TVSquad

You don't see as many made-for-TV movies today as you used to. Sure, Lifetime does some and you'll find some on cable and the odd one on CBS, but the networks don't really do them anymore (and if they do they stretch them to two or more nights and call them a mini-series). But you could see them all the time in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Here are five they hardly show anymore, if ever, but I remember them fondly.

1. One Of My Wives Is Missing (1976): Mystery about a man who reports his wife missing, then a woman shows up claiming to be his wife and he says she isn't. Stars Jack Klugman, Elizabeth Ashley, and James Franciscus. I pride myself in being able to figure out the shocking endings and plot twists that so many movies have (that's what happens when you watch so much TV, not much surprises you anymore), but this movie completely blew me away. It doesn't just have a twist ending, it has about three, and you just smile at the end because it's so clever, and you try to think back to everything that happened to see if they played fair. I haven't seen this movie in about 15 years. It's not on DVD and I can't remember the last time someone ran it. (It was remade years later with a different title, but it wasn't as good.)

If you're of a certain age, then the name Dan Curtis means something to you. He was one of the producers/directors behind such 70s horror classics as The Night Stalker, The Night Strangler, Dracula and Dark Shadows. Curtis was diagnosed with a brain tumor late last year and died at his home in Brentwood, CA.

Curtis was also producer of many other TV movies and miniseries, including The Winds of War, War and Rememberence, and Saving Milly. And he scared the living shit out of me as a kid with that Karen Black movie Trilogy of Terror. I didn't sleep at all the night I watched that.

Sadly, his wife Norma, who he was married to for over 50 years, died herself two weeks ago.