FUN
D: Rafael Zelinsky; with Alicia Witt, Renee Humphrey, William R. Moses, Leslie Hope, Ania Suli.Based on screenwriter James Bosley’s stage play, Fun is a harrowing glimpse into the world of desperate friendship gone horribly awry. Bonnie and Hillary (Witt and Humphrey) are fourteen-year-old girls who meet, become best friends, and end up butchering an old lady, all in the course of one day. Zelinsky uses the girl’s juvenile hall interviews with a smarmy print reporter (Moses) and his social worker counterpart (Hope) as a framing device, allowing us to see their actions from their point of view as well as that of society at large. Bonnie and Hillary’s rationale, or lack thereof, however, is shocking in its mundanity: the morally bankrupt team did it just for “fun.” Witt, as Bonnie, is all hyperactive flailing. When she first meets with her counselor, she refuses to sit down, choosing instead to dance around the spartan room like some incarcerated Tasmanian Devil. She’s as needy as they come, bragging about the terrific sex she’s had with her boyfriend and continually raising the ante with her uncaptive subject. Bonnie, on the other hand, is taciturn and withdrawn, the victim of child abuse and ultimately the one who comes up with the idea to commit the murder. They’re two halves of the same coin. Comparisons to Peter Jackson’s Heavenly Creatures are to be expected, but whereas Jackson’s film played down much of the reality of the situation in terms of both hyperreality and outright fantasy, Fun goes straight for the jugular, using various cinema verit� styles including hand held camera work and 16mm black-and-white to force the viewer deeper into the nightmare. Brilliantly done from beginning to end, it’s a simultaneously bittersweet and repellent look at desperate teenage love. Recommended.
3.5 stars (M.S.)
Dobie
New Review
THE BABY-SITTERS CLUB
D: Melanie Mayron; with Schuyler Fisk, Bre Blair, Rachael Leigh Cook, Larisa Oleynik, Tricia Joe, Brooke Adams, Ellen Burstyn, Peter Horton, Bruce Davison.Like so many pieces of colored glass, the multiple characters and scenarios of The Baby-Sitters Club constantly shift and reassemble in vivid and fanciful patterns. Turning this kaleidoscope of a movie with a deft hand, Melanie Mayron (thirtysomething) in her big-screen directing debut delivers a quirky little movie that captures a lighter side of the oft-explored, flip, desperate to be hip, angst-ridden, roller coaster ride of adolescence. The Baby-Sitters Club is a conglomeration of story lines from the phenomenally successful series of books by Ann M. Martin about a group of friends whose adventures in baby-sitting are the core around which the travails and drama of their post-pubescent lives unfold. The centerpiece of the picture is a poignant and wonderfully disconcerting story about imperfect parental love. Kristy, the president of the club and an energetic and outspoken tomboy (played with natural exuberance by Sissy Spacek’s daughter, Schuyler Fisk) has an unexpected reunion with her well-meaning but totally unreliable father (Mayron’s thirtysomething cohort, Horton) that pits her fervent desire to be loved and wanted against her natural inclination for openness and honesty and loyalty – qualities her father knows little about. Concurrent stories include one club member’s summer romance with an older boy, another’s struggle to pass science, an emerging friendship with a crotchety neighbor, and the ongoing battle with the sworn enemies of the club, the devious, rainbow sherbet-clad Cokie, Bebe, and Grace. The movie zips from one story to another, going through as many mood swings in its hour and twenty minutes as an average thirteen-year-old girl goes through in, well, an hour and twenty minutes. Bright and cluttered and engaging, The Baby-Sitters Club has a youthful buoyancy and whimsical rhythm that catches even the most jaundiced (i.e., sixteen-year-old) viewers up in its play of light and energy.
3.0 stars (H.C.)
Great Hills, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
DANGEROUS MINDS
D: John N. Smith; with Michelle Pfeiffer, George Dzundza, Courtney B. Vance.Michelle Pfeiffer stars as LouAnne Johnson, an ex-Marine with designs on becoming a schoolteacher, who serves as the Great White Hope to the “dangerous minds” of the title: a classroom of ill-mannered, cynical kids who have lost all interest in learning and have more or less resigned themselves to rather dismal futures. Of course, as anyone who’s seen this kind of picture knows, the rest of the story should be pretty easy to guess; we all know that she’s going to put these wayward tots on the right path through her caring, persistence, and cleverness. Never mind that the movie’s plot is a tired one and that the script doesn’t even try to re-work this particular genre’s cliches… like Pfeiffer’s B-Boy stance on the film’s poster, something about Dangerous Minds just feels bogus. Perhaps it has something to do with the aseptic TV-movie atmosphere that hangs over the entire production, or the way it asks us to buy the idea that old Bob Dylan tunes, karate, and candy bars are going to turn a bunch of hardened inner-city kids onto the joys of education. Although it’s based on a true story, Dangerous Minds just doesn’t seem to take place in the real world (the real LouAnne Johnson, who wrote the autobiographical book upon which this movie is based, has been fairly vocal in noting the film’s numerous deviations from reality). Ultimately, the film seems more like an excuse to see how many times the filmmakers can manage to get Coolio’s (admittedly catchy) “Gangster’s Paradise” on the soundtrack than to educate or uplift potential viewers. As far as Pfeiffer’s performance goes, she’s got charm and pep to spare, but next to zero substance when it comes to exploring her character’s particular hypocrisies and pretensions. About the only thing that keeps Dangerous Minds from being a total washout is the humor and energy of the young actors portraying Pfeiffer’s students. They provide, almost without exception, nearly every single memorable moment in the film. But by the time the picture has entered its extremely weak third act, in which the whole enterprise glides toward a boring, predictable, and annoyingly cornball non-ending, even their collective appeal isn’t enough to keep us interested. Needless to say, Dangerous Minds doesn’t make the grade.
1.5 stars (J.O.)
