and Rabbi Samuel by the Schmoll family. The only one who recognizes Pivert (and Slimane) behind the disguise is Salomon, his former driver, who just happens to be a Schmoll nephew. But Pivert and Slimane are able to keep their identity secret and even manage to hold a sermon in Hebrew, thanks to the polylingual Slimane (who is deeply gutted, of course). After a few misunderstandings, Commissioner Andréani and his two inspectors are mistaken by the Jews for terrorists, attempting to kill Rabbi Jacob. The real Rabbi Jacob arrives at Orly, where no one is waiting for him any more. He is mistaken for Victor Pivert by the police, then by Farès and his killers (both times in a painful way for his long beard). There is a chaotic, but sweeping happy ending: *the revolution is a success, and Slimane becomes President of the Republic *Pivert's daughter falls in love with Slimane and escapes her dull fiance near the altar to go with him *Pivert learns tolerance towards other religions and cultures, and also Salomon and Slimane make peace with their respective Arab and Jewish colleagues *the Schmolls finally find the real Rabbi Jacob *the Piverts and the Schmolls go together feasting and celebrating ===== The staff participates in "Big Block of Cheese Day", a fictional workday on which White House Chief of Staff Leo McGarry encourages his staff to meet with fringe special interest groups that normally would not get attention from the White House. Big Block of Cheese Day also is mentioned in "Somebody's Going to Emergency, Somebody's Going to Jail". The rationale for the day, as recounted by McGarry (much to the consternation of the senior staff), is that America's seventh president, Andrew Jackson, had a two-ton block of cheese in the White House foyer from which everyone was welcome to eat. This symbolized the openness of the White House to the American people. White House Communications Director Toby Ziegler derisively refers to the day as "Throw Open Our Office Doors To People Who Want To Discuss Things That We Could [sic] Care Less About Day", and Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman refers to it as "Total Crackpot Day". White House Press Secretary C. J. Cregg meets with a group about building a highway for wolves, while Sam Seaborn meets with a citizen, played by Sam Lloyd, concerned about UFOs. Josh is given a card from the National Security Council with information about where he is to go in the event of a nuclear attack and becomes riddled with guilt after realizing that nobody else on the staff was given one. He visits his therapist and reveals that his older sister died in a house fire while babysitting for him, and that he survived by running out of the house. Later, President Bartlet hosts a reception in the Residence for his youngest daughter, Zoey, who is scouting colleges in the D.C. area. (Earlier in the day, upon learning of her visit, the President announces to everyone that he will make chili for them all.) In a private conversation, the President, Leo and Josh marvel at the extraordinary strength and integrity of the women in their lives. During the party, Josh returns his NSC card to the President, explaining that he just wants to be with his friends through everything and to be able to look them in the eye in the meantime. ===== Sasebo, Nagasaki, Japan, 1969: Inspired by the iconoclastic examples of Dylan, Kerouac, Godard and Che, a band of mildly disaffected teenagers led by the smilingly charismatic Ken (Tsumabuki Satoshi) decide to shake up "the establishment," i.e., their repressive school and the nearby US military installation. A series of anarchic pranks meets with varying levels of success, until Ken and company focus their energies on mounting a multimedia "happening" to combine music, film and theater. Complications ensue. ===== The book opens with the death of American electronics billionaire Michael J. Roscoe in an elevator shaft in his New York City office, arranged by a reputable contract killer known only as The Gentleman. In London, Alex Rider ends up in trouble with the police for causing a large amount of damage to a new conference centre while trying to expose a drug dealer operating at Brookland School. In exchange for any potential charges being dropped, Alex is assigned by MI6 to investigate the motive behind the mysterious deaths of Roscoe and another billionaire, former KGB agent and head of the Foreign Intelligence Service, General Viktor Ivanov, who died when his private yacht exploded on the Black Sea. The only apparent connection between the two men is that they both had a son attending Point Blanc, an academy for the problem sons of billionaires in the French Alps run by a South African scientist, Dr. Hugo Grief. Alex then goes undercover as Alex Friend, supposedly the rebellious son of a supermarket magnate, Sir David Friend, and he spends a week with Sir David's family. However, during his stay with the family, he receives a hard time from Sir David's snooty daughter Fiona. After his stay with the family, Grief's assistant Mrs. Stellenbosch, arrives at the Friend's house by helicopter. Meanwhile, Smithers meets and provides Alex with gadgets (including an explosive ear stud, a bulletproof ski suit, infrared ski goggles, a Sony Discman equipped with a diamond-edged buzzsaw (the blade disguised as a Beethoven CD) and an inbuilt SOS signal, and a hardback Harry Potter book with a tranquilizer dart concealed in the spine). Alex is taken to the academy-owned Hotel du Monde in Paris when the helicopter stops to refuel. During dinner, he is drugged and when he passes out in his room, he is transported to a laboratory where Mrs. Stellenbosch and Dr Walter Baxter strip Alex naked and medically examine him, taking samples of his hair, copying his eyeprints, fingerprints and mouth, as well as other procedures. At the end, his clothes are put back on him and he is returned to his room. Upon arriving at Point Blanc, Alex meets the founder and director, Dr Grief, and later a German student who goes by the name of James Sprintz, as well as a group of five other boys (named Hugo Vries, Tom McMorin, Nicholas Marc, Cassian James and Joe Canterbury) he gets to know through the week. James confides with Alex that he thinks something is wrong with the academy, because the other boys were rebellious before and then suddenly became compliant at some point, with new personalities. James also plans to escape the academy, using skis and then going back to either his parents, or his friends if his parents do not want him. One night, Alex breaks out of his room after the door is locked electronically, and investigates the main hall, where he sees a boy being forcibly dragged downstairs by Mrs Stellenbosch and two guards. He thinks the boy being abducted is James, but he later sees James uninjured in his bedroom. The following day at breakfast, James' attitude towards his plan to escape seems to have changed, and Alex realizes he has become exactly like the other students. Alex climbs a chimney to examine the forbidden top two floors of the academy, which he discovers are largely replicas of the first two floors (for instance, replicas of the boys' rooms, with TV screens monitoring their behavior downstairs). He sees Baxter being shot by Grief when Baxter requests more money, while at the same time seeing photographs of himself being examined in Paris. Alex signals MI6 using the CD device. Upon receiving the signal, Alan Blunt and Mrs. Jones debate whether to move in on the academy immediately. Blunt decides to prepare a SAS unit on standby, who will take action after 24 hours. Upon further investigation the next day (after discovering a hidden lift, whose ground floor entrance is hidden behind a medieval suit of Swiss armour in the library), Alex finds some boys locked in a basement jail, including Tom McMorin, General Ivanov's son Dimitry, James and the son of Michael J. Roscoe, Paul. Alex learns that James was indeed dragged downstairs and was replaced by a replica. Alex reveals the truth about his MI6 status to James and Paul. However, as the cell is bugged, Mrs. Stellenbosch arrives, knocks Alex unconscious and turns him over to Dr. Grief, who then reveals his plan to take over the world, named "Project Gemini". Grief and Mrs Stellenbosch are both revealed to be supporters of the apartheid regime and former agents of the South African Bureau of State Security. Believing that the black population would not be able to run South Africa and seeing the rest of the world are against the regime, Grief thinks he would be better suited to rule the entire world, and he cloned sixteen copies of himself during the 1980s using stolen money from the South African government. Grief pays plastic surgeon Dr. Baxter to surgically alter Grief's 14-year-old clones to resemble the boys in the academy. The clones will later take the positions of the boys without their parents noticing. Dr. Grief and his clones will take their assets and eventually rule the world, taking over every field of human life when their time comes, as the parents are leaders in their respective fields (Tom McMorin's mother runs newspapers, for example; Hugo Vries' father, Rudi, owns a fifty per cent stake in the world's diamond mining market; James Sprintz's father, Dieter, is a multimillionaire financier; Joe Canterbury belongs to a politically powerful family; and Michael J Roscoe, as stated, ran his electronics empire, leaving it all to Paul). The parents Roscoe and Ivanov were both killed because they became suspicious of their "sons'" behaviour. Grief imprisons Alex, planning to dissect him alive the next day for a biology class, but Alex manages to escape, using his exploding earring to blow the cell door open. He improvises a snowboard (using an ironing board and his Discman saw) to escape from the academy, but Grief sends two of his guards to take him down. However, Alex manages to outwit the pursuing guards, who are on snowmobiles, and almost makes it to the bottom of the mountain but encounters a machine gun, set at the foot of the mountain previously by Grief as a failsafe, waiting for him. As the man fires, Alex jumps on top of an incoming train to evade the shots but falls and passes out. Alex is taken to hospital in Grenoble, where a visiting Mrs Stellenbosch is told that Alex has died, and she observes a British Army group carrying a coffin, ostensibly containing Alex's corpse, off for repatriation and funeral. However, it is revealed that Alex is alive, thanks to the SAS unit (who were operating in the mountains, following Alex during his escape and radioing for help), and that his death has been faked to throw the academy off-guard. Mrs Jones then sends him out again with a team of six SAS soldiers led by Wolf, an SAS soldier whom Alex met in Stormbreaker to help liberate the