OCR Text |
Show V rts & Page 9 March 24, 1999 S ntertainment -- Editor: Jennie Squire jennie58hotmail.com Spring Movie Mania Comes to a Theater Near You (RATINGS: The movies listed below are rated according to the following key: 4 stars excellent; 3 stars good; 2 star fair; 1 star poor.) ANALYZE THIS. This slick and rambunctious Harold Ramis comedy with Robert Ee Niro as a Mafia boss suffering from panic attacks and Billy Crystal as the hip young New Yorker who becomes his is smart, personal psychotherapist funny and seems to have everything going for it Still, there are little chinks and script flaws in its comic armor, just as there are neuroses boiling under the Cosa Nostra cool of De Niro's twitchy Paul Vitti. Crystal and De Niro are often a delight working together; so are Crystal and Joe Viterelli, as Vitti's affable bodyguard. Jelly. And Ramis ("Groundhog Day") is a director with a sure touch for contemporary urban comedy. This sure ain't "Jane Austen's Mafia." But as far .as being a comic "Goodfellas." R 3 stars. BABY GENIUSES. This car crash of a film, directed by Bob "Porky's" Clark, is so bad on so many levels that it's difficult to decide what to address first. Should we start with the concept, about an evil corporation named BABYCO, led by a fascistic doctor named Kinder, that is conducting questionable experimentation on very young children, especially twins? Should I go right to the structure, which borrows the talking babies idea from "Look Who's Talking" and mixes it with the mischievous antics of "Home Alone," so that we have bad guys getting their comeuppance at the hands of cackling genius babies? The most notable emotion one is left with is sorrow that such stalwart actors as Kathleen Turner, Peter MacNicol, Kim Cattrall and the great Ruby Dee found their way into this bomb. PG. Zero stars. BLAST FROM THE PAST. This time-war- p comedy shows what happens when a young man bom in a bomb shelter in 1962 finally emerges in tire '90s outside world. Adam (Brendan Fraser) remained hidden for so long because his parents y Calvin inventor devoted his and Walken) (Christopher wife, Helen (Sissy Spacek) thought Los after they nuked soon had been Angeles the shelter their into during disappeared Cuban Missile Crisis. After 35 years, they figure the radiation has dissipated enough for Adam to explore the surface. Adam's mission is to return, to the shelter with more years' worth of provisions and a wife. While trying to cash in some old baseball cards, he meets a kind young woman (Alicia Silverstone) who can't resist helping him. She's evgn willing to help him find a mate, though you know all along where their relationship is headed. brilliant-but-wack- Silverstone is easy to root for. But the entire movie seems to be straining and too often ignores what should be Adam's most rudimentary reactions to modem life. PG-1stars THE CORRUPTOR. Hong Kong super-stChow Yun-Fportrays Nick Chen, a Ghinese-bodetective for the NYPD, who works Chinatown as part of the Asian Gang Unit. He's assigned a young, serious partner (Mark Wahlberg) after the appearance of a group of young toughs hungry to take over power from the older, established bosses. The main problem stems from director James Foley's admirable goal of making the story more involved. Instead, it grows confusing. "The Corrup-tor- " 's buris a step up for Chow geoning American movie career, but as appealing as he is here, they have yet to tap into the dark menace that made him such an idol in Asia. R. 3 stars. CRUEL INTENTIONS. There's a "playing house" quality to this teen version of "Dangerous Liaisons," as Sarah Michelle Gellar vamps in overdrive as the fiendish Kathryn Merteuil while Ryan Phillippe glowers and pouts as heartbreaker Sebastian Valmont, who sets his sights on a sweet virgin played by Reese Witherspoon. writer-directe Roger Although Kumble moves the story along briskly at first, you may eventually realize you neither care about these characters nor enjoy their scheming. With promiscuous high school culture replacing the repressed societies of "Dangerous Liaisons" and "Valmont," Kathryn and Sebastian just come across as spoiled, disaffected rich kids. Like the stylish, vacant "Jawbreaker," "Cruel Intentions" revels in its heroine's nastiness, then expects you to get charged up for her downfall. R. 2 stars. 3. ar m Yun-Fat- first-tim- stars. EIGHT MILLIMETER. This film is a stomach-churnin- g, nerve-shreddin- g thriller about pornography and murder. But just because a movie gets our guts heaving, does that mean it's a good show? Set in the darkest cranny of the illicit pornography industry, the bloody domain of "snuff," this is a truly grisly story, with realistically rotten villains and gore galore. As the movie unwinds its young nasty tale about a straight-arrodetective (Nicolas Cage) scouring the sexual underworld to find the killers of a possible snuff victim director Joel Schumacher and company keep throwing fresh atrocities at us. It's possible that Schumacher ("Flatliners," "Batman and Robin") and writer Andrew Kevin Walker Schumacher trying are at to make a serious statement on obsession while Walker just tries to and take us on just another gruesome "Seven"-styl- e ride. "Eight" promises more than it delivers on every level but gore. R. ed w cross-purpose- s: 2-- stars. FORCES OF NATURE. Sandra Bullock is paired with Ben Affleck in this romantic comedy of modest intentions and lesser results. He's an uptight New Yorker on his way to Georgia to wed girlfriend Bridget (Maura Tierney). He's distracted by Bullock's kooky and comely character, travail is contrived and their and plentiful, including a near plane crash; getting arrested; getting rained and hailed on; having to take their clothes off; dancing for money at a gay bar; hooking up with a bunch of seniors on a bus tour. The stars make a most unlikely pair, and unlikable sorts leading and as well, likely to ever lead their lives on the most emotionally superficial levels. Bad trip. PG-1One star. WING COMMANDER. Where have we seen these things before: a scrappy young space pilot from the boondocks with a dark secret, his trigger-happgonzo side-kicthe gruff but secretly sensitive female love interest? Sounds a little bke "Star Wars," doesn't it? "Wing Commander," a new movie based on the video game series of the same name, tries mightily to give cliches the proper seathese warmed-ove- r soning, but in the end these leftovers fail to 3. k, y, satisfy. PG. stars. 5 or Summer TutorCounselor Positions Available a The Dixie College Upward Bound Program seeks several individuals to live in the dorms and supervise and tutor 60 high school students. UPWARD BOUND Qualifications Must be 21 years of age Must have a minimum 2 years of college and be in good standing. Ability to tutor math, English or Spanish. Must possess a valid driver's license. THE DEEP END OF THE OCEAN. This is a tale that should have touched audiences to the quick, moved them as effortlessly as many were moved by the book on which it was based. Jacquelyn Mitchard's bestseller. But, for me at least, it doesn't. The problem of may be, partly, in the obliterating power "Deep End's" central story. This film takes what must be a mother's worst fear the sudden disappearance of a young child and gives it body and contour. As we watch, mother Beth Cappadora (Michelle Pfeiffer) looks away for a minute from her child Ben (Michael Mcelroy) at a young high school reunion, leaving him with his older brother. And in that instant, the child is gone. Will he be found? Will he be the same? Can she ever forgive herself? This is a movie that should have made us cry and bleed. But though it's an affecting, polished film, it's not satisfying: a nightmare 2 that never achieves full intensity. PG-13. Jr1 Salary $308 per week ($1850 for the summer) room and board included. For a complete description, contact: Kathryn "Sug" Miles 111 Browning Building 652-765- 9 Application deadline is April 5. Ik? 1 |