Jay Boyar

Without mystery and glamour, Madonna may never make it as a star of regular movies. But for this dish-umentary, she's absolutely perfect. [17 May 1991, p.7]

Revenge isn't sweet. It's crude, ugly, pretentious, repulsive, obnoxious and just about unwatchable.

This may be the most truly disturbing movie to come along since Lynch's Blue Velvet of 1986...But for those who are willing to go the distance with Lynch, the return trip to Twin Peaks is well worth the trouble. [31 Aug 1992]

Backhanded compliments are pretty much the only ones The Boy Who Could Fly deserves. The subjects, here, are childhood and illness: topics that otherwise tough-minded people are inclined to approach with uncharacteristic sentimentality. But though the film is both sappy and cliched, it's not as sappy or cliched as might be expected. All things considered, it could have been a lot worse.

Goldberg's performance does have its moments, especially once she gets past the frenzy of the movie's first half. But like such accomplished fellow cast members as Maggie Smith and Harvey Keitel, Whoopi is wasted in this godawful nunsense. [29 May 1992, p.17]

No, this offbeat story probably wouldn't make it on Matlock. But it does make for a gripping documentary about a particular way of life - and of death. [05 Jun 1993, p.E3]

If there is any reason at all to create a big-budget, 2 1/2-hour film epic about Columbus, it is to bring the explorer and the people around him into focus as human beings. But that's just what director Ridley Scott fails to do. [09 Oct 1992, p.17]

Fresh is easily one of the best of the new ''hood flicks'' because it doesn't neglect the basics. There's a story here - a good one - and characters you can connect with.

Like "The Living Daylights", Licence to Kill definitely has its moments. But also like "The Living Daylights", the new, two-hour-plus picture goes on too long and is encumbered by a needlessly complicated plot.

Mr. Holland's Opus pretty much plays things straight. There are occasional jokes, but, basically, it's a clumsy tear-jerker. The biggest laughs in this one aren't intended. [19 Jan 1996, p.24]

Cry-Baby is hipper and funnier than any Elvis flick ever was, but in many ways it's not so different from Viva Las Vegas or Blue Hawaii.

Mr. Magoo manages to be faithful to cartoon's format without capturing an iota of its charm. [26 Dec 1997, p.24]

Although Moretti's deadpan delivery and his film's relaxed pacing may be too unemphatic for some, those on his wavelength will be delighted. If you like this sort of comedy, treat yourself to Caro Diario. [09 Dec 1994, p.34]

If you're not on the Kids' wavelength, this could quickly become annoying. So, for that matter, could their offbeat sense of humor, which isn't just dark but gleefully dark. But if you like this sort of thing, it's fun hopping around with the troupe as their movie's geography gradually becomes clear. [21 Apr 1996, p.A2]

The actors make the most of Carroll's dialogue, which is often quite witty. [22 Jan 1999, p.17]

Looking around, you realize that only so much is possible in this town. Fortunately, the limited range of possibilities includes a film like Gas, Food, Lodging. [8 Jan 1993]

The triumph of this bleak, unsettling picture is that, no matter how grim it gets, it's far too involving for you to turn away.

Nobody's Fool is funny at times and as cuddly as an old teddy bear. But this movie is being taken far too seriously in some circles.

Not only does Slam strike me as one of the best films about being a writer I've ever seen, it is also the least sentimental coming-of-age movie to come along in years. [06 Nov 1998, p.19]

when Mr. Jones is working, it's surprisingly enjoyable, partly because the cast is so entertaining. [9 Oct 1993]

It's not enough to have the characters act scared and then to throw in a bunch of special effects. It's absolutely essential to creep out the audience, and that's what De Bont neglects to do. [23 July 1999, p.17]

This modern-day vampire movie is, to be sure, no masterpiece, but its suggestive narrative and dreamlike visual style are distinct improvements over those of such recent living-dead flicks as The Lost Boys and Vamp. And if Near Dark doesn't provide a complete answer to the ''necking'' question it raises, well, heck, it's an exploitation film, not an advice column.

What's missing in Point of No Return is basically the same thing that was missing in La Femme Nikita - cleverness. Both are stylish action pictures that would seem a lot more stylish with a few ingenious plot twists. [23 March 1993, p.E1]

The movie's dark themes, unhurried pace and talkiness make it something of a gamble for many children. But older children - especially those who have been asking specific questions about death - may find some nourishment in this garden.

