Mike Clark

A timeless story. [07 Oct 2005, p.8E]

Great cinema - and also a whopping good time. [19 September 1990, Life, p.1D]

Michael Mann , directs with his standard prejudice toward the sheer physical. The result, almost musical, has only a couple recent movie precedents. [25 Sep 1992, p.1D]

Bugsy is a gangster film around the edges, a '40s love song down the middle, and the year's breeziest live-actor movie through and through. [13 Dec 1991, p.1D]

The Crucible shrewdly saves its most potent ammo for the end, audience-friendly showmanship to further signify a bang-up movie. [27 Nov 1996]

It's at once funny, exciting, tearful and tuneful. [13 Nov 1991, p.1D]

Rain is a 126-minute genre movie stacked for effect; when you see Douglas racing his motorcycle at the beginning, you know what the climax will be. Scott, though, may be the definitive state-of-the-art moviemaker right now - and violent Rain is the most aggressively cinematic movie in a while. [22 Sep 1989, p.1D]

The rawest, most sustained screen portrayal of 20th century combat.

Emma is the peak of the recent Austen pack and a star-maker, too -- an antidote to a summer in which even good movies have subordinated writing and characters to special effects. [02 Aug 1996, Pg.01.D]

Half-factual, half-fanciful and all funny, this labor of love is also unexpectedly touching. [28 September 1994, Life, p.5D]

It has always been around and easy to take for granted. But its lack of pretension weathers years nicely. [09 Mar 2007, p.12D]

Though Weaver is by all accounts (mine included) in the real-life “none-nicer'” class, I've always suspected she might be great as a shrew. She is. [21 Dec 1988, Life, p.1D]

More than any other example in recent memory, Chicago shows how much the element of surprise is missing from today's movies.

A singular accomplishment so specifically keyed to Spacey's talents that it mandates going out on a limb to say it contains the performance that will ultimately be regarded as "the one."

Forman finesses the story's grimmer aspects as he did in "Cuckoo's Nest," and his ability to switch moods on a dime remains unsurpassed.

For a brutal black comedy about L.A. hitmen, Pulp Fiction bursts out of its binding with loopy delights. [14 Oct 1994]

Happily, there's nothing to misconstrue about the film: It's fabulous.

After watching Pfeiffer and Day-Lewis submerge molten 19th-century sparks here, it is now conceivable that Scorsese could make compelling cinema out of “Three Blind Mice.” [17 Sept 1993, Life, p.1D]

Cassavetes wrote and directed on his standard improvisational shoestring. The oft-shattering result, which runs 2 1/2 hours, is so uneasily lifelike that the academy temporarily ignored its prejudice against independent productions by rewarding Rowlands and Cassavetes with Oscar nominations. [18 Sep 1992, p.3D]

Tucker is the best Capra movie since Capra quit making them himself. [12 Aug 1988]

There've been few screen moments more moving this year than Cruise's initial reaction to his brother's almost superhuman math prowess. [16 Dec 1988]

As the suddenly somber Hickey, the traveling salesman who rudely stops regaling assorted skid-row barflies with flip patter in 1912 New York, Lee Marvin is very good in a role that Jason Robards always owned. Otherwise, the actors are all on a "wow" level. [04 Apr 2003]

This is the kind of people-driven story that the movies used to give us - before special effects took over.

Stripped of all bravado, Cruise delivers a raw and probably detractor-proof performance. Spielberg does what he did right in creating a novel milieu for "A.I. Artificial Intelligence," but this time the writing is fresher and anything but unwieldy.

A great movie just got greater, thanks to this thorough restoration. [Director's Cut; 27 June 1997, p.D3]

Another great 1950s John Wayne Western from Warner Bros. [25 May 2007, p.4E]

The most powerful of all recent wayward-youth sagas; indeed, it's tough to recall the last such drama that packed as much emotional clout.

Express is 80 tight minutes of railroad intrigue, an Oscar winner for cinematography (there's none better) and the film with the enduring line: "It took more than one man to change my name to Shanghai Lily." [22 Oct 1993, p.3D]