Peter Stack

Problem Child is a beautiful example of what junk entertainment can be with a smattering of brains behind it. While it hangs there as a monument to audience idiocy, it also lets you have a wallow in fun. You leave thinking there have been worse things on which to spend your time and money. [28 July 1990, p.C3]

Mulholland Falls is a provocative crime drama with a limp script and a forced feeling. But star Nick Nolte is a ticking time bomb as a brutal Los Angeles police detective with a hulking, gasping sense of pain and meanness. He gives the film an odd, askew tone that keeps it tough and alive.

It's not a great film, but Event Horizon produces an intense sense of visual involvement. The hallucinatory, almost 3-D-like scenes stick in the mind.

Glitters, but it's not pure gold.

Has a certain slow, mechanical quality.

It's not always clear what this film is driving at, but Shiota makes the weirdness visually arresting.

It's not a deep film, but there is a certain poignancy in Luke's situation and in the earnestness with which the burly Sinbad approaches the boy. Simms has a warm style and lets Luke know he's not a nut for feeling the need to explore the world a bit.

Dark City grabs your eyeballs and squeezes.

The movie, based on the novel by Simon Brett, tries very hard to make a statement about the feelings of a man who has struggled for years and suddenly finds himself over the hill, a shutout at work and at home. But the tale falters on Caine's character. [23 Mar 1990, p.E5]

This slight, predictable comedy has appealing moments.

Swimming With Sharks, despite its attempt to be wicked and hiply fun, is ultimately just tiring as it pits people against one another.

The film's constrained style keeps the drama from reaching a full boil.

Curiously mellow for a John Carpenter thriller, Village of the Damned, a full-color, cornball special-effects remake of the 1960 sci-fi favorite, is a trip to a village of the darned tedious.

Shyamalan's story is clearly autobiographical, and he imbued the tender tale with a wistful atmosphere as well as a kindly regard for parochial school, hitting some of the details just right.

It's a fizzle as as comedy. Still, the film has character.

Still, it's almost impossible to entirely wreck this great chestnut of Broadway and film. Thanks mostly to the terrific songs, the new version has transporting moments. [20 March 1999, Daily Notebook, p.B1]

Among Chan devotees, it achieved cult status.

Wicked fun with flickers of intelligence.

Father of the Bride Part II is too long, completely predictable and unabashedly immersed in a posh world that is totally out of reach of most people. It's a comfort to see that riches don't keep some guys from being dithering fools when it comes to life's fundamentals.

Viewers may feel let down because the depth promised by the movie's visual artistry is never quite delivered.

Extreme Measures has disturbing moments, and poignant ones, too. It plays a good game of paranoia with its unlikely hero. Once the story gets past Luthan's implausible firing on trumped-up drug charges, it places him alone in a hostile world. Relying only on a determination to solve the medical puzzle, he goes on a desperate expedition into the bowels of the subway system. It's a grim, scary sequence, and Grant seems a million miles away from his stammering comedic style -- an extreme that is surprisingly engaging.

Does have a certain classy charm because of its upscale setting. One could wait for the video.

Could have used more dramatic energy, maybe at the expense of some of that gorgeous scenery.

It has the simple charm of being mindless fun with nary a worry that there are several pockets of lame gags or far-fetched comedy bits that refuse to register on the giggle meter. [16 Feb 1990, p.E3]

Want a believable plot or acting? Forget it. But if you just want knockout images, unabashed eye candy and a riveting look at a complex world that seems both real and fake at the same time, "Hackers'' is one of the most intriguing movies of the year.

Pathetic yet stupidly entertaining for several minutes of its interminable running time, 3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain makes half its cast look like retreads and half like fresh ponies desperately karate-kicking a dud script to see if it has any signs of life.

Vampire in Brooklyn is neither funny nor frightening and comes up a tedious middle-road hybrid from veteran scaremeister Wes Craven, who directed.

A sappy, muddled production that misses the jarring tone of the autobiographical book by Susanna Kaysen on which it is based.

Has unusual visual vitality in a John Cassavetes vein. For the adventurous, it's worth checking out.

Schlock, but amusing schlock.

A mixed bag concocted with an almost willful aim to be quaint and a little arty, but one with small wonders poking through its soft, somewhat plain fabric. [06 May 1994]

Quickly assumes an appealing mockumentary style.

Viewers expecting rip-roaring, chandelier- swinging swordplay adventure are likely to be disappointed by the measured tone and portentous verbal interplay.