school. In the school, the SAS team takes down several guards and goes down to the basement to save the imprisoned boys. An ongoing fire-fight ensues as the team encounters more guards. Wolf demands that Alex stays back, and Alex later sees Dr Grief attempting to escape in a helicopter. A surprised and disappointed Mrs Stellenbosch appears and fights with Alex. Mrs Stellenbosch proves impervious to Alex's attempts to subdue her (as she is a weightlifting champion, having bent a fireplace poker out of shape on Alex's first day at the academy) and knocks him down. Just as she points her gun at Alex, Wolf appears, who is shot three times by Mrs Stellenbosch but manages to shoot the woman himself with his machine gun, sending her crashing through a window to her demise. Alex prevents Dr. Grief escaping by driving a snowmobile up a ski jump and sending it on a collision course with Grief's helicopter, jumping off at the last second as it obliterates the doctor in a fiery explosion. Alex is debriefed by MI6. He is told that fifteen of the clones have been arrested in their native countries, and that Wolf survived being shot thanks to body armour. Alex later goes to the headmaster's office at school, being informed that his school headmaster, Mr. Bray, wanted to see him. Alex is startled to find the sixteenth and final clone, who resembles Alex and had escaped from the academy. The clone tries to shoot Alex in revenge for Grief's death, causing a fire and an explosion in a laboratory when he ruptures a Bunsen burner with a bullet. Alex runs up to the roof, to be followed by the clone, and the two fight ending with one of them falling into a hole in the roof due to the explosion, and the other being rescued by the fire service. ===== Satya (J. D. Chakravarthy) arrives in Mumbai in search of work and finds a job at a dance bar. Jagga (Jeeva), a criminal, throws the glass of whiskey that Satya prepared for him in his face because he dislikes the taste. Later another small time goon Pakya, (Sushant Singh) who works for Jagga, demands money from Satya. Satya refuses to pay and slashes Pakya's face with a razor. Pakya tells Jagga about the attack, and Jagga's goons beat Satya. A film producer is murdered by Bapu (Rajesh Joshi) and Vitthal Manjrekar (Sanjay Mishra) on the orders of Bhiku Mhatre (Manoj Bajpayee). Manjrekar is captured by police during the getaway and admits Mhatre's involvement to Inspector Khandilkar (Aditya Srivastava) during questioning; Mhatre is arrested. Jagga makes fun of Satya when he is serving drinks; they fight, and he later frames Satya for procuring. Mhatre and Satya fight in prison and Mhatre, impressed by Satya's courage, arranges his release through lawyer Chandrakant Mule (Makrand Deshpande). Satya is given a flat by Kallu Mama (Saurabh Shukla) and meets Vidya (Urmila Matondkar), his neighbour and an aspiring singer. Manjrekar denies any link to Mhatre in court, and Mhatre is released. With Mhatre's help, Satya shoots Jagga in the dance bar and joins Mhatre's gang. Malhotra (Mithilesh Chaturvedi), a builder whom Kallu Mama extorted, asks them to meet him for the money and Mhatre, Satya and the gang are ambushed. Under questioning, they admit working for Guru Narayan (Raju Mavani). Vidya is initially rejected by music director Renusagar (Neeraj Vora), who later signs her for a project after Satya threatens him. Vidya and Satya begin a romantic relationship. Guru Narayan arrives in Mumbai. Mhatre and his gang are ready to kill him, but are forced to abandon their plan on orders from politician Bhau Thakurdas Jhawle (Govind Namdeo). Bhau asks him and Guru Narayan not to endanger his career with a gang war. Guru Narayan says (over phone, to Bhau) that he wants to kill Satya to avenge Jagga's murder. This conversation is not heard by Mhatre, who (under Bhau's pressure), agrees to call it evens with Guru Narayan. However, Satya later tells Mhatre that if they do not kill Guru Narayan, he will kill them. Mhatre gang, then kill Guru Narayan. This brings Mhatre and Satya in direct confrontation with Bhau. A new police commissioner, Amodh Shukla (Paresh Rawal), is appointed because of the increase in crime. In a strategic move, Bhau forgives Mhatre and his gang for their earlier actions. The police encounter a group of criminals, including Mhatre gang member Chander Khote (Snehal Dabi). At Satya's suggestion, Shukla is shot by his gang to alarm the police. Bhau wins election by a landslide, thanks to Mhatre's help. Satya and Vidya go to the cinema. When they step out for a drink during the intermission, Pakya sees Satya and informs the police. Inspector Khandilkar arrives and orders all the doors locked except one, expecting to apprehend Satya when he leaves the cinema through the single open door. Satya shoots a blank cartridge at the ground, creating a stampede, and escapes with Vidya. He is afraid of losing her after the incident, and Mhatre offers to move them to Dubai. Mhatre arrives at Bhau's house that night to celebrate his election victory with Kallu Mama and Chandrakant Mule, and the politician kills him for disobeying his order and killing Narayan. Satya tells Vidya he has a job in Dubai when the police arrive and he is forced to escape. Vidya learns from Inspector Khandilkar that Satya is a criminal. Satya arrives at Kallu Mama's residence. Mule orders Mama to kill Satya but Mama rebels and kills Mule instead, prompting the two to avenge Mhatre's murder. During Ganesh Chaturthi at a beach, Satya kills Bhau and is wounded. He and Mama leave; Mama plans to help Satya board a ship to Dubai, but Satya insists on going to Vidya's house first. Mama waits in the car while Satya knocks on her door. Vidya refuses to answer and, while they argue, Khandilkar arrives and shoots and kills Mama. Satya manages to break down Vidya's door, however Khandilkar shoots him and he collapses a few inches from her and dies. ===== The novel begins with the introduction of the hero, Chauntecleer, a rooster in command of a company of hens, and the land surrounding his coop. The story takes place at a time when humans have not yet made an appearance upon the Earth (a time before the Book of Genesis). Animals have been put on earth before man in order to protect the world from an ancient evil Wyrm, which is trapped at the center of the Earth. Chauntecleer, while not a bad ruler, is a flawed character, somewhat quick to anger, and self-important. The novel's initial chapters define several important characters as well as the origins of the main antagonists in the book, Wyrm and Cockatrice. While Chauntecleer spends his days dealing with a rogue rat that has invaded his coop, and trying to become accustomed to a newcomer, Mundo Cani, a depressed dog that is always crying out in anguish, the reader is shown another country from across the river. This is where the author introduces the evil in the book. For in the land away from Chauntecleer's there lives another rooster named Senex. He is a rather weak ruler, and his barnyard subjects don't think anything of him. What troubles Senex the most is his lack of a son, which he mourns greatly over. One day though, he is spoken to by Wyrm, who communicates to him through dreams. Wyrm instructs Senex to have faith in him, and to wait for him to deliver Senex a son of his own. Senex does exactly what his visions request, and soon he manages to lay an egg, defying the natural order of mating. Eventually the egg hatches, though what appears from it is a horror beyond words. An evil monster named Cockatrice is born. It is a creature with the head, wings, and legs of a chicken, but a thin, gray, scaly, serpent body. He kills Senex, and claims the kingdom for himself. A sycophantic toad serves as Cockatrice's voice and turns the basilisk eggs for him. He becomes an evil tyrant and begins to rape all of the laying hens under his rule, in order to give birth to an army of wicked basilisks; poisonous snakes that he uses to crush any opposers to his will (Toad is killed with them) and destroy the country. A few of the animals manage to escape the land, and flee into Chauntecleer's kingdom, where they live happily for a while, trying to forget the nightmares of their past. Finally there seems to be peace in the book. There comes a time of spring, when everyone in the land is filled with joy. Chauntecleer has even bred three sons to his name with an escapee from Cockatrice's land, one of his hen victims, named Pertelote. Unfortunately he is plagued with terrible prophetic visions all the while. He dreams about the river next to his land, rising up and engulfing everything in an apocalyptic manner. The Dun Cow, one of God's messengers, brings an enigmatic riddle to him about the ways he can defeat the trio of evils: Cockatrice, his basilisk army, and Wyrm himself. During the day he tries to find happiness, but everyone is immediately struck with unbearable sorrow when the rooster's three sons are found lying dead by the river. The same egg-eating rat that Chauntecleer drove away is discovered dying, holding part of a venomous serpent (a basilisk) in his mouth. Chauntecleer soon discovers the story of Cockatrice, hearing it from his wife, who was a refugee from the land under Cockatrice's dictatorship. Eventually Chauntecleer learns that Cockatrice is attempting to make war on the world of animals, to make way for the coming of his true father, Wyrm. Chauntecleer takes action and bands together all of the animals in his land. All sorts of farm and woodland animals come together to fight the terrible evil that is at hand. They wait for a time, building up their forces, beginning to wonder if this evil really exists. Before long there is a surprise attack on a goofy wild turkey named Thuringer, who dies from a basilisk's bite. However, Mundo Cani saves the remaining turkeys. Thus begins the war between the basilisks and the animals of the land, a war reminiscent of the battle of Armageddon. The animals suffer massive casualties, but in the end manage to drive the basilisks to death. Unfortunately Cockatrice has not yet been dealt with, so the brave Chauntecleer dons a pair of war spurs (the weapon of choice for a bipedal bird) and goes onto the blood-soaked battlefield to confront his enemy. The battle between the two leaders is fierce and merciless. Cockatrice and his enemy do battle in the sky, and Chauntecleer eventually is forced to wrestle with the evil king on the ground. Chauntecleer manages to gain the upper hand, though not by much, and defeats the evil Cockatrice. He throws the monster's head into the river, and Wyrm announces his presence. Chauntecleer faints from weakness, and is brought back to the coop, which has by now been transformed into a fortress, where they try to resuscitate their fallen, but victorious, hero. Trouble is still ahead, though, for