Hal Lipper

Envisioned as a surrealistic painting come to life, it is a delight to behold, yet it fails miserably as a compelling piece of storytelling. It is a listless, largely vapid tale, even though it has been revised over a dozen years by writer-director Barry Levinson. [18 Dec 1992, p.21]

Hiding Out is a hip movie. Hip but slow. It's an adult comedy hiding in an adolescent concept, burdened by humor that can be very knowing or nauseatingly sophomoric. [06 Nov 1987, p.3D]

Rather than embellish the original movie, the filmmakers have merely strived to re-create it. [22 Mar 1991, p.6]

Three elements rescue Three Men and a Baby from its inherent shallowness: its casting, pacing and its infant. Nimoy capitalizes on parental instincts without being cloying or cute, so after viewing Three Men and a Baby's tender moments, it's practically impossible to dismiss the movie as mere fluff. [27 Nov 1987, p.7]

Cher rips through this material, dragging the audience behind her. It's because of her that Suspect is so intoxicating and that the lapses in Roth's script are practically forgotten in the excitement. [23 Oct 1987, p.1D]

It's a scathing, somewhat setbound movie about greed, manipulation and the depths to which some people sink to survive. It's a movie that a lot of Americans can identify with. That's what makes it so painful to endure. [02 Oct 1992, p.9]

This tender tale of two sisters coping with their free-spirited mother in innocent 1963 is just too cute. It needs some chinks in its gossamer-glazed armor. [14 Dec 1990, p.12]

Dafoe is every bit as commanding as he was in Platoon or The Last Temptation of Christ. But the essence of this movie is as difficult to grasp as its title, White Sands. [24 Apr 1992, p.9]

Lean on Me is the type of cloying, crowd-pleasing drama you can't help but like - a little bit - even if its situations are contrived and its direction is stilted.

Writer-director Luis Valdez's movie is an example of just how tedious a bio-pic can be. [24 July 1987, p.3D]

Director John G. Avildsen and screenwriters Tim Kazurinsky and Denise DeClue do an amiable job balancing humor and pathos while investigating the ultimate nightmare of every sexually active unmarried adolescent. [16 Jan 1988, p.1D]

Avalon is a crowning effort by Levinson. He could stop making movies today and be satisfied with his Baltimore trilogy. [19 Oct 1990, p.6]

Miraculously, Chances Are has some engaging moments despite its saccharine script and Emile Ardolino's (Dirty Dancing) sluggish direction. [10 March 1989, p.10]

Overboard is predictable, yet charming. Russell exudes a natural earthiness that lends itself to this type of material. Hawn plays gamely along. While Overboard recalls director Marshall's (Nothing in Common) sitcom days, the movie is shot with the sort of graininess that can never be mistaken for television. It could look a lot better. [18 Dec 1987, p.7]

Reynolds can't sustain the movie's pacing, nor can he blend the disparate elements of this sweeping epic. Yet, there are touches that make Robin Hood enormously entertaining. The battles with flaming arrows, catapults and a forest city of catwalks and tree houses under siege are masterfully recorded. [14 June 1991, p.6]

Like its predecessors, A Dry White Season is too reserved to effectively depict the hell of South Africa. Its most powerful moments occur in the courtroom, in jail cells and morgues filled with dead black children when its starched white protagonist is safely off-screen. [06 Oct 1989, p.6]

As if these weren't enough subplots to juggle, screenwriter McPherson revives the romance between boat captain Steve Guttenberg and Antarean Tawnee Welch. This sort of interspecies romance presumably violates Florida law and certainly counters any attempts at efficient storytelling. [23 Nov 1988, p.1D]

No Man's Land takes the showroom approach. It doesn't get its hands dirty. It embellishes what you'd see if you stood in the waiting room of a Porsche dealership and peered into the service bay. A little more grease is in order. [23 Oct 1987, p.3D]

The Believers is the type of movie that generates shocks more successfully than it tells a story. [10 Jun 1987, p.1D]

Although The Bear is as handsome as Quest for Fire - the story of an Ice Age tribe moving up the evolutionary ladder - it is also as turgid. [27 Oct 1989, p.12]

While The Stepfather doesn't transcend the limitations of most slice-and-dice movies, it comes close. And has fun trying.