Arbor, Highland, Lake Creek, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Westgate
DRUNKEN MASTER
D: Yuen Woo Ping; with Jackie Chan, Simon Yuen.A rare chance to see Jackie Chan’s original 1978 kung fu/comedy classic on the big screen where it belongs. The thin story finds Chan turning the legend of real-life folk hero Wong Fei Hung on its ear, playing the famous do-gooder as a rambunctious, bratty youngster always getting into fights. In an attempt to straighten him out, Jackie’s father sends him to be disciplined by the titular drunken master, an old beggar who teaches Fei Hung the secrets of “drunken boxing,” a fighting style based upon the staggering movements of drunkards. As directed by Yuen Woo Ping, Drunken Master is basically one long fight sequence, occasionally interrupted by the picture’s torturous training set pieces. The chemistry between Chan and legendary Peking Opera actor Simon Yuen, playing his newfound master, continues the charming rapport they shared in their previous hit Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow (and, to a far lesser extent, in Chan’s first starring vehicle, 1971’s mediocre Little Tiger of Canton) and provides one of the most memorable and imitated master/student relationships in the genre. Yuen Woo Ping’s direction is wildly energetic, and his fight choreography – strongly assisted by Jackie, no doubt – is nothing less than groundbreaking, shamelessly mixing slapstick from crude to clever, along with traditional martial arts stances and acrobatics. He deftly fills his Cinemascope frame with brilliant movement. Undoubtedly, many will snub their noses at the film’s lack of plot, and, admittedly, Drunken Master is far from brain food. However, not unlike the silent films of Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd, or for that matter, the best pictures of Hong Kong’s Seventies kung fu films, the genius of Drunken Master lies in its kinetics. Pure entertainment, and a true chop-socky classic.
4.0 stars (J.O.)
A KID IN KING ARTHUR’S COURT
D: Michael Gottlieb; with Thomas Ian Nichols, Joss Ackland, Ron Moody, Paloma Baeza.Considering the fact that there are well-documented cases of near infants being called upon to rescue helpless adults from the clutches of unprogrammable VCRs and terrifying screen messages like “general program protection fault,” it stands to reason that the latest re-telling of Mark Twain’s classic, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court would be a Disney effort with a kid in the title role. Modern day dweeb Calvin Fuller (literally) drops out of the dugout and back in time about 1,600 years. It seems that Arthur’s Camelot has fallen on hard times, its elderly king duped by the conniving Lord Belasco. Merlin, now a ghostly, discombobulated head floating in a magic well, misfires in his attempt to stop the knight in tarnished armor, bringing the gawky no-hitter in to save the kingdom. Not that Calvin is totally unprepared. His backpack is full of wondrous twentieth century treasures – superglue, a CD player, rollerblades, and Mad Dog chewing gum. But, as it turns out, this kid is no McGyver, his use of high tech ingenuity to enlighten the Dark Agers surprisingly restrained. Instead, the movie equips its unlikely champion with age-old, singularly human attributes such as courage and honor and love. Nichols essentially reprises his Rookie of the Year role as a less-than-stellar baseball player whose life is changed by an extraordinary turn of events. Despite a goofy hairdo and a voice that cracks as often as my office mate’s gum, he still shines as the charmingly ordinary hero. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of his current vehicle. Even with Nichols, decent production values, a pair of plucky princesses, and a few pleasant surprises tucked here and there, A Kid in King Arthur’s Court is a pretty prosaic picture. There are simply not enough sparks here to fire the imagination. While its cool, cavernous castle scenes offer a pleasant afternoon respite from the August heat, this version of the fabled kingdom is not the stuff of which legends are made.
0.5 stars (H.C.)
LIE DOWN WITH DOGS
D: Wally White; with White, Randy Becker, Darren Dryden, Bash Halow, James Sexton, Michael Richoz.The life lessons learned by by the gay Everyboy in Wally White’s semi-autobiographical Lie Down With Dogs don’t evoke much of an empathetic response: As the clich� goes, you had to be there. It’s an experience much like being cornered by someone at a party for an enthusiastic telling of “How I Spent My Summer Vacation” – the holiday, in this instancce, spent in homo-friendly Provincetown, Massachusetts – and wondering if the story has a point. In Lie Down With Dogs, the somewhat aimless Tommie decides to leave Manhattan to pursue a summer of love in P-Town only to be disappointed by scarce jobs, freeloading boyfriends, and shallow acquaintances there. Along the way, there are some insightts into the lifestyle that dares not speak its name, but the double-edged nature of such a way of life is never fully realized, seemingly touched upon only in passing and without any real emotional weight. (Can a movie be too lightweight for its own good?) Part of the problem is White’s persona, both as director and leading man. He’s likable enough (almost goofily so), but there’s something about him that’s too ingratiating; without any edge to his perspective, the film’s voice is something akin to first-person whine. You can forgive the cheesy narrative devices in Lie Down With Dogs – White loves to break through the fourth wall, with coy results – but it’s difficult to get past the gut feeling that this first feature is mostly self-indulgence. The best thing about this movie is the on-target performance of Becker as the boyfriend from hell, who’s good for nothing more than bumming cigarettes and kitchen-table sex. He epitomizes everything that’s missing in this film: the rough, the brash, the not-so-nice. When Becker is onscreen, Lie Down With Dogs is all bite.
0.5 stars (S.D.)