although all of the animals thought the war over, there enters the final evil. A great crevasse in the land breaks open, as Wyrm attempts to enter the world. During all of the turmoil Chauntecleer stirs inside the coop, and, delirious from exhaustion, he sees the dog and thinks him a traitor. He scolds him fiercely, rebuking him and instructing him to leave. In response, the other animals all agree that Chauntecleer is delusional, and that Mundo Cani should not be forced to leave. The dog turns to them and tells them that he knows what he must do, and takes off without any further words. The animals are confused by all of this, and only Chauntecleer, still in delirium, shouts for Wyrm to emerge so that they can fight. Just as Wyrm is about to creep from his prison onto the earth, he is confronted by a certain small dog. Mundo Cani comes to the crevasse, wielding the horn of the Dun Cow as a weapon, egging the ancient evil out of its crevasse by insulting it, insinuating that Wyrm is a coward not to face a small dog such as he. Wyrm falls for the trap, and when he sticks out his bright white eye, that he might see his opponent, the dog leaps onto his eye and impales it with the horn in his mouth. This causes Wyrm to fall back into the crevasse, collapsing the earth and sealing both Wyrm and Mundo Cani in a dark world below the crust. The entire world is safe again, though horribly shaken. The animals all find it difficult to fit back into their normal lives, especially Chauntecleer, who after bottling his emotions for a while, breaks down in front of his wife. He cries out in pain, knowing that the last thing he said to Mundo Cani before his great sacrifice, were words of scorn and hatred. His wife seeks to comfort him, saying that his penance is to honor Mundo Cani and to ask for his forgiveness. ===== There are three main characters - Daniel and two of his clones. Daniel is a successful comedian who can't seem to enjoy life despite his wealth. He gets bored with his hedonist lifestyle, but can't escape from it either. In the meanwhile he is disgruntled with the state of current society, and philosophizes about the nature of sex and love. His two clones live an uneventful life as hermits, in a post- apocalyptic future. They live in a time where the human species is on its last legs (or, alternatively, on its first legs, as they have returned to societies of hunter-gatherer tribes), destroyed by climate change and nuclear war. The two clones are confronted with the life of the first Daniel and have different views about their predecessor. Scattered around are the remnants of tourist resorts, cities and consumer items and some natural humans living in small tribes without any knowledge of the past or of civilization. ===== Loosely based on the historical Children's Crusade, the story follows an exiled young knight, played by Eric Stoltz, who leads a band of orphans to join the Third Crusade with King Richard the Lionheart while protecting the children from the Black Prince (Gabriel Byrne), a disillusioned crusader turned child slave trader (not to be confused with the real-life Edward, the Black Prince). ===== {| style="font- size:100%; float:right; width:18em; margin:0.5em 0 0.5em 1em; background:transparent;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" |- ! style="font- size:100%; padding-left:0em;" | Anime cast |- | {| class="infobox wikitable" style="width:100%; margin:0;" cellpadding="3" |- ! Role ! Japanese voice actor ! English voice actor |- | Momo | Akiko Kobayashi | Jessica Boone |- | Daniel | Ai Shimizu | Nancy Novotny |} |} Ballad of a Shinigami primarily centers around a young-looking girl named who is a shinigami, or death god. Momo is clad in all white, along with having long white hair, and as a god of death, she leads deceased souls to the other side. She carries with her a large scythe and an ID card which helps to facilitate in her identification as a shinigami; her shinigami ID number is A-100100. Momo is different from other shinigami because she tries to ease the suffering of the people she encounters whether they be living or already dead, such as conveying messages from the dead to the living. She is also known to cry a lot, and she says that she cries for the dead because they no longer can. Accompanying Momo is a talking black cat familiar named with a bell around his neck and bat-like wings who helps Momo out. The living frequently hear the ringing of Daniel's bell when Momo and Daniel are nearby. Daniel has a calm character and does not show as much sympathy to humans as Momo, but is still patient with them. In the TV drama, Daniel is portrayed as a young boy rather than a cat. The story follows Momo and Daniel as they interact with the living and usually consists of them changing something sorrowful for the living. Another shinigami featured in the series is also a young-looking girl named who is clad in all black, along with having black hair. Like Momo, she shows outward emotion towards the living and dead, but An has a cruel personality and does not give mercy to anyone. Despite the fact that shinigami are meant to transport souls to the other side, An chooses to terminate the souls of the people she kills. Among shinigami, she is very powerful, and is referred to as a special type of shinigami. Her shinigami ID number is A-99. Accompanying An is a talking gray cat familiar named , but is referred to as for short. Before starting to work with An, Nicol had once been very close friends with Daniel. ===== The story details the return of Richard to his home town of Matlock, Derbyshire in the Peak District, England, after serving as a paratrooper in the British Army. Richard and his younger, mentally- impaired brother Anthony, camp at an abandoned farm near the town. Flashbacks reveal Anthony's abuse by a group of drug dealers in the town; Richard vows to take revenge. Richard has a face-to-face confrontation with Herbie, one of the abusers, who does not recognise him at first. Later, Herbie and friends Soz and Tuff are in a flat taking drugs. He tells them about the confrontation, and states he thinks the man might be Anthony's brother, who has been away serving in the army. When Herbie leaves he sees a man in a military gas mask banging on the front door of the block. Soz and Tuff run outside but the man is nowhere to be seen. When they go back into their flat they discover Richard has ransacked it, stolen the drugs and spray painted the words "Cheyne Stoking", a pun on the scientific name for the pattern of breathing a human being goes into when they are dying. The next day the thugs visit Sonny, the de facto leader of the gang, to explain where the drugs went. When they meet, Sonny has had his face painted but doesn't realise. The other gang members arrive during this time and they have had their hair and clothes painted as well. They all suspect one another of playing games until Herbie states that the man he saw in the pool hall is Richard, Anthony's brother. All of the gang become silent as they realise that Richard is back in town. The men encounter Richard while driving in their Citroën 2CV. He makes it clear that he is not scared of any of them and invites them to come and find him at the old farm where he is staying. The gang leaves with Sonny visibly concerned at Richard's apparent lack of fear. That evening, while the gang are hiding out and playing cards, Sonny decides that they should shoot Richard. When one of the members leaves, Richard (having sneaked into the house) brutally kills him with an axe, using the dead man's blood to smear the words "One Down" on the wall. The next morning, they take their car and go to the farm where Richard is staying with Anthony. Sending in Big Al (one of their members) to draw Richard out, Sonny prepares to shoot him with a rifle and their only round. However, he misses and kills Al. With no rounds remaining in the rifle they retreat and return to town, while Richard smiles. The surviving members stop at a local petrol station where the car breaks down and Tuff runs off, scared of Richard's revenge. Later at Sonny's house, they arm themselves and search the place, expecting Richard to be there. They do not find him, although he is hiding in the kitchen pantry. While they are upstairs Richard laces their kettle with a cocktail of the drugs he took from the gang earlier in the film. The three men become completely intoxicated a few hours later and Richard reappears to kill them one by one. He toys with them, dancing and joking. He shoots Sonny in the head, and kills Soz with an upward palm strike. He then sits Herbie down and brings out a suitcase, which has Tuff's corpse inside. Richard then tells him he is a good man and will let him live if he tells him where the final gang member is as he left the gang years before. He tells him without hesitation and Richard hugs him. But he finds Herbie's knife and asks him if it was to be used on him. Herbie lies at first then tells the truth, but Richard stabs him regardless. Richard leaves right after. The next day, Richard arrives in a nearby town where the final gang member, Mark, lives with his wife and two boys. He talks with the children's mother and asks her to let her husband know that he is Richard, Anthony's brother. When Mark returns home, she explains the conversation to her husband. Terrified, he tells her how the gang abused Anthony. The abuse culminated with them pretending to hang him at a local ruined castle whilst he was high on acid. This final episode of abuse culminates with Anthony actually hanging himself after his 'friends' run off. It then becomes clear that Richard has been alone the whole time, and talking to a vision of his dead brother. The next morning, Richard sneaks into Mark's house and takes him hostage using a knife. He makes him drive to the same ruined castle where Anthony hanged himself and demands he tell him his part in what happened. Mark explains how his fault was in not stopping the abuse. Richard confesses to his crimes against the other men, and reveals that he thought of Anthony as an embarrassment to him because of his mental disabilities. He tells Mark how he now feels like the monster and that he simply wants to lie down with his brother. Richard gives the knife to Mark and demands that he kill him lest he continue his monstrous ways. Mark refuses but Richard clasps his hands and pulls them towards him. Mark eventually stabs and kills Richard, then stumbles away. ===== Like the legendary phoenix, the Materese are rising from the ashes and are regaining their former power. The new leader of the Matarese is an enigmatic figure named Jan van der Meer Matareisen, according to himself the only legitimate grandchild of Baron Guillaume de Matarese, the founder of the Matarese group. With the help of another shadowy