Best Drama Movies of 1989

In 1962 in Montgomery, Alabama, State Attorney Richmond Flowers, Sr. is one of few willing to fight racial injustices even if it costs him his family's peace.

Dr. Alexander Brown (Martin Sheen) arrives in Las Vegas, awarded for his recent medical invention. An ex-G.I. tells Brown he was a test subject during the 1950's, exposed to atomic bomb radiation in the Nevada desert-- will Brown help the man uncover the truth? In 1950's Nevada, Brown (played by Emilio Estevez) is a young psychiatrist and a guest of the U.S. Army, where soldiers were routinely exposed to excessive radiation. The young Brown and a colleague interview soldiers, who show their ignorance and insouciance in the face of this danger. The movie intercuts scenes between the young Alexander Brown and older Alexander Brown, some thirty years after the nuclear tests. Will the decorated psychiatrist finally speak out on the atrocity he witnessed?

In Germany, an old man attacks another old man and is arrested. The attacker refuses to speak. A female lawyer is appointed to him. She discovers that the attacker has numbers tattooed on his arm and the attacked man was a German officer.

Hungarian physicist Leo Szilard leaves Europe, eventually arriving in the United States. With the help of Einstein, he persuades the government to build an atomic bomb. The project is given to no-nonsense Gen. Leslie Groves who selects physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer to head the Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico, where the bomb is built. As World War II draws to a close, Szilard has second thoughts about atomic weapons, and policy makers debate how and when to use the bomb.

Ken Malansky, a law student of Perry Mason's, is accused of murdering a fellow student. Perry is reluctant to take on his case as the victim was the son of a close friend.

A young theatre director is accused of killing a more famous Broadway director. Perry takes his case.

Saul Barnard grew up in a family of woodcutters. The woodcutters are scared of the elephants in the forest, but there's one elephant that never seems to threaten Saul. Tired of being exploited by wood buyers, Saul takes a stand and his father chases him away. He goes to work on the wood buyer MacDonald's wood yard, where he gets to know MacDonald's daughter, Kate, and falls in love with her. After a few years he leaves MacDonald and joins the first prospectors in the forest, searching for gold. Millwood becomes a small town with hotels and bars and houses. Kate appears again.

A young boy can transfer his body energy into ESP and heal sick people. While the subject of scientists' studies, he runs away to try to find out about his past and why he is the way he is.

A hockey player of friend of Ken Malansky's is accused of murdering a team owner. Perry takes the case.