Village
PEACE HOTEL
D: Wei Kar-fei; with Chow Yun-fat, Cecilia Yip Ye-tong.If nothing else, this latest vehicle for Hard-Boiled star Chow Yun-fat gets off to a terrific start, as the ultra-charismatic Chow, sporting a shaved head and wielding a mean sword, chases a bloodied youngster through a corpse-filled hotel, intent on sending the injured young man into the hereafter. Unfortunately, most of what follows this promising prologue, which is stylishly filmed in grainy black-and-white, isn’t anywhere near as confidently executed and the result is a disappointing picture that fails to live up to the promise of its own intriguing premise. The plot, set in China during the early 1900s, is great: Chow stars as “The Killer,” a sensitive man of action who, in an attempt to repent for his mysterious past, has opened the titular “peace hotel,” a safe haven where anyone seeking protection from the outside world can come and live out their life in peace. But when a snotty, manipulative woman shows up claiming to be the killer’s long-lost love, the peace hotel is plunged into chaos as general confusion reigns inside while, outside, an old enemy with a score to settle waits and prepares a deadly siege that could destroy the hotel and all it stands for. Well, it sounds great, so what happened? In a couple of words – the script. Peace Hotel simply wastes too much time (in what is fast becoming an annoying trend in Hong Kong movies) with silly, out-of-place comic relief. To make matters worse, the action sequences, which are usually the one area in which Hong Kong pictures are infallible, are not that great – they’re energetically shot, but choreographed no better than, say, any of the Highlander films. On the positive side, Chow turns in a bravura performance that practically defines charisma, and there’s an interesting re-creation of the famed “reviving” sequence from James Cameron’s The Abyss. Director Wei does stage a few genuinely effective scenes and has a great eye for powerful, ironic images – like the film’s unforgettable final shot of the Peace Hotel’s sign literally soaked with blood. For fans of Chow (and who in their right mind isn’t?) Peace Hotel is, reportedly, the actor’s final Hong Kong production before crossing over to the United States, but will prove to be a passable time-waster at best. Yet, as some frustrating moments demonstrate all too well, it could have been so much more.
1.5 stars (J.O.)
Dobie
RETURN TO A BETTER TOMORROW
D: Wong Jing; with Chang Yee Kin, Lau Ching Wan, Chingmay Yau.With the Hong Kong martial arts epics of the last two years going out of style, the filmmakers from the free city seem more eager than ever to discover the next trend that will hit the big time, with the primary suspect being a revival of the “Heroic Bloodshed” gunplay pictures that were so popular during the early Eighties. Perhaps desperate to get a jump on the competition, quirky director Wong (Royal Tramp) Jing, has decided what better way to bring back the genre than by making a sort of quasi-sequel to the movie that started it all – John Woo’s seminal gangster classic A Better Tomorrow. The end result is something of a mixed bag, with the first half being a solid action thriller along the lines of Ringo Lam’s Full Contact, then lapsing into total insanity during its second half which is filled with so many inane subplots, ridiculous action sequences, and continuity errors that they would give Ed Wood pause. Pop singer Chang Yee Kin stars as a young gangster protege who, after he is framed for drug smuggling and murder, flees to the People’s Republic of China, where he must fight for his life against hired killers. He goes into hiding as a dishwasher in a Chinese restaurant, but when the bad guys rape and cripple his girlfriend, he comes out of hiding to exact a bloody revenge against the vicious rival who is setting him up to be killed. The script is brutal and nihilistic but goes overboard in the second act as the chain of events goes from tragic to ludicrous. The actors are all very charismatic, and the performances are uniformly excellent, but even they can’t make the ridiculous second half work – a shame considering the promise held by the great first 45 minutes. Still, it’s not a total waste of time and fans may want to see it just for the beginning and the exciting gunfighting set pieces and, who knows, with hilarious nicknames like “Lobster” and “Holland Boy,” coupled with the occasional appearance of the bizarre goofiness for which director Jing is known, maybe the whole enterprise was designed as a camp throwaway. Perhaps the director of Stephen Chow’s silly comedies isn’t exactly the perfect choice to direct a hard-boiled crime melodrama, but the film is frustratingly both more than you expect and less than you might have hoped for – a contradiction that fits this confused film like a glove.
2.0 stars (J.O.)
Hogg
First Run
BABE
D: Chris Noonan; with James Cromwell, Magda Szubanski.Perhaps one of the cutest children’s films ever made, this tale of the young piglet named Babe who decides his calling in life is to be a sheepdog is also a rousing comedy appropriately filled with a variety of subtle messages, from self empowerment to the importance of treating others as equals, even though they may be, ah, sheep. Produced by the Australian company Kennedy Miller (oddly enough, the same company which produced the hyper-violent Mad Max series) and directed by newcomer Chris Noonan, Babe is one of those movies that makes you positively melt from its guileless charm (never have I heard so many otherwise rational adults succumb to the “ooohs” and “ahhhs” usually reserved for infants encountering their first kaleidescope) without making you feel like a twit. Kids, of course, don’t have that sort of self-consciousness and instead will be cooing and laughing unrestrainedly. When Babe the piglet is taken from his dreary life at the automated pig farm, he ends up at the farm of kindly, taciturn Farmer Hoggett (Cromwell, in a brilliant piece of casting) and his wife (Szubanski). Here he falls in with Hoggett’s sheepdogs, the bitter Rex and motherly Fly and their pups. Fly adopts the lonely innocent as her own, introducing him to the various members of the farm community, from the old matron ewe Maaa, to Ferdinand the duck, while Rex lays down the rules, those being essentially an updating of the Orwellian notion that all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others. Eventually, Babe gets the notion to join Rex and Fly in their duties as sheep herders, and, when he proves to be more adept at the job than they are, Farmer Hoggett takes notice and enrolls the piglet in the local sheepdog trials. Working with 90% live action animals and 10% animatronics courtesy of Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, Babe looks and flows wonderfully. Especially hilarious is a sort of Greek chorus of singing field mice that pops up from time to time, eliciting more chuckles than any of the other members of the menagerie combined. This has been a good year for children’s movies, and Babe is no exception. It’s a clever, witty, touching piece of work that, coincidentally enough, is also a decidedly excellent date movie. Really.
3.5 stars (M.S.)