figure known as Julian Guiderone a.k.a. "son of the shepherd boy," who seems to have survived the events recounted in "The Matarese Circle" nearly twenty years ago, they are hatching a new and diabolical plot to plunge the civilised world into total chaos. Only one man, a consular operations operative known as Brandon Scofield a.k.a. Beowulf Agate, can stop them, but he has been retired for nearly twenty years. Brandon Scofield is once again sent into the field together with a CIA case officer, Cameron Pryce, but this time the enemy is more dangerous. ===== Subramaniyam Siva (Ajith Kumar) is in jail, awaiting the death sentence for killing corrupt and evil members of the police force who had killed his father SI Ganapathy (Rajesh) and sister. SP of Police Nethiadi Nandakumar (Prakash Raj) is an honest, fearless and upright police officer who has been given the mission to flush out the terrorist outfit behind the Coimbatore blasts. He decides to employ unconventional methods to fulfill his mission and engages Siva to assist him, renaming him Paramasivan, changing his look (cutting his long hair), and giving him a single-point agenda – trace out and erase the people responsible for the Coimbatore blasts. Unaware to Paramasivan, Nandakumar intends on killing him after the mission is completed. The fly in the ointment is played by CBI officer Nair (Jayaram), who is out to trace Paramasivan and stop his unlawful activities. His assistant SI Agniputran (Vivek) provides lighter moments. How Paramasivan finishes the villains and his job forms the rest of the story. Paramasivan comes to know of Nandakumar's idea to kill him after the mission during the last few scenes where Nair intervenes. Eventually, Paramasivan is forgiven and starts a new life with his lover Malar (Laila). ===== Thirupathi (Ajith Kumar) is a straightforward young man who leads a happy life with his parents and younger sister. He happens to meet Priya (Sadha), and both fall for each other. Thirupathi's sister is pregnant, and at the time of delivery, he takes her to a hospital. The doctor there expects bribe, but when it is not forthcoming, he neglects his duty; therefore, Thirupathi's sister dies. Thirupathi comes to know that this is not the first instance in the hospital, and the doctor is his best friend Soori's (Riyaz Khan) brother (Sampath Raj). When Thirupathi goes out to get Soori's brother, Soori and his father do all that they can to protect him from Thirupathi. How Thirupathi gets his revenge on the people responsible for his sister's death forms the rest of the movie. ===== The story tells of vacationing American artist Jeff Farrell who becomes romantically involved with an older woman named Eve Beynat in southern France while at the same time harboring an attraction to her teenage stepdaughter, Annette. Eve's husband/Annette's father Georges is in an asylum for, four years ago, using a blowtorch to kill a man who had raped Annette. Believing it will help make Eve his for life, Jeff agrees to assist her in springing Georges from the asylum. Of course, Eve has a completely different agenda in mind. Inspector Etienne sets up a plot to help trap the real killer, and the climactic scenes are set at Les Baux-de-Provence in the huge stone galleries dug into the rock of the Val-d'Enfer on the road to Maillane. ===== The plot deals with Alec Sects, an F-15 pilot who was trained by the FBI, as he tries to take down Nostra, an Israeli-based international company that produces food products, bio-chemicals, genetics, e-commerce and children's software. Daemon Curry, a man who believes himself to be the figure mentioned in several religions (for example: the second christ/antichrist and believes in the prophecies of Nostradamus), is the founder and leader. To deal with him, the IES create a team called Spyhunter. Curry has reason to believe that it is the same person who stopped him in 1983 (Spy Hunter), when he was trying to launch his plan, he sends all he has after him. Curry's plan is to use four EMP weapons mounted on satellites, dubbed the Four Horsemen, to stop all electricity in the world, then plans to rule. Originally Alec does light missions, mostly destruction of Nostra property (like a vehicle created from Nostra and stolen IES technology). However, Nostra hijacks the "Weapons Van" and an Interceptor, and Alec is forced to destroy it. Eventually, the G-6155 Interceptor receives an upgrade (and a change of paint) to the G-6155 Interceptor II, complete with an EMP Launcher, Scanner, and a shorter Turbo lag time. Nostra's schemes become more dangerous, and Alec finds himself returning to most of the previous Nostra bases for more intense missions such as destroying weapons of mass destruction. Later, He finds the headquarters where the Four Horsemen are based in Petra. After a hard-fought battle, the Four Horsemen are diffused and explode, while Alec escapes on the Interceptor II. Following a parachute dive from the cliff-side base and landing safely on the ground, he heads toward Russia, setting the stage for SpyHunter 2. Curry's fate is never shown, but he is most likely killed in the explosion as he is not mentioned among the Nostra ringleaders in the sequel. ===== left When her beloved husband dies after a long illness, Jessica Drummond is comforted by the executor of her husband's estate lawyer, Frank Everett, a longtime family friend who later shows an interest in dating "Jess". Jess has two boys: 14-year-old Kim and 12-year-old Keith. She tries to reconnect with her old friends, but finds they remind her too much of her husband. She is accosted by one of them, George Van Orman, when he brings her home one night. Fortunately, she has a real friend in Ginna Abbott, whom she runs to and stays with, the night George bothers her. Ginna and her husband, Cary, invite Jess to vacation with them at Lake Tahoe. When Jess finds herself lost with a broken ski, she meets Major Scott Landis. He helps her back to the Abbotts' lodge. After an evening of socializing, he spends the night downstairs on the sofa. Jess and Scott get to know each other better, but she spurns his advances and tells him to leave. Back in Lake Forest, just outside Chicago, Jess finds herself alone again except for her longtime housekeeper and cook, Anna. Frank comes to call and is invited to stay for dinner. However, Ginna phones and tells Jess than she and Cary have spotted Scott at a club. Jess asks Frank if they can go out instead of eating at home, and gets all dressed up. At the club, Jess deliberately bumps into Scott and finds out that he is stationed in Chicago, but refrains from telling her that he is waiting for orders to go overseas. Another day, Scott asks Jess to meet him at his apartment before going out to dinner. A friend of Jess's mother, Stella Thompson, sees Jess enter his apartment. This becomes a subject of gossip among Jess's friends, including George's wife Riette, and eventually their children. Jess's mother, Mary, confronts Scott on Christmas Eve. All the while, however, Jess's relationship with Scott is platonic, though Jess has begun to return his affections, initially out of spite against the rumor mill. She later confronts it head-on at a New Year's Eve party. Behind closed doors and at Jess's insistence on knowing the source of the rumors, Riette expresses her disapproval of Jess's behavior. Jess tells her that she is doing nothing wrong and she will not be deterred by other people's opinions. She leaves the party with Scott, going to Chicago to ring in the new year. Back at Jess's house, the boys hear them come home at 3 am. Jess tells Scott she loves him and he abruptly tells her that it will not work out, as he has orders to report in New York tomorrow for his next assignment, which could be anywhere overseas. Jess tells him that she will go with him to New York so they may spend as much time together as they can. They agree to meet at the train platform at 7. Afterward, Kim and Keith ask her if she is really leaving for New York. She affirms that she is. In the early morning, when she goes to her sons' room to say goodbye, Jess is horrified to discover that their beds are empty. She gets a call from Mary, who informs her they are at her house. She goes there and pleads with her sons to understand her loneliness and grief and that she greatly loved their father and he will always hold a place in her heart, but she has room to love another. Keith embraces her and tells her that even though he does not understand, he just wants her to be happy. At 7 o'clock, Jess runs down the train platform searching for Scott. She hurriedly tells him she cannot go with him as her sons are too young to understand the situation. Scott tells her that he knows he is meant to be with her and asks her to wait for his return, before leaving on the train. ===== Elbryan Wyndon and his childhood friend Jilseponie Ault (nicknamed Pony), whose lives are irrevocably changed by the destruction of their home town Dundalis, and Avelyn Desbris who is a very pious man that enters a group of monks that go to a monastery by the name of St. Mere Abelle to study and serve under God. So while Elbryan and Pony try to sort out their lives, Avelyn comes to terms with the all-too human brothers of the church and the myriad of injustices he watches them cause. After the destruction of Elbryan’s home town he is taken in by the Touel’alfar and to their home Andur’Blough Inninnes (The Forest of Cloud) and teaches him to not just train his body, but also his mind in the ways of philosophy to become a formidable ranger. While Elbryan is training his childhood friend Pony can’t even remember her past and is trying to ease the pain of her forgotten past. While all this is happening Avelyn has problems of his own and soon has to leave the church in a most unexpected way. It is not till years later when they all meet each other and fight an evil like no other by the name of Bestesbulzibar who is a mighty demon that was reawakened by the humans weakness to rule all the realm with an army of goblins, "powries" (dwarfs), and Fomorian Giants and not only that the church is after Avelyn, too. So now this ragtag group of friends, with the help of some unlikely allies, must stop the demon and save the entire realm from its impending doom. ===== Even with the destruction of the dactyl, all is not well in the kingdom of Honce-the-Bear. The servants of Bestesbulzibar still roam the land, creating havoc while, at St.