A GREAT DAY IN HARLEM
Producer: Jean Bach and Matthew Seig; writers: Bach, Seig, and Susan Peehl; editor: Peehl; narrator: Quincy Jones; interviews with Art Kane, Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey, Sonny Rollins, Marian McPartland, Horace Silver, Gerry Mulligan, Art Farmer, and others.This hour-long documentary is the story of a photograph: a fascinating story about a fortuitous moment frozen in time, a moment that innocently bares the bedrock of an era, a transitory moment that can now become a fertile doorway. Fifty-seven New York City jazz musicians gathered for this photograph, which was shot one summer morning in 1958 on the steps of a brownstone on 126th Street. The movie tells the story of how such an unprecedented number of jazz notables assembled on this particular day at 10am (an ungodly hour for any working musician) to record this image. The movie also uses this photograph as a stimulus for anecdotal reminiscences by the surviving musicians. These contemporary interviews cover the individuals’ memories of the event, as well as their free-ranging thoughts about the styles, habits, contributions, and innovations of their friends and fellow musicians. It’s like one big, tasty jazz alphabet soup or, as Stephen Holden put it in a New York Times review, the photograph is “akin to a jazz version of Proust’s madeleine.” From these interviews with people such as Dizzy Gillespie, Art Blakey, Sonny Rollins, Marian McPartland, Horace Silver, Gerry Mulligan, Art Farmer, club owner Bud Freeman, and others, insights are offered about things as various as the differences between the styles of Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young, the talent and breakthroughs of Mary Lou Williams, the genius and intrinsic morality of Thelonious Monk, the not-forgotten brilliance of Red Allen and Rex Stewart, the prediction that in 100 years Pee Wee Russell’s clarinet style will be better remembered than Benny Goodman’s, and succinct comments such as Bud Freeman’s remark about Count Basie, “Everything he did swung.” The photograph was, originally, the idea of then Esquire art-staff member Robert Benton (later to become a writer and film director: Nobody’s Fool, Places in the Heart, Kramer Vs. Kramer) for a January 1959 issue celebrating jazz. Freelance art director Art Kane was hired, and an open invitation was extended to jazz musicians throughout New York to assemble at this certain time and place. Everyone was surprised by the big turnout, and the gathering grew into a nearly unmanageable event that took the inexperienced and awed young Kane at least a couple of hours to shoot decently. Other images of the event were captured by stride pianist Mike Lipskin and by Milt and Mona Hinton, who brought an 8mm camera with them that morning. These images are also used to amplify other angles on that frozen moment in time. Outside footage is also used to provide examples of individual music styles and history. Constant samples of music riffs embed the storytelling in an ever-changing background of jazz sounds. The copystand camerawork that animates the still images is about as fluid and expressive as I’ve ever seen. Curiously, A Great Day in Harlem lists no single individual as director, seeming to favor recognition of the collaborative efforts of the core production group spearheaded by self-confessed “jazz groupie” Jean Bach. Sometimes, the movie’s freewheeling narration feels scattered as it jumps from one topic and personality to another. Though a more associative order might benefit the film, its randomness does not impede its understandability and, in a sense, it’s true to jazz’s improvisatory nature. Within the constraints of its one-hour running time, this movie packs numerous lifetimes of tidbits. A Great Day in Harlem is the story of a shot that ought to be heard around the world.
4.0 stars (M.B.)
Village
New Review
BATMAN FOREVER
D: Joel Schumacher; with Val Kilmer, Jim Carrey, Tommy Lee Jones, Nicole Kidman, Chris O’Donnell, Michael Gough, Drew Barrymore.Batman forever… and ever… and – yawn – ever. This third installment in what, previously, was a deliciously gothic take on the Dark Knight drags on interminably, filled to bursting with all kinds of spectacular, violet-hued explosions, pithily cumbersome one-liners, and enough ham-handed psychotherapeutic explanations for Batman’s noblesse oblige – from Nicole Kidman, no less – to choke Freud for days. Director Schumacher, taking the reins this time from Tim Burton, who instead fills in as producer, is, of course, an old hand at cinematic bombast, having churned out such previous exercises in aesthetically void sound and fury as Flatliners and The Lost Boys. Batman Forever is no exception to his personal rule of film as cultural static: There’s so much and so little going on here simultaneously that you’re not sure whether to squirm or doze. Finally, MTV has been topped. Kilmer, who replaces the genuinely interesting Michael Keaton as the caped crusader, has little of the manic, psychologically warped gleam that his predecessor brought to the role. Instead, he plays it for cheap laughs, spouting a veritable fusillade of wry tidbits that sound as though they were culled directly from some aborted Bruce Willis vehicle. Screenwriters Lee and Janet Batchler forsake the more adult-oriented aspects of the first two films (not to mention the story itself, if you’re in the mood to quibble about trivialities), and instead head directly into territory staked out by the campy Batman television show of the mid-Sixties: All that’s missing is the cartoony “Pow!” after every well-connected punch. Jones and Carrey – as Two-Face and the Riddler, respectively – are the film’s saving graces, as villains are wont to be in this sort of adolescent exercise. Carrey positively thrives in this sort of role; he’s inherited the same twisted, everything-and-the-kitchen-sink comic glee that older members of the audience will recall from Robin Williams’ glory days. His Riddler is a whirlwind of absurd posturings and fevered, maniacal obsessions; Frank Gorshin’s TV portrayal seems pre-Cambrian by comparison. Jones does his best to keep up (no mean feat under all those layers of shoddy latex scar tissue), but it’s Carrey’s show all the way. When he’s off the screen, the film bogs down in Kilmer’s bland surfer-boy good looks, Kidman’s preposterous (and marginally offensive) sexual high jinks, or O’Donnell’s “Origin of Robin, the Boy Wonder” subplottings. Holy story line gone awry, Batdude! Even the most inspired use of the word “bifurcated” I’ve ever heard in a motion picture can’t save this molten chunk of pop-culture cheese-whiz from sinking under its own ridiculous weight. Batman forever? Does that mean Jon Lovitz as Egghead next time around? Sandra Bullock as Batgirl? Better stop before I give Joel Silver any ideas.
2.0 stars (M.S.)
