Bill Cosford

The whole point is excess, and O'Bannon's good at getting to that point. But the film is so clearly meant for giggles that it packs nowhere near the emotional punch of one of Romero's, which are truly dreadful. [19 Aug 1985, p.D5]

The lead roles are played by Al Pacino and Michelle Pfeiffer. They're the reasons this movie works. Despite itself. [11 Oct 1991, p.G5]

These are small subjects here, and intimate ones, and they are handled with great warmth. [27 May 1982, p.B5]

Pacino is the only real attraction. His character feels ancient, used-up, bone-tired -- vulnerable, maybe, but numb. We need to see this in his face, and Pacino can use his the way Triple-A uses maps. That face is still one of the great instruments of modern movies. [15 Sep 1989, p.G5]

The Undiscovered Country looks and feels more like a movie and less like a TV-family reunion. Still, the allegory is labored to say the least. [6 Dec. 1991, p.G5]

The great film that The Accused could have been is in there. So is Foster's lovely, measured work, the work of an actress at the top of her art, and this in a supposed "comeback." Yes, darker and more sadistic passages have burdened many lesser movies. But this one has ambition, and this one has this performance. It's a hard movie to like; it's an impossible one to ignore. [14 Oct 1988, p.E1]

Compromising Positions is not a big movie in any way, and it has its share of rough spots, particularly toward the end. But it's a late-summer concession to grown-up tastes after a season of intergalactic kids. And it's hard to hate a movie that contains this sentiment, again delivered deadpan: "God, I'd love to kill a dentist." [30 Aug 1985, p.D15]

Burnett is probably the most interesting here, but not by much. John Ritter is fun, Marilu Henner is sexy enough to hold her own even while Nicollette Sheridan, who is lovely, colts about the stage in lingerie. Julie Hagerty, as a steadily more nervous stage manager, is the scariest and funniest; Denholm Elliott, the barely reformed boozer who chases every bottle that turns up backstage (and many, many do), is a hoot...The whole thing vibrates with its dark possibilities: Utter humiliation awaits at every turn. Bogdanovich's movie doesn't move at the speed of the live performances of Noises Off that I have seen -- I'm not sure it could, without sacrificing comprehension. But it moves fast enough. If you can't laugh at Noises Off, you're just not mean enough. [21 March 1992, p.E1]

Sneakers is tremendously entertaining when the team is working to breach unbreachably secure institutions. [11 Sep 1992, p.G5]

Though the filmmakers have clearly done their homework, and clearly care, they don't find much remarkable in the story of Ritchie Valens. Even given the short life at hand, La Bamba is as schematic and predictable as it is likable. [24 July 1987, p.D1]

Ihave it on good authority that Pat Conroy's The Prince of Tides is a wonderful book. People rave about it. But Barbra Streisand's lumbering, tearjerker adaptation gives little hint of that. This movie is long and full of pain, and it's driven by the most syrupy musical score I can recall. [25 Dec 1991, p.1]

School Ties is powerful, but it cheats, too -- and the inspiring climax is telegraphed well in advance. What seems worse, though, is the movie's timidity on ground that has been well tested since A Gentleman's Agreement almost 50 years ago. [18 Sept 1992, p.G4]

I wish it ended better, but Mortal Thoughts is easily the most interesting movie of the year to date. And it's a throwback to that time at the movies when a single murder was a big deal. Run, don't walk. [19 Apr 1991, p.G5]

That's what's wrong with Sweet Dreams. Its insights into this sudden, shortlived star are no more profound than those of a tabloid expose; it's bad-marriage gossip. [17 Oct 1985, p.B6]

Soapdish is a spoof of soap operas, and the problem should be apparent from the start: It is very, very difficult to parody that which dwells already in the land of self-parody. [31 May 1991, p.G5]

So it's all pretty silly. But it does move along, and the range of weapons is formidable. Steve Carver, who did Norris' An Eye for an Eye, knows how to handle action, though Lone Wolf might have been more convincing had he let any of the bad guys shoot straight. [5 May 1983, p.B10]

The good-heartedness and skill of Ron Howard, director, have become something to be reckoned with. Cocoon, for all its failures -- and its dependence on hokey effects is a major one -- suggests that Spielberg is not alone out there. [21 June 1985, p.C1]

De Niro is solid in a role that requires little more than righteous indignation. The stretch, however, is by Sam Wanamaker in the role of a Los Angeles attorney who specializes in getting his Hollywood clients out of trouble by feeding them names to inform on. Wanamaker himself did 10 years in exile in England rather than answer a congressional subpoena after publicly defending the Hollywood Ten among other witch-hunt victims. The film is worth seeing if only for a look at him in this role -- these days, when the word hero is tossed about with something approaching desperation, Wanamaker gives us a glimpse of the real thing. Maybe he should have directed this one. [15 Mar 1991, p.G5]

