Filmguy6

Since I was only about two miles away from the real shootout and saw the footage on the news about 100 times, I was quite interested in seeing the movie to see how accurately it would depict the real event. The film was not only accurate (with very few exceptions) but it was also riveting (with the shootout edited together with documentary-style testimonials from the policemen characters) and peppered with some FX-style swearing and graphic moments. Of the actors, Michael Madsen and Mario Van Peebles were the best (and most well known) and Ron Livingston was good too, but seemed a bit out of place as a hard-edged, SWAT team member. Interesting tidbits were that the gunmen's full names were never mentioned (one was referred to as Larry a few times, but nothing else) and the gunmen characters looked nothing like the real gunmen (the wrong one had long hair and one of the real guys was about 100 pounds heavier than the other). Also, Michael Madsen, who is often confused with Tom Sizemore, who was in the 1995 film Heat, brings up Al Pacino's character from Heat in one of his testimonials. Heat is often mentioned in the same breath as the real North Hollywood incident, because of the similar shootouts and the fact that the real gunmen used the movie as an informal training video for robbing banks. The real gunmen also were nicknamed the 'High Incident Bandits' and the shootout was also the basis for the final episode of the 1996-97 ABC cop show 'High Incident' starring Blair Underwood. Good film.

One of the most anticipated TV shows of the 1999 season, Action! is a rare TV idea....an original concept. Jay Mohr plays Peter Dragon, a brutal, rude and very arrogant Hollywood movie producer who steps on and swears at everyone in his quest to make big-budgeted, multi-million dollar studio movies. Mohr is very funny in the role of Dragon, who is very loosely based on action movie producer Joel Silver, who happens to be the executive producer of this show.

Much of the humor comes from Dragon's arrogant, profane and/or angry tirades, the many Hollywood "In" jokes and celebrity name-dropping. The rest of the main cast includes Illeana Douglas as a former child-actress turned high-priced prostitute turned movie executive who is hired by Dragon because she doesn't kiss his butt, and Buddy Hackett as Dragon's Uncle Lonnie, who's head of Peter's security team. There is also the occasional cameo by a big-name movie star. Due to the sexual content and the bleeped-out foul language (a network TV rarity), the show is for mature audiences only.

Neighbours is an amazing and sometimes vicious animated masterpiece.