Arbor, Highland, Lake Creek, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
CONGO
D: Frank Marshall; with Dylan Walsh, Laura Linney, Tim Curry, Ernie Hudson, Joe Don Baker.Congo has everything – civil war, exploding airplanes, deranged hippos, rumbling volcanoes, murderous gorillas – and that’s its trouble: It suffocates you with one faux thrill after another. Jawdroppingly bad, this adaptation of Michael Crichton’s 1980 novel about a talking ape named Amy and a fabled lost city deep in the jungles of central Africa is as sophisticated in execution as a Jungle Jim movie. The clich�s abound (I kept waiting for someone to mutter, “The natives are getting restless”), while the multi-million-dollar special effects look cheesy (the molten lava at the film’s end gurgles across the screen like runny pizza sauce). Had Congo employed the breakneck pace of action-adventure films such as Raiders of the Lost Ark, its shortcomings might have seemed less obvious. But with Spielberg prot�g� Marshall behind the camera, you’re painfully aware of every ridiculous moment. (Didn’t Steven teach you anything, Frank?) Equal fault must lie with fallen-from-grace screenwriter John Patrick Shanley (Moonstruck), whose script either uses a sledgehammer to communicate exposition or spits out critical explanations with the clarity of static. The actors in this misfire resort to affecting strange accents to compensate for the absence of dimension in their characters: Hudson finds creative solace in talking like Thurston Howell III, and – in the role of a Romanian treasure hunter looking for the riches of King Solomon’s mines – Curry does Bela Lugosi with a mouth full of marbles. Most embarrassingly, Linney is called upon to be the film’s �ber-gal, a telecommunications genius with a Ph.D., a former CIA operative who can handle any kind of firearm, and a chic dresser who always looks fresh on safari in her crisp Banana Republic ensembles. Only Amy, the precocious gorilla who communicates through sign language, comes off looking good in Congo, probably because she has the least amount of dialogue. By the time she’s saved her teacher Walsh from killer apes and survived a cataclysmic eruption – all in the film’s last 15 minutes – it’s no small wonder that she’s ready to find a home in the mist with her new simian family. Like the audience of Congo, she’s had enough of this monkey business.
0 stars (S.D.)
Arbor, Lake Creek, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
FIST OF LEGEND
D: Gordon Chan, Yuen Woo Ping; with Jet Lee, Chin Sui Ho, Shoji Kurata, Yuen Woo Ping.An action-packed remake of the Bruce Lee chopsocky classic The Chinese Connection, Fist of Legend stars Hong Kong’s current king of martial arts superstars, Jet Lee (Once Upon A Time In China, Fong Sai Yuk) , as the famous Chinese folk hero Chen Zhen. Set in 1940s Shanghai, the Jet must solve the mystery behind his master’s death, while fighting the tyranny of local Japanese prejudice against the Chinese. But when Li enters into an interracial romance with a pretty Japanese student, he finds himself caught in the middle, with both sides against him. For all the non-stop brawling and affectionate tributes to “the little dragon,” Fist of Legend is a considerably quieter picture, and Li’s silent, stoic performance is quite a contrast to Lee’s manic powerhouse. Writer/Director Gordon Chan (King of Beggars) ups the dramatic ante as well, and lightly (perhaps too lightly) touches on the mutual racism between the Chinese and Japanese. Unfortunately, despite some very effective scenes and resonant historical references, these fascinating points are never fully developed, and the story’s political overtones have been all but discarded by the finale. Although this is disappointing, there are more than enough good scenes (both action and otherwise) to keep this enterprise afloat and entertaining. Punctuated by lots of kung fu fighting directed and choreographed by chopsocky vet Yuen Woo Ping (Drunken Master, Wing Chun), this melodramatic action film delivers the goods.
2.5 stars (J.O.)
Hogg
JLG BY JLG
D: Jean-Luc Godard.////LA VIS///D: Didier Flamand; with Jean Reno.The JLG of the title is film great Jean-Luc Godard (and if you have no idea who Jean-Luc Godard is or what makes him one of the greats, that’s probably a good sign that this movie is not for you). As implied by the title, JLG by JLG is an autobiographical study. It shows the director and film thinker at the age of 65 at his home by a lake in Switzerland. The movie is self-reflexive to the utmost. (Even the title is self-reflexive: Godard’s first compilation of critical writings bore the English title Godard on Godard, although in French it was originally called Jean-Luc Godard par Jean-Luc Godard – a precursor of this movie’s French title, JLG par JLG.) In JLG by JLG, we see Godard (or his shadow) as he goes about his day: jotting note fragments to himself, taking walks, reciting aloud passages from Wittgenstein and Johnny Guitar, looking at a childhood picture of himself, and so on. The mood is a kind of agitated melancholy which, halfway through its hour-long running time, is jostled by more restless camera movements and some jocular episodes that, seemingly, try to wrest the director from his insular self-absorption. There’s some truly funny stuff in this section, although by the time you reach it, you’ll be ready to seize on just about anything for a laugh. And so is Godard; he seems to welcome this humorous self-deprecation as his salvation. My personal reaction to JLG by JLG is almost as intriguing to me as the movie itself because it seems to be telling me as much about my own autobiography as the director’s. Though appreciative, I find myself more distracted by his current film exercise than I suspect I might have been, say, 20 years ago, when Godard was revered as the hero of radical filmmakers worldwide. It’s a position that Godard, himself, may never have wanted and one from which he is, obviously, still trying to extricate himself. Yet, apparently, I am still wed to a desire for heroics and passive stimulation, a need that overshadows this calculated exercise in anti-autobiography. Despite these personal reflections and the movie’s cunning solipsism, JLG by JLG shows Godard pumping at full throttle to create the most meaningful work he’s produced in quite some time./////La Vis (The Screw) is a 20-minute short film that also shares the bill with JLG by JLG. This French film which stars Jean Reno (The Professional) recently won the C�sar (French equivalent of the Oscar) award as the best short of last year. It is the first film by well-known theatre director Didier Flamand and the look of the film and the set design hints of its theatrical grounding. On a set that looks something like a bizarre merger of socialist realism and German Expressionism, this odd little comedy is related as unnaturally as possible. Essentially, La Vis tells the story of a man’s search for the proper screw to fit some strange apparatus he is building, and through this rudimentary story line offers a commentary on consumer society and our tendency to make square pegs fit round holes. At times, the souped-up comic delivery resembles Chaplin’s send-up of mechanization in Modern Times. La Vis, adds to its artificiality with techniques like its iris-frame edits and the frenzied sound of the indecipherable polyglot/make-believe language spoken throughout. The amusing La Vis is a well-conceived and -executed little movie, an example of short filmmaking at its finest.