Child's Play 2, stupid as it is, is a surprisingly tight low-budget production, making effective use of dark settings and rainy nights, and a handful of in-yer-face scare tactics that keep the action pumped up. [10 Nov 1990, p.C3]

It's a violent yet occasionally funny film - thanks to some inventive gags that pop up - and it hits some of the same blood-splashed chords as "Terminator." [17 Jul 1987]

Tokyo Decadence is not an action picture, blue or otherwise. Murakami almost batters you with his slow, deliberate style, and in the end the film ventures into puzzling bravura sequences that seem hard to grasp for someone outside Japanese culture. Throughout, Murakami subtly accompanies his work with strains from the introduction to an aria from Verdi's ''Don Carlo'' where the aggrieved King Philip sings ''she never loved me.'' [18 June 1993, p.C12]

If The Hidden were less obvious, it might have been a zinger of a sci-fi action flick. But this cinematic presentation, now available on home video, is too predictable, and even though wickedly fun at times, it's only halfway as awesome as it might have been.

Watching this film is a little like wallowing in warm surf with soft pop music wafting in the breeze.

Kinda cute, occasionally amusing and very, very slow... I just wish [it] had more momentum, more oomph. [9 Oct 1987]

Sizemore ("Heat") and Miller, though saddled with a lot of scientific DNA jargon, are really the only lively people in this dense, gruesome film that stubbornly refuses to break out of its contrived atmosphere.

An awkward script, a mannered style and the selection of hill-and-dale Petaluma as a stand-in for an Illinois small town all undermine the film.

It's troubling to watch it stray and ramble as first-time director Antonio Banderas struggles to pull disparate elements together.

If Hoffa is supposed to be an intimate portrait of the labor leader, it never gets much beyond painting a murky picture of a one-note Johnny who seems more like a stock Jack Nicholson character. [25 Dec 1992]

This messy science fiction comedy blows most of its inspired moments because of its mean-spirited, deafening siege mentality, which turns rich promise into a tiresome parade of half-baked skits. Hilarity never seemed so tedious.

The cheesiness has increased, but it's surprising how clever low-budget film makers can be when they throw every nut and bolt within reach into a film, and stir wildly with computer-generated images. [15 Jan 1996, p.E6]

By and large a misguided and lame affair. Except for gratuitous gunplay so extreme it actually jolts you awake, it's a major snore. [28 Aug 1993, p.F1]

For Morgan Freeman ("Seven") fans, it's a chance to see a great actor save a movie from itself.

Mouse Hunt is inane, antic cinema in the extreme. But even if half the gags don't quite work, the other half are inspired.

But this soggy, sentimental tour through a rural dreamworld of salt-of- the-earth versus supercharged intelligence never quite gets deep enough to touch the soul -- or to make sense.

I think mature pre-teens along with immature teens might relate to this overbearing showcase of bizarre rubber duckies. Adults are bound to find it a major yawn, and young children are likely to be scared out of their wits. [27 Jun 1986, p.82]

The movie, a rather pointless thing when you get down to it, has little of the provocative intelligence that was found in "Terminator." But at least it's self-propelling in terms of suspense and cheap thrills. [12 June 1987, Daily Datebook, p.78]

An unabashed wallow in the moronic humor of Adam Sandler.

This movie reverie has an almost laughable '80s tone - a yuppified style and even language - that practically buries Costner. [21 Apr 1989, Daily Datebook, p.E1]

The strained romantic plot is a slow fizzle.

Diamonds doesn't shine.

It's the worst Carrey movie yet, but it has a handful of inspired moments in which his signature wackiness is so funny it hurts.

At least it can be said that Renaissance Man, the new Penny Marshall film arriving at theaters today, has its heart in the right place and that star Danny DeVito comes across as thoughtful, intelligent, even sweet. [03 Jun 1994]

Surprisingly dull and predictable in its characterizations.

When all is fretted and done, there's little dramatic payoff in this moody first feature by Bart Freundlich. But cinematographer Stephen Kazmierski's images are appealing, and the mood is on target -- Thanksgiving as hell.

The colorful, character-rich details of Carlito's Way provide the fire and fun in Brian De Palma's latest suspense opera, which dives into a Spanish Harlem swaggering and swaying with macho and meanness. But it's a bloated picture, full of itself in the name film art. [12 Nov 1993, p.C1]

Pleasant, ultimately sweet but never quite inspired.

Given its mad-dog subject, Cobb, starring Tommy Lee Jones as the raspy, snarling and seemingly demented Ty Cobb -- one of baseball's greatest players -- should have been a home run of a bitter, heartrending drama. Instead, this histrionic portrait of the most celebrated cur in sports history comes across like a fly ball that thuds on the ground.

It's engaging as a non-drama of people doing nothing, but suffering a lot.

Kinda cute, laced with a few chuckles, but mostly just annoying, the new feature film version of The Little Rascals is not likely to go down in history as a paean to kids or a filmic delight for anyone much older than 7. [05 Aug 1994, p.C3]

A pleasant addition to the time-honored genre of terminally cute youth romance movies, roughly equivalent to staring at a saccharine greeting card for a while.

Though predictable, isn't half bad.

Director Richard Linklater ("Dazed and Confused") should have taken a cue from the music -- the film needs a lot more snap.

Rosewood is startling, infuriating, painful history played out as a not-very-satisfying, overly ambitious and overlong movie.