Best of all, though, Part Deux lampoons the cinema of cheerful ultraviolence without mercy. You've probably seen the coming-attractions trailer in which Topper, having emptied his quiver, uses a live chicken as an arrow. The film tops that easily a few scenes later, when Topper's gun jams and he simply throws a handful of cartridges at some bad guys, all of whom are instantly slain. This is the genuine article: good spoof, no prisoners. [21 May 1993, p.5]

It's not a movie for the easily distracted, but it has its rewards for those who pay attention. [19 Dec 1983, p.C6]

Sounds like Dirty Harry, looks like Dirty Harry, plays like Dirty Harry. The big difference is that Norris is not so mean as Eastwood, nor so interesting. Eastwood's Harry is flawed, even philosophical in his grumpy way; Norris' Sarge is just a nice guy who can kill you a hundred different ways. [06 May 1985, p.B6]

So. All this virtuosity, lots of thumps and crashes and even a few empty moments in the desert night. Signifying: Not so much. Not in the movies, which throw a glare even into the corners, which are empty here. Fool for Love has the look of a project that was a lot of work for director, writer and actors. It's not so much fun for the rest of us, either. [28 Feb 1986, p.D3]

It's fun seeing what these two can do when they're inspired, but it's awful having to sit through what happens when they're not. [21 Dec 1984, p.D10]

Cloak and Dagger does have its charms. It also has its tense moments, and an unforced sentimentality that helps it end on just the right note. And it's nicely performed. [10 Aug 1985, p.6]

Though there's a scene of racial discomfort (nothing more serious) and a few rather flat-footed references to anti-war feelings back home in Hamburger Hill, the sense of time and place is missing altogether. Hamburger Hill is an all-purpose war movie with the requisite noble message -- war is hell, and futile, too -- but it could be set anywhere. In those parts of the world where local audiences will not accept an American adventure movie with the Vietnamese as vanquished foe (parts of Southeast Asia were shown Rambo with subtitles that portrayed it as a anti-Japanese commando raid from World War II), Hamburger Hill will play with few problems...Unhappily, neither screenwriter Jim Carabatsos (who did Heartbreak Ridge for Clint Eastwood) nor director John Irvin is able to provide the story any tighter focus, either. [28 Aug 1987, p.D1]

Like all bad thrillers, and some very good ones, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle doesn't always make a whole lot of sense and seems to depend overmuch on coincidence, happenstance and shameless contrivance. But that doesn't matter. The Hand That Rocks the Cradle will scare the wits out of you anyway. Pick it apart later, when you're home safe and sound. You won't have the chance while the show's on. [10 Jan 1992, p.G5]

Flight of the Navigator is a cheerfully unaccomplished little movie, a kind of E.T. for kids that recalls the Disney live-action films of a generation ago. E.T is not the only movie borrowed from here; there are echoes of Back to the Future and most of the rest of the last decade's science-fiction fantasies, though Flight of the Navigator is generous in acknowledging its sources. It's a happy knockoff. [31 July 1986, p.C5]

The movie is at its most chilling, oddly enough, when one or another chase isn't going on. The real fun begins when Ryan becomes desperate and goes for help to his old pals in intelligence. This is prime Clancy material -- high-tech surveillance, computerized image enhancement, Intelligence with a capital "I." [5 June 1992, p.G5]

Ladyhawke would be harmless fun if, in fact, it were more fun. [12 Apr 1985, p.D2]

The film likewise lurches here and there, but for the most part its aim is true. Action accelerates nicely, a series of pointless cuts to parallel action in Moscow and London provides a false but convincing sense of urgency, and not until the final moments do the filmmakers run out of steam. They have an answer for that, too, in the film's coda. [28 Aug 1987, p.D5]

Brooks as Brooks is the funniest observer of contemporary mores in Hollywood. Brooks behaving himself, as in Defending Your Life, is just another clever fellow. [05 Apr 1991, p.G5]

Douglas' performance is surprisingly dull, and he has a script to match (by Diane Thomas). Moral: Remaking Raiders is harder than it looks. [04 Apr 1984, p.B6]

The movie is sweet and reflects Disney's usual care, but there's nothing in it to match that title. [23 June 1989, p.H11]

The World According to Garp is another of those films that fairly cries out for Robert Altman, who makes movies the way John Irving writes books. Altman doesn't seem to be making movies any more, so this is as close we're able to get to Garp, and it's not close enough. [23 July 1982, p.D10]