4.0 stars (M.B.)
Hogg
First Run
ASHES OF TIME
D: Wong Kar Wei; with Leslie Cheung, Bridget Lin, Tony Leung Kar Fei, Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau, Tony Leung Chu Wai, Jacky Cheung.Easily the most ambitious picture of last year, this epic, action melodrama from director Wong Kar Wei (The Days of Being Wild) is so structurally complex in its unfolding of plot and characters, not to mention so ruthlessly revolutionary in its destruction of typical narrative techniques, that films like Pulp Fiction look like simple A-Z storytelling by comparison. Based on a classic Chinese novel, the plot follows hired assassin Leslie Cheung (A Chinese Ghost Story) and the unusual characters that cross his path: A wandering friend suffering from amnesia, a visually impaired swordsman, a kind-hearted warrior turned hired-killer, and a curiously asexual stranger with a split personality (appropriately named “Yin” and “Yang”) all visit Cheung at one time or another, and as the movie progresses, their web-like connection to one another is slowly revealed. The story itself really isn’t all that complicated, but is told in such a fractured style that subtle details and character relationships aren’t at all clear until the gloriously anticlimactic finale, and, even then, it may take multiple viewings to get the whole thing straight. The all-star cast is absolutely tremendous (with the possible exception of pop singer-cum-actor Jackie Cheung), with all of them delivering solid, textured work. Tony Leung Chu Wai’s blind swordsman and Bridget Lin’s lovelorn schizophrenic are particularly worthy of mention. Other pluses include the fine electronic music score, Samo Hung’s energetic fight choreography (deliriously photographed in a variety of slow-motion and step-framing techniques), and last, but not least, the astonishingly rich and inventive cinematography by Christopher Doyle, whose expert realization of Wong Kar Wei’s imagery earned the award for best cinematography at last year’s Venice FilmFestival. As I said before, Ashes of Time is a film designed for multiple viewings, and therefore, may not be everyone’s cup of tea. (A fellow viewer dubbed it, with deliciously overblown hyperbole, “the most inaccessible movie ever made!”) But Wong Kar Wei’s film is definitely one of the most challenging to come along in quite some time – reason enough to give this wildly ambitious picture a look, or two, or three… or until you think you’ve got it.
4.0 stars (J.O.)
Hogg
THE BRIDGES OF MADISON COUNTY
D: Clint Eastwood; with Eastwood, Meryl Streep, Annie Corley, Victor Slezak, Jim Haynie.With Unforgiven, Clint Eastwood was grandly given credit for single-handedly reviving the moribund genre of the film Western. Such hyperbole may also come his way for The Bridges of Madison County, which can be seen as breathing fresh life into the stagnant genre of women’s film melodrama. But probably not, because Bridges is, after all, a woman’s story, and what’s our Clint doing mucking around in girl stuff? Clearly, Bridges is a movie Eastwood very much wanted to make; not only does he co-star, he also directs and co-produces. Yet when word crept out that Eastwood was preparing Robert James Waller’s runaway bestseller for the screen, reactions were generally incredulous and bemused. The common ground between the screen icon and the romance novel were far from obvious. But Eastwood has always been one to flex his screen persona, so it’s not that unusual that he chose to play the role of the sensitive photographer and lover, Robert Kincaid. His real stroke of genius, though, was casting Meryl Streep as Francesca Johnson, the story’s Italian-born Iowa housewife. Through her body language, Streep conveys just as much through what she doesn’t say as through what she does. She is a lonely woman, though she is surrounded by family; she is someone whose dreams of coming to America have not been fulfilled by the dull reality of her life in Winterset, Iowa; she has a busy life stuffed with details but has nothing that truly satisfies or excites her anymore. She’s certainly no lachrymose creature bemoaning her fate, but one senses that her capacities for feeling have deadened over time. She’s ready for that handsome stranger to come to her door seeking directions. In some ways, Bridges reminds me of The Rose Tattoo with Anna Magnani and Burt Lancaster. In it, Magnani plays a fiery widow with a thick Italian accent who falls for the beefy truck driver who comes to her door. The set-up is not too unlike Italian-accented Francesca’s four-day solitary holiday while her family is at the state fair, only her gentleman visitor is a lanky photographer from National Geographic. Actually, between Bridges and Don Juan DeMarco, 1995 has so far proved to be a good (if you really want to call a sum total of two “good”) year for the depiction of romance amongst the over-40 set. Bridges is punctuated by scenes of Francesca’s grown children discovering the existence of her long-ago affair after their mother has died. At times, watching them deal with this new information is interesting, since it makes them question everything they thought was true about their lives. But their involvement becomes too much and their resolutions ring phony. Another problem with this otherwise beautiful script by Richard LaGravenese (The Fisher King, The Ref, A Little Princess) is that it sometimes renders things way too literally, when the film’s evocative images would have sufficed perfectly. But, for the most part, the script strips the novel of its purple prose while retaining the drama at the heart of the story. Bridges is another example of Eastwood’s remarkable economy of style as both a director and an actor. It is neither his best work nor his worst, though it is a fascinating exploration.
3.5 stars (M.B.)