Great Hills, Highland, Lake Creek, Lakehills, Movies 12, Northcross
THE NET
D: Irwin Winkler; with Sandra Bullock, Jeremy Northam, Dennis Miller, Diane Baker.The Net is the first of several new movies that tap into the growing national fear of becoming roadkill on the information highway. No one will be dissuaded from their paranoia by The Net; in fact, the movie targets our worst suspicions. We live in an age in which we’ve all been subject to the computer glitch that distorts a record, wipes out a history, or temporarily shuts down a switchboard, a bank, or an air traffic control tower. Such victimhood stokes our logical fear of a nefarious network of information tycoons driven to control all international infrastructures. No longer a remote nightmare, this information junta is now conceivable – maybe even visible. But I guarantee that the takeover, when it comes, will not bear any resemblance to the scenario portrayed in The Net. Conceived as a kind of Alfred Hitchcock meets John Grisham thriller, The Net merely proves what makes those guys such pros and what makes producer-turned-director Irwin Winkler (Guilty by Suspicion, Night and the City) such a heavy-handed knockoff. The Net is sensationalism sans substance – a hip topic, a hot actress, and a hokey script. Professional computer hacker Angela Bennett (Bullock) is a program debugger. This meek young woman works at home and communicates with her employer and colleagues by computer. We are to believe that Angela never leaves the house; we see her order dinner (a pizza) by modem and socialize via computer chat rooms. For the plot to work at all, it is essential that there not be a soul in the world who can identify her: not a neighbor, not a co-worker, not a relative (Mom conveniently has Alzheimer’s), not a friend. Is this really possible, even given the most hermetic computer nerd? (Perhaps this should serve as a reminder to handsomely tip all pizza delivery guys so that they can instantly ID us should the dire need arise.) But, alas, poor Angela cannot find a single soul who can attest to her real identity and the bad guys also make it impossible for her to turn to the police. Angela Bennett is erased from the map even more expeditiously than leftists are “disappeared” in modern Argentina. Why the megalomaniacal bad guys go to the vast trouble of stripping Angela of her life rather than just mowing her down is somewhat mysterious, though supposedly explained by her would-be assassin’s unplanned attraction to this cyber-gal equal. Talk about unsafe sex: a one-night stand with an apparent Mr. Right (who is concocted from Angela’s “private” computer fantasies) with murder on his mind shows that the cautionary “Mr. Goodbar morality” is still as potent as ever in our brave new computer age. Loss of identity is a central Hitchcock theme and the source for much of his movies’ suspense. All the evil-doing is simply the MacGuffin that prompts the identity crisis. The Net reverses that formula; recovering her original identity means returning Angela to her former mousy self, and the movie’s suspense derives from figuring out how wide the evil net has been cast. But in terms of suspense, this Net is full of holes.
1.5 stars (M.B.)
Arbor, Highland, Lake Creek, Lakehills, Movies 12, Riverside, Roundrock
PARTY GIRL
D: Daisy von Scherler Mayer; with Parker Posey, Omar Townsend, Sasha von Scherler, Guillermo Diaz, Anthony DeSando, Donna Mitchell, Liev Schreiber, Nicole Bobbitt.Party Girl will do for library science what Saturday Night Fever did for disco. Well, maybe. At the least this film – Mayer’s feature debut and a favorite at the SXSW Film Festival earlier this year – will allow audiences to see more of Parker Posey, whose previous supporting roles in films like Dazed and Confused and Sleep With Me only hinted at her sly comic timing and her fun-at-all-costs attitude (many appropriately have described her as a Holly Golightly for the Nineties, both in and out of character). Posey plays Mary, queen of a social whirl made up of various Manhattan hipsters who live to club, throw outrageously fun parties, and wear incredibly memorable outfits put together with more personal style than cash. When Mary lands in jail after organizing one of her too-successful “promotions,” she throws herself on the mercy of her librarian godmother Judy (Sasha von Scherler, the director’s mother). Judy reluctantly offers Mary a clerking position at the library, which sets the stage for many hilarious confrontations and a little bit of drunken soul searching. Mary’s future career as a library science specialist is foreshadowed early in the film when she carefully arranges her wardrobe according to designer, clothing item, and fashion era. During her quest to learn further the benefits of the Dewey Decimal system, Mary meets and pursues a Lebanese teacher-turned-pushcart-vendor named Mustafa (Townsend); negotiates a club job for her deejay-friend Leo (Diaz); and impatiently listens to Derrick (DeSando) whine about his Mr. Right, a one-night stand living somewhere in Manhattan. Mary’s story isn’t that much different from other coming-of-age stories on film these days, but zippy one-liners written by co-scripters Mayer and Harry Birckmayer, delivered with razor-sharp precision by Posey, spice up the all-too-familiar tale. Add to the speedy dialogue the latest in club music and a truly entertaining wardrobe, not to mention the ambiance of downtown Manhattan, and Party Girl becomes as freshly appealing as its opening credit sequence. Party Girl’s campiness occasionally wears thin, but this is done so good-naturedly that it is easy to overlook, just like Mary’s self-absorption. Party Girl strives only to be as fun and lighthearted as its namesake. Posey’s romp through this film is probably the best thing about Party Girl; she just may be the next “It” girl.
3.0 stars (A.M.)