The lushly photographed film skids into the gutter. It may have a certain appeal to people who like to talk mean to each other, but beyond that, it's one stupid rubber ducky. [13 Dec 1991, p.F1]

In spite of its downbeat subjects, Drugstore Cowboy becomes a satisfying drama of redemption. [27 Oct 1989]

The movie is a mess of bits and pieces that try to gel but don't. Still, it is stupidly fun.

It's gimmicky Saturday-morning cartoon wackiness in your face -- funny, but brain-deadening.

The film is too mannered, too stuffy. Even Malkovich's interesting performance won't let it break free of a formal style and cloyingly creepy tone that becomes precious while trying to be merely claustrophobic.

Kids probably will enjoy portions of Return to Oz, but at best, it's a mechanical movie that never finds a real heart to engage an audience. [21 Jun 1985, p.79]

Tombstone, in spite of its action-movie pacing, becomes an awkward, unconvincing tale as Russell's stubbornly benevolent Earp is slowly nudged by moral compunction into fighting various scourges, not the least of them a vicious gang of red-sashed cowboys led by Curly Bill (Powers Booth) and his fiendishly cool gunslinging sidekick, Johnny Ringo (Michael Biehn). [25 Dec 1993, p.E1]

Mostly it seems forced, pat and didactic.

It isn't terrible. It's far from a milestone in Japanese animation, and not an especially memorable entertainment. Yet it doesn't try to be either of those things.

The dolphins are charming, which is at least 50 percent of the concept of the film. The flip side is the film's predictability and shallow characters. Audiences may walk away feeling that they got a pleasant dose of cinematic Dramamine, but that it takes a long time and is a little tedious en route.

Like a coffee-table book, it looks inviting and teases you with sumptuous photography but leaves you cold.

Though far from memorable, it's a moderately charming number calculated to radiate a certain Father's Day glow. [17 Jun 1994, p.C3]

Fortunately, the people save Operation Dumbo Drop, and it's their determinedly good-natured performances that keep the film moving through several well-paced misadventures.

Set It Off blends action and urban drama effectively, but at times isn't sure which foot to lead with.

The film, "suggested by" John Irving's novel "A Prayer for Owen Meany," is so unabashedly manipulative -- and implausible -- that even while crying, many viewers may also feel abused.

3 Ninjas is shoddy, violent and numbingly pointless, an action comedy in which three brothers spend their summer practicing martial arts under their grandfather's tutelage. [07 Aug 1992, p.C4]

As a coming-of-age melodrama and high seas adventure, White Squall is fair.

The music and wizard DJs in Groove are better than the dopey story.

It's the kind of movie that crumbles into trash -- non-recyclable -- if you spend more than 10 minutes thinking about it. It's designed for dumb fun, and delivers some. [10 July 1992, p.D3]

Doesn't quite measure up to the extraordinary sweetness of the classic children's book by E.B. White on which it is based. But then again, how could it?

This disappointing comedy, which seems to move at a snail's pace, is almost saved by the gorgeous scenery and settings, crisply photographed. Locations include the Grand Hotel du Cap Ferrat, Beaulieu-sur-Mer, the harbor at Juan-les-Pins, and other lovely spots on the Cote d'Azur. [14 Dec 1988, p.E1]

If you ask too many questions about Jacob's Ladder, you're likely to burst the bubble. For all its emotional sizzle and spit, it leaves you hanging. Yet the ride to Lyne's middle-of-nowhere is almost worth it. [2 Nov 1990, p.E1]

Braveheart comes up short by beating the drums of human treachery and violence so loudly they become assaults.

Some folks will have no trouble being inspired by Rudy's story; some will feel as though they boarded a sinking submarine. [13 Oct 1993, p.D2]

Angels in the Outfield may not be a great baseball movie, but it is a cheerful line drive as a story about having faith when the world seems stacked against you.

Overall, the film sparkles. But it's a curiously unaffecting sparkle, an example, almost, of how the special effects stole Christmas.

Its dazzling special effects make its combatants flip and fly, spin and soar, all the while punching and kicking each other like jackhammers, only to leave viewers utterly unmoved.

Its virtues of crisp, uncluttered photography and striking performances are frustratingly undermined by the muddled pretensions of Hungarian director Peter Medak. [09 Nov 1990, p.E7]

Although the film doesn't live up to complexities of the human issues -- nor the awesome tragedy -- that must have been faced in real life, what you feel watching it is a mixture of horror, moral self-examination, a tinge of inspiration, and -- let's face it on these winter nights -- you feel cold. [15 Jan 1993, p.C1]

The Beverly Hills Cop formula shows serious signs of wear in its third outing as Eddie Murphy tries desperately to hold onto his tough-guy, mock-grin edge while screenwriters and director John Landis do little more than stir-fry lame gags with furious but tiresome fusilades of gunfire. [25 May 1994, p.E1]