Great Hills, Lake Creek, Lakehills, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock
CASPER
D: Brad Silberling; Christina Ricci, Bill Pullman, Cathy Moriarty, Eric Idle, Malachi Pearson as the voice of Casper.At its best, which is when it’s exploiting both its eye-popping special effects and delicious production design (the interior of the haunted mansion is truly awe-inspiring), Casper proves itself to be passable, if mindless, kiddie fare. At its worst, Casper continually resorts to desperate star cameos to get a rise out of the audience, lame and phony heart-tugging to get them emotionally involved (and there is more of this nonsense than you might expect), and ridiculous, coincidental plotting to make sure this thing runs at least 90 minutes. For the record, the story follows young Kathy Harvey (Ricci, better known as the scene-stealing Wednesday from the two Addams Family movies) and her father (Pullman), who makes a living as a psychiatrist for, as he puts it, “the living impaired.” He is hired to clear unwanted spirits out of an old abandoned mansion by two sleazy, money-grubbing opportunists (Moriarty and Idle, both of whom seem to be having a good time) who are eager to get their hands on the “treasure” buried within its basement. There are four ghosts in the house: Casper, of course, is the friendly one, and immediately falls head over heels for Kathy; the mischievous Stinky, Stretch, and Fatso are the hell raisers, bent on making (mostly harmless) trouble and scaring the daylights out of whomever they can. Throw in a Halloween party gone awry, a machine that can magically bring ghosts back from the dead, and an unwelcome dose of coming-of-age melodrama, and you have a movie that’s constantly busy… but never really going anywhere. The cast is still appealing, however; the talented Bill Pullman comes off the best and provides some wonderful physical slapstick, particularly in a fun scene where he takes on the three troublemaking ghosts with a toilet plunger. But let’s cut to the chase, shall we? The only real reason anyone is going to see Casper is for its special effects sequences, which, thankfully, are both spectacular and frequent, though lacking the same jaw-dropping sense of wonder that audiences felt when they saw such milestones as Jurassic Park’s dinosaurs or the water tentacle from The Abyss. In the end, if you’re looking for mindless entertainment that might keep the kids busy for a couple of hours, the effects-filled Casper will probably fit the bill, but if you want a real story, real characters, or – let’s just say it – a really good family movie, don’t get lost in the Spielberg hype machine (Spielberg and his company Amblin produced Casper) and forget about a movie called A Little Princess.
2.0 stars (J.O.)
Great Hills, Lake Creek, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
FARINELLI
D: Gerard Corbiau; with St�fan Dionisi, Enrico Lo Verso, Jeroen Krabbe, Caroline Cellier, Omero Antonutti, Renaud Du Peloux de Saint Romain.The grand, operatic gestures in Farinelli are apropos, considering its subject matter: It tells the story of Carlo Broschi, an 18th-century castrato called Farinelli, a performer with the beautiful voice of a soprano and the tortured heart of a man who can’t help but believe his gift, one deviated from nature’s course, is both a blessing and a curse. Sumptuous to look at, this recent Oscar nominee for best foreign film has contemporary resonance – as countless women swoon over the charismatic but emasculated title character, you can’t help but see parallels between this historical figure and modern-day, pop culture icons such as… Michael Jackson, perhaps? Scriptwriter Andree Corbiau has structured the film’s larger-than-life screenplay in Freudian terms in which fraternal love and guilt are inextricably intertwined. Farinelli and his brother, Riccardo, have a pact which dictates that they share everything – their careers, their women, their lives. What’s more, it requires Riccardo to compose musically inferior works short on inspiration but long on flourishes and embellishments, allowing Farinelli to showcase his vocal range for his adoring audiences. (Of course, there’s a reason for this symbiotic relationship, one that’s not too difficult to discern before its revelation in the film’s third act.) As Farinelli, Dionisi emphasizes his character’s grande-dame tendencies; for the most part, he plays the role with the flair of a temperamental diva. It’s a performance, however, that’s little more than adequate, trading more on superficialities than any true emotion. And although a subplot involving the famed (and somewhat sadistic) George Handel, a composer who is awed and envious of Farinelli’s success, has Amadeus-inspired overtones, the heart and soul of this movie lies in its brother-love conflict. Despite its aspirations, however, Farinelli doesn’t always soar with the beauty and feeling of its castrato’s arias. But there’s no question that it hits a couple of high notes, which – if you like historical dramas of this kind – may make it worth seeing.
3.0 stars (S.D.)
Village
JOHNNY MNEMONIC
D: Robert Longo; with Keanu Reeves, Dolph Lundgren, Ice-T, Dina Meyer, Udo Kier, Henry Rollins, Barbara Sukowa.From controversial artist Robert Longo comes his film debut based on William Gibson’s short story (Gibson also wrote the screenplay) about the perils of cyberspace in the 21st century. Reeves is Johnny, a mnemonic courier (that is, a person with a cranial implant which enables the uploading and downloading of sensitive information from computer to brain, and vice versa) on the run from the vicious Yakuza with only 24 hours to download 300-odd gigabytes of precious information before it kills him. The information turns out to be the blueprint for the cure to NAS, a sort of global-wide plague that destroys the human nervous system and is afflicting humanity at a rapid rate. Teaming up with the LoTeks – a rebel band fighting a guerrilla war against the current corrupt government – and an NAS-carrying female bodyguard (Meyer), Johnny must fend off the ever-increasing attacks from the Yakuza and their henchmen while desperately trying to locate an avenue of release for the information overload in his head. Fans of Gibson’s grim cyberpunk writings will no doubt flock to the film in droves, but Johnny Mnemonic also works fairly well for those of us trapped in the Stuckey’s alongside the gridlocked information superhighway. Take away all of Gibson’s technophobic grime and Longo’s crazed, cluttered set pieces, and you’ve basically got an updated D.O.A., with Reeves filling in for Edmond O’Brien (in a version that’s vastly superior to Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel’s cheesy San Marcos-lensed yawn-fest of 1988). For his first shot at feature filmmaking, Longo does an admirable job of keeping the story line rocketing along, though his seeming attempts to out-Blade Runner Ridley Scott in the decaying cityscape department grow wearisome and the occasional wooden drivel that Reeves spouts adds a bit of unintentional humor to the proceedings. All in all, it’s much better than expected, and almost certainly a notch or two above the upcoming The Net, whose current theatrical previews curiously make it out to be The Pelican Brief with more technospeak and less Grisham.
3.0 stars (M.S.)