-Mere-Abelle, the centaur Bradwarden is held captive. It is up to Elbryan and Pony, with help from friends, to attempt a rescue while fighting the enemy. It is during this time that Elbryan teaches Pony Bi'nelle dasada, the sword-dance of the Touel'alfar, the short winged elves of Corona. It is also at this time that Father Abbot Markwart, head of the Church of St. Abelle, begins his spiral downward. In this novel the reader meets Andacanavar, a northern ranger from Alpinador. Also, the character of Marcalo De'Unnero becomes more fully developed. Category:American fantasy novels Category:Novels by R. A. Salvatore Category:1999 American novels Category:Del Rey books ===== Granta Omega is an evil mastermind who has one goal: to help the Sith destroy the Jedi order. Now, Omega has escaped to the planet of Korriban, graveyard of the ancient Sith and home to their most powerful secrets. It's up to Obi-Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker to intercept this madman before his sinister power grows out of control. Accompanying the pair on this mission is Anakin's rival, Ferus Olin. The competitive Anakin sees the search for Omega as a contest to be won. But such thoughts are unbecoming of a Jedi, and as the quest plunges deeper into the dark side, Jedi disciplines may be all that stave off the inevitable outcome of this showdown: Death. ===== Each summer, Celaya (Lala) and her family return to her grandmother's home in Mexico City. At the house, Lala meets Candelaria, the maid's daughter, who she secretly admires for her beauty and her "caramelo skin" that is almost too pretty to look at. The Awful Grandmother, having chased out the renters to make room for her family, controls everything from the family's activities to what will be served for dinner, as the Little Grandfather looks on. As the narrative unfolds, Lala starts to understand how her dysfunctional family members became the way they are. One by one, the members of the family reveal pieces of their life that helped shape their personalities: Narciso lived in Chicago for a time, where he fell in love, but was injured in the war and had to come home; after Soledad's mother died, she has cherished a silken rebozo but has never truly been loved, other than by her son; Aunty Light-Skin had an affair with an unnamed movie star. One by one, secrets are exposed, the cruel ones that usually wreck a family. Through it all, Cisneros illustrates how the ties between families are similar to those that bind the ancient silken rebozo. The rebozo (shawl) is central to the story, as it is a caramelo, not especially the most valued or sought after color of scarf, but the rebozo is the only thing that Soledad has that belonged to her mother. The symbolic shawl parallels familial relationships, perhaps not the first choice or the most beautiful, but even in dysfunctional relationships, families can maintain a culture of interconnected relationships. ===== Alec Sects tries to deal with the remains of Nostra. First, he tries to familiarize himself with the new G-8155 Interceptor and later goes on a reconnaissance mission. Alec then learns about a defector in the Russian Nostra branch, Vladimir Polvac, who was a very influential figure, and has information about the Russian Nostra leader, "The Cossack". He needed an escort to an embassy, a transport to an airport, and needed Alec to ensure his plane took off unharmed (As he was trying to leave the country because of his defection). An informant later on revealed large sums of money being diverted to the restoration and fortification of an old nuclear power facility. Alec and fellow agent Vanessa Duvelle investigate the plant and Alec finds unique compact energy cells. After this, The Cossack's identity is revealed as Vladimir Impalakov, who then tries to leave his estate to a warehouse complex on the Baltic coast, using a massive and heavily armed experimental ekranoplan, but is killed by Alec before he could escape. Alec then travels to New Orleans to meet Senator and televangelist Noah Thurgood. However, "Mad Mojo" Carter, a regional crime lord and leader of the American Nostra faction, sends an agent in a stolen G-8155 Interceptor prototype to kill Thurgood. The agent succeeds and the rendezvous is compromised. Alec follows Thurgood's killer and attempts to take him alive to be interrogated but aborts the mission and the rogue Interceptor escapes on a VTOL. Alec is needed elsewhere because an IES steamboat is holding a meeting about the strange Russian energy cells and needs protection. Alec then learns that Mad Mojo Carter's real name is Calvin Blackwell Jr., son of deceased industrialist Calvin Blackwell Sr., is an MIT graduate with honors in engineering, and that he stole top secret information from Thurgood before eliminating him. Alec tracks him down to a bayou, which he was using to cover his escape route. Blackwell was using a cargo jet to escape and had many guards protecting the runway, but Alec shoots the engines to prevent immediate takeoff and destroys the jet, Blackwell, and the top secret information he stole (Since Alec could not recover it). Alec proceeds to Asia via Cargo Ship. He then protects it from attack and reaches an IES Safehouse. Alec, along the way, destroys contraband cargo trucks and Phoenix forces working for the Krait Fang criminal organization (Asian faction of Nostra). Alec then learns his partner, Agent Vanessa Duvelle, has been kidnapped by the head of the Krait Fang, Nguyen McGinty and is being held for execution. Alec breaks her out, and later, destroys most of his forces, allowing a planned assault by special IES forces. This allows Alec to infiltrate the Krait Fang Fortress. He then learns McGinty is attempting to escape on a heavily armed train powered by one of the strange Russian energy cells and wants to destroy a city with a Dirty bomb he has on his train. Alec destroys the train and kills McGinty. They then move to the Alps, where Alec finds a rogue Interceptor prototype, similar to the one from New Orleans. The rogue Inteceptor prototype was stolen by Leland Chevre, the leader of the La Rouge Crime Syndicate (Swiss Nostra). Alec finds Chevre and kills him for the data in his vehicle. Alec analyzes the data from Chevre's vehicle and learns that three European Union facilities have been targeted for nuclear attack. Alec finds and destroys the Mobile Missile Platforms. Alec then heads to a castle owned by the Ararat Society with Agent Duvelle based on information from the stolen car. Alec then discovers that Thurgood is alive, and the leader. Thurgood escapes to the Antarctic, where he has created a Mobile Research Facility that is also an "Ark" and Mobile "City" and plans to flood the world by using the unique compact energy cells to melt the Polar Ice Cap. With Impalakov, Blackwell, McGinty, and Chevre gone, he goes ahead with the plans so he and select others rule what's left. Alec destroys the ark, and him and Agent Duvelle are ordered to their next mission in Los Angeles. ===== Kenta (Tetsuji Tamayama), a classically trained pianist, is fired from his orchestra and gets drunk in a bar. He wakes up the following morning in what turns out to be a bookstore in heaven. The owner of the bookstore had brought him there, and explains that people live to be 100; people who die before this age go to heaven to live out the rest of their allotted time before they are reborn on earth. In heaven, he meets Shoko (Yūko Takeuchi), a pianist who he had admired on earth. Together, they start work on a special composition that she had started writing on earth. Meanwhile, on earth, Shoko's niece Natsuko (also played by Yūko Takeuchi) wants to organise a fireworks display that was discontinued twelve years ago. It turns out that Shoko had been engaged to Takimoto (Teruyuki Kagawa), a talented firework maker, but her hearing had been damaged by a firework accident he caused. As a result, she stopped playing music, he stopped making fireworks, they split up, and later she died. Natsuko wants Takimoto to make his special 'loving fireworks' for the fireworks display. These are the special fireworks that inspired Shoko to compose her special composition, uncompleted when Takimoto stopped making them. He is vehemently opposed to making fireworks again. However, at the end of the firework display 'loving fireworks' unexpectedly appear in the sky, set-off by Takimoto. Kenta returns to earth and plays Shoko's now completed composition to accompany them. Natsuko and Kenta meet. She asks how he knows the piece, to which he responds that he met 'her'. In the end, they start laughing together (as the credits begin to roll). ===== Largo Winch (Paolo Seganti) is a 28-year-old adventurer, drifting around the world, searching for himself. Along the way he's picked up with Simon Ovrannaz (Diego Wallraff), an ex-thief he met in a Turkish prison. The two are best friends...almost brothers. Then one day, Largo's life is changed forever when he learns that Nerio Winch (David Carradine), the step-father he barely knew, is dead. Nerio is an Aristotle Onassis-like billionaire who secretly adopted Largo as a child, but never took him in. Instead, he paid a family in Luxembourg to raise him, then sent him to a monastery as a teenager to be educated. Nerio paid the bills, and that was pretty much the extent of their relationship. These last few years, they barely saw each other. Now Nerio has committed suicide because he was dying of a brain tumor...and, incredibly, has left his vast fortune and control of Group W, his multi-national corporate empire, to Largo. Largo is overwhelmed by the responsibility of this sudden inheritance. The board of directors at Group W despise him, thinking him unworthy and incompetent. Then Largo receives an astonishing video recorded by his step-father just before his death. On it, Nerio reveals that he was once a member of a mysterious organization called The Adriatic Commission, a secret conspiracy of billionaires and politicians who work to control the economic and political destiny of the world for their own ends. For years they have tried to kill Nerio for leaving. In the video Nerio says that if he is dead, despite what the official cause of death may be, it is because they have finally succeeded. Nerio ends by charging Largo with using Group W to seek out and destroy The Commission and uncover the names of its secret members. Eventually Largo discovers another bit of amazing information. Nerio was not his step-father at all, but his biological parent. He kept Largo's existence a secret to protect him from The Commission, which would have surely used the son against the father. And so Largo faces a series of enormous challenges. He must learn to run one of the world's biggest corporations, all the while being opposed and undermined at every turn by his own board of directors. They are led by Michel Cardignac (Charles Powell), a charming, scheming, ruthless executive who will do whatever he can to see Largo ousted and himself at the head of Group W. Largo must also follow his father's wishes and try to expose and destroy The Adriatic Commission. And since The Commission is determined to gain control of Group W, they