Ronny Cox

This science fiction blockbuster from 1990 began its production life as a very different movie than the one that was released. An adaptation of the Philip K. Dick short story "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale," Total Recall was originally conceived of with Richard Dreyfuss starring as a Walter Mitty-like character who experiences a variety of artificially induced fantasies. The movie we know is a mega-budget action epic set on Mars. Arnold Schwarzenegger plays a normal working man who discovers that his entire reality has been invented to conceal a plot of planetary domination.

In this compelling drama, a cadet major (Timothy Hutton) leads his fellow military students in an armed revolt to prevent authorities from turning their school into a condominium complex. His surrogate father, who is also the academy's commander (George C. Scott), vows to fight the closing as well. But when an unexpected accident leads to the school's demise, military discipline goes haywire and tragedy results. Sean Penn, Tom Cruise and Ronny Cox co-star in this thought-provoking film that questions the values and morals of today's society.

A sadistic crime wave is sweeping across America. In Old Detroit, the situation is so bad a private corporation, Security Concepts, Inc., has assumed control of the police force. The executives at the company think they have the answer - until the enforcement droid they create kills one of their own. Then an ambitious young executive seizes the opportunity. He and his research team create a law enforcement cyborg from the body of a slain officer. They program RoboCop to: 1. Serve the public trust. 2. Uphold the law. 3. Protect the innocent. All goes well at first.

Four ordinary men in two canoes navigate a river they only know as a line on a map, taking on a wilderness they only think they understand. Deliverance, based on James Dickey's novel, surges with the urgency of masterful storytelling, like Georgia's Chattooga River along which it was shot. Equally masterful is the portrayal of each man's change of character under stress, harrowingly enacted by award winners Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty and Ronny Cox.

The 1988 sequel to one of the most successful movies of all time finds Eddie Murphy reprising his role as Detroit police detective Axel Foley, and once again playing a fish out of water as he tries to solve a series of heists in Beverly Hills that may be connected to the attempted murder of his friend, a Beverly Hills police captain (Ronny Cox). Constructed in a much flashier and faster-paced visual style than the first film, the song still remains the same as Foley tries to keep his job in Detroit while solving crimes for the Beverly Hills cops.

While its sequels were formulaic and safe, the first Beverly Hills Cop set out to explore some uncharted territory, and succeeded. A blend of violent action picture and sharp comedy, the film has an excellent director, Martin Brest (Scent of a Woman), who finds some original perspectives on stock scenes (highway chases, police rousts) and hits a gleeful note with Murphy while skewering L.A. culture. Good support from Judge Reinhold and John Ashton as local cops not used to doing things the Detroit way (Murphy's character hails from the Motor City).