Gene Siskel
Select another critic »For 511 reviews, this critic has graded:
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63% higher than the average critic
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1% same as the average critic
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36% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 0.3 points lower than other critics.
(0-100 point scale)
Gene Siskel's Scores
- Movies
- TV
| Average review score: | 65 | |
|---|---|---|
| Highest review score: | A Clockwork Orange | |
| Lowest review score: | UHF | |
Score distribution:
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Positive: 339 out of 511
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Mixed: 68 out of 511
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Negative: 104 out of 511
511
movie
reviews
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- Gene Siskel
So if you're in the market for a "family" film, Natty Gann qualifies. But that doesn't mean it's a boring, namby-pamby entertainment. Rather, it's that Natty, in her cap and jacket and determined look, is a character with universal appeal. [15 Oct 1985, p.2C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The Breakfast Clu" is a breath of cinematic fresh air, taking on a very real adolescent problem and offering, in a dramatic way, a possible solution. The film is at its very best when the brainy kid wonders out loud toward the end of the film whether any of his new-found friends will still be his friends come Monday morning. It's a very real question, such being the impulse to conform in high school. A simple "hello" between a jock and a wimp in a crowd is a big risk for both of them. [15 Feb 1985, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Though critical of the director's selfish character, the story does make a case for the macho man as someone who won't tolerate phonies. [14 Sep 1990, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Ford`s character is disoriented from the very beginning of the movie, suffering from jet lag, and you can view the movie as one long tourist`s nightmare. Although the suspense never reaches the level of Polanski`s finest work-there are plot holes that are enormous-the film is well made technically and has so many twists and turns that one can`t help but want stick around to see how it turns out. In other words, you have just read a guarded recommendation.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
John Badham's exciting thriller about an L.A. detective (Roy Scheider) who battles against the government creeps who have created a monstrous helicopter to be used for 1984-style crowd control. Great action in a David-versus-Goliath story. [22 July 1983, p.10]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Clint Eastwood's most entertaining film in years, a whimsical fable about a Wild West showman with a dream of turning his rag-tag employees into one big happy family. Great country music mixed with Eastwood's natural charm. [11 July 1980, p.8]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Watching the systemized corruption of Q&A is like watching a traffic accident in slow motion: You can't take your eyes away from the broken bodies and spirits.[27 Apr 1990, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A sometimes-funny, dope related comedy with the team of Cheech and Chong trying to survive in the city while having a very high time. [1 Aug 1980, p.4-10]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A shockingly bad film that is utterly lacking in laughs and turns out to be little more than a big-screen adaptation of the TV sitcom's pilot. [15 Oct 1993, p.C2]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Not for a moment did I believe any of these characters. They were not as provocative as the clips Fiennes was selling, and, in a strange way, "Strange Days" is undone by the very product it condemns. [13 Oct 1995, p.B]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The film has a purposefully repellent but fascinating quality. Bogosian`s performance, based on his stage play, is spectacularly demented.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
It's a superb, thoughtful drama that doesn't claim to be a documentary and shouldn't be judged as such. [22 Dec 1995, p.B]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Most biopics mistakenly try to take us from cradle to grave and end up skimming the surface. The wisdom of Cobb is that writer-director Ron Shelton (Bull Durham) knows that the close study of a single day can decode a human life.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Frankie & Johnny manages to work as a sudsy romantic picture about big city loneliness despite an awkward performance by Al Pacino in the role of a hash-house dispenser of wisdom.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Both Pacino and Barkin are quite good playing battle-scarred veterans of mature relationships. Just like New Yorkers who lock their doors, these two characters have locked their hearts. This is Pacino's quietest and best performance since The Godfather Part Two. Credit director Harold Becker for helping to keep Pacino from spitting his way through another role.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A fresh and exuberant romantic comedy that is as smart about playground basketball as Bull Durham was about minor league baseball.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
For many, a little of this joking will go a long way; devoted fans, however, will wish for a double-bill. Count me closer to the latter group.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
There's a good movie lurking somewhere in Susan Isaacs' script of her comic murder mystery novel "Compromising Positions" but neither Isaacs nor director Frank Perry has found it. [30 Aug 1985, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