Great Hills, Lincoln, Movies 12, Westgate
SEARCH AND DESTROY
D: David Salle; with Griffin Dunne, Dennis Hopper, Christopher Walken, John Turturro, Illeana Douglas, Ethan Hawke, Rosanna Arquette, Martin Scorsese.These days, the newest rage seems to be for established visual artists to enter the ranks of film directing. Robert Longo recently released his debut feature Johnny Mnemonic and it’s reported that Julian Schnabel is currently working on a film project about his deceased colleague Jean-Michel Basquiat. Search and Destroy represents hyperrealist painter David Salle’s first foray into filmmaking, following an art career shaped by drastic swings between public lionization and critical opprobrium. It is unlikely that Search and Destroy will engender much heartfelt reaction from either end of the spectrum. The movie is an offbeat black comedy with edgy noir eruptions that, despite many wonderful bits and pieces of dialogue, staging, and performances, never fully coalesce into a unified whole. Salle’s foremost achievement with this project may be the impressive assemblage of creative talent he managed to gather together. Search and Destroy originally came to life in the early Nineties as an off-Broadway play by Howard Korder. The play was adapted for the screen by the under-appreciated filmmaker Michael Almereyda (Twister, Nadja). Salle’s art-collector pal Dennis Hopper signed on for the film project and Martin Scorsese, who reportedly saw the film as something of a cousin to his own After Hours, came aboard as executive producer. Griffin Dunne, who essayed the story’s lead character of Martin Mirkheim in the off-Broadway run (and also starred in After Hours), recreated the character for the screen. Mirkheim is a failed-but-always-trying entrepreneur and a wannabe film producer. Martin has sundered so many enterprises that even the IRS is having trouble keeping account of his failures. His new dream is to produce a movie based on an uplifting adventure novel by late-night TV self-help guru, Dr. Luther Waxling (Hopper, in a brilliant embodiment of a self-serving huckster). When Martin’s lack of cash proves a turn-off to the good doctor, Martin turns for help to Waxling’s assistant Marie (Douglas), who aspires to sell her unproduced horror screenplay about a “spine sucker” that looks like “a gangrene penis with a lobster claw” and a heroine who is “a fully realized, multi-dimensional character with huge breasts.” Martin and Marie go to New York to get some fast cash through the contacts of a business acquaintance played by Walken. Walken here creates another one of his creepy characterizations of a dangerously borderline personality who, in turn, introduces Martin to an even wonkier character played by John Turturro. Two scenes between Walken, Turturro, and Dunne – one staged in a tailor’s fitting room with a three-way mirror and the other on an in-home squash court – are so outrageously performed and shot, that they, by themselves, make the entire movie worthwhile and probably come the closest to manifesting Salle’s visual style on film. Watching Walken and Turturro each trying to out-crazy the other is an oddsmakers’ bout between two well-matched loons. Actually, all the film’s performances are finely etched and enjoyable to watch. The story’s dark center about the nature of business as the provider of hope for the hopeless is sardonically witty and sharp. But the movie’s constant shifts in tone and undeveloped angles prove frustrating. Search and Destroy doesn’t zero in on its target so much as it camouflages the perimeter.
3.0 stars (M.B.)
Village
THE SECRET OF ROAN INISH
D: John Sayles; with Jeni Courtney, Eileen Colgan, Mick Lally, Richard Sheridan, John Lynch, Gerard Rooney, Susan Lynch, Cillian Byrne.Water moving, in ripples, in waves. It is the first image in this film, and from it we can feel that the story we are about to be told is one begun many years ago, before the births of our fathers and mothers, before the births of their fathers and mothers, before even the births of those generations before them. Sure enough, as John Sayles’ screen adaptation of Rosalie K. Fry’s novel Secret of the Ron Mor Skerry unfolds, we are led back in time to ancient days when wind and land and sea and beasts and folk lived with an unbroken bond among them, when seals and humans shared the island Roan Inish and tales of selkies – seals who could take the form of humans – were more than legend. Sayles’ new film is a swirl of mystery and enchantment, of romance between men and mystical creatures, of a baby abducted by animals, of his sister who resolves to win him back and in so doing restore her family’s place on Roan Inish. It’s a tale of old ties that we’ve set aside but which are still important and for which we still yearn, and Sayles tells it in a remarkable way, in a swirl of history, nature, and folklore that speaks to all ages. As in other of his films, especially Matewan and Passion Fish, Sayles gets under the skin of the place, to a spot where the pulse of it can be felt and its beat is a steady sound. Here, he doesn’t so much “capture” the rhythm and spirit of Irish coastal life as ride alongside them, matching their pace and rising and falling with them, like a seal through the tide. The atmosphere of this world is thick and pungent as peat; it washes over us in the lyrical language (“He slept like a Christian”), in the lovely performances, in the sounds of Uillean pipes and penny whistles on Mason Daring’s Celtic score, in the crisp cinematography of Haskell Wexler, which celebrates in the stones and seas ash, slate, pearl, and a thousand other shades of gray. Roan Inish conjures magic, but like another current film that is its cousin in spirit, A Little Princess, it does so without relying on technical wizardry. Instead, it creates wonder in the unexpected – in the sudden glimpse of a naked boy in a cradle on the sea – and in the generosity of the human heart – in children restoring decayed homes to save a lost boy. The film is unapologetically sweet and hopeful, but it’s said the heart’s true home is the water, that its nature is to bob atop the cares of the world like a wooden cradle on the waves.
4.0 stars (R.F.)
Dobie
TALES FROM THE HOOD
D: Rusty Cundieff; with Corben Bernsen, Rosalind Cash, Rusty Cundieff, David Alan Grier, Anthony Griffith, Wings Hauser, Clarence Williams III.A deft, well-directed horror anthology film from the makers of last year’s hilarious Fear of a Black Hat. Cundieff weaves together a quartet of eerie urban shockers that brings to mind everything from Amicus Film’s early-Seventies shockers, Tales From the Crypt and The Vault of Horror, as well as Hammer’s superlative Dr. Terror’s House of Horrors and the more recent Creepshow and Tales From the Darkside films (there’s even a tip of the skull to several Twilight Zone episodes, not to mention Christopher Young’s decidedly Zone-esque scoring). The framing device – three young hoodlums meet up with the bizarre owner of an all-black funeral parlor in an effort to retrieve a cache of lost drugs – is as strong as can be expected from this sort of thing; almost as a rule, it’s the opening and closing bracketing systems that are the weakest links in the anthology chain. Williams III (best known as Linc from television’s The Mod Squad), as the certifably deranged mortician-in-residence, gives a deliciously hilarious, absurdly over-the-top performance that adds a much-needed dose of creepy humor. The four interwoven stories here are, I’m glad to say, well above much of the tame drivel most similar films have put out recently. The first, and the weakest, concerns a group of rogue cops who murder a black activist and then are subjected to a Horrifying Vengeance From Beyond the Grave. “Boys Do Get Bruised,” the follow-up tale, posits a battered young schoolboy and the sympathetic teacher who intervenes to save him from “the monster.” Not half bad, really, but it’s the two final stories – “KKK Comeuppance” and “Hard Core Convert” that are the bloody icing on this particular cake (devil’s food, one suspects). LA Law’s Bernsen stars in the first as Duke Metger, a racist southern politician who incurs the wrath of a cadre of haunted dolls possessed by the wandering spirits of the slaves who died at the plantation house where he now resides. Excellent stop-motion animation by the Chiodo Brothers gives this a truly sinister frission. “Hard Core Convert” takes a page from A Clockwork Orange in telling of the bizarre “reprogramming” awaiting a hardened gangbanger in “Dr. Cushing’s” medical laboratory. Nicely executed (no pun intended) from start to finish, Cundieff proves that Black Hat was no fluke with what may be the best African-American horror film since William Crain’s Blacula.
