If Zeffirelli's Hamlet does resemble an actual movie at several points, it's thanks almost entirely to the inventive and atmospheric lighting of veteran cinematographer David Watkin, whose somber, gray-green palette gives the film a dignity and substance it would otherwise lack. [18 Jan 1991]

By and large this is an admirably sober, responsible piece of work, one that covers much of the same ground as Dances With Wolves but with far less self-importance and New Age babbling. Kleiser's use of the Alaskan landscapes is stirring without dipping into postcard prettiness, and the animal action (which includes a guest appearance by Bart of The Bear) is smooth and expressive.

Depardieu has so much life on screen, so much bounding energy and insistent physicality, that he almost brings it off.

Van Damme himself, a graduate of the blank-stare school of acting, is so without emotional inflection on the screen that his most affecting moment in this film, if one is to judge from a preview audience's reaction, is when he drops a bathrobe for a couple of seconds of magnificent gluteal exposure.

A bimbo-rama of the type you'd see on USA Network's "Up All Night." [24 Jan 1992]

It is Field's bursting, big-eyed American-ness - a commodity she has carefully banked since her days as TV's "Gidget" - that generates the film's lurid fascination. [11 Jan 1991, p.K]

An air of embarrassing familiarity hangs over the entire project, as if it were a story told by an aging relative not quite aware of how many times, and how much better, he has been over the same material before. [25 Dec 1990, Tempo, p.1]

A mildly diverting, mostly forgettable variation on themes the writer-director has treated with more depth and vigor on several past occasions. It's a tentative, tiny film, every bit as inconspicuous as its recessive, occasionally invisible heroine. [25 Dec 1990, p.10C]

Kindergarten Cop never feels mercenary in the manner of, say, "Look Who's Talking Too" or "Three Men and a Little Lady." It is, instead, an extremely amiable, good-hearted film, unashamed of its desire to please and quite entertaining for it. [21 Dec 1990, p.B]

With its general spirit of tabloid scandalmongering and frequent cutaways to an oddly enhanced Melanie Griffith in scanty panties, the point of reference seems less Victorian fiction than Victoria's Secret.

Awakenings is a film that unquestionably succeeds on its own terms, though those terms are deeply suspect. It is a canny piece of false art, one that consistently swaps meaning for superficial effect. [20 Dec 1990, p.1]

Cher plays a footloose, life-loving mother of two fatherless daughters who sports a bouffant hairdo and, at one crucial point, a Mylar mermaid costume that looks as if it were constructed, on a bet by designer Bob Mackie, entirely out of common household objects. The part isn't much of a stretch for America's reigning queen of wacky non-conformity, though it should please her established fans while scraping the nerves of the unconvinced as lightly as possible.

Strange, funny and powerfully moving… Burton has found a way to move through camp to emotional authenticity, to communicate-through a concentration of style and an innocence of regard-a depth and sincerity of feeling that his deliberately (and often, comically) flat characters could not summon on their own. [14 Dec 1990, Friday, p.C]

It's hard to imagine what prompted Eastwood to direct and star in such a creaky vehicle unless this was his commercial payback to Warner Bros. for letting him make his excellent, financially disastrous White Hunter, Black Heart this year. [07 Dec 1990, p.C]

Huston gives one of her very best performances as a strong lady who can con almost everyone but herself. Her manner on the screen in this picture and in Woody Allen's "Crimes and Misdemeanors'' marks Huston as the one contemporary actress who comes closest to having the power of classic female dramatic stars of years past. [25 Jan 1991]

With resources that took five years to assemble, [Rappeneau] has turned out a Cyrano that should prove definitive for many years to come. [25 Dec 1990, p.11C]

Like any good work of popular culture, Rob Reiner's film of Stephen King's best-selling book Misery functions on more than one level.

While the actresses seem authentic in these interviews, they are forced and unconvincing in Jaglom's script, which centers on characters who might kindly be described as narcissistic Harpies. [21 Jun 1991, p.G]

The picture hurtles along, smoothly if not plausibly, and saves some surprises for the last reel. The Predator, it seems, represents that part of the human spirit that responds with pleasure when violence breaks out, whether it is in Central America, the inner city, or the suburban multiplex playing Predator 2. [21 Nov 1990, p.3C]

Thoroughly dull. [23 Nov 1990]

What is undeniably good about Rocky V is that our working-class hero returns to the grimy neighborhood from which he sprang. Seeing a more slender, "street" Rocky is a refreshing change of pace from the muscle-bound champ of Parts 3 and 4. [16 Nov 1990, p.C]

It's a far better piece of animation than the dismal Oliver and Company of 1988 and last year's smartly conceived but indifferently executed Little Mermaid. Butoy and Gabriel obviously love their medium, the first Disney directors to do so in years.

A three-hour delight… The movie generates much of its power by being so life-affirming at a time when people feel nervous about the future. [9 Nov 1990, Friday, p.C]

It is hard to imagine a world where films such as Child's Play 2 - essentially, a dim excuse for a prolonged, extremely exploitative display of abused and abusive children - can pass as mainstream entertainment. [13 Nov 1990, p.3C]

There's little doubt that Jacob's Ladder is a failure-it's a messy, unsatisfying and often overreaching film-yet it fails in interesting, ambitious ways. It's a must-see disaster. [2 Nov 1990, p.C]

Vincent & Theo is a by-the-numbers art biography that barely succeeds in recapping the best-known events in the life of its subject, Vincent van Gogh. There is something almost chilling in the degree of the director's evident disengagement from his material and the complete lack of craft with which he has filmed it.

The movie suffers from various technical difficulties - like choppy editing and songs that get cut off mid-groove - and in the end everything collapses in a heap. [05 Nov 1990, p.4C]

The theory seems to be that if you indiscriminately toss in enough familiar ingredients, you get soup. But Graveyard Shift is more like lumpy water. [29 Oct 1990, p.5C]