It waffles. In the end, it emerges a distinctly pro-soldier, possibly anti-war movie that supports America's overseas doctrine, whether it be right or wrong. One shudders to think what they might create if asked to portray the United States' current role in Central America. Their film certainly wouldn't dare make a statement, bother to educate or entertain. And most importantly, it wouldn't take sides. [29 Aug 1987, p.1D]

The material fails the execution and performances. [13 Jan 1989, p.7]

Eastwood is absolutely the wrong actor to play Huston, called John Wilson in White Hunter, Black Heart. Eastwood is tense and tightly coiled, while Huston was gleefully bombastic. [12 Oct 1990, p.7]

For all its shortcomings and long speeches, The Presidio is to be credited for trying to reach beyond formula. Hyams and screenwriter Ferguson (Highlander, Beverly Hills Cop II) have aspired to make more than a mismatched buddy movie. But the task has proved too intricate for them to achieve. [10 June 1988, p.6]

Whatever raffish charm Reeves and Swayze exhibit is lost in the superficial gloss of Iliff's screenplay and Bigelow's direction. [12 July 1991, p.7]

Lifeboat is one of Alfred Hitchcock's weakest films, yet it remains a notable experiment for its ability to maintain a sense of action despite its cramped setting. [9 March 1990, p.10]

Had the writing matched their performances, Fried Green Tomatoes would be this year's Driving Miss Daisy. As it is, it's an absorbing period mystery and a hapless social comedy. Half of it works. [24 Jan 1992, p.28

What undercuts Deep Cover is its convoluted, talky and ultimately predictable screenplay written by Henry Bean and Michael Tolkin. [15 Apr 1992, p.1D]

You're safe this Christmas. There are no more obnoxious, senile or terminally stupid relatives to go around. Clark Griswold has invited them all to his house. Know what? They're no more fun to watch at his place than they are at yours...This sort of predictable, lowest-common-denominator humor is entertaining to a degree. It fulfills expectations. [1 Dec 1989, p.7]

The Rookie is the most brain dead action-thriller Eastwood has ever directed or starred in. It plays well as a comedy, but that isn't its intent. [07 Dec 1990, p.6]

Like Top Secret and other less inspired efforts made by Zucker, brother Jerry Zucker and pal Jim Abrahams, The Naked Gun 2 is consistently amusing without being outright funny. [28 June 1991, p.6]

Like most of Hill's movies, Johnny Handsome plays like an outline: a good idea in need of development. [29 Sep 1989, p.7]

A stylish though formulaic whodunit that swathes old cliches in new wrapping. [6 Nov 1992, p.6]

Taking Care of Business is the funniest movie Charles Grodin, Jim Belushi and director Arthur Hiller have made in years. [17 Aug 1990]

While The Hidden never manages to meld Aliens with Blue Velvet - that appears to be Hunt's intention. It has a kinky charm that fuels it full throttle throughout. [30 Oct 1987, p.5D]

Blue Steel is a horror movie masquerading as a cop thriller. It's a compelling, preposterous mixture of Fatal Attraction and Halloween, about a rookie cop who becomes romantically involved with a psycho killer. [16 Mar 1990, p.7]

Audiences get what they pay for: suspense, chills and a bloody resolution as Sleeping with the Enemy charts its predictable course with Martin tracking Laura to small-town Iowa where she's being courted by a patient, polite, fuzzy-bearded drama teacher named Ben. But the picture doesn't delve deeply enough into the problem of spouse abuse. [08 Feb 1991, p.7]

A half-baked FBI drama in the 48 HRS.-Lethal Weapon buddy-buddy mode. [12 Feb 1988, p.7]

Pink Cadillac is the most amiable and mindless Eastwood comedy in years. That it's even marginally entertaining is a substantial feat, given John Eskow's predictable script, which has more pings than the Caddy's engine. [30 May 1989, p.1D]