3.0 stars (M.S.)
Highland, Riverside
Still Playing
BRAVEHEART
D: Mel Gibson; with Gibson, Sophie Marceau, Patrick McGoohan, Catherine McCormack, Angus McFadyen, Brenden Gleeson.In the late 13th century, there was a historical person named William Wallace. Then there is this splendid, rousing adventure by Mel Gibson, a deliberate heroic myth-making tale that combines history with fantasy. Gibson, who starred, produced, and directed, audaciously presents this as a classic adventure, without apology. Although it presents complex political relationships, these are mostly entanglements designed to complicate and enhance the plot rather than pose real ideological or historical relationships. Gibson plays fast and free with history, but Braveheart is a film of romance, of legend, of possibility, and of freedom. Deftly, Gibson directs this epic along; with most of the story racing to reach the screen, the almost three-hour film rarely drags until just before the end, and even then, redeems itself. This is a movie of warfare, of smoke, of blood, and of fire. Although Gibson occasionally overuses slow motion, the whole film is beautiful (shot by Legends of the Fall cinematographer John Toll), and the battle scenes are splendid. Outside of celebrating violence, freedom, liberty, and the rights of the people against the uncaring nobles – all as extremely broad and nonspecific concepts – Braveheart offers no real vision. But it is a most thrilling epic; the scope is grand and the acting ideal for the film.
4.0 stars (L.B.)
Arbor, Lake Creek, Lakehills, Lincoln, Movies 12, Riverside, Roundrock
CRIMSON TIDE
D: Tony Scott; with Denzel Washington, Gene Hackman, George Dzundza, Viggo Mortensen, James Gandolfini, Matt Craven, Jason Robards.Submarines hold a near-mythic place in the pantheon of Great American Male Film Fantasies, and this juggernaut of a movie plays right into these childlike fantasies. Scott’s film posits a sudden takeover by rebel Russian soldiers of various strategic nuclear arsenals and the West’s alarm over such an occurrence. Sent in to “give the rebels pause” are Captain Ramsey (Hackman) and Executive Officer Hunter (Washington). Once on board the sub, the two men find themselves not only in close quarters but also in constant conflict, as the complex, Harvard- and Annapolis-educated Hunter and the crusty, combat-hungry Ramsey engage in their own verbal and psychological war while the real thing waits just around the corner. Scott is a master of slick action films, and Crimson Tide is beautiful to look at. The central conflict between Hackman and Washington, though, quickly becomes bogged down in unintentional war movie clich�s as the two act and react to each other (especially in Hackman’s overwrought, bombastic performance) like a pair of noisy schoolchildren. Their conflict has all the subtlety of a torpedo. Go see it, get the adrenaline rush; it’s noisy and fun, but that’s all it is.
3.0 stars (M.S.)
Arbor, Highland, Lake Creek, Movies 12, Roundrock, Westgate
DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE
D: John McTiernan; with Bruce Willis, Samuel L. Jackson, Jeremy Irons, Graham Greene, Colleen Camp.Continuing the unlikely adventures of beleaguered NYPD cop John McClane (Willis), this third installment unfortunately forsakes much of the occasionally clever, somewhat wry dialogue and situations of its predecessors in favor of a more generic action-adventure approach that piles on stunt after stunt, explosion atop explosion, and leaves you with nothing so much as a headache and the notion that the Die Hard franchise is indeed dead. McTiernan is an old hand at actioners and, like the pro he is, keeps the film rushing along from fiery stunt to stunt. But after an hour or so you find yourself wishing for fewer big bangs and more pithy extemporizing from Willis, one of the few humanistic – albeit contrived – aspects from the series’ previous outings. Thankfully, Irons keeps the film from sinking too far into dismal self-mockery with a bravura, nicely twisted performance.
2.0 stars (M.S.)
Arbor, Lake Creek, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
THE ENGLISHMAN WHO WENT UP A HILL BUT CAME DOWN A MOUNTAIN
D: Christopher Monger; with Hugh Grant, Colm Meany, Tara Fitzgerald, Ian McNeice, Kenneth Griffith.Perhaps it is because in a country as small as Wales, with such tiny villages where so many share the same surname and where nearly everyone knows everything about one another, local events are reduced to a nearly microscopic level. That trait, combined with a fierce patriotism for a country which has struggled to maintain its own cultural identity, requires that the inhabitants of the village Ffynnon Garw make a mountain out of a hill. Which, of course, is the subject of The Englishman Who Went up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain, a gentle comedy based on a true story passed down to the film’s director and writer by his grandfather. Rich in lush Welsh landscape and eccentric characters, Monger’s Englishman provides a look, both sweet and sly, at a place most people only know of through Dylan Thomas or Richard Burton. Hugh Grant shines as the reluctant hero. The picture’s deadpan humor and quiet romance is marred by a too-loud, overly dramatic score and some serious pacing problems, but nearly redeems itself with a hilarious ending.
2.0 stars (H.C.)
Great Hills, Highland
FLUKE
D: Carlo Carlei; with Matthew Modine, Nancy Travis, Eric Stoltz, Max Pomeranc, Ron Perlman, and Comet.With a fledgling director (this is Carlei’s second feature, his first in the U.S.), a terrific cast, and some fine cinematography, Fluke teeters between shameless, manipulative melodrama and a story that is heartfelt and very human – despite its canine focus. Fluke explores a puppy’s growing realization that, not too long ago, he had only half as many legs. And with this realization comes a disturbing sense of vengeance and a need to find and protect the human family he left so unexpectedly. What Carlei captures perfectly, and what gives Fluke its affecting moments, is a sense of uncanny canniness that the “lower” animal world so often displays. That and a neat little plot twist make Fluke an interesting, offbeat family movie. Unfortunately, the movie suffers from the use of a sweeping musical score that crescendos constantly, signifying nothing, and enough cute animal shots to prove that adage about too much of a good thing. But on the way home, I had a wonderful, spirited discussion about reincarnation with two curious eight-year-olds who will never look at another living (or dying) thing in the same way again.
