Kevin Thomas

It's polished without being slick; well-paced and graceful and brought alive by stellar performances led by Jaffrey.

Because its gimmick lays bare the evils of racism so easily, the movie works for a while, but it becomes so predictable that it runs out of gas long before the end. [13 Oct 1985, p.5]

It is a slack and preachy business that never comes to grips with its underlying theme of homophobia.

A ruggedly beautiful landscape of desert and sea provides a dramatic setting for a psychological drama told with the utmost rigor--and unabashed eroticism.

The problem is that, even though a romance develops, Buddy himself changes almost not at all, which means the film leaves a sour aftertaste. [15 June 1986, p.SUN-6]

This stunning, unjustly neglected 1981 release unfolds much like a Ross MacDonald Lew Archer mystery as it becomes a singularly devastating indictment of the plight of the neglected Vietnam veteran. [13 March 1988, p.2]

Among the most sophisticated, fully realized and satisfying films of the year.

Lively, incisive and comprehensive documentary.

More than three decades later, Jodorowsky’s vision of chaos has acquired a powerful aura of prophecy.

Le Samourai is a film of few words but many vivid images and, above all, impeccable style. [09 Jul 1998, p.F18]

Dazzling visually but is flattened by corny dialogue better suited to the 1936 "Flash Gordon" serial, a needlessly hard to follow plot and heavy-handed exposition clotted with pseudo-scientific mumbo jumbo.

Moves way past the predictable into the shocking. Indeed, the film is so expertly structured and paced that its denouement knocks you off your feet.

Remains a timeless, major work of a master.

Towering over one and all, not surprisingly, is Finney as the increasingly tormented but brave Alfie. [22 Dec 1994]

In not taking itself too seriously New Suit scores more points than some pictures that take a scathing approach.

Lively and often comical.

Even as you feel grateful to be able to laugh off this film, you realize that its humor is really only inuring you to a nonstop series of stabbings, slashings, impalings, stranglings and yet other means of killing. Be warned: For all its laughs, Friday the 13th -- A New Beginning (rightly rated R) is just one more nauseating sick joke. [25 March 1985, p.C6]

Tony Burrough's vast Toy Workshop and Elf Village at the North Pole is the film's strongest asset. The workshop is a dazzling and accurate display of the Art Nouveau style in sinuous full flower.

Bagdad Cafe, which Adlon wrote with his wife, Eleonore, and Christopher Doherty, is a miracle of timing and control for all its aura of zany, off-the-cuff spontaneity. It is the work of a director who has such a clear idea of what he wants and where he's going that he can take his time to build up every joke for the maximum payoff.

An emotion-charged tale that's also an edgy commentary on women's destinies and how they're still so largely affected by men.

Instead of a genre movie-industry calling card, Roy has made a venturesome and effective film.

As splendid as John Wayne is in these films, the elegiac She Wore a Yellow Ribbon provides him with one of his finest roles. [19 May 1996, p.72]

Certainly sexy, entertaining and provocative -- in several senses of the word -- but it's also tiresome as only a French film can be when everyone in it has only sex and amour on his or her mind and is deadly serious about both.

A likably thoughtful romantic comedy.

Even though Drool rambles and ultimately slides into overly obvious make-believe, Kissam emerges as a fearless risk-taker of promise.

A fresh examination of the plight of the Tibetans still craving independence after a half century of either homeland misery or increasingly long exile.

More than anything, The Grudge suggests that it's time for Shimizu to move on.

In the Mouth of Madness is a thinking person's horror picture that dares to be as cerebral as it is visceral.

These formidable actresses [Redgrave and Daly], abetted by a persuasive Connick, and by Hurt as the most genteel and benevolent of ghosts, set a high standard for a splendid ensemble cast.

Breathtaking reverie worthy of Fellini.

Would that all love stories were as sophisticated and amusing as the satisfying Charlotte Sometimes.

Crewson is a game, experienced actress but hasn't sufficient star charisma to lift Suddenly Naked out of the doldrums.

Philadelphia filmmaker Cheryl Dunye has such a light, easy touch both in front and in back of the camera that you're in danger of not noticing how skillful a craftsman she really is or how deftly she raises serious issues of race and sexual orientation in The Watermelon Woman.

A bittersweet, wryly amusing "dramatic fiction"

There's a strong elliptical quality to Kiarostami's style, which underlines the filmmaker's ability to maintain focus with considerable emotional force and depth and with great precision. [27 March 1998, p.14F]

Unfortunately, Jodorowsky is no Bunuel -- nor a Leone, for that matter -- and El Topo’s bloody odyssey, involving endless heavily symbolic encounters with the bizarre and fantastic, expresses the eternal tug of war between the savage and the spiritual in human nature on the most obvious level and in the most ponderous fashion.