Jaglom isn't the first to suggest that food is at least as powerful as sex when it comes to enhancing life, or screwing it up. But he's the first to bring his giddy blend of documentary and farce to bear on the subject. Mmm-mmm, good. [08 Feb 1991, p.G12]

Octopussy is not very good. Though there's a good car- and-train chase scene and the usual schedule of narrow escapes, this one has fewer adventure sequences and less drama even than the last half-dozen. There are more gimmicks. [10 June 1983, p.12]

It's an A-list thriller directed by Barbet Schroeder (Reversal of Fortune, Barfly ) and graced with wonderful performances by Bridget Fonda and Jennifer Jason Leigh. [14 Aug 1992, p.G5]

It throbs with innocence; like prom night itself, it's an instant good memory. And like its creator, the always surprising John Waters, it's sideshow weird. They don't make 'em like this anymore. They never did, either. [6 Apr 1990, p.G5]

Among the mysteries of Hollywood life is the terribleness of Jaws sequels; they are the very worst of a bad lot. Now comes No. 4 -- Jaws the Revenge -- and it is as wretched as it is ungrammatical. [17 July 1987, p.1D]

We hear a lot about the great hunger for "wholesome" films, but it is rare that one is successful; wholesomeness and treacle seem to have become confused in the Hollywood mind. The Man From Snowy River is different. It's a lesson in how such films should be made. [26 Jan 1983, p.B8]

In their defense, it must be said that Dennis Quaid (as the chief dreamer) and Kate Capshaw (back again, this time in the time-honored woman's role of "assistant scientist") make an appealing couple. The presence of Max von Sydow and Christopher Plummer is more problematic; someone paid these people a lot of money to sleepwalk. [16 Aug 1984, p.B6]

The movie is facile and manipulative, but it can't hide the gifts of Jackie Gleason in the role of Hanks' father. [30 July 1986, p.D6]

It's a gentle and wholly implausible comedy with an appealing character carrying the load -- no more. [27 Sept 1986, p.D3]

Greystoke has its many pleasures, and despite its bobtailing at the hands of the bottom-line-watchers, it has the sweep of epic. [30 Mar 1984, p.D1]

Patty Hearst is a compelling piece of work, with the bogus immediacy of old newspaper clippings. And yet it plays at times almost as satire. It's a vaudevillian's account of the end of the '60s radicalism, a murderous skit. Schrader, who loves ambiguity, has outdone himself this time. [23 Sep 1988, p.E1]

Occasionally, this Bounty seems about to soar; the scene in which the ship first makes land at Tahiti, all throbbing drums, bare breasts and hooting sailors, is wonderfully rich if no less cliched. At other times, as when the Bounty leaves calm water for a gale in a split-second cut, the film seems almost amateurish. The rest of it occupies the middle ground between ho-hum and grand -- sure to disappoint those knowledgeable about the early films, still likely to engage those with two hours to kill. [05 May 1984, p.C5]

One thing it's not, despite the several lesbian love scenes that earned the film its NC-17, nee X, is "steamy." Nor is it provocative or even, Kaufman's best intentions notwithstanding, particularly erotic. It's a handsome bore. [05 Oct 1990, p.G5]

Prostitution is hardly a new topic for film, of course, but Working Girls was directed by a woman, working with a largely female crew, and that is unusual. So is Borden's technique, which is almost anti-technique. It's the film's strength, and its weakness. [27 Mar 1987, p.D5]

Though Wise Guys isn't a big movie, its gentle parody of gangster mythology, which adopts the pace and tone of a European caper movie from its opening titles, makes Prizzi's Honor seem naive by contrast. [13 May 1986, p.B6]

For everyone? Clearly not. Greenaway is an acquired taste. Once acquired, he's a pure original, not to be forgotten. X marks the spot. [6 Apr 1990, p.G5]

Empire of the Sun seems to end a half-dozen times -- always a bad sign. Its merits notwithstanding -- and Spielberg probably can't make a bad film -- in its own way this movie is as ego-heavy and ponderous as Ishtar. It's literary, all right. Empire of the Sun is a weighty tome indeed. [11 Dec 1987, p.D1]

The movie is bloody and gruesome and quite harmless, just the way they made them "in the good old days." [02 Aug 1985, p.C7]

It's more fun than you'd figure, this sendup aimed at two distinct generations, only one of which ever took Annette or Frankie seriously. You wind up, by the end, thinking of them both as awful good sports. [08 Aug 1987, p.B1]

A thoroughly wholesome, if not particularly entertaining, experience. [17 Jul 1992, p.G5]

My Favorite Year moves from bad joke to bad joke, but it does move. [08 Oct 1982, p.D9]