2.0 stars (H.C.)
Movies 12
FORGET PARIS
D: Billy Crystal; with Crystal, Debra Winger, Joe Mantegna, Cynthia Stevenson, Richard Masur, Julie Kavner, William Hickey, Robert Constanzo, John Spencer, Cathy Moriarty.Forget Paris is not a total bust: It does have a few very funny scenes and gags. Billy Crystal can be a genuinely funny guy. But why does he insist on having all the marbles? Not simply a star, Crystal is now his own producer and writer, as well as his own leading man. Crystal’s self-inflation factor is exactly what is wrong with Forget Paris: too much Crystal and not enough substance. The movie recounts the bumpy path of romance traveled by Mickey (Crystal) and Ellen (Winger) told in continuing segments by a slow-gathering ensemble of old friends of the couple. The better we get to know Mickey and Ellen, the less appealing the two steadily become. Neither is there any “chemistry” or believable passion in the pairing of Crystal and Winger. This is only made more painful by the awareness that all the other assembled couples are infinitely more interesting than Mickey and Ellen. Only William Hickey emerges unscathed in his on-target portrayal of a just-this-side-of-senile father-in-law. Ever wonder what happens after the ellipses in When Harry Met Sally…? Forget Paris provides the answer in the form of When Mickey Met Ellen….
1.5 stars (M.B.)
Great Hills, Highland, Lakehills, Movies 12, Roundrock
FRIDAY
D: F. Gary Gray; with Ice Cube, Chris Tucker, Nia Long, Anna Maria Horsford, Regina King, Bernie Mac, John Witherspoon.Friday is a refreshingly lighthearted look at day-to-day life in the inner city. It suffers from a few problems in the scripting and directing departments, but entertains nonetheless, thanks mainly to the easygoing style of its talented cast. Rich in low-brow laughs, Friday’s most obvious strength is its energetic cast, led by rap superstar Ice Cube and stand-up comedian Chris Tucker. The downside? Well, F. Gary Gray’s direction is painfully flat, and curiously – especially for a popular music video director like Gray – lacking any interesting visual style. Another drawback is the scattershot script by Ice Cube and fellow rap star D.J. Pooh, which runs out of ideas about halfway through and sets up a bizarre finale. Despite its faults, Friday is lively entertainment, full of personable actors and cheerfully served up with nary a trace of cynicism.
2.5 stars (J.O)
Highland
FUNNY BONES
D: Peter Chelsom; with Oliver Platt, Lee Evans, George Carl, Freddie Davies, Leslie Caron, Jerry Lewis, Richard Griffiths, Oliver Reed, Ruta Lee, Harold Nicholas.Funny Bones is a wonderfully eccentric movie, one whose narrative advancement occurs more through epiphanies than events. Unfolding in what seems, at first, quite a random fashion, the viewer must trust that the movie will, ultimately, come together and deliver a payoff. Funny Bones rewards that trust handsomely. In its odd mixture of comic and serious tones, as well as its strong sense of place, Funny Bones resembles Chelsom’s last film, Hear My Song. The movie also functions at a level beyond the pure narrative; it provides a sort of ongoing meta-commentary on such thorny issues as mortality and the essential nature of comedy. Despite this dark center, Funny Bones is side-splittingly hilarious, with wonderful performances by the likes of a near-perfect Jerry Lewis, English variety artists George Carl and Freddie Davies, newcomer Lee Evans, trouper Leslie Caron, and lead man Oliver Platt. Oddities are the stuff of this universe. The most significant contribution of Funny Bones may be the way it celebrates the act of dancing on the edge, the way a true artist needs to push the borders and venture into the dangerous beyond. Lovingly recapturing the visual texture of the past while embracing the artistic challenges of the future, Funny Bones is a rare contemporary delight.
4.0 stars (M.B.)
Village
A LITTLE PRINCESS
D: Alfonso Cuaron; with Eleanor Bron, Liam Cunningham, Liesel Matthews, Vanessa Lee Chester, Rusty Schwimmer, Errol Sitahal, Heather DeLoach.Director Alfonso Cuaron, in his first American movie, has fashioned a world so real and so engaging that you can feel it and smell it and taste it as surely as if you were there. Based on the Frances Hodgson Burnett (The Secret Garden) novel, A Little Princess tells the tale of 10-year-old Sarah, who moves from India to Miss Minchin’s School for Girls in America when her widowed father is called to fight in World War I. At first, Sarah’s loneliness and aversion to her new prim and stuffy surroundings is buffered by Miss Minchin’s desire to please the affluent Captain Crewe and by her own affinity for the magic of make-believe. She shares the lore of her beloved India with her fellow students and with the serving girl, Becky, who quickly become an avid audience for tales romantic. But when Captain Crewe is reported killed in action, Sarah becomes a penniless orphan and is exiled to the attic with Becky to earn her keep. Now it is Becky and the other girls who must keep the magic of hope alive for Sarah. From the exquisite costumes to the remarkable set design to the superb performances, this fairy tale comes to life in a way that makes you despair when it ends.
4.0 stars (H.C.)
Great Hills, Highland
MAD LOVE
D: Antonia Bird; with Drew Barrymore, Chris O’Donnell, Amy Sakasitz, T.J. Lowther, Joan Allen, Jude Ciccolella, Kevin Dunn.While watching Mad Love, the warning “Kids, don’t try this at home” kept running through my head. Although Barrymore and O’Donnell perform well as high school seniors Casey and Matt in director Bird’s (Priest) tale of young love and manic depression/schizophrenia, these weighty issues aren’t treated with respect. In turn, the viewer is pandered to, just as these high school students are in the film. Yes, humor helps when tough issues are tackled on screen, but the film’s presentation of Casey’s clinical depression and her relationship with Matt echoes many after-school specials in that problems are solved, people are cured, and love really does conquer all, although in this case, sex may be the operative term. Mad Love presents a sensitive subject (here, manic depression) in a slick, relatively tidy package in which too much material is crammed into too little screen time. The last third of Mad Love hints at what this film could have been if treated as less of a music video for the Seattle scene and more of a film about a young woman struggling to live a regular life as a teenager and cope with mental illness. Even though Barrymore and O’Donnell are both in their mid-twenties and a little hard to believe as high school seniors, their romantic chemistry does have its moments.