Dobie
SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT
D: Lasse Hallstrom; with Julia Roberts, Robert Duvall, Gena Rowlands, Kyra Sedgwick, Dennis Quaid, Haley Aull.In 1990, Swedish director Hallstrom (My Life as a Dog, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape?) made his American debut with Once Around, a film about a family’s coming to terms with itself, flaws and all. This film had promise but never quite smoothed out its rough edges. With Something to Talk About Hallstrom succeeds where his first American film failed: the King family is laid bare, warts and all, and is made to seem ideal, ugly, weak, and strong all at the same time. Credit most definitely should be shared between Hallstrom and screenwriter Callie Khouri, best known as the writer responsible for Thelma & Louise’s funny, oft-quoted words. Khouri’s dialogue in this film contains some sweet surprises. Just when you think you’ve got a handle on Grace (Roberts), a young Southern wife estranged from her philandering husband Eddie (Quaid), she utters some line that reveals a little more depth than is at first apparent. “I don’t want to be this wife,” she stammers as she breaks down during a confrontation with Eddie. She is referring to masking her feelings of jealousy, rage, and mistrust. Grace spends the rest of the movie trying to address her emotions and needs – not an easy task for a woman raised to appreciate calm surfaces and pleasing appearances. When a visitor to her parents’ horse farm remarks that Southern womean seem easy to please, Grace laughingly responds, “That comes from centuries of keeping our expectations low.” Battling not only her husband but her domineering, horse-breeding father Wyly (expertly played by Duvall), Grace struggles against expectations and years of tradition to pinpoint her own desires and goals, which involve veterinary school instead of managing the family farm. As crises tend to do, Grace and Eddie’s separation sends ripples through the family, encouraging her well-heeled mother Georgia (the luminous Gena Rowlands) to confront her own husband about his past infidelities. Supporting roles by Sedgwick as witty, independent sister Emma Rae and Aull as Grace and Eddie’s young daughter round out a well-chosen cast. Roberts and Quaid work well together onscreen; the film offers Roberts a rare opportunity to play an adult role that allows her some range. Something to Talk About also features the inimitable cinematography of Sven Nykvist, whose camera captures all of the natural beauty of South Carolina and Georgia, re-creating stunning horse riding competitions such as the finale’s Grand Prix Championship. Perhaps the most satisfying aspect of this film is its lack of tidy closure. As in life, compromises are reached and battles continue with the opponents squaring off warily or affectionately, depending upon the circumstances. Three-dimensional in scope, the characters react to one another with love, anger, subtle manipulation, and generosity. While the film does have its overwrought moments and even some wince-worthy Southern clich�s, Something to Talk About is a pleasant surprise amidst a summer of big cinema hype and little entertainment payoff.
3.0 stars (A.M.)
Arbor, Highland, Movies 12, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
VIRTUOSITY
D: Brett Leonard; with Denzel Washington, Kelly Lynch, Russell Crowe, Stephen Spinella, William Forsythe, Louise Fletcher.Director Leonard returns to the virtual reality setting of his previous film, The Lawnmower Man, with this sophomore effort that asks the burning question: “What would happen if a renegade VR program came to life?” Well, okay, so maybe that’s more like a smoldering question instead of an out-and-out conflagration, but Leonard posits it nonetheless. Washington is Parker Barnes, an ex-LAPD detective unjustly incarcerated for a crime he didn’t really commit. When a VR composite of almost 200 serial killers by the name of Sid 6.7 (nicely essayed by Crowe, who, to me, will forever be the evil skinhead Hando from Romper Stomper) is suddenly let loose on the world at large via a chain of inexplicable events too convoluted to go into here, Barnes is set free in an effort to track down and eliminate the attention-starved, media-savvy killer. The notion of the downside of VR hasn’t really been toyed with that much in the movies of late, but Leonard’s film, instead of tackling what could have been a nifty piece of cyber-socio-commentary, fails to deliver the goods, instead coughing up a tired, clich�d bit of cops and robbers tedium that begs, borrows, and steals its narrative from everything from Escape From New York and Terminator 2 to Washington’s own Ricochet. Sadly, there’s not much to chew on here and what’s worse is the fact that even the action sequences – supposedly the saving graces in a film of this sort – are shoddily directed, with sub-par editing and the sort of poorly chosen, intrusive guitars on the soundtrack that are the hallmark of grade-B action films these days. Despite some briefly breathtaking, computer-generated special effects, Virtuosity is 95 minutes of unsubstantial firefights and meandering plot twists. The genuinely talented Washington seems wasted here alongside everything, and nearly everyone, else. Does that make this virtual filmmaking, I wonder?
1.5 stars (M.S.)
Arbor, Lake Creek, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Westgate
A WALK IN THE CLOUDS
D: Alfonso Arau; with Keanu Reeves, Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, Anthony Quinn, Giancarlo Giannini, Angelica Aragon, Evangelina Elizondo.Describing his experiences in World War II to his new acquaintance Victoria Aragon (Sanchez-Gijon), Paul Sutton (Reeves) declares, “Once the shooting starts, you just go blank.” Never have I heard a more fitting description of Reeves’ acting. How this overrated and monotonal actor could have been cast in director Arau’s Hollywood debut is beyond me. A Walk in the Clouds marks Arau’s follow-up to the much-acclaimed Like Water for Chocolate, whose blend of magical realism, comedy, and sensuality enthralled international audiences. Arau’s second film contains a similar blend of these elements; it is a story of fate, love, and family honor. Based on the Italian film Four Steps in the Clouds, Arau’s loose adaptation reflects the filmmaker’s own Mexican roots. Taking place just after the end of the war, the film tells the tale of Paul’s arrival home to San Francisco to a changed world and a wife who never read his letters. Disoriented and disheartened, he leaves the next day on a journey to gain some perspective about his future. A chance meeting on a train introduces him to Victoria, a master’s candidate who’s pregnant and abandoned with her professor’s child. Paul is leaving his home; Victoria is returning to hers in the Napa Valley, a vineyard idyll owned by her tightly-knit Mexican family. The two devise a plan in which Paul poses as her husband, but their welcome is marred by Victoria’s father Alberto (Giannini). A proud and decent man, he is nonetheless blinded by his own fears and prejudices, which results in profound consequences for the Aragon family fortune. A Walk in the Clouds has sweet moments of humor and sensuality interspersed among a few rather flat scenes. As the Aragon patriarch Don Pedro, Quinn is superb. Like a larger-than-life sprite, he coaxes and cajoles Paul into realizing his love for Victoria. Giannini is equally wonderful as a man of grand and passionate gestures, both in love and anger. Making her American debut, Sanchez-Gijon also gives an impressive performance. Despite Reeves’ one-dimensional acting, there does exist a smoldering chemistry between the two actors. Luscious images by cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki add to the sensuality of A Walk in the Clouds. But alas, Reeves sticks out like a bad grape in an otherwise acceptable harvest. Having taken this role to broaden his acting horizons, his gain is the film’s loss. In one of the film’s more poignant moments, Paul and Victoria toast to “what if.” Their toast is all the more bittersweet when applied to A Walk in the Clouds: what if someone else had been cast in place of Reeves? Here’s to a somewhat flawed but enjoyable film, and to what-ifs.