are always shadowing him, always waiting for an opportunity to pounce and destroy him. But Largo is an adventurer at heart, not a businessman. And so, at every opportunity, he bolts the boardroom and sets off in search of excitement. But he doesn't go alone. He's assisted by Joy Arden (Sydney Penny), a beautiful ex-CIA agent who used to work for Group W's security under Nerio, and Georgi Kerensky (Geordie Johnson), a former KGB agent who left Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union. His biggest ally inside Group W is John Sullivan (Serge Houde), head of the Group W legal department and a member of the board of directors. He was Nerio's best friend, and swore to do all he could to help Largo navigate the treacherous waters of Nerio's empire. ===== The series follows an aspiring angel who for some reason, will not enter heaven, but is assigned to guide someone who has died prematurely. The prematurely deceased, played by the episode guest stars, may choose from the afterlife to correct something that went wrong earlier in their life. The key concept to the series was that each episode featured a different guest star in the leading role, while the series regulars played a supporting role. Episodes are centered on an individual who had reached the end of their life in one timeline, and due to circumstances seen by their advocate and judge, is then given 3 days to travel into their past, and without revealing their true identity, convince their younger self to make a different choice at a pivotal point to effect a different outcome for example, by quitting smoking, or choosing a different job and in changing this learn a key lesson to make them become a better person. This way, the series was an anthology of many different arenas and characters. Season One featured Gordie Brown as advocate Mr. Jones, and Paul Popowich played the role of advocate Mr. Smith in Season Two. Al Waxman played Judge Othniel in 42 of the 44 episodes, replaced for two episodes of Season One by Polly Bergen as Judge Deborah. Waxman died in heart surgery on January 18, 2001, while the second season was airing. ===== Lacey Farrell (Emma Samms), a young rising star on Manhattan's high-powered and competitive real estate scene is in the course of selling a luxurious apartment when she becomes the witness to a murder and hears the dying words of the victim, a woman convinced that her attacker was after a journal kept by her recently deceased daughter Heather up until the day she died in a hit-and- run, what everyone believes to be a tragic accident. ===== This is a nightmare scenario, true for many Cold War submarine veterans. After a North Korean nuclear missile test goes wrong, the American nuclear attack submarine USS Lansing is cut off from communications. Detecting radioactivity in the air and believing the world to be at nuclear war, the executive officer takes command of the ship from the captain and prepares to fire the submarine's nuclear missiles at targets in Russia. Some members of the crew do not believe they are at war and help the captain take back control of the ship. Meanwhile, a second American submarine is sent to hunt down and destroy the Lansing before it can start a real war. In the end, the captain is successful in regaining control of the vessel and preventing the missile launch. After outmaneuvering the other submarine, the captain surfaces in a Russian harbor and uses a mobile phone (gained from a crewman who brought it on board during a stop-over in Tokyo) to contact an admiral and inform them that the situation is now under control. ===== Currier and Ives illustration The ballet bore little resemblance to de la Motte Fouqué's Undine: > The plot is no more like the romantic baron's story than it is like that of > Robinson Crusoe, excepting so far as a water-nymph is the heroine. > Therefore, the readers of Undine have to unlearn all they know, if they > would avoid mystification while witnessing the marvels of the new ballet. Their only point in common appears to be the ill-fated love of a water sprite, Ondine, with for a mortal man who already has a mortal sweetheart. However, the ballet's divergence from the original novel "derive from intermediary works linking the book and the ballet, which Perrot used to enrich and enhance his theatrical conception". The greatest changes that Perrot made to the basic plot were the change of location from the darkly evocative Danube to the sunnier shores of Sicily, and the transformation of the aristocratic Sir Huldbrand into the humble fisherman Matteo, while Undine's rival Bertalda became the orphan Giannina. In many ways, Perrot's ballet is more similar to René-Charles Guilbert de Pixerécourt's play of the story, Ondine, ou la Nymphe des Eaux, which was first presented in Paris in 1830 while Perrot was also performing there. ===== ===== Marco (Dingdong Dantes), a photographer, along with his sister (Isabel Oli) and their cousin Duke (Jojo Alejar) are on a vacation in an old sleepy town. While strolling around town a mysterious woman is hit by a van while trying to save Marco's life. He visits the woman and is drawn to her granddaughter Lianne (Karylle). Marco and Lianne start to develop a relationship but recent events cause Marco to be withdrawn. He suddenly finds himself haunted by a deep feeling of loneliness. His yearning leads to a telephone conversation with Divina (Iza Calzado), the daughter of a haciendero. They find solace in each other. Divina lives in the past (1957) while Marco lives in the present (2006). In a sleepy town, time curved for two people to meet and part... ===== Bill Jenner is part of an exploration team on their way to Mars. He is the only survivor when their spaceship crashes in the Martian desert. He is trying to reach the shallow polar sea they saw as the approached, but after walking for days it is clear he has misjudged the distance. As he climbs another dune he looks into the valley on the far side and sees a village made of marble. As he approaches a strange grating sound follows him. Starving and almost out of water, he runs into the town and grabs a fruit from one of the trees. It burns his lips and gums before he spits it out. Drinking a tiny bit of his remaining water, he explores the town and finds it to be completely alien. He falls asleep, exhausted, and wakes to find a poisonous mist falling from the ceiling, forcing him to run from the room. Initially, he believes it to be an attack, but later concludes it was simply a shower, one for an alien body. Over the next days, Jenner attempts to teach the village how to cater to his needs, replacing the deadly food with something partially edible patterned on the crumbs from his pocket, and providing water after he drips out what remains in his bags. At first relieved, he later notices that the village is destroying itself in order to provide these elements, which are almost unknown on Mars. He realizes his respite will be short; the village will be destroyed keeping him alive for a few days, leaving him no better off than before. Throughout, the noise continues to bother him. He awakes to the sound of violins, playing a dirge for the Martian race, now long dead. It serves food which is now a delicious meaty stew and he completes his meal with a refreshing shower. After days of trying to communicate with it, the village has finally figured out how to cater to his physical needs. He shakes the cleaning fluid off his tail and waddles out to bask in the sun. ===== Twelve year-old boys Romeo Brass and Gavin Woolley have been best friends and neighbours for most of their lives. Gavin suffers from a back injury which causes him to be bullied by other boys while Romeo is quick to step in and defend him. One day Gavin is confronted by two boys, Romeo intervenes and things turn violent. Gavin's injury prevents him from assisting his friend. During the fight Gavin spots Morell, who is a few years older, and calls to him for help. Morell chases the two boys off and then drives Romeo and Gavin home. Romeo's family notice that Morell's behaviour is a little unusual. Morell develops an immediate attraction toward Romeo's sister Ladine and seeks Romeo's advice about asking her out. Gavin plays a prank on Morell which results in him humiliating himself. Morell goes to the shop where Ladine works to apologise and ask her out again; she accepts out of pity. Morell encourages the boys to miss school and accompany him to the beach. When Romeo goes to buy ice cream, Morell confronts Gavin about the prank that he pulled and viciously threatens him with what will happen if he ever tries to do it again. Romeo continues spending time with Morell while Gavin goes into hospital for an operation, which results in Gavin distancing himself from both of them. Romeo looks up to Morell as a new father-figure after he is infuriated by his estranged and violent father Joe coming back into his life. Morell encourages Romeo to behave more violently and convinces him to stay away from Gavin whilst continuing to pursue Ladine who is disturbed by his eccentric behaviour. Ladine is in Morell's flat when he makes a pass at her which she rebuffs. Feeling rejected, Morell is angry and tries to persuade Ladine to at least fool around with him sexually but she storms out of the flat. Morell takes his frustrations out on Romeo, bullying him, and ejecting him from his flat. The next day Morell forces Romeo into his van in order to follow Ladine. In front of Romeo, Morell then badly beats a customer who Ladine was flirting with, which causes Romeo to run away. Upset by Morell's actions Romeo goes to Gavin's house where he is comforted by Gavin's parents. Morell follows Romeo back to Gavin's house and starts to bully Gavin's dad Bill. Witnessing this, Romeo's father Joe steps in to defend Bill, attacking Morell, and forcing him away. Romeo and Gavin reconcile their friendship and restore some semblance of normality back into their lives. ===== Obsessed tells a story of Stephen Friedman—a successful realtor, a Jewish immigrant, and an orphan who had tried to find out who his parents were for a long time and at last gave up. An unexpected letter from a friend and a newspaper article offer help: Stephen discovers that his mother was Rachel Spritzer, a woman who had been through the nightmare of World War II concentration camps, and recently died. Stephen also learns that she was quite wealthy and had some property, including a priceless historical artifact—a stone of David, one of the five stones believed to be used by David to defeat the giant Goliath. Also, it may be that she knew where the other four stones are. Stephen becomes obsessed with the idea to find the remaining stones. He heads to his mother's old house, where he believes the clues are hidden. However, the house is bought by someone