2.0 stars (A.M.)
Movies 12
MY FAMILY, MI FAMILIA
D: Gregory Nava; with Jimmy Smits, Esai Morales, Eduardo Lopez Rojas, Jenny Gago, Elpidia Carrillo, Constance Marie, Edward James Olmos.Gregory Nava’s (El Norte) most recent film spans 50 years in the life of the Sanchez family, a Mexican-American clan whose roots in the United States date back to the 1920s in Los Angeles. The film’s epic proportions occasionally diminish into blips in the family’s history as the action takes place in various decades. These 20-year shifts are problematic in terms of developing any real connections with characters. Scenes that attempt to depict the problematic integration of American culture with the Sanchez’s Mexican heritage groan under the burden of representing years of stereotypes. My Family, Mi Familia’s cast represents some powerhouse acting talents, yet the film loses steam because of weak dialogue and underdeveloped characters. My Family, Mi Familia seems to speed through the important developments in this family’s history. While the current state of Hollywood cinema calls out for a strong epic film about Mexican-American life (or any non-Caucasian life, for that matter), Nava’s film does not fill that void.
2.5 stars (A.M.)
Highland
SHALLOW GRAVE
D: Danny Boyle; with Kerry Fox, Christopher Eccleston, Ewan McGregor, Keith Allen, Ken Stott, Colin McRedie.From its opening titles, you know you’re in for something different, something wild. First-time director Boyle scores impressively with this Scottish tale of greed, murder, and the quest for a perfect flatmate that echoes everything from Alan Parker’s The Commitments to The Treasure of Sierra Madre, and never feels anything but wholly original. Boyle keeps the proceedings quick and humorous, despite the gravity of the story. It’s as much a comedy about the modern foibles of roommates as it is a psychological suspense drama, and his camerawork is top-shelf, heightening both the panicky tension that rises as the film moves forward and the desperate comic air the film maintains throughout. For their parts, all three leads are mini-masterpieces of audacious, thoroughly believable acting. Shallow Grave is a bracing, beautifully filmed black comedy-cum-horror show that grabs hold of you in the first few minutes and then refuses to let you go until the bitter, shocking end. Brilliant.
4.0 stars (M.S.)
Dobie
WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING
D: Jon Turtletaub; with Sandra Bullock, Bill Pullman, Peter Gallagher, Peter Boyle, Jack Warden, Glynis Johns, Micole Mercurio.From the man who brought us the bizarre Disney hit Cool Runnings and – ouch! – 3 Ninjas, comes this love story: lite, a frothy bit of fluff that goes down as easily as cotton candy and almost as nutritiously. It’s charming, in its own little way, but really, this film has as much substance as a Cirrus cloud, despite fine turns from Boyle as the family patriarch and Warden as Godfather Saul. Bullock, as always, is so goonily charming, it’s all you can do not to leap up and try to hug her. In essence, While You Were Sleeping is a swell date movie: romantic, sweet without being cloying, and light on its feet. But that’s all it is.
2.5 stars (M.S.)
Arbor, Highland, Lakehills, Movies 12
Previews
AMATEUR
D: Hal Hartley; with Isabelle Huppert, Martin Donovan, Elina Lowensohn.Amateur, the latest effort from Hal Hartley (Trust, The Unbelievable Truth) is an outrageous study of several unusual and quirky characters and their adventures in the Big Apple. Huppert stars as a pornography-writing ex-nun who takes in a mysterious stranger (Donovan, a Hartley regular), who is found wandering the streets and suffering from amnesia. He is actually the husband of the world’s most infamous porno queen, essayed by Elina Lowensohn, who believes that she has murdered him for his criminal actions. Throw in a cop, a pair of vicious corporate strong-arms, and an eccentric porn accountant to heighten the already delirious atmosphere and you have the usually affectless Hartley’s most high-geared narrative yet.
stars (J.O.)
Village
DOCTOR ZHIVAGO
D: David Lean; with Omar Sharif, Julie Christie, Geraldine Chaplin, Tom Courtenay, Alec Guinness.Admittedly, this overlong and over-romantic Oscar-winning epic has never melted my personal tundra, but it’s definitely quite the spectacle and directed by the modern-day king of epics, David Lean. The movie is something that shouldbe experienced by everyone at least once in a lifetime, and I guarantee that you’ll never have a better opportunity to see this wide-screen love story than in this two-day Paramount run of the newly restored print.
stars (M.B.)
Paramount
HIGH VOLTAGE ASIAN COP
D: Andrew Kam; with Donnie Yen, Roy Cheung, Edu Manzano.Little known but talented Hong Kong action director Andrew Kam (responsible for the incredible Eighties gunplay epic The Big Heat) teams up with underrated action hero Donnie Yen (Iron Monkey) for this solid, low-budget action flick, whose many obvious limitations are nicely surmounted due to a solid dose of the two things money can’t buy – style and personality. Yen stars as the titular High Voltage Asian Cop, a Hong Kong policeman whose violent methods and intense demeanor cause his fall from favor with his fellow officers and superiors. The plot follows him as he travels to the Philippines to escort an important witness back to Hong Kong, only to find himself teaming up with a local cop (Filipino actor Edu Manzano) to bring down a wicked crime syndicate, not to mention facing down an old enemy from his past (Wicked City’s Roy Cheung in a nicely psychotic performance). At times, the script steers dangerously close to becoming an uninspired Lethal Weapon rip-off and, to be sure, the story is far from original, but the film is redeemed by a number of offbeat touches and non-stop, breakneck pacing. Director Kam stages the ultraviolet action sequences with an edgy sense of danger that recalls the hard-boiled crime stories of peers Ringo Lam and Kirk Wong, while Yen delivers a fierce, angry performance appropriate to the vicious goings-on (in addition to kicking some serious butt in the film’s numerous hard-hitting fight scenes). In a time when sorry, kiddie trash is dominating the Hong Kong low-budget scene, and the big-budget movies are getting more and more carried away by comic relief, High Voltage Asian Cop proves to be a nice change of pace – a tough, violent, and unapologetic action picture that may not aim high, but at least fully realizes its own modest ambitions by simply “delivering the goods.”
2.5 stars (J.O)
Riverside
This article appears in June 16 • 1995 and June 16 • 1995 (Cover).