Peter Stack

This thick, leaden production starring Bob Hoskins and Patricia Arquette - and an uncredited Robin Williams - has a sophomoric air, even though it faithfully follows the book.

A convoluted mess, but there have been worse.

RoboCop 3 ought to be a lot more mean and harrowing a sci- fi thriller than it is. Yet it still has a wicked humor underneath its prophetic grin. [05 Nov 1993, p.C3]

Jack Frost starts out with sweet promise, then loses steam and gets a little too strange for its own good. It also gets cloyingly manipulative, but its heart is in the right place.

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.

Yet for all its faults and limitations, Swing Kids is not necessarily easy to forget. [05 Mar 1993]

It's going to be easy for some to dismiss the new Touchstone Pictures comedy, Captain Ron, as a leaky boatload of predictable gags. But it's what you can't predict that keeps this stupidly amusing seafaring tale afloat, making it surprisingly fun. [18 Sep 1992, p.C3]

The greatest sexual suspense drama ever made has come to be regarded by many Hitchcock admirers as his most accomplished film. It is certainly his most forlorn, and easily his most mesmerizing. [Restored]

A surprisingly clever lunatic comedy that may prompt some sniping from liberal fussbudgets, but has undeniable comic vitality. [15 Oct 1993, p.C1]

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]

The Island of Dr. Moreau ought to have been a great film in these times of gene splicing and DNA research and all the moral, ethical and practical questions those developments raise. But director John Frankenheimer and screenwriters Richard Stanley and Ron Hutchinson's attempt to update Wells yields only a maddening mess of empty gestures.

It's a swashbuckling extravaganza, but Davis is not convincing. And before anyone objects, it's not because she's a woman. Get out already! This is the '90s, and women can do anything. But they can't escape from a lousy movie any better than a man can.

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]

The new comedy is screechingly inane and skitters in nine directions at once.

The Next Karate Kid' has all the makings of a terrible movie, but it never quite becomes one. One reason might be that cinematographer Laszlo Kovacs just loves a beautiful picture. [10 Sep 1994, p.E6]

Bordello of Blood easily could have been called "Bore- dello of Blood." This gory vampire spoof is remarkably free of jolts, hardly registering as a fright film, with a series of weak special effects involving many globs of guts...The big themes in this lackluster second feature under the "Tales From the Crypt" banner are sex and religion. Both are presented with painfully sophomoric irreverence.

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]

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.

Every instance when Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie feels like the worst movie ever made, some goofy little screechy moment involving the villainess, Divatox, saves it. So it winds up being nearly the worst movie ever made.

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.

Leaves an unintentional unpleasant aftertaste.

Chase is so dull in this film, he looks as if he's sleepwalking.

A joyous, hilarious send-up of rock star pretensions and an enchanting celebration of "girl power" in pop culture.

As pleasantly earnest as Jim Belushi tries to be, and as pert as Linda Hamilton is as his plucky wife, their new movie Mr. Destiny is so contrived, pokey and predictable that it becomes a test of viewer patience. [12 Oct 1990, p.E5]

Diamonds doesn't shine.

The movie keeps a snappy pace and the suspense pot boiling. The snippy interplay between the two cops adds enjoyable twists of comic chemistry. Constant rain and slick streets, though a cliche, set a moody tone. [07 Oct 1996, p.D2]

The jump gimmick sounds as if it might make a cute romantic movie. But If Lucy Fell has so little meat that it plays like a television sitcom that somehow grew into a feature-length movie. It's airy, fluffy and ultimately uninteresting.

A joyous first feature by director Kwyn Bader, is a charmer.

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]

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

Surprisingly dull and predictable in its characterizations.

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]

Stupid yet cogent, High School High is a rapid-fire gag machine that's dopey enough to get belly laughs and smart enough to earn a C-plus as engaging entertainment.

Aspen Extreme is an extremely slow-moving story about romance, buddies and skiing in the famous Colorado town. With a pleasant cast of mostly unknowns, except for Finola Hughes (''General Hospital's'' Anna Devane), it almost saves itself with spectacular downhill action scenes. A big almost. [23 Jan 1993, p.C3]

Things are generally cute in the film -- and that goes for the stars -- and it all chugs along in some curious bubblegum-chewing sort of way. But the flavor's decidedly flat. [18 May 1991, p.C3]

Score it big-time inane but a load of fun.

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

Bulletproof is a raunchy exercise in macho posturing -- but thanks to a layer of satire, the new action comedy at Bay Area theaters provides a few zingers of lowbrow entertainment.

Two If by Sea should have been titled "Two at Sea." It's adrift. Stars Sandra Bullock and Denis Leary have no chemistry together, and a perfectly good story is wasted on a really bad script.

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]

Sloshes between comedy and drama, never quite hitting stride as either.

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]

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

The dragging pace is one of several agonizing defects in this bloated sci-fi action drama.

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]

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

Wicked fun with flickers of intelligence.

The rat problem happens only on the graveyard shift, accounting for the title of Stephen King's all-time worst movie -- and he's got a lot of them. [27 Oct 1990, p.C3]

Highlander: The Final Dimension is no more compelling than the average pile of bricks.

The movie isn't up to much either, but it has a certain eccentric energy, nicely stitched to rock-and-roll songs and a music track by ex-Police drummer Stewart Copeland. And it draws you in for an agreeably empty-headed ride and thrilling skating scenes. [18 Sept 1993, p.F1]

"Steel" plays like a Saturday morning cartoon -- overdone stunts and hokey chase sequences with the hero on a motorcycle, dodging heavily armed gangsters as well as cops who think he's a bad guy.

Fast falls from interestingly loopy to tiresome.

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

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]

A perfect vehicle for Robin Williams. He again plays the compassionate, manic clown that has been his main character throughout his movie career. And audiences love his wild end runs.

Billed as a comedy, it's draped over dreary gags and irritating manic overacting on the part of its co-star, British comic actor Rik Mayall. [24 May 1991, p.E7]

Well acted, well crafted and might have been a truly searing drama if it weren't so simplistic, pat and predictable.

Decidedly lowbrow.

It's forgettable matinee fodder.

So inept it's almost entertaining.

(Driver) is stuck in a mess of a movie that suffers from awkward writing, a plot with major disconnects in plausibility, an annoyingly screechy kid character and cheesy production values.

It is aimed primarily at children, and its affectionate treatment of animals is certain to please most of them.

An unblushing sex farce often so raw it might make even fairly open-minded people feel a bit uncomfortable.

An overstuffed, underfed numbskull movie.

Has an unrelenting staccato quality. Some would say a jackhammer quality.

A feeble excuse for a movie.

Though predictable, isn't half bad.

Only a couple of good gags in its pileup of otherwise lame jokes keep the production from being an unqualified stinker.

Schlock, but amusing schlock.

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]

It's a shame Arnold is stuck on the loudmouth clod schtick, because there are moments he's downright pleasant on screen. But in Carpool, these moments are kept to a minimum.

Mixed Nuts, opening today at Bay Area movie theaters, is laced generously with chuckles, though it neglects one little detail that helps make movies satisfying: a plot. [21 Dec 1994, p.E1]

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.

Chevy Chase continues his string of starring roles in bad movies. [16 Feb 1991, p.C3]

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.

A stupid comedy with toddlers talking like hip '90s grown-ups.

Shore possesses only two talents -- his ability to assume yoga-like positions and fondle his own behind, and his mystifying knack for getting starring roles in bad movies.