John Hartl

What began as a feature-length toy commercial instantly disintegrates into MTV fodder. [22 Mar 1991, p.24]

Begun by screenwriter Mark Steven Johnson (Grumpy Old Men), Jack Frost ended up taking four credited writers to finish - and still it's a derivative mess. [11 Dec 1998]

The odd couple here is just as charmless, and their adventures are equally unfunny. When the filmmakers try to get sentimental about the relationship, you'll either be rolling your eyes or thinking about heading for the exit.

"We're in Twin Peaks here," says the only surviving teenager in town. It's a lame attempt to create class by association. Unlike David Lynch's kinky series, the creators of Freddy's Dead couldn't care less about the movie's interchangeable characters. The actors are often hard to tell apart; some are just worse than others. [14 Sept 1991, p.C5]

A supernatural thriller that would like to be the new Exorcist, this hapless film has a promising villain and a sympathetic hero, but their confrontations are mostly anti-climactic. [02 Sep 1995, p.F3]

Time-travel movies don't come much dopier than Freejack. [18 Jan 1982, p.C5]

Much of the time, for all the leering effort she puts into portraying this demonic tease, Barrymore just seems to be playing dress-up. She also needs a more responsive co-star than Gilbert, who gives a one-note performance in the part that should be at the story's center. [29 May 1992, p.18]

It's no more obnoxious than the original, and in several ways it's more interesting. [08 Apr 1995, p.C7]

Toy Story approached toy frenzy from the toys' point of view while craftily exploring the media-driven delusions of that Turbo Man-like doll, Buzz Lightyear. Jingle All the Way had that kind of potential, but somewhere along the way the filmmakers lost all perspective. [22 Nov 1996, p.F7]

Cute and daffy enough to make your molars ache, Bakery in Brooklyn is the kind of romantic comedy that lacks all conviction.

Child's Play 2 is perfunctory, disagreeable and patience-trying. [09 Nov 1990, p.24]

Tokyo Decadence includes what may be the only near-death experience ever played for laughs in a movie. [15 Oct 1993, p.D26]

Unfortunately, the recycled plot is still the driving force here, and the movie becomes increasingly frantic trying to accommodate it. In the end, Raffill can't bring this dummy to life, but he does try.

There's only so much a director can do to dress up a sequel as ill-conceived and impoverished as this one. [30 Aug 1991, p.24]

The best that can be said of this campy but witless time-travel thriller is that it's acted with some authority. [12 Jan 1991, p.C7]

Unfortunately, he's working from a cliche-choked, insensitive script, written by Gary Goldman (``Big Trouble in Little China'') and Chuck Pfaffer (``Dark Man''), that makes a point of stirring up old prejudices.

The cast of "Ladybugs" is good-natured enough, but Dangerfield is reduced to reading lame one-liners about "drag races" as his future stepson hops in and out of a dress. Brandis is never allowed to have much fun with the complications that result from pretending to be a girl, and his best friend (Vinessa Shaw) barely seems to notice when he reveals that he's been deceiving her. What should have been a wild door-slamming farce never really gets started. already are turning from brown. [28 March 1992, p.C5]

Unfortunately, everyone's trying too hard to recapture the original's wry tone, and Culkin lacks the gawky, impish charm that Billingsley brought to Shepherd's childhood alter ego. [06 Jul 1995, p.E1]

The dumbest, goriest bone-cruncher of the season: an unnecessary and Arnold-less sequel to the Schwarzenegger science-fiction hit of three years ago. [21 Nov 1990, p.C3]

Unfortunately, Craven's constant emphasis on cannibalism, child abuse and incest adds up to more unpleasantness than thrills. [02 Nov 1991, p.C3]

Cynical, over-hyped and enthusiastically brainless, Bird on a Wire demonstrates the programmed, soul-less bankruptcy of the Hollywood hit-making system in the early 1990s. [18 May 1990, p.28]

Striking Distance wants to be a whodunit, a buddy movie, a serial-killer thriller, a romantic drama, a story about one honest cop fighting a corrupt department - and the ultimate car-and-boat chase movie. It is all of these, and so much less. [17 Sept 1993, p.D16]

The script earns a few points for trying to deal with the puzzles inherent in time-travel stories, and it's not surprising that the author is John Varley, who has won both the Hugo and Nebula awards for his science-fiction novels. But he needed a more inspired director than the plodding Michael Anderson. [15 Mar 1990, p.D5]

This installment is essentially the same mix as before, with only a better-than-average cast to recommend it. [30 Sept 1995, p.F7]

Stuffed with touristy images but not enough dramatic substance to make any of them count.

Were expectations running too high for this "erotic thriller" from legendary director Richard Rush, who hasn't completed a movie in 14 years? Or is it really the full-blown fiasco it appears to be?

The Last Boy Scout is no worse than Lethal Weapon, and it's slightly more tolerable than Hudson Hawk. The action scenes deliver, the storyline is efficiently handled (if utterly unoriginal), Wayans is an appealing foil, and Willis' wiseacre personality fits the character he's playing. [13 Dec 1991, p.35]

The sad fact is, this 90-minutecharade - like almost every movie ever made that features "Silent Night" on the soundtrack - will be showing up on late-night television every Christmas Eve into the next century. Talk about your nightmares before Christmas. [5 Nov 1993, p.D32]