Although FernGully is no Little Mermaid, it moves along nicely, and the ecological message generally stays out of the way of the action. [10 Apr 1992, p.24]

There probably isn't anyone working in movies today who could have done more with this material than writer-director Paul Mazursky does. In Down and Out, he finds humor in those contemporary issues about which most people haven't quite resolved their feelings. This can lead him into dangerous territory: AIDS, anorexia, homosexuality and even "We Are the World" all figure in Down and Out's unusual comedy. [21 Nov 1999, p.60]

White Men Can't Jump isn't a terrific movie, but it's the best showcase Snipes has had so far to demonstrate how hip he can be.

One triumph of The Untouchables is the way its operatic style accommodates larger-than-life performances.

It's a lot of fun to watch - over two hours of thrills, spills, elaborate sets and special effects, all tied together by a pleasingly varied (and lighter than usual) musical score by John Williams.

Director Richard Benjamin and screenwriter Holly Goldberg Sloan use a single comic device throughout the entire movie. In scene after scene, two things are made to happen simultaneously with supposedly hilarious results. [11 Jun 1993, p.22]

The music becomes an aspect of Washington's performance - as does, in a satisfying way, everything else in the film. [03 Aug 1990, p.7]

If some of the ingredients in this "masala" aren't exactly first-rate, it is spicy enough to recommend. [28 Feb 1992, p.20]

As good as the supporting players are, Cadillac Man is Robin Williams' show. He gives the production its pace, its zest and its heart. Without him, this movie is unimaginable. With him, it's consistently entertaining. Williams knows what every successful salesman knows: Sell yourself, and you'll sell the product. [18 May 1990, p.20]

Nunez's determined lack of slickness does have its rewards. For one thing, it allows the atmosphere of the movie's tourism-based town to emerge. And Nunez doesn't go the easy route of using the tackiness of the gift shop and the other locations for cheap laughs: He's more interested in their authenticity. [26 Nov 1993, p.20]

A production that's strong on atmosphere but weak in the plot department. Watching this often-tedious film, you begin to feel as if you've been kidnapped - which is appropriate, anyway, since the story concerns an abduction.

Even if the Blues Brothers routine is a joke that has gone on too long, the music in Blues Brothers 2000 turns at least some of the film into an encore worth hearing. [06 Feb 1998, p.20]

Basically, the film is a vehicle for the talent on board. And though the ship is creaky, it does stay afloat. [02 July 1997, p.E2]

A Shock to the System, a dark comedy with the structure of a thriller, is delightfully hard-edged. [23 Apr 1990, p.C1]

Notwithstanding the hero's Superman similarities, Hercules isn't quite super. But it's strong enough to get the job done. [27 June 1997, p.17]

If the thunder-and-lightning sort of movie that Reiner has come up with doesn't square with the quiet power of the material, some of that power breaks through nevertheless. Still, I couldn't shake the feeling that a smaller-scaled production - possibly even a documentary - would have better served this particular story. [03 Jan 1997, p.17]

Movie could use a little of the tight plotting and clarity that made The Hit so effective. But perhaps the new film's diffuse nature is the price of its ambitiousness. Besides, in many ways My Beautiful Laundrette is a beauty.

Many years ago, Mel Brooks made up his mind about what was funny and he hasn't budged since. [30 July 1993, p.21]

The best monster movie to come slithering out of the muck since Jurassic Park. Species is an exploitation picture while Jurassic Park was mainstream, but the new one is lots of fun if you're in the mood for B-movie thrills. [07 July 1995, p.19]

Profoundly moving. [24 Sept 1993, p.17]

The whole movie, in fact, is one big blooper.

Manhattan Murder Mystery is Allen's lightest, most inconsequential production in ages. It is, you might say, fun while it lasts but not a moment longer. [20 Aug 1993, p.17]

Outbreak is sharp, sometimes-exploitative entertainment that does its job with great efficiency.

His movie is only partly satisfying. [23 Feb 1996]

Memoirs of an Invisible Man had all the right elements to become Chevy Chase's equivalent of Steve Martin's wonderful Roxanne (including the winsome Daryl Hannah), which was also about a form of alienation. But Chase's movie ends up being merely pleasant. [28 Feb 1992, p.17]

Frankie & Johnny is no big deal, but it has plenty of laughs and it's appealingly romantic. The movie is a collection of small, trivial things that add up to something that is, while not important, at least entertaining. [11 Oct 1991, p.22]

Possibly the most disappointing sequel since "Jaws 2". [10 Dec 1993, p.19]

This sequel lacks the zany spark that energized the first movie although the new film is often amusing and its narrative is more streamlined.

