You know the sensation: the feeling you get after gulping a slush drink too fast. The rush to your frozen noggin is unbearable for one brief, piercing moment. Then it stops. It’s a revelation, relief or rejuvenation. Writer/director Kevin Smith’s Clerks (A) is like that instant of peace when you regain your equilibrium and once again feel ready to take on the world. It’s a delightful slacker comedy about a day in the life of two friends who work in an adjoining video shop and convenience store. Through a farcical display of raunchy, raucous dialogue, the film captures the wacky world of life on minimum wage. The wisdom of these foul mouthed philosophers should give solace to anyone who has ever contained fury at a customer or secretly desired to break the rules. Smith employs a non-linear approach with quick camera jerks and slow promenades over the absurdist landscape to fashion a monochrome masterpiece. Despite the snark, there’s a certain sweetness to the central duo’s friendship and a perverse charm to their assortment of strange friends and customers. This is strictly for folks who don’t mind a little residual cheese puff dust on their hands.
“Legends of the Fall” a Lush Drama
Anchored by solid performances by Brad Pitt and others and filled with gorgeous scenery, Edward Zwick’s Legends of the Fall (B+) is a romantic ode to family and friendship in the early 20th century. Set in the shadows of the Montana Rockies, the film tells the story of three brothers (Pitt, Aidan Quinn, Henry Thomas) a stern father (Anthony Hopkins), a love interest (Julia Ormond) and a world on the brink of love and war. Prodigal son themes and some less successful WWI sequences are all eclipsed by the force of nature that is the central smoldering romances and breathtaking photography told to the score of James Horner. It’s a poetic, intoxicating story about living and learning and taking the journey.
“Ready to Wear (Pret-A-Porter)” Sends Up the Parisian Fashion Scene
In the summer of 1994, acclaimed film director Robert Altman threw a huge bash in Paris during the peak of fashion paparazzi. Attracting hoards of celebrities and models to his ten-week gala, Altman unveiled a hyped-up hootenanny, establishing his reputation as the world’s premier party host. It’s unfortunate that Altman the auteur was making a film in the process. His clothes hangover posing as a fashion scene parody is Ready to Wear (C-), a deluded mis-mesh that could have benefited from a formal screenplay and perhaps a few short cuts. Stars galore from Kim Basinger to Julia Roberts to Cher to Sophia Loren in snippets of plot delight in moments but can’t stitch together the threadbare affair. Fashion aficionados may enjoy the glimpses of the pret-a-porter and some of the runway frivolity. Ultimately, though, Altman’s statement on this one is the lampshade still on his head.
“Interview with the Vampire” is Rather Beguiling
Lestat and Louis, the vampires immortalized in Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, are holding a blood drive, and you’re invited. You won’t need a crucifix. Or garlic. Or even a stake. Just bring your desire for thrills and excitement. You’re about to experience the ultimate revisionist vampire tale. Neil Jordan’s Interview with the Vampire (B+) is a stylish thriller combining a fascinating cast of characters with glamorous locales and a twisted brand of dark humor. It’s a cunning mixture of theatrical gusto and cinematic horror. Tom Cruise is coy and confident, Brad Pitt brooding and Kirsten Dunst disarming in their roles as surrogate bloodsucking family. Extend your wrist, tilt your neck and give in!
“StarGate” is Subpar Sci-Fi
Sand. Lots of sand. That’s the big takeaway from StarGate (D), a pricey science fiction epic about an intergalactic doorway to an alternate world of phony pyramids, an androgynous pharaoh and mumbo jumbo amidst dusty dunes. Writer/director Roland Emmerich gives James Spader, Kurt Russell and Jaye Davidson little to do in a story that quickly sinks like quicksand amidst the bombast. It’s not one for the ages.
“Pulp Fiction” is Tarantino in Full Command of Craft
One moment you’re pulling back in horror. And the next instant you can’t control your laughter. That’s the thrilling sensation director Quentin Tarantino creates in his splashy piece of Pulp Fiction (A+), an audacious interweaving of three stories about a surprisingly vulgar and witty underclass on the scene of the modern American crimescape. It’s complete with blood-drenched violence, uncompromising revenge and accidental acts of fate. Wordplay is front and center as “take her out” may involve dating someone and “take care of him” may mean slow torture in a basement. John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson play iconic hitmen gabbing about Big Macs and foot fetishes between jobs, and Travolta’s night out with Uma Thurman provides a dance floor sequence to rival Saturday Night Fever. This is a film for people who love movies, with mystery briefcases, prizefighters on the road to redemption, tales told out of order, shots held long and tight and homages that will be studied shot by shot.
“Shawshank Redemption” a Magnificent Drama of Friendship Against the Odds
The Shawshank Redemption (A), written and directed by Frank Darabont, is one of the best movie adaptations of a Stephen King work. Tim Robbins plays a banker imprisoned for murdering his wife and her lover; in Shawshank prison, he befriends a fellow lifer played by Morgan Freeman, known for his ability to smuggle creature comforts into the pen. Together they hatch an unlikely friendship and break down a series of barriers both physical and emotional. Magnificent performances buoy this tribute to persistence.
“Quiz Show” is Gripping Drama
Director Robert Redford’s Quiz Show (A-) explores the scandal behind a rigged televised game show, paralleling some of the promises and disenchantment of America in the ’60s. Ralph Fiennes, so chilling in Schindler’s List, brilliantly plays the contestant at the center of the controversy. The film is timely as a fabricated Dateline segment prompted similar outcry about what is fact and fiction in multimedia manipulation. John Turturro and Paul Scofield also give great lived-in performances.
“Road to Wellville” a Curiosity
Alan Parker examines the foibles of the human body in the comic farce The Road to Wellville (C+), pitting Anthony Hopkins as a Willy Wonka of a 1907 health sanitarium against naifs Matthew Broderick and Bridget Fonda. This episodic film often provides a tonic to the funny-bone but fails to find a remedy and resonance against any enduring central theme.
“Love Affair” (1994) is a Lifeless Remake
Glenn Gordon Caron’s Love Affair (D-) is a remake of An Affair to Remember which inspired the much more interesting homage Sleepless in Seattle. Warren Beatty and Annette Bening are smarmy in the soft-lit central roles, and Katharine Hepburn makes a cameo to mumble something unnecessarily vulgar. By the time the lovers meet up at the Empire State Building, you’re just glad it’s almost time for the credits to roll.
“Ed Wood” a Triumphant Salute to B-Movies
Moviemaker Edward D. Wood, Jr. could have been the next Orson Welles. Both men hit their stride at an early age and possessed unswerving obsession for the films they created. There’s just one thing Ed Wood lacked: talent. Wood, infamous for dreck such as Plan 9 From Outer Space is biographically redeemed in director Tim Burton’s Ed Wood (B+). As portrayed by Johnny Depp, the title character plays out his passions and peccadilloes against a quaint black and white stock ensemble dramedy. Martin Landau is genius as legendary film star Bela Lugosi, who adds heft to the proceedings. The movie magic of rubber squids, aluminum foil robots and zombie body doubles creates a pleasant phantasmagoria that’s right at home in Burton’s oeuvre.
“Blankman” is Uninspired
Mike Binder’s Blankman (F) is a superhero spoof that just sits there like a bad chunk of Kryptonite. Damon Wayans, whose transition to the big screen from In Living Color has not quite soared, plays an inner-city superhero, and that conceit is intended to be funny in and of itself. This film has the power to move viewers to not a single laugh in a single bound.