Peter Stack

Bound by mother-daughter ties that are complex, touching, ultimately so powerful they yield the kind of tearful joy rarely experienced at the movies.

Paradis, an actress and pop singer, is sensational.

A grandiose cinematic invention, cleverly turning the present-day urban American world on its ear.

Jumbled and stupid plot, bad acting and a few predictable gags that fall flat.

Stone's feisty, intensely personal style of film making is well-known. With Born on the Fourth of July we are treated to a poignant, spirited and captivating - for the broken heartedness of it all - performance by Tom Cruise. [25 Dec 1989, p.E1]

Director Manuel Poirier (Antonio's Girlfriend) is easygoing in the way he uses Paco and Nino to poke through veneers of machismo.

Gorgeous but dark -- not the usual Disney experience. Audiences will find much to embrace in this animated drama, yet they may not walk away humming the kind of catchy tunes contained in Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King or Aladdin.

Stunning, odd, glorious, calm and sensationally absorbing.

Among Chan devotees, it achieved cult status.

Bucking the lava tide of computer special effects gushing out of Hollywood this season, the makers of Breakdown use old-fashioned ingenuity -- plus a compelling star, a fast- paced mystery and a deadpan villain -- to come up with a sizzler.

Consistently absorbing as the amazing Deneuve reveals, scene by scene, new facets of a fascinating character in a mercantile war that involves equal parts greed and vanity.

A deftly layered drama.

Has an odd mix of quickly grabbed handheld shots and scenes of striking beauty.

A joyful film -- and hopefully one that will not slip away unnoticed.

Burns has created an endearing gathering of people we all know, and every one of them is so much fun that leaving the theater at the end elicits a touch of regret.

This is not comfortable comedy.

Captures the emotions of spousal charges, countercharges, defenses and pleadings ranging from brutally sarcastic to despairing.

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.

A skillful exposition of the pain of pro wrestling, and the high price participants pay in terms of physical and ego injuries.

It's an excellent movie for kids, because it is about how amazing children can be.

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]

A humongous animation event that ratchets up the level of the computer art that Hollywood is swooning over these days.

Sappiness and romance always are fine with me, and Big is a good example of a movie that effortlessly blends sweetness and fun - it feels a little like stumbling on a picnic of smiles. [3 Jun 1988, p.E1]

Pretentious but absorbing.

Can make a person sick in two ways at once -- through its lowdown raunch and through the spasms of laughter that use stomach muscles one might not have known existed.

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]

Children, and adults with adventurous taste in movies, will find this among the most eye-popping big-screen experiences in ages.

Always is such a lamentable production _ hardly a moment rings true _ that you almost feel like saying ''pardon me'' when you wonder why it apparently didn't occur to Spielberg or anyone else involved that no chemistry was taking place. Not only are the stars rather uninteresting people, they don't seem to like each other in any way that you can feel. [22 Dec. 1989, p.E1]