Mike Clark

Designed to be a date movie, Rules could have stronger male appeal than many comedies of its ilk.

Nil is harrowing and soul-sapping, a look into the heart of darkness of London's underclass.

Overall, this is a tart little toughie - within its limitations. Like 1987's The Bedroom Window, also directed by Curtis Hanson, it admittedly pales next to suspense classics it recalls. Yet on its own terms, it's a hefty cut above the norm. [09 Mar 1990, p.1D]

It's fast, easy on the eyes, full of funny putdowns and cast well enough to have two memorable villains.

It's one bad apple.

Yet because this adaptation of Franz Lidz's childhood memoir is odd enough and even stylish enough to attract a small following, you might want to weigh my ingrained dyspepsia before electing not to see it. [15 Sep 1995]

The crucifixion is the strongest such scene of all time. [26 Aug 1988]

This cliche primer is a bit more than bearable - even when it's literally and figuratively off the track. It's no Cocktail, but it's no Dom Perignon, either. [27 Jun 1990, p.1D]

This is a great movie, but it needs a sales job because it's in Mandarin.

Though the movie is more mediocre than abysmal, Ryan's recently banged-up filmography (remember In the Cut) could use what every fighter needs at ringside: a good cut man to stop the bleeding.

This movie is so much the opposite of uplifting that you think Gary Oldman ought to be in it. But it's honestly made, and its second half does linger in the memory.

Pace and performances dominate, with popped salutes going to Keifer Sutherland, Kevin Pollack, Kevin Bacon and especially Nicholson's smiling barracuda. [11 Dec 1992]

You can feel the movie going wrong in the first scene.

The relaxed and confident Crusade is the first Jones outing to benefit from actual characterizations. [24 May 1989, Life, p.1D]

For a movie that earns its R-rating for drug content and violence atop language and sexuality, it leaves you with the next thing to a mellow smile.

Director Francis Ford Coppola's revamping of his Vietnam epic, Apocalypse Now, with 49 added minutes, has significantly improved the troubled blockbuster. The film now seems both mellowed and — thanks in part to the most vibrant-looking prints in its 22-year history — revitalized.

Land has a lot of funny moments, which are no less serious for being so, especially when the script turns politically prickly.

Jaded samurai Toshiro Mifune shows younger warriors the ropes, just as John Wayne used to toughen up tenderfoots on the range. [21 Apr 1995, p.3D]

Director James Foley deftly juggles expressionistic actor closeups with drab widescreen shots that convey abject seediness. [30 Sep 1992, p.1D]

Eastwood gutsily stages the extended opening slowly and methodically... [But u]nintentional yuks litter an otherwise somber political thriller adapted from David Baldacci's novel.

The result is a foot-stomping rouser. Where else can you get a cop in his underwear boogalooing with skyscraper terrorists? [15 July 1988, Life, p.4D]

Talk about the limitations of using the four-star rating system to assess a movie both glorious and dreadful, with the dreadful components glorious as well in their own bent way. [23 Feb 1996, p.1D]

Even in the classiest movie summer of the decade, Mob is destined to demand respect for Pfeiffer. [19 Aug 1988]

A premier boxing movie and a forceful Depression remembrance for the socially conscious, Cinderella Man also ices it for stargazers that Russell Crowe is the dominant screen actor working today.

But it does mine Murphy's gifts, and the payoff is both nutty and funny. Sometimes even touching, too. [28Jun1996 Pg.01.D]

The most imperfect of the year's best movies, Magnolia's flaws are easily forgiven because they are the result of go-for-broke ambition.

The cycle thrills here are everything: flips, collisions, a chase across the top of a fast-moving train and even a zoom down the aisle of one of the train's cars as the passengers take it in stride.

The filmmaker's new subject, the German occupation of France, has been treated with the seriousness it deserves in countless movies over the past half-century. This treatment is light and breezy for a change, though not altogether frivolous.