How many times can Michael J. Fox ask his fans to sit through junk before they stop being his fans? [1 Oct 1993, p.22]

David Mamet, the Oscar-nominated screenwriter (The Verdict) and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright (Glengarry Glen Ross), is in a pop-elemental mode here, spinning simple, basic myths about manhood for the masses. [26 Sep 1997, p.19]

Gene Hackman, who plays Hambleton, has always been a master of understatement, an actor whose quiet authority forces you to pay close to seem just a little too subdued had the movie not also featured some broader, more obviously lively performances. [14 Feb 1993, p.56]

The thrills and spills are often fun, despite their predictability. Watching this movie doesn't seem so much like white-water rafting as it does like taking a theme-park thrill ride that you've already taken a few dozen times. [30 Sep 1994, p.25]

There's an air of desperation about this movie - a sense that the stars are yearning to do something so patently undemanding that it just can't miss.

But weird as that is - and as insensitive as the studio's decision about the film's release date may be - the big question for most people is whether Unlawful Entry is a good movie. I think it isn't - not because the film exploits the Rodney King incident specifically, but because it is so exploitative generally. [27 June 1992, p.E1]

Movies like Wild Orchid give sex a bad name...The only thing to be said for this embarrassingly inept film is that, in its own schlocky way, it does intermittently manage to get a libidinous buzz going. This is not an especially tough thing for a movie with sex scenes to do, but it's something.

Wild Bill is uncompromising almost to the point of orneriness. Director Hill takes you from one incident to the next, trusting you - or, rather, expecting you - to work out the connections among them. [01 Dec 1995, p.21]

As an evening out: Its many faults notwithstanding, Bonfire does have at least one thing going for it. The movie is a mess, but, like Wise Guys, it's a lively mess.

Where The Last Picture Show was emotionally involving and dramatically episodic, Texasville is sprawling, badly paced and remote. [29 Oct 1990, p.C1]

The most jarring casting mistake (even more jarring than the miscasting of Dangerfield) involves Keith Gordon, who plays Thornton's son. Gordon, who has shown himself to be an intense and quirky actor in such films as Christine and Dressed to Kill, is a smoldering presence in what ought to be a light, comic role. His psycho-killer eyes just don't fit here.

The action in Terminator 2 is edited for maximum suspense, and much of it is mounted on such a grand scale that little in movie history comes close. (Scenes in last summer's Die Hard 2 did, but they lacked the finesse of the new film).

Otomo's movie, set in the usual sci-fi post-apocalyptic world, has all the narrative fascination of a Godzilla movie (not much). The filmmaker does have a vivid visual imagination, but this imagination has more to do with composition and color than with motion (i.e., animation). [01 Jun 1990, p.7]

Egoyan makes you pay dearly by subjecting you to large doses of film-festival-strength ponderousness. [14 Apr 1995, p.19]

The problem isn't that the film is derivative, it's that the film fails at being derivative. In Only the Lonely, we get only the baloney. [28 May 1991, p.D1]

By the end of the film, there's even something vaguely inspirational about our antihero's painful journey through the bowels of his self-created hell.

A Walk in the Clouds does have its problems, but it looks good enough to eat. [11 Aug 1995]

The Russia House is one of the most gorgeous-looking movies currently in release and also, unfortunately, one of the dullest. If it were a travelogue, it would be great. But it isn't. [21 Dec 1990, p.9]

If you tried to remake a cheapie zombie flick with a big budget and an eye on the mass audience, you'd end up with something like Death Becomes Her. This new horror-comedy has to be one of the most heartless mainstream pictures ever made. [31 July 1992, p.17]

The dialogue sounds irritatingly tough-clever, the premise is elaborately contrived, and the pacing is best described by the term "commercial-ready." But Narrow Margin has one element that lifts it above the all-too-obvious limitations of the material. That element is Gene Hackman. [21 Sep 1990, p.8]

The basic problem with Indian Summer: The movie sacrifices credibility in an attempt to get easy laughs. [23 Apr 1993]

No one can know what Jim Henson would have thought of The Muppet Christmas Carol, but I suspect he would have admired the way it fuses Dickens' spirit with his and usually comes up with something fresh and subtly different from either. Taking Scrooge's advice, Brian Henson and his crew keep Christmas in their own way - which, I suppose, is the only way to keep it. [11 Dec 1992, p.C-19]

Compared to Ghost Dad and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Jetsons: The Movie is eminently orbital. [6 July 1990, p.6]

Noisy and (nearly) awful, Noises Off is the sort of movie that gives filmed theater a bad name. Based on Michael Frayn's popular, Tony-nominated play, the screen version is so lame that even without having seen a stage production of the material I can tell that the film doesn't do it justice.

