As shamelessly as Tombstone rips off pieces of Unforgiven, you can rest assured none of them relate to Eastwood's strong portrayal of women -- or his antipathy toward violence. The latest shootout at the O.K. Corral is only a prelude to your basic bloodletting in the name of mass entertainment. [24 Dec 1993, p.25]

The flashback-laden story, which has the Joker romping through a decrepit old model for the space-age future, is pretty herky-jerky. But what counts most are the visuals, which in true comic book fashion are colorful and wittily stylized: Batman's cinderblock jaw and massive physique can't obscure his lunkhead nature and unimpressive voice. [27 Dec 1993, p.23]

And yet Philadelphia is quite a good film, on its own terms. And for moviegoers with an antipathy to AIDS but an enthusiasm for stars like Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington, it may help to broaden understanding of the disease.

Any movie featuring cameos ranging from Lou Reed to Mikhail Gorbachev has its heart in the right place. That heart is what sustains it; though long and uneven, occasionally sentimental and portentous in its message, Faraway, So Close comes close enough to greatness. [23 Dec 1993, p.29]

By casting attractive stars in the leads, by finding the right visual look, by underlining the action with brooding, ominously sad music, a good director can create the illusion of meaning even when nothing's there.

What is most amazing about this film is how completely Spielberg serves his story. The movie is brilliantly acted, written, directed and seen. Individual scenes are masterpieces of art direction, cinematography, special effects, crowd control.

This is a painful movie to watch. But it is also exhilarating, as all good movies are, because we are watching the director and actors venturing beyond any conventional idea of what a modern movie can be about. Here there is no plot, no characters to identify with, no hope.

If Wayne and Garth ever grow confident of their success, the series will be over. Everything depends on the delighted disbelief with which they greet every new victory.

What's strange about Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit is that it abandons most of what people liked about the first movie and replaces it with a formula as old as the hills.

Walter Hill's "Geronimo," a film of great beauty and considerable intelligence, covers the same ground as many other movies about Indians, but in a new way.

Adapted with unusual faithfulness from John Guare's much-heralded 1990 play, the movie, directed by Fred Schepisi with a screenplay by the playwright, is nothing if not frenetic. And yet it attempts to explore a slew of profound ideas -- about race, social class, art and the whole nature of experience among a very particular and unusually sophisticated segment of contemporary urban American society. [22 Dec 1993, p.48]

The Snapper sees its characters with warmth and acceptance, and earns its laughs by being wise about human nature.

Francois Girard’s “Thirty Two Short Films about Glenn Gould” brilliantly breaks with tradition and gives us a movie that actually inspires us to think about what it was like to be this man.

But the film is not as amusing as the premise, and there were long stretches when I'd had quite enough of Mrs. Doubtfire.

This is a movie that surprises you. The setup is such familiar material that you think the story is going to be flat and fast. But the screenplay by John Lee Hancock goes deep. And the direction by Clint Eastwood finds strange, quiet moments of perfect truth in the story.

What is most beguiling about Addams Family Values is the way the relationship between Gomez and Morticia has ripened.

Maybe 7-year-olds will enjoy this PG-rated stuff, but it's not funny. [12 Nov 1993, p.39]

The acting here, by Sean Penn, is a virtuoso tour de force - one of those performances that takes on a life of its own.

There is something intrinsically silly in this story, and unless you can find a way to believe in it at some level (even on the level on which Peter Pan believes in fairies), it's just a lot of feathers. Many of them from horses.

The whole movie is quiet, introspective, thoughtful.

Why do they persist in making these retreads? Because RoboCop is a brand name, I guess, and this is this year's new model. It's an old tradition in Detroit to take an old design and slap on some fresh chrome.

The first film had maybe a shred of realism to flavor its romantic comedy. This one looks like it was chucked up by an automatic screenwriting machine.

Ruby in Paradise is a breathtaking movie about a young woman who opens the book of her life to a fresh page, and begins to write.

The past traps the present, fate smothers spontaneity, and all of the dialog sounds like Dialog - not what people would say, but what characters would say. The film is depressing for some of the right reasons, and all of the wrong ones.

The suspense screws up tighter than a drum-head. The characters remain believable; we have a conflict of personalities, not stereotypes. The action coexists seamlessly with the message.

It is one of those rare movies that is not just about a story, or some characters, but about a whole universe of feeling.

Armand Assante, on the other hand, is one of the best movie actors of his generation. But he isn't very funny in Fatal Instinct.

The director of the film, a veteran stop-action master named Henry Selick, is the person who has made it all work. And his achievement is enormous.