Basic Instinct has the action and gore of Verhoeven's Total Recall and the cool sheen of his equally bloody RoboCop. Verhoeven can deliver style in spades, but Eszterhas' jumble of confusing plot twists and conventional movie cliches proves fatal. [20 Mar 1992, p.29]

Memphis Belle is the most superficial, jingoistic, stereotyped World War II movie in years. [12 Oct 1990, p.6]

Caton-Jones' North Sea sensibilities seem askew for Doc Hollywood. He's operating from movie memories, and movies rarely have been kind to Southerners. With Doc Hollywood, which already is exaggerated, he overplays its hand. [02 Aug 1991, p.19]

Scott retains his sense of mood and tension. Despite the script's predictable and flawed nature, he elevates Someone To Watch Over Me to the point that it emerges as a surprisingly satisfying piece of filmed entertainment. [9 Oct 1987, p.3D]

It's all art direction and no content. There's nothing for Morticia and Gomez to do. [22 Nov 1991, p.7]

Scene by scene, Batman Returns is more outrageous, inventive and fun than the original Batman. Yet, by its apocalyptic ending, Batman Returns is in danger of collapsing under its own weight. [19 June 1992, p.22]

It defies convention. It breaks taboos. It isn't a pleasant experience, but it is challenging. [21 June 1991, p.7]

Always is meant to be a fantasy. But it is far too sappy to ignite the imagination. [22 Dec. 1989, p.6]

A solid, ultimately uplifting comedy that questions what we require of our heroes and our popular notions of bravery. [02 Oct 1992, p.5]

The problem is this sporadically funny farce takes 40 minutes to snap into gear and then it struggles to maintain momentum. [12 June 1992, p.5]

Toy Soldiers is a lame-brained action-adventure casting a quintet of Tiger Beat heartthrobs as prep school pranksters battling Colombian narco-terrorists who overrun their alma mater. [26 Apr 1991, p.12]

While the first half of The Rescuers Down Under is breathtakingly magnificent, the second half is slower than a sloth. [16 Nov 1990, p.7]

Action director John Badham has made the ultimate smash-and-crash chase movie. It's practically brain dead. It uses a hackneyed premise to string together as many stunts as possible, all the while borrowing from Badham's, Gibson's and Hawn's movies. [18 May 1990, p.7]

Planes, Trains and Automobiles puts on the miles without many smiles. The journey hardly seems worth the trouble. [27 Nov 1987, p.6]

As hollow as it is hip. [5 Feb 1988, p.8]

Newman is terse and quietly assured as Groves. He gives Fat Man and Little Boy its rigid backbone, its sense of purpose. Regrettably, he spends a fair amount of time off screen and away from Los Alamos. [20 Oct 1989, p.6]

Single White Female is simply Fatal Attraction or Final Analysis in a new locale. Superbly crafted, yet unremittingly violent, it's the cinematic equivalent of being bludgeoned for two hours. [14 Aug 1992, p.21]

The movie is too unwieldy and densely packed. The superb performances by Snipes, Sciorra, McKee, Turturro and Jackson can't overcome its sprawling nature. [7 June 1991, p.6]

This is a fun picture, even if it's overly sentimental and has the feeling of an extended Amazing Stories segment. Director Dear is a master Spielbergian craftsman. Now, all he has to do is demonstrate some originality to establish himself as a quality film maker. [5 June 1987, p.1D]

Switch is a movie in search of an ending, much like Edwards' other lesser comedies. It covers an incredible amount of ground without getting anywhere. [10 May 1991, p.6]

Foley's screenplay and direction constantly require viewers to re-evaluate the trio and their relationship with one another. This works as long as the dialogue is tolerable, which isn't long enough. [07 Sep 1990, p.6]

It is a fairly conventional cartoonish farce, like his 1986 horse racing comedy A Fine Mess. And despite Blind Date's emphasis on excess, its final cut seems uncommonly restrained. [27 Mar 1987, p.4D]