else, snatched right out of Stephen's hands. The new owner is Roth Braun, a German, the son of Gerhard Braun who was the Nazi Commandant of the concentration camp, Torùn. Roth Braun knows about the stones and about Stephen's plans. And he also has plans of his own. The story goes on as Stephen makes one desperate attempt to get into his mother's house after another. Braun's thugs do their best to keep him away. Another storyline takes us back in time to the World War II camp, telling about two pregnant women, Ruth and Martha (Stephen's mother) and their struggles with the ruthless commandant who kills on a whim and plays games with the prisoners by giving and taking away their hope. There is some mystery here, and, although the two storylines seem unconnected, they eventually come together. ===== After a bike accident, the sweet- yet-nerdy 15-year-old Louise Miller knocks on the door of a strange-looking house, hoping to use the phone. Instead, she meets a unique but welcoming woman, the seer Madame Serena. Reading Louise's palm, Serena is stunned when she learns that Louise is a reincarnated witch and an old friend from one of her previous lives. Serena reveals that exactly one week later, on Louise's 16th birthday, her magical powers will return with the aid of a powerful amulet that was lost in a former life, an item that Madame Serena says searches for its owner. Once Louise discovers that she has the power to alter the world around her, she attempts to make her dreams come true by casting a love spell to win over Brad, the hottest guy in school. With Madame Serena's help, Louise uses her newfound powers to become the most popular girl in school, while also getting back at her harassing English teacher, Mr. Weaver and the catty group of cheerleaders who never respected her. It is only after her popularity spell gets out of hand—which in turn causes her to abandon her equally unpopular, but loyal, best friend Polly—that Louise realizes she doesn't need magic. In the end, she relinquishes her powers by giving her amulet to Madame Serena, creating her own happy ending in the process. Louise finally got to be with Brad without her magic. ===== On her birthday, Princess Annika worries her parents after going outside to ice skate without permission. As a result, the overprotective King and Queen forbid her from going skating ever again. That night, Annika sneaks out again to join a festival in the village. A powerful sorcerer named Wenlock appears and asks the princess to marry him. The King and Queen arrive to confront Wenlock to which he furiously reminds the king and queen the fate of their "other daughter". When Annika refuses his proposal, Wenlock petrifies her parents as well as everyone in the village. Annika is rescued by a winged horse named Brietta, and Wenlock warns her she has three days to marry him, otherwise the spell will become permanent. Brietta takes Annika to the Cloud Kingdom, ruled by Queen Rayla. Annika discovers that her parents’ "other daughter" is, in fact, Brietta, who was transformed into a pegasus by Wenlock when she refused to marry him; explaining why their parents were so protective of Annika. The Cloud Queen tells Annika that the only thing that can defeat Wenlock is a "Wand of Light"; built from a measure of courage, a ring of love, and a gem of ice lit by hope's eternal flame. Despite Brietta’s reluctance due to past failed attempts, Annika assures her that they can build the wand together. Annika, Brietta, and Annika’s polar bear cub Shiver travel to the Forbidden Forest, where they meet Aidan, a blacksmith. When Shiver falls into a giant's stew pot, Annika uses her hair ribbon to help them escape. The ribbon is a measure of courage and turns into a staff for the Wand of Light. After getting a map from the gem dealer Ferris, the group finds a large cavern filled with gems, where Annika and Aidan take one each. Aidan reveals that he ran away from his parents after he lost all of their money gambling. He took an extra gem to bring to his parents so they could forgive him. Brietta offers her tiara for the ring of love. With all three objects, Aidan smiths the "Wand of Light" and Annika uses it to transform Brietta back into a human. On their way back to the Cloud Kingdom, Annika and Brietta are pursued by Wenlock, and Brietta is knocked unconscious in the chase. Enraged, Annika orders the wand to destroy Wenlock, but it doesn't work. With no other options, she gives in and finally agrees to marry him. Wenlock refuses, calling her annoying, just like his other wives. He takes the wand and buries her in an avalanche. Aidan helps dig Annika out and, after she recuperates, the group sneaks into Wenlock's palace. Annika finds the wand, but the gem breaks off and falls into the sea. Fortunately, Aidan offers his gem as a replacement. Finally realizing that the wand cannot be used for vengeance, Annika breaks all of Wenlock's spells for the love of her family and her people. Wenlock is stripped of his powers and the spell on Annika's kingdom is broken. Annika and Brietta are reunited with their parents, while Aidan reconciles with his father. In the Cloud Kingdom, Annika and Aidan skate together, while the Cloud Queen lifts the wand into the sky to become a star. ===== In an unnamed kingdom, a blonde princess and a brunette pauper are born at the same time. Several years later, Princess Anneliese is betrothed by her mother, Queen Genevieve, to the wealthy King Dominick to save the nearly bankrupt royal treasury, but she is in love with her young tutor Julian. The Pauper Erika is an indentured servant at Madame Carp's Dress Emporium—working off her parents' debt—but dreams of becoming a singer and seeing the world. Unbeknownst to the Queen, the reason behind the kingdom's bankruptcy is her adviser Preminger has been stealing gold, emptying the royal mines. Upon learning from his henchmen, Nick and Nack, that the Queen has arranged Anneliese's marriage to King Dominick, he decides to make Anneliese mysteriously disappear, which will cancel the engagement; after which Preminger can pretend he has found the Princess, earning her hand in marriage, and allowing him to accede the throne and become king. Julian takes Anneliese for a day out into the kingdom so that she can be free for once; there, she witnesses the poverty caused by the kingdom’s bankruptcy. Anneliese hears Erika, who is performing in the street to earn money for herself, but Madame Carp collects it as part of her debt. Anneliese and Erika meet and learn they are identical, apart from their hair color and the crown-shaped birthmark on Anneliese's shoulder. The two bond over their shared troubles and become fast friends. That night, Anneliese and her cat Serafina are abducted by Nick and Nack, who leave a forged letter saying she ran away. Julian, doubting the letter, asks Erika to impersonate the Princess, saving the engagement while he investigates Anneliese's disappearance. Preminger is surprised when Erika, disguised as Anneliese, presents herself at the palace. King Dominick introduces himself to the disguised Erika; over time, the two fall in love, but Erika worries about what will happen if she is found out. The real Anneliese escapes Nick and Nack, but is turned away from the palace because the guards think the Princess (Erika) is already inside. Mistaking Anneliese for Erika, Madame Carp forces Anneliese into her shop and locks her inside. A suspicious Julian follows Preminger to the house where Anneliese was being kept and overhears Preminger's plans, but is discovered and captured. Anneliese has Serafina take her ring and a tag from the dress shop so someone can find her; unfortunately, Preminger and his dog Midas intercept her. Preminger takes Anneliese to the mines where she is imprisoned with Julian after Nick and Nack cause a cave-in. Preminger returns to the palace, where he exposes Erika as a fake and has her imprisoned. Preminger convinces the Queen that Anneliese is dead and that they must marry to save the kingdom; with no other options, she reluctantly agrees. Erika escapes the dungeon by singing a lullaby, causing the guard to fall asleep, and taking his keys. She bumps into King Dominick who tells her that he doesn't believe Preminger's claims about her. Meanwhile, Anneliese and Julian find out how to restore the kingdom's resources with some geodes filled with crystals; the two then confess their love for each other. Erika's barking cat, Wolfie, unearths a mine shaft and the group escapes by flooding the room and floating towards the surface in a barrel. At the Queen and Preminger's wedding, Anneliese arrives, proves her identity with her birthmark, and reveals the truth about Preminger. After a brief chase, Preminger is arrested along with Nick and Nack. Anneliese tells her mother that she wants to marry Julian and that they can help save the kingdom. Soon after, the kingdom’s prosperity is restored thanks to the crystals in the mine. Madame Carp goes out of business; and—with her debt finally paid—Erika leaves to become a renowned singer. After touring the world, Erika realizes where her heart is and decides to return home to marry Dominick. Anneliese and Erika have a double wedding and they and their husbands ride off in a carriage together. ===== The story is told by Barbie to her younger sister Kelly, who is insecure in her painting abilities. Rapunzel is a young woman with long, floor-length hair who lives as a servant to the wicked witch Gothel, residing in an magically secluded manor in the woods. She finds companionship in Penelope, a young dragon and Hobie, an anxious rabbit. She spends her time painting pictures of places she dreams of going when she is free one day; Gothel disapproves of this, accusing Rapunzel of being ungrateful to the witch for supposedly saving her from abandonment as a baby. One day, Rapunzel and her friends inadvertently open a secret passage to the basement where Rapunzel finds a gift from her birth- parents: a silver hairbrush engraved with a message affirming their love for Rapunzel; this leads Rapunzel to question Gothel's claims of her abandonment. Penelope also discovers a tunnel underneath the floor. Rapunzel follows it, leading to the kingdom outside. Outside the castle Rapunzel saves Princess Katrina from a pit trap with the help of her older brother, Prince Stefan. He tells her the trap was set by King Wilhelm, the ruler of an opposing kingdom who has an ongoing feud with Stefan's father, King Frederick. Rapunzel hurries off without learning Stefan's name to avoid Gothel discovering her disappearance. However, Gothel's pet ferret Otto, who had followed Rapunzel, informs his mistress of Rapunzel meeting a man. When Rapunzel insists she doesn't know the name of the man she met when Gothel questions her, her paintings are destroyed and her