2.5 stars (A.M.)
Arbor, Lake Creek, Lakehills, Lincoln, Movies 12, Riverside, Roundrock
WATERWORLD
D: Kevin Reynolds; with Kevin Costner, Dennis Hopper, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Tina Majorino, Michael Jeter, Zakes Mokae.If you can work your way past the monumental anti-hype and ill-will surrounding this most expensive of all films, you’ll find Reynolds and Costner’s enfant terrible of a movie isn’t so terrible after all. With a budget hovering around the $200 million mark and a backlog of cast and crew horror stories so colossal they make Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate-woes pale in comparison (the hurricane that destroyed the main set was a nice touch), Waterworld has been a project under siege almost from day one. That makes it all the more pleasant to find out that the film is actually quite good, as far as gargantuan summer blockbusters go (certainly, it’s vastly more entertaining and technically superior to the sounds-like-a-threat-to-me Batman Forever). Set in a future where an unknown cataclysm has melted the polar ice caps, Waterworld is just that: an environment sans terra firma. Sailing, rowing, and, occasionally flying across this vast, murky expanse are the last footholds of humanity: the Atollers, who have banded together to create a semblance of normalcy atop a vast, floating community; the Smokers (so named because of their penchant for cigarettes; where, though, do they get all these non-soggy cancer sticks?), a vile group of marauders led by the predictably over-the-top Hopper; and – our hero – the Mariner (Costner), a lone, web-footed scavenger who cruises the ocean searching for barterable goods (like, say, dirt). When the Mariner, after an attack by the Smokers, is unwillingly pressed into aid by a stranded woman and her young female charge (Tripplehorn and Majorino, respectively), he must choose between a solitary life on the sea or the more noble (albeit less palatable) route of Savior of Humankind. If this sounds familiar to you, that’s because Reynolds’ film is essentially George Miller’s Mad Max remade by Greenpeace; it’s almost uncanny how much Reynolds and screenwriters Peter Rader and David Twohy have borrowed from Miller’s film (and, going further back, several Kurosawa epics and, of course, Shane), so much so that it sometimes grates on your nerves. That aside, Waterworld succeeds nicely on its own merits. Sure, there’s the occasional plot hole that gapes wider than the toothy maw of Spielberg’s Jaws, but Costner’s misanthropic characterization of the Mariner – not to mention all the terrific “so that’s where all that money went!” stunts – allows you to forget all that logic stuff for a while and just have a rollicking good time watching things blow up all over the place. Nowhere near the Hollywood disaster that was foretold, Waterworld is a near-model summer fantasy: two hours and 21 minutes of loud, expansive fun.
3.0 stars (M.S.)
Great Hills, Lake Creek, Lincoln, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
Still Playing
APOLLO 13
D: Ron Howard; with Tom Hanks, Bill Paxton, Kevin Bacon, Gary Sinise, Ed Harris, Kathleen Quinlan, Mary Kate Schellhardt.Ron Howard’s take on the ill-fated 1970 moon shot is a big step forward from his previous two films – Backdraft and The Paper – which were generally muddled exercises in how an excellent filmmaker can get lost in his own story. Apollo 13 has no such problems, and as such, it’s a riveting, nail-biting, two-buckets-of-popcorn return to form for Howard, filled with the almost unassailable heroics of the U.S. space program and the genuine urgency of history. The story, by Texans William Broyles, Jr., and Al Reinert, is equally compelling, playing up the interesting notion that by the time this third moon shot came around, not even the media was very interested in the space race anymore until something went awry. Howard pulls out all the stops on this one and the performances are uniformly wonderful: It’s almost a valentine to NASA, but without the celestial mythologizing of films like The Right Stuff. Oddly, some of the integral special effects in the film – and they are integral – seem less than perfect but, overall, Apollo 13 succeeds and may be the only summer adventure blockbuster without bullets or warheads.
3.5 stars (M.S.)
Arbor, Highland, Lake Creek, Lakehills, Movies 12
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. There’s so much and so little going on here simultaneously that you’re not sure whether to squirm or doze. 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. Jones does his best to keep up, 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!
2.0 stars (M.S.)
Highland
CLUELESS
D: Amy Heckerling; with Alicia Silverstone, Stacey Dash, Brittany Murphy, Paul Rudd, Donald Faison, Breckin Meyer, Jeremy Sisto, Justin Walker, Wallace Shawn, Twink Calan, Dan Hedaya.Rarely do you find a film so aptly titled as this one. Director Heckerling, who scored so well so long ago with the brilliant, seminal Fast Times at Ridgemont High, returns to cloyingly similar territory in what is essentially a mediocre Nineties updating of that previous film. Silverstone and the ensemble cast of generic high-schoolers (including a phenomenally ill-used Wallace Shawn replacing the Ray Walston character from Fast Times) tweak their way through a Fox sitcom-quality string of cheap gags and ham-handed teen angst that isn’t so much humorous as it is boring. Perhaps it’s unfair to keep returning to the comparison with Fast Times, but those characters – as portrayed by Judge Reinhold, Phoebe Cates, Sean Penn, et al. – seem, in retrospect, to have been achingly more realized. The kids here just mope, pout, and whine to varying degrees until you want to ship them all off to Rock ‘n’ Roll High School so the Ramones can take a crack at ’em (“Teenage Lobotomy” never sounded so accurate). Clueless indeed.
1.0 stars (M.S.)
Lincoln, Movies 12, Roundrock, Westgate
CRUMB
D: Terry Zwigoff.Though Crumb is packed with information and telling details about the artist, the movie’s objective is hardly art history or a survey of R. Crumb’s place in the world of comics. The movie aims for broader subject matter, to discover something about the role art plays in the life of the artist, and about how the release of art may, indeed, allow the artist to function as a stable human being. Crumb is also about the Crumb family, a unit that, in addition to his wife and children, includes Crumb’s mother, vestigial traces of a deceased father, two brothers, Charles and Max, and two sisters, who declined to be interviewed. Crumb is most fascinating when it’s exploring the chicken-and-egg conundrum. Can art be a buffer between sanity and the abyss, can it expiate all our ugliness within, can it instigate its own path of madness? In Crumb, we have a disturbing portrait of three brothers whose early art experiences were similar, but who all grew quite differently. For R. Crumb, art-making may be his redemption.