Ironweed doesn't work despite the stellar performances of Nicholson as former baseball pro Francis Phelan and Meryl Streep as his pal, Helen Archer, the former musician whose booze-ravaged voice still bears the air of cultivation. [12 Feb 1988, p.5]

My Girl isn't a must-see, it isn't as lyrical or as deeply moving as it should be, but it is a rare family film. It addresses serious subjects with honesty and earnestness. And it has a heroine worth crying for. [29 Nov 1991, p.5]

Withnail and I is one of those pictures that manages to be consistently amusing and grating at the same time. It stirs some good memories while pointing to the aimlessness of an era. [2 Oct 1987, p.5D]

It's unfortunate a picture as lovingly envisioned and beautifully rendered as Hope and Glory has to struggle to find a resolution. [25 Dec 1987, p.7]

Mortal Thoughts is limited both by its scope and its structure, a relentlessly long Q&A session that relates what happened through a series of flashbacks. It grows tedious at first, then becomes frustrating as the women bungle their alibis and the truth is revealed. [19 Apr 1991, p.6]

While the movie's technical aspects are first-rate and Stallone manages more than a monosyllabic performance, Over the Top can't overcome its sense of deja vu or provide any reason for Hawk's suitability as a parent. [14 Feb 1987, p.5B]

Director Alan J. Pakula generates a degree of suspense, even though the story's implausibilities and overall stupidity of Kline's and Mastrantonio's characters are stupefying. Everyone in this movie is a prig, including a frail E.K. Marshall as Richard's defense attorney who doesn't believe his client's innocence and Forest Whitaker as a private eye who lets Richard do the investigating. [16 Oct 1992, p.5]

What ultimately is so distressing about The Last Boy Scout is that, despite its loathsome attitude, it is an outstanding action thriller. It sets its sights a hair above the gutter and hits bullseye every time. [13 Dec 1991, p.5]

It never digs very deep. But it's palatable and well-meaning. It's a Disneyland version of a big-issue movie. Nothing great. But we could do worse. [07 Feb 1992, p.7]

Her Alibi isn't a tremendous movie. But it's pleasant and entertaining in a corny, old-fashioned way. [3 Feb 1989, p.10]

Silver wrote The Hand that Rocks the Cradle as a graduate thesis at the University of Southern California film school, and the movie's derivative nature shows it. The Hand that Rocks the Cradle has the viciousness of The Stepfather. DeMornay's live-in nursemaid recalls Michael Keaton's malicious tenant in Pacific Heights. The entire picture stinks of Fatal Attraction, a movie that begins as an ethical exploration and ends as a mad slasher movie. [10 Jan 1992, p.5]

Surprisingly, though, Army of Darkness is slowest during its extended special effects sequences and best when human low-lifes are groveling in the squalor of the 13th century. [19 Feb 1993, p.8]

Deceptions drive A Kiss Before Dying. Too bad they're too implausible to impart any sense of believability in this bloody fantasy. [26 Apr 1991, p.10]

Miami Blues is reminiscent of Demme's Married to the Mob and Something Wild. It has a superb sense of place. It savages Middle American tackiness. Regrettably, Miami Blues is even more mainstream and less developed than Married to the Mob. Its characters' lapses of logic and the holes in Armitage's script require a forgiving audience. The blood-letting at its conclusion necessitates a strong stomach. [20 Apr 1990, p.19]

It's a stunning, dazzling motion picture that somehow, almost unaccountably, has the magnetism of a slab of corned beef. [20 May 1988, p.6]

Chevy Chase only knows how to play Chevy Chase. Unless he jettisons his smug routine and learns to act, he will always be his and his movies' biggest liability. [17 March 1989, p.6]

More than a little has been lost in the translation. Screenwriters Richard Maxwell and A.R. Simoun have created a horrific Indiana Jones adventure with Davis being portrayed by Bill Pullman, an actor who does a poor imitation of Michael Douglas doing a poor imitation of Harrison Ford.[6 Feb 1988, p.2D]

Even Pee-wee seems subdued. The man-child whose suit cuffs are intimate with his ankles and elbows is growing up. Kids may still adore him. But adults will find his persona worn at the edges. [23 Jul 1988, p.1D]

Powaqqatsi is a melange of images and music, so beautiful and mesmerizing that it's completely possible to overlook Reggio's message. [09 Jul 1988, p.1D]

Despite sharp humor and bravura performances - including a cameo by Regis Philbin as the epitome of Harry's dream of success - Night and the City is not a pleasant experience. While anything less would betray its bracing dose of true grit, Night and the City is so downbeat that it ultimately seems like an exercise in self-flagellatio.