But the bottom line is that The Naked Gun 2 1/2 is very funny about such plastic themes as a Barbara Bush look-alike taking a pratfall at a dinner table. [28 June 1991]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The production is first-rate in all technical ways imaginable, but the villain that Holmes and Watson chase is not worth their intellect or time or ours.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Good movies can take us to faraway places; great movies usually take us inside the human mind. "Jo Jo Dancer" is a great confessional movie.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
In lesser hands, Mortal Thoughts could have been another well-intentioned, star-studded lesson about how women tolerate and rebel against physical abuse. But as directed by Alan Rudolph, the film is more of a nightmare of half-baked schemes hatched by dim-witted characters. [19 Apr 1991, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The point is: When Sweet Dreams' as it is now constructed, is over, we remember and are intrigued more by Charlie Dick than by Patsy Cline, played by Jessica Lange in a performance that comes up short when necessarily compared with Sissy Spacek`s tour de force as Loretta Lynn in ''Coal Miner`s Daughter.''- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
What no plot summary of Darkman can provide is how much director Raimi ("The Evil Dead") brings to the party. In addition to giving us a conflicted hero - more disturbed than Batman - Raimi fills every action sequence and even routine plot scenes with fresh images that reflect his Darkman's rage. [24 Aug. 1990]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Soapdish runs on longer than necessary, and not every scene is as funny as one would like, but it's funny enough to recommend. [31 May 1991, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
Posted Jun 28, 2017 -
- Gene Siskel
A dreadful witches' comedy with the only tolerable moment coming when Bette Midler presents a single song.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
My only major criticism of Cocoon is the ending, which needlessly places the film in familiar extraterrestrial movie territory. Without giving too much away, either most of the characters should have made a different decision or the film should have had courage to jump off into a completely different direction. Special visual effects are wonderful, but the human being is still the greatest special effect of all.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Greenaway is a unique filmmaker in that he layers images upon one another in a single frame and doesn't require dialogue to make his films arresting. [18 Jul 1997]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A wildly overwritten melodrama about the sins of the press. Newman's character is compelling, but Field's reporter is such a lamebrain that we know she would be fired at any major newspaper. [25 Dec 1981]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Guilty by Suspicion isn't a bad movie, but it isn't compelling entertainment either. [15 Mar 1991, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
There are a couple of potentially interesting movies lurking inside Heaven Help Us, a film that, sadly, doesn`t have the guts to push any one of its elements to the hilt. The result is a picture that is sort of a comedy, sort of a romance and sort of a condemnation of parochial schools, all wrapped up in a nostalgia piece about the mid-`60s.- Chicago Tribune
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- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Chuck Norris takes a big leap in his film career with Code of Silence, a solid cops 'n' drug dealers picture filmed last year in Chicago. Norris' big step is that this time he stars in a much more realistic action film, one with a credibility only slightly undone by a few of his martial arts maneuvers at the end.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
It's a good ol' boy version of "Who's Afraid of Virgina Woolf?," but whereas that classic had four characters in direct conflict, "Fool for Love" essentially is a two-character duel to the quick.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
There`s nothing really seriously wrong with the movie, save for the casting of Elwes. Lady Jane simply states and restates its premise, and then it`s over in a predictable manner.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A charming, adult-oriented saga of the famous cartoon character that comes alive only when Popeye finds his baby, Swee'pea. [19 Dec 1980, p.10]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The film doesn't have the pace or the scale of Back to the Future, but it does have the same sweet moment when a child declares his love for his parents because he's seen them in a different light. Joey Cramer is quite winning as David.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A pretty good how-to movie as far as the CIA combating terrorism is concerned and a very good movie in terms of explaining why Harrison Ford is one of the most compelling leading men. [5 June 1992, p.C2]- Chicago Tribune
Posted Jun 29, 2017 -
- Gene Siskel
It's a tribute to the quality of writing, direction and photography in this film that we willingly go along with the story.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The Fourth Protocol is full of seemingly inside information about the techniques of spies. And although the film rarely develops as much sustained tension as the adaptation of Forsyth's "The Day of the Jackal," The Fourth Protocol does have Caine as an anchor of credibility as well as solid performances as Russian agents by Joanna Cassidy and Brosnan, who looks here like he would have made a fine James Bond. [28 Aug 1987, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Silverado is a completely successful physical attempt at reviving the western, but its script would need a complete rewrite for it to become more than just a small step in a full-scale western revival. [10 Jul 1985, p.5]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
