Blaise Dietz (Patty Duke Astin) plays the wife of police officer Blaise Dietz (Frederic Forrest), who wants to join a special investigative unit. Forrest is denied this position on the basis of information concerning his wife. The information, which reveals a dicey extramarital affair, was culled from a department surveillance file that was supposed to have been destroyed by court order. Blaise battles through legal channels to expose the police force's illegal actions, even as she and her husband suffer the innuendoes and cold shoulders from his fellow officers.
Based on the novel Winterkill, by William Judson, Cold River is the story of an Adirondack guide who takes his young daughter and step-son on a long camping trip in the fall of 1932. When winter strikes unexpectedly early (a natural phenomenon known as a 'winterkill' - so named because the animals are totally unprepared for a sudden, early winter, and many freeze or starve to death), a disastrous turn of events leaves the two children to find their own way home without food, or protection from the elements.
When strange accidents happen at the factory where Mr. Monroe works, and vegetables are drained of their juices, the neighbors as well as Harold the dog and Chester the cat suspect that the new-found family bunny is really a vampire.
A single mother is overprotective of her mentally challenged son, which has made him angry and difficult, while she denies herself a social life. Things change for the better when the boy gains self-esteem training for the Special Olympics, and his mother learns to let go.
A baby alligator is flushed down a toilet and survives by eating discarded lab animals that have been injected with growth hormones. The now gigantic animal escapes the city sewers and goes on a rampage, pursued by a cop and a big-game hunter.
The mysterious owner of a costume shop rents a Santa Claus suit to three very different men: a math teacher trying to get the nerve to propose, a homeless restaurateur trying to hide from the mob, and a harried political speech writer visiting with his estranged wife and son. Their lives are inexorably changed by their experience of playing Santa Claus.
"Once Upon a Midnight Scary" is a 1979 television program that aired as part of a CBS television anthology series. The program, hosted by noted actor Vincent Price, features scenes from three stories, including "The Ghost Belonged to Me" by Richard Peck, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" by Washington Irving, and "The House with a Clock in Its Walls" by John Bellairs.