Belushi is the Clydesdale of formulaic comedies. He performs as expected with little artistic invention. He carries Mr. Destiny amiably, although a more resourceful actor might have provided the additional gloss this formulaic comedy so sorely needs. [12 Oct 1990, p.12]

While there isn't much mystery to this mystery - only a handful of suspects are interviewed - there is a compelling sense of helplessness underscoring the lives of all its characters. In that sense, Sea of Love is a gender bender Looking for Mr. Goodbar, a disturbing allegory for the '80s when the fear of AIDS and sexual violence only deters a percentage of the singles population from making its appointed meat-market rounds. [15 Sep 1989, p.6]

Co-writer and director Barry Primus knows his characters well, but his scenarios are stilted and pretentious. So is Landisman's screenplay, which everyone wants to change.

The Power of One emerges as a broadly painted piece of rhetoric. It means well and has an undeniable dramatic pull, but its relegation of blacks to the sidelines and its creation of a white savior are unforgivable. [10 Apr 1992, p.10]

With its clunky, overworked script (credited to a non-existent Joseph Howard) and Emile Ardolino's predictable direction, Sister Act is a spry but witless comedy aimed at mainstream audiences. [29 May 1992, p.6]

Goldberg has honorable intentions. But like Tammy Faye's make-up, it's impossible to see beneath his movie's overwrought facade. [27 Oct 1989, p.7]

If only lead actors Johnny Depp and Amy Locane could sustain the perverse pleasures Waters envisions. [6 Apr 1990, p.7]

FernGully...The Last Rainforest is surprisingly fun for being the first politically correct, environmentally conscious full-length animated film. [10 Apr 1992, p.5]

Jerry Lee Lewis' rise and repeated falls from grace are the makings of a great movie waiting to happen. Great Balls of Fire isn't that movie. [30 June 1989, p.18]

Mo' Better Blues is not only about artistry unfulfilled. It is artistry unfulfilled. It is perfection without a meaningful plot. It lopes along, pleasantly, never reaching fruition. [03 Aug 1990, p.18]

At the film's beginning, each of these characters seems hopelessly dated and repressed. It's as if they walked out of a 1940s romance. Yet that's the beauty of Only the Lonely. Innocence has its virtues, as Columbus' bittersweet comedy demonstrates. [24 May 1991, p.14]

Hook is so enormous, so cumbersome, that it resembles a complex machine inching its way across the resplendent three-moon Neverland landscape. It's a brilliant technical achievement, but it hasn't much of a soul. [11 Dec. 1991, p.3D]

Cadillac Man's beginning and ending are superb. (The hearse sequence is classic.) But the movie, like most of the salesmen's waists, sags heavily at its midpoint. [18 May 1990, p.6]

Indeed, there's so much cutting between Hackman on the ground and Glover in the sky, the overwhelming feeling at the end of Bat 21 is relief that the viewer was able to get through the ordeal without a dose of Dramamine. [21 Oct 1988, p.6]

Its logic is so simple, its emotion is so heartfelt, its editing and composition are so fluid, it seems to be a perfectly-crafted contemporary drama. Yet, in retrospect, it's a difficult movie to stomach. The problem with Brothers' script is that he and Yates paint characters with unbelievably broad strokes. [06 Oct 1989, p.12]

Romances such as Frankie's and Johnny's work better in the artificial environment of the stage than the "real" world of movies. The couple's bond seems phony from the start. [11 Oct 1991, p.7]