There's no development of Turner's character. The laughs in the first reel are the same as those in the last. [15 Apr 1994, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
More explosive laughs from Leslie Nielsen, Pricilla Presley, and friends (George Kennedy, O.J. Simpson) in another madcap police farce that is often so funny you lose track of the terrorist story. Alas, the comic pace is not sustained to the finish, but maybe it couldn't be. [18 Mar 1994, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A thoroughly enjoyable Raiders of the Lost Ark inspired adventure film, set in the present and starring Michael Douglas as an American hustler in Columbia who helps uptight romance novelist Kathleen Turner search for buried treasure. [22 June 1984, p.12]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The main performances are fine; it's the script that's cheap. [09 Mar 1990, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Succeeds, just barely, on the good will of its stars and the sumptuousness of its Western locations.- Chicago Tribune
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- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
This is nothing more than a half-hour Ramar of the Jungle episode, blown up to motion-picture length.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
For a while the actors seem intimidated by the `50s references, but the film eventually develops a musical energy that carries the day. Amy Locane shows promise as the virtuous girl who falls for juvenile delinquent Johnny Depp.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
I think what I like most about Executive Decision is that director Baird constantly tries to top himself. A more experienced director would have ended the film a few crises earlier. But Baird goes for broke in his directing debut, and the result is a most entertaining movie.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The problem is that their heists are poorly executed, and most of the actresses (especially Queen Latifah) wildly overact. [08 Nov 1996, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The best thing I can say about "Prelude to a Kiss" is that it seems fresh, daring its talented performers to play a couple in love. In 1992, that seems very bold. [10 Jul 1992, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A shockingly powerful screed against racism that also manages to be so well performed and directed that it is entertaining as well. [30 October 1998, Friday, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Big laughs, foul language to the point of absurdity and one hilarious, screaming performance atop another combine to make Wise Guys one of the funniest times you will have at the movies this year.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
As entertaining as The Goonies finally becomes--and its last hour is mostly one pleasure after another--it's a shame that Spielberg, writer Chris Columbus and director Richard Donner felt the need to take the low road in terms of language. [7 Jun 1985, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Credit for the triumph of this picture must go to West German director Uli Edel, who works on a canvas as large as Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America. [11 May 1990, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
It's a clever premise that is fully realized with old songs, old TV performers and new ones, too. This could become as big a cult movie as Pee- wee's Big Adventure. It certainly is more entertaining than that film and even more fun than Grease.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Shoulders sloping, not quick on the uptake, utterly agog at the adult world of sex and high-powered business, Reinhold's character is a wonder to behold. And Fred Savage is completely inoffensive as the officious boy-man, which is quite an achievement for a child actor. [11 Mar 1988, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Norma Rae is not a bad film, just one that made me angry for what it might have been. Imagine another, more skillful actor, say Dustin Hoffman or Al Pacino, in Leibman's part; then strip away some of the more broadly drawn scenes, and Norma Rae could have been yet another fine film by director Martin Ritt ("Hud," "Sounder," and "Conrack"). [2 March 1979, p.4-12]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The Natural is a fairy tale from start to finish, full of wildly implausible scenes that win over our emotions because, frankly, that's the way we'd like life to be. Being a baseball fan involves repeatedly experiencing exquisite pain and exquisite joy. Well, there's a lot of both in The Natural.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Robert De Niro's characterization is too jokey, a knockoff of his Rupert Pupkin ("The King of Comedy"), and Irwin Winkler's direction is earnest but lethargic. Jessica Lange does better as a barmaid who wants her own saloon. [23 Oct 1992, p.CN]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
David Mamet's fascinating polemic about sexual abuse in the workplace. A college teacher confers with a coed in his office to talk about her poor work, and all hell breaks lose with accusations. What were the teacher's motives? Does the student become the pawn of a feminist study group? This is the kind of all-too-rare picture that creates conversation on the way home from the movie theater.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A pleasing but overlong version of the Rocky story told through the character of a put-upon young high school student who learns karate from an old Japanese master to vanquish the local school bullies. There is no reason this simple story should run 2 hours and 10 minutes. Such a running time strains the good will generated by a cast full of likable performances. [22 June 1984, p.12]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