Ward does manage to pump the film with tension in the climactic, will-the-Indians-beat-the-Yankees sequence, and I found Major League hard to resist in its last 20 minutes or so -- even though it's sappy enough to make Levinson's prettifying of The Natural seem positively dour by contrast. Maybe it's just the season. [7 Apr 1989, p.1]

First Blood is no more than a man-bites-town retread, in which Vietnam and its aftermath are merely the angle. [27 Oct 1982, p.B6]

The Natural is dense with Boys' Life stories and grand heroics, and it sometimes wanders from black comedy to serious icon-bashing and back again. But mostly it's good fun. At the end, everyone in the audience is swinging imaginary bats. It's a great movie for summer. [11 May 1984, p.D1]

Night and the City is the most disappointing big- expectations movie of 1992. It's hard to overstate the magnitude of its failures. There is almost nothing right about it. [23 Oct 1992, p.G5]

In New Jack City, director Mario Van Peebles seems determined to show that he can make a movie as shallow and violent as any white Hollywood hack. No problem: He did it. [8 Mar 1991, p.G12]

It is not in most respects more than an ordinary thriller, however; were it not an Eastwood picture, it would be instantly forgettable. [17 Aug 1984, p.D1]

Rose made the perfectly splendid and terrifying Paperhouse, a film-festival thriller from 1988, which Candyman resembles not at all. Paperhouse scared you because it was quiet and subtle and eerie. Candyman is just Barker stuff -- all hook, no suspense. [19 Oct 1992, p.C6]

The movie never feels as strong as its ideas. It has a kind of movie-of-the-week gloss to it -- no weight, no power, all going-through-the-motions. There are a couple of reasons for this, and both involve Hoffman in the title role. [02 Oct 1992, p.G5]

I suppose if you haven't seen Rocky or its many imitators, The Karate Kid might have its modest charms; there's a good bit of man-to-boy philosophizing in it, on the order of "To thine own self be true," and that's harmless enough. But there's a measure of laziness in this whole idea that is dismaying, that borders on cynicism. One wonders what went through the minds of the filmmakers as they prepared to make a film that has been made so many times before. By the look of The Karate Kid, some quick-play box-office may have been the highest aspiration. [26 June 1984, p.B3]

Hot Shots isn't quite that bad, but given the material -- the military mind is certainly, in military parlance, a target-rich environment -- it ought to be funnier. [31 July 1991, p.D1]

Parker is flashy and gory and fun as usual. If only there were more to the thing. Then Angel Heart might not seem so dumb. [06 Mar 1987, p.D1]

Schrader, one of this country's most literate filmmakers, can be a show-off, and there are times in The Comfort of Strangers when we're more aware of style than story -- this piece is impeccably tailored, and it looks awfully good even when it isn't making sense. [17 May 1991, p.G11]

The Monster Squad is schoolyard-clever and cut to the rhythms of Saturday morning TV, within which limitations it's actually a lot of fun. It's a swell movie for kids under 13. [20 Aug 1987, p.C8]

Lee is better at topical parody than he is at intimate character drama, at least so far. Another is that movies about jazz are never very good, and Spike Lee, talented as he is, couldn't do much to change that. [03 Aug 1990, p. G5]

This is a movie that didn't have to be well made --its emotional impact has been assured by the daily news. But Jaffe took care. He made a solid Hollywood movie of a story that is terribly sad. He plays the heartstrings like a virtuoso, and that's not always a bad thing. [07 Feb 1983, p.C6]

It seems very much an exercise in time, place and character, without much soul, as if Demme expected the period to provide most of the romance. [17 Apr 1984, p.B5]

Nothing here for the time capsule, make no mistake. But the Boz seems to have found a calling. [21 May 1991, p.C1]

In the hands of Brian De Palma, not to mention Hitchcock, Jagged Edge might well have been a serious film. It is no less a thriller for lack of lineage, however. It's ferocious hack work, not believable for an instant, and never boring, either. [4 Oct 1985, p.6]

This is a B-movie through and through, and no less fun for that. [29 Sep 1989, p.G12]

The Star Chamber has the slippery feeling of a movie made with optional endings, and the narrative sag of pulled punches. You can tell it was meant to be a thoughtful action picture, a B-movie with smarts. But it's too slick, and ultimately it's too careful. [6 Aug 1983, p.7]

Penn and Oldman booze and brawl and fight a losing battle. Their worst enemy, alas, is their director's self-indulgence. [05 Oct 1990, p.G5]

The Bear is a big, polished children's film, nothing more. [27 Oct 1989, p.G5]

Its situation and its sight gags are marvelous, recalling the best of Spielberg's 1941. But like that movie, The Money Pit is disconnected; pieces seem missing, and subplots seem to have been abandoned in a rush. [28 Mar 1986, p.D5]