4.0 stars (M.B.)
Dobie
FREE WILLY 2: THE ADVENTURE HOME
D: Dwight Little; with Jason James Richter, August Schellenberg, Jayne Atkinson, Jon Tenney, Elizabeth Pe�a, Michael Madsen, Francis Capra, Mary Kate Schellhardt, M. Emmet Walsh.Just as every boy thrives best when he has a family to belong to, so too does every whale. That was the lesson of Free Willy I. But, whereas Willy I was built around one glorious, spectacular visual image – that of the orca leaping bravely and gracefully over the water’s above-sea-level retaining wall – a shot that was the movie’s raison d’�tre, a shot that served the story and summarized the narrative and thrust events into an epic realm… Free Willy 2 has no similar reason to exist. As a-boy-and-his-orca sequel, this one’s pedestrian. Any adult watching Willy 2 should be able to predict events before the tide ever changes. Kids, on the other hand, should be satisfied with the movie’s mix of family drama, playful whale bonding, and impending ecological crisis. And, somewhere, in the midst of all this, the voice of Michael Jackson turns up to ask the preposterously self-reflexive musical question, “Have you seen my childhood?”(Hint: If you really want to see a great and current movie about the interaction between humans, sea mammals, and myth, check out John Sayles’ Secret of Roan Inish.)
1.5 stars (M.B.)
Great Hills
THE INCREDIBLY TRUE ADVENTURE OF TWO GIRLS IN LOVE
D: Maria Maggenti; with Laurel Holloman, Nicole Parker, Maggie Moore, Kate Stafford, Sabrina Artel, Toby Poser, Nelson Rodriguez, Dale Dickey.It’s senior year of high school and two teenagers fall in love. They love in the way that all first-time lovers do – for always and forever. Randy’s skin is white; Evie’s skin is black. Randy likes loud rock music; Evie prefers classical. Randy gets around on Rollerblades; Evie drives her own Range Rover. And, oh yeah, they’re both 17-year-old girls. Incredibly True Adventure tells the story of the relationship between these two girls and the social, racial, and sexual storm it sets in motion. The story is standard teen fare; only the protagonists are new. Yet new protagonists can generate new narrative conflicts, possibilities, expectations, and resolutions. From the outset, Incredibly True Adventure declares its intention to subvert traditional conventions and expectations. But in the hands of director Maggenti, subversion becomes the epitome of fun. In films containing lesbian thematics, Incredibly True Adventure breaks new ground in comedy. This humor may take the form of a visual punchline or the farcical anarchy that dominates the movie’s last third. But the humor is the spice that makes this Adventure addictive. Premiered in Austin at the SXSW Film Festival.
4.0 stars (M.B.)
Village
NINE MONTHS
D: Chris Columbus; with Hugh Grant, Julianne Moore, Tom Arnold, Joan Cusack, Jeff Goldblum, Robin Williams.No matter how long writer/director Chris Columbus labored over Nine Months, even a C-section couldn’t rescue the shallow script and overplayed performances by Grant and Arnold. Columbus’ romantic comedy is all crazy sight gags and no story. Problems with this film arise immediately due, in large part, to the lack of chemistry between Grant and Moore. No one would argue that this film tries to be anything more than a sweet and lighthearted look at one man’s fear and trauma over impending fatherhood and marital commitment. But there are successful ways to pull this off, and Nine Months is one extended shtick that ends long after the last laugh is heard. The labor scene toward the end of the film offers a fine example of over-the-top antics that just aren’t funny; in fact, some of the gags are even offensive. All of this isn’t to say that Grant’s a one-trick actor, but perhaps the success of Four Weddings and a Funeral was due, in large measure, to the timing and abilities of that film’s ensemble cast and the strength of a smartly written script. Nine Months has neither of these.
1.5 stars (A.M.)
Lincoln, Westgate
OPERATION DUMBO DROP
D: Simon Wincer; with Ray Liotta, Danny Glover, Denis Leary, Doug E. Doug, Corin Nemec.Operation Dumbo Drop is a terribly irresponsible picture that seems shamefully patterned after director’s Wincer’s other box office success, Free Willy. The first feel-good family movie set against the backdrop of the Vietnam war, Operation Dumbo Drop follows a motley group of American soldiers (Liotta, Glover, Leary, Doug, and Nemec) as they try to track down and deliver an elephant to a nearby village.Operation Dumbo Drop is a rotten movie for many reasons: illogical scripting, inconsistent performances, sloppy direction, or the unbelievably offensive oversimplification of the atrocities of the Vietnam war. There is one effective sequence – played up with obvious desperation by the movie’s trailers – in which the elephant, thanks to a wide array of fairly convincing special effects, parachutes from a plane. Beyond this genuinely exciting bit of footage, Operation Dumbo Drop is a disastrous miscalculation that leaves the viewer with only one burning thought: “What the hell were they thinking?”
0 stars (J.O.)
Great Hills, Highland, Movies 12, Roundrock
POCAHONTAS
D: Mike Gabriel and Eric Goldberg; with the voices of Irene Bedard, Judy Kuhn, Mel Gibson, David Ogden Stiers, Russell Means, Linda Hunt.Here is a movie that knows its target audience. Pocahontas’ arrow, tipped with tender romance and feathered with spirited folklore, hits the bulls-eye dead on. If you can get past the frenzied hype and a liberal license with historical accuracy (and I challenge you to show me a seven-year old who can’t), this latest Disney effort rivals the animated features from the fabled studio’s heyday. Like the best Disney cartoons, Pocahontas is both resplendent and restrained. The rousing action sequences are brief but compelling counterpoints to the beautiful simplicity of the piece. The animation is wonderful. Pocahontas is lovely and while the animators have succumbed to the modern day heroine’s seeming requisite – impossible Barbie doll physiology – they have also imbued her with a spirit so innocent and a bearing so noble that it precludes a too-lascivious allure. The characters are nicely vocalized, the studio scoring a magnificent coup with Russell Means’ portrayal of Pocahontas’ father, Chief Powhatan. Composer Allen Menken is back, and his music lifts the movie to lofty heights.