John Travolta stars as a Texas construction worker who spends his nights chasing a woman and the cowboy myth in a huge honky-tonk bar. Debra Winger is a standout as the object of Travolta's anger and affections. [11 July 1980, p.8]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The late Mr. Cassavetes directed a film called A Woman Under the Influence. This is a powerful variation on that theme -- a woman tossed every which-way, physically and emotionally. [29 Aug 1997, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The movie could reasonably be rated S for slow because director Alan Parker seems more concerned with style and with hiding the film's big mystery than with pacing. We develop no empathy for the Rourke character, and so watching the movie, as attractive as it is physically, is like riding on a slow conveyor belt. [06 Mar 1987, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
But after introducing these issues, director Jonathan Kaplan ("The Accused") takes the easy, unimaginative way out by turning Liotta's character into a complete lunatic in the manner of the psycho-husband who terrorized Julia Roberts in "Sleeping With the Enemy." How much more interesting "Unlawful Entry" might have been if his character had been played brighter and less easily dispatched than simply with a bullet. [26 June 1992, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A sometimes smart social commentary on Los Angeles characters who seek spiritual salvation when they can't buy every object they want. Judy Davis and Peter Weller play a trendy couple who look like they are from the outtakes of "Short Cuts" and "The Player."- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Director Ken Russell is at his kinky best in this horror story that is adult in its thrills, humor and sexuality. Figuring out who is the worm in the movie is quite easy. But the particulars of Russell's imagination are delightfully outrageous. [11 Nov 1988, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Chicago Tribune
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- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
We could do without the film's leather sex scenes, but otherwise From Beyond is a decent enough low- budget horror film that delivers what audiences have every reason to expect--a funny, horrific grossout. [24 Oct 1986, p.A]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Fans of true-life crime stories should gain special pleasure from Jagged Edge, because the film does succeed in making its ending unpredictable--even though an unresolved ending would have been better.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
A lame comedy about the quirky true story of the 1988 Jamaican bobsled team that competed in the Calgary Winter Olympics...The intelligence level of the comedy insults preteens. [1 Oct 1993, p.C2]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
It's bankrupt in terms of imagination. All he (Romero) does is place his zombies in the basement of a missile silo and have a few crazed military types scream at the zombies and at each other. End of movie. [03 Sept 1985, p.5C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
OK, it's a formula picture, but the ingredients are lively and combined with style by director Beeban Kidron.- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Days of Thunder, the latest Tom Cruise movie, which is a flimsy but nonetheless compelling story of a hot-shot amateur race car driver who wants to make it in the big-time world of championship stock car racing. Good writing by Robert Towne and a host of strong supporting performances complement the on-the-track visuals of director Tony Scott in giving us a sense of the leap of faith that is required by drivers at this level. [29 Jun 1990, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
An exceptional comedy...Car wrecks and blues-related music galore in the best movie ever made in Chicago. [11 July 1980, p.3-8]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The Money Pit, a miserable ripoff of the old Cary Grant comedy Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House, has nothing to do with such nuances of the human experience. Instead, it is an action comedy that regularly throws its actors around and through pieces of plywood, into and out of windows.- Chicago Tribune
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- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
Tony Bill directs a fresh and only occasionally too purple script by Tom Sierchio. [12 Feb 1993, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
But here's the problem: Bruce Campbell's character is a complete stiff, and so is everyone else he meets who isn't a special effect. The result is that we couldn't care less who wins any battle in the movie no matter how inventively photographed. What about a love interest? Embeth Davidtz, as the lady who's waiting, doesn't have a sexy scene in the movie. [19 Feb 1993, p.C]- Chicago Tribune
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- Gene Siskel
The stirring, somewhat too earnest story of a white newspaper editor in racist South Africa who rallied to defend black activist Steve Biko, who was beaten to death in jail in 1977. The film is weighted to the story of the editor (Kevin Kline)-his education about Biko, his subsequent determination to spread the word of the widespread bigotry in South Africa and his adventure story of his family fleeing their native land before they were all jailed for treason. Directed by Richard Attenborough (Gandhi) in the same noble, yet effective manner. [06 Nov 1987, p.41]- Chicago Tribune