Kevin Thomas

Shyer and Meyers... are endlessly inventive. They're not afraid to be sophisticated and screwballish in the best '30s tradition, and they know just how far to exaggerate for laughs without leaving touch with reality entirely or destroying sentiment. The humor in Baby Boom is sharp without being heartless.

An exhilarating celebration of the possibilities of love and friendship, and Lucía, Félix and Adrián could not be more likable.

Richly inspiring and informative documentary.

Exceptionally well-made family entertainment, this 3 Ninjas is constantly inventive, action-filled and funny, with a flourish of good special effects.

An odyssey of self-discovery of much charm, humor and admirable subtlety.

A film of simplicity and power, beautifully shot and effortlessly acted by nonprofessionals.

Swain balances the personal and the political, allowing his film to be intimate while keeping a larger perspective. It is refreshing to see people on screen who are living in a real world.

A shimmeringly beautiful and wise reverie on love and desire.

A summer treat for sophisticated moviegoers -- graceful and serious, yet not overly so. This easy-to-take movie gets everything just right and is a pleasure to watch.

As an exposé, there could hardly be a stronger case for ensuring and strengthening the separation of church and state -- or a stronger message to gay people as to the magnitude of the challenge to win equal rights.

Virtuosity is a sleek, brutal techno-thriller that generates nonstop action, but for at least some of us the fun is spoiled by its numbing body count and murky story line.

A splendid work that will be a revelation to the uninitiated and a joy to music lovers.

The plot is not absolutely airtight, but Craven's filmmaking is too fast-moving and too involving for this to matter. As a movie, Red-Eye is in every way as well crafted and sharply designed as the Boeing 767 Lisa fatefully boards.

Sparkling 1934 comedy-mystery derived from the Dashiell Hammett mystery and directed by W.S. Van Dyke. It dared to suggest that a sophisticated married couple, Nick and Nora Charles (William Powell and Myrna Loy) could have fun with each other. [14 Jul 1996, p.4]

An all-stops-out rabble-rouser that hurls a broadside at America's medical insurance crisis.

Director Dennis Hopper has the anarchic spirit to make “Chasers” pay off, and writers Joe Batteer, John Rice and Dan Gilroy have provided him with a smart script, a deft mix of slapstick, sharp repartee and sentiment.

Subtlety and nuance mark both the film's dialogue and performances. It's hard to see how Dancy and Byrne could be any better.

While this "Night" hasn't the chilling, almost cinema-verite credibility of the original, it is certainly a well-sustained entertainment, with one foolish or unlucky incident triggering another. Like the original, this R-rated production is definitely not for children. [19 Oct 1990, p.F1]

There's a beguiling throwaway quality to Flirt that has the effect of making it stick with you.

Richard Brooks’ Fever Pitch lives up to its title in capturing the frenzied existence of the compulsive gambler...It also resembles its subject in its hit-and-miss quality: Some scenes pay off, others don’t. But it never lets up, and the result is a film that’s always a pleasure to watch even when it’s defying credibility at every turn or moving so fast it’s hard to keep track of what’s going on.

It’s a sprawling, rowdy, vital film laced with both outrageous absurdist dark humor and unspeakable pain, suffering and injustice.

Ward directs his actors as adroitly as he has written for them, and the vulnerability that he allows his three stars to reveal is really what makes the movie work. No one, not even baseball fans, should go to Major League hoping for "Bull Durham's" sex, raunch and sophistication. But "Major League" has its own ingratiating charm.

That it is a fine example of modest-budget filmmaking, boasting first-rate acting, writing and directing, is not all that surprising.

Occasionally heavy-handed and overdone -- and scarcely free from a self-congratulatory tone -- this latest spoof is nonetheless lots of fun, clever and fearless, and loaded with wicked lines and touches.

Fast and raunchy, Friday After Next surely stands apart from other holiday-themed movies for its gleeful low-down humor and a raft of uninhibited characters involved in one outrageous predicament after another.

The result is both merciless and darkly funny.

Glowing, amusing movie that's a good bet to lift your spirits.

An exceptionally satisfying film of much grace and beauty.