3.5 stars (H.C.)
Great Hills
THE POSTMAN (IL POSTINO)
D: Michael Radford; with Massimo Troisi, Philippe Noiret, Maria Grazia Cucinotta, Linda Moretti, Renato Scarpa, Anna Bonaiuto.The Postman is an Italian co-production whose history is as tragically romantic as the poetry of one of its main characters, Chilean poet Pablo Neruda. It is loosely based on a novel about an incident in Neruda’s life when he was befriended by a young postman while living in Italy. Together with Radford, The Postman’s lead actor Massimo Troisi had worked diligently since 1990 to bring the story to the screen; both he and Radford share screenwriting credit with three other writers. Sadly, Troisi passed away from a heart condition the day after principal photography was completed on the film. Set in 1952 during the time of Neruda’s exile from Chile to a small island off the southern coast of Italy, the film recounts the friendship between the aging Communist poet and the shy, directionless son of a fisherman who knows only that he does not want to follow in his father’s footsteps. The Postman also is a love story of the first order, a sweet Cyrano tale and, in fact, one of the sweetest stories on film this summer. Slow in parts but appealing overall, The Postman suggests how interwoven the bonds of friendship and love can be. With lyrical beauty and memorable performances, The Postman articulates many feelings that seem to defy explanation.
3.5 stars (A.M.)
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.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. 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; it washes over us in the lyrical language, 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. Roan Inish conjures magic, but does so without relying on technical wizardry. Instead, it creates wonder in the unexpected.
4.0 stars (R.F.)
Dobie
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. 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
SMOKE
D: Wayne Wang and Paul Auster; with William Hurt, Harvey Keitel, Stockard Channing, Harold Perrineau, Jr., Forest Whitaker, Giancarlo Esposito, Ashley Judd, Victor Argo.As beguiling and as ephemeral as its title, Smoke is a movie that draws you in and lingers a while in your bloodstream. It’s certainly not harmful to your system but like those darned cigarettes, Smoke leaves you wanting another not long after the last one has been extinguished. Knockout ensemble performances like these don’t come around all that often, and when they do they ought to be savored. The performances here are smokin’. On the other hand, the story that connects all these characters is a bit wan. The movie is structured as a series of converging vignettes; however, the story lines never converge as completely as one might like. Yet, obviously there were more stories to tell here since while Smoke was being shot, director Wang (The Joy Luck Club) and Auster spun off another film, Blue in the Face, that was shot in the three days following the completion of Smoke. Can’t wait: Even if it never all comes together, the fumes are quite intoxicating.
3.5 stars (M.B.)
Village
SPECIES
D: Roger Donaldson; with Ben Kingsley, Michael Madsen, Alfred Molina, Forest Whitaker, Marg Helgenberger, Natasha Henstridge.Despite a very promising first 15 minutes, Species proves to be nothing more than another tired rip-off of Alien, with a touch of Tobe Hooper’s Lifeforce thrown in for good measure. The story concerns a desperate manhunt for a young, but rapidly growing, little girl who has taken part in a genetic experiment that has combined alien and human DNA, resulting in a creature (code-named “Sil” and designed by H.R. Giger, the Swiss surrealist artist who is also responsible for the award-winning titular creature in Alien) that often looks sweet and harmless, but can mutate into a pus-dripping beast and tear your spine out. Species 2. Species is one of those movies in which our hero is always one stupid step behind the villain who, in this picture, doesn’t really seem all that smart to begin with. The only thing worth a damn in Species is the talented cast, with Madsen’s deadpan cool and quiet charm providing most of the film’s memorable moments.
1.0 stars (J.O.)
Highland
UNDER SIEGE 2: DARK TERRITORY
D: Geoff Murphy; with Steven Seagal, Eric Bogosian, Katherine Heigl, Morris Chestnut, Everett McGill.Under Siege 2 is so bad and illogical that even devoted Seagal loyalists should find their faith tested. The subtitle Dark Territory doesn’t even begin to describe how inchoate and blemished this storytelling is. All activity is fashioned with one objective in mind: how to introduce Seagal into the scene so he can kick, whump, stomp, detonate, and, basically, humiliate every bad guy in the hemisphere before eradicating him forthwith. In Under Siege 2, Seagal reprises his character of Casey Ryback, a cook and an ex-Navy SEAL. Typical of his bravura style, he, literally, takes on a whole trainload of bad guys this time when (and I don’t think I’m being nitpicky here) it would have been so much more effective to hop off the train and gather the cavalry. In one of the year’s most unlikely bits of casting, Eric Bogosian, the noted monologist, plays the deranged villain. This bodes well for nothing other than a Rocky sequel co-starring Spalding Gray.
0 stars (M.B.)
Great Hills
Previews
MORTAL KOMBAT
D: Paul Anderson; with Christopher Lambert, Robin Shou, Linden Ashby, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Bridgette Wilson, Talisa Soto.“Nothing in the world has prepared you for this,” swears the tag line for this action feature. Except perhaps Super Mario Brothers? Once again, Hollywood has dipped into the well of the video arcade to try to summon up a flood at the box office. For the Kombat-impaired, the set-up involves three Earthling martial arts experts dispatched to the Outworld to engage in battle with the forces of the evil Shang Tsung. Lambert cheers on the human heroes as the wry Thunder God (is there any other kind?), Rayden. Ka-pow!!
stars (R.F.)
Arbor, Highland, Lake Creek, Movies 12, Northcross, Riverside, Roundrock, Westgate
This article appears in August 18 • 1995 and August 18 • 1995 (Cover).