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Show Let's Go To The Movies By Dr. Allen Hasson AWELESS! (YAWN) EXCITING TO THE MINI (ZZZZZ) "Let's see. Richard Pryor is good boxoffice. Maybe we can sign him for a villain part and. ..Yeah! Richard Pryor as a villain! What an idea!" Sorry, guys. The old excitement is gone. After the first few entertaining moments of "Soop 3," the film fizzles. Pryor is a crooked but nice computer com-puter programmer whose power-hungry power-hungry boss (Robert Vaughn) forces him to help get rid of Superman. In an unrelated secondary plot, Clark Kent goes to his high school reunion reu-nion in Smallville, and acquires a new romantic interest, Annette O'Toole. Back to the main plot: (The movie is as fractured as this review). The villains, thanks to Pryor's genius, produce pro-duce a bad strain of Kryptonite that makes Superman evil. Clark and Soop battle each other in a junkyard (junkyards are "in," you know), and the good guy wins. (Captain Kirk would have made this all much clearer on "Star Trek"). Finally, there is a battle with a computer-generated Krypton-ray machine. Naturally, your ending includes the traditional. tradi-tional. ..zzzzzz. Oh, yes, the Evil One's lab goes up in smoke, sparks, snores and snickers. How could it all go so wrong? Like this: Acting: Lethargic. Directing: Confusing. Story: Confusing. Characterization: Weaker than skim milk. Insulting female stereotypes. And most of the main characters inexplicably change character! John Williams' original theme repeated, and some new scoring by Giorgio ("Flashdance") Moroder. Editing: Confusing. Special Effects: Fair. ("Hey Mommy! Mom-my! I can see the wires!") Action and pacing: Underwhelming. Continuity: What can you expect from a director who will not worK In the U. S., trying to make an American-spirited American-spirited adventure in Canada, Italy and England? Comedy: All in the first 5 minutes. Villains: Too sweet. Romance: Too short. Pathos: Too late. Pryor, prior to "comedy" films, was (and is) a marvclously perceptive solo comic. He's good at that. He should stick to it. Chris Reeve was great in "Soop 1", so-so in "2", but we couldn't care less in "3". He should take a hint. Rated PG for a half-dozen instances of blasphemous profanity. |