Sayles has created a lively and instructive entertainment, a moral tale that is everything The Natural (1984) should have been.

Prelude to a Kiss is a kind of fairy tale, but it's a fairy tale grounded in human experience. [10 Jul 1992, p.10]

What it all comes down to is that Kaufman gets the hard things right and messes up the simple stuff. If there isn't a Japanese saying for that, there certainly ought to be.

While the movie's visuals are complex and suggestive, the plotting and dialogue are merely congested and muddled. Hill and the writers get caught between political correctness, historical fidelity, dramatic license and simple movie nostalgia. [11 Dec 1993, p.E1]

At a time when a lot of very silly and terribly dangerous things are being said about sexual harassment, Oleanna sheds a remarkable amount of light on one of the major issues facing us as we struggle, both women and men, to play out our new roles. [02 Dec 1994, p.20]

Even by kid standards, young Macaulay can't act. The boy just races through his dialogue, barely pausing long enough to be understood. And when the script requires him to actually show some emotion, he sounds completely mechanical - as if he were merely parroting a line reading that some adult had given him. [20 Nov 1992, p.16]

Despite the film's serious shortcomings, it does have a certain wan charm. And its surprise ending packs a strong punch. [23 Feb 1990, p.4]

The setup isn't exactly what you'd call plausible, but the follow-through is consistent and clever.

With DiCaprio and Thewlis cast as 19th-century French poets Arthur Rimbaud and Paul Verlaine in Total Eclipse, you'd figure that the new film would almost have to be worth watching -if only for the acting. You would be mistaken. [01 Dec 1995, p.23]

The filmmakers should be praised for injecting a stark, sense-quickening drama into the current movie scene. Just say yes to this Rush. [13 Jan 1992, p.B1]

This good and gentle film, directed by Sydney Pollack (Tootsie), might have been fashioned to make the most of Streep's natural qualities of independence, humor and sophistication (bordering on snobbishness) and her exciting suggestion of untrustworthiness.

When the comedy is on this level, all the actors can do is to hang on and hope for the best. [23 Nov 1990, p.7]

Even if your expectations were not especially high, chances are that you would be disappointed by Into the West. [17 Sep 1993, p.21]

The movie blends comedy with drama, and if it isn't the best party you'll ever attend, it does at least manage to sustain a party atmosphere. [20 Sep 1991, p.20]

The love scenes turn out to be the most appealing sequences in this otherwise uninspired movie. [05 Feb 1993, p.17]

Indian Runner, for all its faults, is only half-bad. For an hour or so, the movie may get to you on a scene-by-scene basis. [06 Dec 1991, p.24]

Despite its faults, however, Pacific Heights does the most important thing that any thriller can do. Whether you're a landlord or a tenant, it'll get you crazy. [28 Sept 1990, p.7]

With Heavenly Creatures, we're always on the outside looking in. And if that view is far from boring, it lacks some of the high drama that a more inside perspective might have offered. [23 Dec 1994, p.26]

It's a fairly intriguing (and, surprisingly non-exploitative) premise, but director/co-writer Ernest R. Dickerson is lost when it comes to devising situations that would suggest what goes on inside his characters' heads. These people are all exactly what they appear to be on the surface, which isn't very involving. [17 Jan 1992, p.20]

Throughout the movie, there are occasional "joke" lines, most of which are pretty lame but at least they establish that this is all intended as comedy. For the most part, however, the humor depends upon the audience's finding the movie's repulsiveness funny.

I must admit that, all things considered, it's not bad. In fact, I liked it almost as much as the first one, which I thought was vaguely enjoyable, if somewhat too long. [23 Aug 1996, p.17]

Club Paradise isn't particularly offensive, but it isn't especially funny, either. And all that's holding it together is Williams' amiable performance and the music, most of which was written by Cliff, who also performs it.