room transformed into a high tower with Penelope's father Hugo tasked with ensuring she doesn't leave. As Rapunzel sleeps, the hairbrush magically transforms into a paintbrush. When Rapunzel attempts to use the brush, a mural of the kingdom magically appears on her wall which she discovers acts as a portal. Rapunzel uses it to meet Stefan again, though she insists he never tell her his name for fear of Gothel, and Stefan gives her an invitation to the masquerade ball that night. Afraid that her father will be punished if Gothel finds out Rapunzel has left, Penelope goes through the portal and begs Rapunzel to come back. Promising to meet Stefan again, Rapunzel paints a portal back to the tower and returns with Penelope. Back at the tower, she paints herself a beautiful costume. Unfortunately, Otto swipes Rapunzel's invitation and takes it to his mistress. Gothel cuts off Rapunzel's hair, shatters the paintbrush, and destroys the portal to the kingdom. When Rapunzel once again cannot give Stefan's name, Gothel then puts a spell on the tower to never release its lying prisoner. With the help of her friends, Rapunzel manages to escape the tower as she never lied about not knowing Stefan's name, and Penelope flies them to the castle. At the ball, Stefan is lured outside and attacked by a disguised Gothel wearing Rapunzel's hair; at the same moment, King Wilhelm infiltrates the castle, intending to end the feud by force. Wilhelm accuses Frederick of kidnapping his daughter many years ago—the source of the feud; Gothel arrives and reveals that she was the one who took Wilhelm's daughter, Rapunzel, due to her unrequited love for him, wanting the kingdoms to destroy each other. Rapunzel arrives and Wilhelm recognizes her as his daughter. Rapunzel tricks Gothel into running into her painting of the tower, where she becomes permanently imprisoned for her lies. Rapunzel is reunited with her biological parents and marries Stefan. The feud ends and the two kingdoms are united, as Rapunzel's dreams of freedom come true. Kelly now feels better and begins painting after Barbie reminds her that creativity is the true magic in art. ===== The story is told by Barbie to her little sister, Kelly, who is feeling uneasy about being at overnight camp for the first time. Odette is a young woman who lives in a small village with her father and sister, and works in the family bakery. Odette is a talented dancer but is shy and timid about it. Meanwhile, Prince Daniel is informed by his mother that it is time for him to marry and that she is hosting a ball for him to choose a wife. The men of the village go after a unicorn named Lila. With the help of Odette, Lila escapes and is followed by a curious Odette into an Enchanted Forest. Lila becomes caught in a bush, so Odette looks for something to free her. She spots a crystal lodged in a rock which she easily removes as the other denizens of the forest watch in astonishment. Odette is approached by the Fairy Queen who tells her that by freeing the magic crystal, she is destined to defeat the sorcerer Rothbart. The Fairy Queen explains that Rothbart, her cousin, was angered when she was chosen to become the next ruler of the enchanted forest. Rothbart left and returned years later, wielding powerful dark magic, with his daughter Odile, and has since taken over most of the forest, even turning its denizens into animals. Odette, afraid to get involved, declines to help. While Lila escorts her out of the forest, Odette is confronted by Rothbart, who gives her the same curse as the others, turning her into a swan. The Queen arrives too late and gifts Odette with a tiara embedded with the crystal that protects her from Rothbart's magic. As her powers are too weak, the Queen only partially reverses the spell on Odette, allowing her to regain human form by night but turn back into a swan by day. Odette and Lila meet up with Erasmus, a troll who takes care of a massive library, in order to find the Book of Forest Lore, which can tell them how to break the spell; however, they are unsuccessful. Daniel, who is out hunting, is lured into the forest by Rothbart, determined to get him to hunt and kill Odette. However, just as he's about to shoot her down, Daniel is captivated by the swan's beauty and decides to let her live. Odette then transforms in front of him and protects him from Rothbart. The two of them spend the night together and fall in love. Daniel invites Odette to the ball the next night, to which she agrees. Erasmus eventually finds the book and reveals that the key to defeating Rothbart is true love. However, if Daniel falls for another girl, the magic crystal will lose its power and Odette will die. As the others help Odette prepare for the ball, Rothbart abducts Erasmus and the book. While Odette rescues Erasmus, Rothbart attends the ball with Odile, magically disguised as Odette. Odette flies to the castle in her swan form to warn Daniel, but is too late; Daniel pledges his love to Odile, causing Odette to collapse. With the crystal's power gone, Rothbart takes it from Odette. The Fairy Queen arrives, takes the unconscious Odette into her carriage, and flees with Rothbart in pursuit. The carriage crashes back in the Enchanted Forest. The Fairy Queen challenges Rothbart to a duel, but is overpowered and turned into a mouse. Odette wakes up in time as Daniel arrives to confront Rothbart. The two reunite but Rothbart's spell hits them both, leaving them unconscious, their hands intertwined. Rothbart believes he has won, but at that moment, he is consumed by the crystal's magic, as Daniel and Odette tried to protect each other out of true love. The two awaken as all of Rothbart's evil is undone. Everyone from the village and the Enchanted Forest celebrate as Odette and Daniel are to be married. Rothbart becomes a cuckoo clock, while Odile ends up as a maid in Erasmus's library. The story of courage gives Kelly new resolve and she promises she will participate in a race the following day, with Barbie smiling in approval. ===== The story is told by Barbie to her younger sister, Kelly, who is having trouble rehearsing a ballet solo and fears going onstage. A girl named Clara lives with Drosselmeyer, her stern grandfather, and Tommy, her younger brother. On Christmas Eve, they receive a surprise visit from their Aunt Elizabeth. Clara receives a Nutcracker from her aunt who claims it contains the heart of a prince. Clara falls asleep by the Christmas tree and awakens to see her Nutcracker suddenly alive and fighting an army of mice led by the wicked Mouse King. The Mouse King shrinks her down to his size, though he is unable to defeat them and temporarily retreats. The Nutcracker explains that he needs to find the Sugarplum Princess, the only person who can defeat the Mouse King’s magic. The wise owl of the grandfather clock reveals that the Sugarplum Princess is also the only one who can make Clara her original size again. The owl gives Clara a locket that will send her back home when she opens it. Through a portal in a mouse hole, The Nutcracker and Clara land in an ice cave. They escape with the help of a group of snow fairies and enter the Nutcracker's home of Parthenia. The two journey to a gingerbread village, where they meet two children and the horse Marzipan. The children tell them that the rightful heir to the throne, Prince Eric, has gone missing. The group narrowly escapes the Mouse King's army when they are saved by Major Mint and Captain Candy, who lead a small group of villagers in hiding. Mint reveals that the Prince Eric's careless attitude led the former king to pronounce the Mouse as temporary ruler until Eric accepted his responsibilities. Clara realizes that the Nutcracker is the missing Prince Eric; when the Mouse decided he wanted to be king permanently, he turned Eric into a Nutcracker. Eric hopes to redeem himself and make things right again. Clara and the Nutcracker, joined by Mint and Candy, set off on a journey to reach the Sugarplum Princess. While Mint and Candy prepare a boat, Clara and Nutcracker manage to free a group of flower fairies who had been trapped in a well by the Mouse King. The group is suddenly attacked by a rock giant, sent by the Mouse King to stop them from reaching the Princess. The snow fairies arrive and freeze the sea, followed by Marzipan pulling a sled, allowing the group to cross. The Nutcracker uses his sword to crack the ice, causing the rock giant to sink into the sea. The group reaches the Princess's island, but it is revealed to be a trap and the Nutcracker, Mint, and Candy are caged and carried off by the Mouse King's bat henchman Pimm, leaving Clara behind. The flower fairies help carry Clara off the island and to the Mouse King's castle where she frees her friends. The Nutcracker battles with the Mouse King who has his own spell reflected back at him, shrinking him to the size of a real mouse and causing him to flee. The Nutcracker is severely injured and Clara kisses him whereupon he is restored to his true form as Eric. Clara, because she was able to break the spell and save her friends, is revealed herself to be the Sugarplum Princess. Eric is crowned king and the couple, who have fallen in love, dance as the citizens celebrate. The shrunken Mouse King returns riding on Pimm's back, snatches Clara's locket and opens it, but is knocked out of the sky with a snowball. Clara disappears and is magically transported home. Clara wakes up where she fell asleep. The Nutcracker is missing, and she runs to her grandfather, who dismisses the story as her imagination. Just then, Aunt Elizabeth returns with a young man who is revealed to be Eric, whom she introduces to Clara. Eric asks her to dance. A snow globe shows Prince Eric and the Sugarplum Princess dancing happily in the palace. As the story ends, Kelly realizes the importance of not giving up, and she and Barbie finally manage to dance the solo perfectly. ===== Twin siblings and Veritas Project members Elijah and Elisha Springfield are sent to investigate the Knight-Moore Academy when a missing boy mysteriously reappears with his mind wiped clean of almost all of his memories. The only two things he can say are "I don't know" and "Nightmare Academy". When the young man dies mysteriously, the Springfield family is tasked with the investigation of what happened to the boy and what exactly the Nightmare Academy is. Elijah and Elisha are sent to Knight-Moore and discover that sinister happenings abound on the campus, such as campus raids and frequent fights. During the course of the investigation the teens lose contact with their parents and Elijah is taken to a mysterious mansion after someone starts a fight with him. Elijah's sister has to find a way to save her brother without help from her parents before he is murdered or loses all of his memories... =====