May be too heady for some tastes but can stir you deeply, if you're open to it.

Sweet-natured but hopelessly confused. [3 March 1989, p.6-10]

Hill, who brings considerably less humor to his film than Kurosawa did his, unfortunately hasn't anything new to add that makes it worth sitting through his blood baths, as skillfully staged as they are. [20 Sep 1996, p.F10]

The very title suggests that this compelling and provocative film is going to be different from other Holocaust documentaries.

Overly preachy and maudlin but is saved by its obvious sincerity and forthright sense of purpose, and further enhanced by its rich color cinematography.

Boiling Point is taut and crisp, and when it’s required, Harris handles violence with swift dispatch rather than the large-scale fireworks that have become de rigueur.

[An] inept, incoherent and charmless would-be romantic comedy-thriller.

Has a seductive easiness (which may not be for everyone, but it works), a laid-back yet ever-so-slightly portentous score and a wonderful sense of place.

In working with Lynne Adams' script, Shalhoub, the esteemed star of the current USA series "Monk," gives his cast the inspiration and confidence to express the characters' many facets and seeming contradictions.

Romero easily commands an enormous cast, a plethora of action sequences and a cornucopia of special effects -- some of them very gory -- and creates one darkly dazzling image after another that allows Land of the Dead to emerge without any nudging whatsoever as a bleakly humorous, hard-charging allegory.

Smartly directed by Jim Gillespie from a script by various hands, Venom is from Dimension Films and follows its stylish, energetic and darkly amusing horror movie tradition.

Locale is crucial here, and Monte Carlo, Athens and Istanbul are a wonderful trio of cities for glamorous romance, intrigue and danger--and they could not seem more richly atmospheric with Dreujou's lush camerawork.

Can never rise above the melodrama of a past era, despite a splendid, impassioned portrayal by Willem Dafoe and an affecting one by Luo Yan.

What makes the famous 1949 Raoul Walsh gangster film White Heat a classic is its crackling tension that derives from Walsh's breakneck pace and the developing psychological complexity of James Cagney's Cody Jarrett. [21 Oct 1990, p.6]

A harrowing and wrenching coming-of-age story.

An ambitious and intelligent film probing that chronic contemporary phenomenon, the seemingly senseless crime, but it is ultimately unsatisfying for all its efforts and various pluses.

In short, Vlad could have used a substantial transfusion of wit and energy, with a dash of dark humor.

Jakubowicz has aptly said of his film that "the beauty of Secuestro Express is how localized it is. The more local it becomes, the more universal it becomes." The truth of his remark resonates throughout this fast and furious film.

A heady yet disciplined work, a dazzling fable of love, destiny and redemption.

Although Head Over Heels moves swiftly, has an appealing cast and a serviceably diverting plot, it is nevertheless hard to fall head over heels over it.

Since the film is based on the Atari video game of the same name, it also has much to appeal to headbangers: fast pace, lots of gadgets, monsters, explosive special effects, plenty of inscrutable plot twists and turns.

Successfully brings to the big screen those no-brainer nerds who have brought laughter to living rooms around the world for nearly four years.

A hard-charging horror movie with a clever gay twist.

Clever and diverting dark comedy.

The effect is dazzlingly beautiful and surreal.

A fantasy, a fairy tale, but its characters and the emotions they elicit become painfully real.

As stylish as it is grisly, Jeepers Creepers has cult film written all over it, and it's not for nothing that Francis Ford Coppola has been a staunch Victor Salva mentor.

A decently crafted, standard Mafia blood bath with a few new wrinkles and an aura of authenticity.

Moving and invaluable.

Walter Hill's Extreme Prejudice is as red-hot as a Saturday-night special, an ultra-violent action-adventure fantasy so macho that it verges on parody--on purpose. Sensational rather than serious, it is an exploitation picture but one with class: it has style, a point to make that happens to be highly topical and, thankfully, a dry, saving sense of humor.

Smile is like a dose of cod liver oil: It may be good for you, but it's no fun.

She has something to say to everyone, and one can only hope that she is preaching to more than her choir of devoted fans.

Not ultimately original enough to sustain its many horrific images.

A sweet-natured Iranian film of considerable charm and humor that might have been more enjoyable had its writer-director-star, Hamid Jebelli, been a tad less self-indulgent in telling his slender tale.