Even as you feel grateful to be able to laugh off this film, you realize that its humor is really only inuring you to a nonstop series of stabbings, slashings, impalings, stranglings and yet other means of killing. Be warned: For all its laughs, Friday the 13th -- A New Beginning (rightly rated R) is just one more nauseating sick joke. [25 March 1985, p.C6]

In this film, Shaw come alive for you in ways that go beyond his physical presence (still handsome, a balding, bearded 74), or the sound of his clarinet (its impeccable sheen and limpid line).

The Hit is something special: thoughtful, perfectly performed and carrying the clear stamp of an extremely interesting director.

Of course, "It Happens One Night" comes to mind, but The Sure Thing is so sparkling and original in its humor, so perceptive about human nature in its own right, that its key elements seem classic, not carbons.

A rank, execrable disaster, Certain Fury is the kind of movie that's destined to show up in a trivia game as the answer to the question: "What's the worst film ever to star two Oscar-winning performers?" Rated R for its gratuitous violence, foul language and bad acting, it's a cheesy, ludicrously implausible bloodfest that tries to pass itself off as a distaff update of "The Defiant Ones." [6 March 1985, p.4]

Credibility and even simple logic seem to have gotten short shrift in its transposition to the screen from a highly praised first novel by Terry Davis. The result is a film of some lovely and funny moments, with some appealing people, that finally disappoints.

The Mean Season makes deft use of the thriller form to examine the relationship between those who report the news and those who make it, and how that line can blur dangerously. The film is very honest about how seductive a byline can be.

Although it, too, is gorgeous to look at, this skeletal thriller is as direct and spare as its Mennonites. [08 Feb 1985]

By the time their jaw-dropping story is over, you may feel you have traveled every inch of their journey with them, a downward spiral all the way. What you still may not understand is what really made Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton) and Andrew Daulton Lee (Sean Penn) do what they did, or, more importantly, what made director John Schlesinger feel their story was worth telling.

Neither terrible nor outstanding, it's the kind of middle-of-the-road picture that's hard to remember a week after seeing it. [8 Feb 1985, p.C2]

It's an unambitious, derivative but engaging little comedy...It's hardly original. It's hardly deep. But, in contrast with much of its genre ("Porky's" and its progeny), it's a model of sophistication, decorum and even taste. It has crass moments and cheap shots, but it's still good: cleverly thought out and gracefully filmed by first-time film director Michael Dinner, who directed the PBS "Miss Lonelyhearts."

Fandango overreaches badly and sinks under a heavy weight of symbolism, bathos and sheer preposterousness that no amount of humor and incident can redeem.

Blood Simple becomes a dazzling comedie noire, a dynamic, virtuoso display by a couple of talented fledgling filmmakers who give the conventions of the genre such a thorough workout that the result is a movie that's fresh and exhilarating (in the way that Jean-Jacques Beineix’s “Diva” was).

It's fairly safe to predict that Silent Night, Deadly Night will start making "Worst Movies of All Time" lists almost immediately. It has all the prerequisites. A roaringly bad idea. Derivative scriptwriting. Tastelessness. Naked opportunism. A cast full of actors who mug, gesticulate and savor every rotten line. A general "we're only in this for the money" attitude, visible in every sloppy frame. And, to top it off, that most crucial quality: enough conscious or unconscious humor to keep you watching, and insulting, it. [11 March 1986, p.C5]

It's an absorbing study of power couched in thriller format. As with any Roeg film, the stunning visuals are the real star. [20 Dec 1985, p.22]

Cloak and Dagger is fun for adults as well as older kids, thanks to the imaginative writing (by Tom Holland) and direction (by Richard Franklin).

Unfortunately, Electric Dreams has another thing in common with most rock videos: It’s strong on music and visual effects, while somewhat lacking in story development.

Star Trek III has a genuine spirituality, and, at its end, you may be surprised, especially if you're not really a Trekkie, to realize how moved you've been.

Helped by Ennio Morricone's trademark score, especially the haunting playing of pan pipes by Gheorghe Zamfir, this is a work whose overall mood is one of overwhelming melancholy and sadness, of youthful yearning, mature regret, and the transcendent but fleeting nature of memory itself. [10 Jul 1999, p.F1]

A picture with possibilities and an attractive star performance from James Garner that's among his best, but Marvin J. Chomsky's blunt, straight-on direction flattens out the film as surely as if it had been run over by the Sherman tank of its title. [28 Aug 1988, p.5]

Fresh, virulently funny, with an eye on life that's as offbeat as the early Beatles movies, the talents behind the bizarre and irreverent Repo Man are a real discovery. [16 Nov 1986, p.5]

That rare comedy that is as completely entertaining now in its re-release...as it was back then.

Paul Newman plays a crackerjack demolition man; unfortunately, before even half of this meandering and soggy film is over, Newman, as co-writer, co-producer, director and co-star, has flattened everything in sight, audience included. [29 Nov 1987, p.5]

1984's "Rebel Without a Cause" copy Reckless has a tighter-than-usual Chris Columbus script, moodily colorful direction by James Foley, and good acting by Aidan Quinn, Daryl Hannah and Kenneth McMillan. [20 Jul 1986, p.5]

Gives new meaning to the phrase rat race. [15 Aug 2003, p.22]

Laugh-out-loud funny. [11 Dec 1997, p.F48]

Lynne Littman's unforgettable, uncompromising and understated Testament is quite simply the most powerful anti-nuclear dramatic film ever made and stars Jane Alexander, superb as a woman trying to hold her family together in the aftermath of a nuclear holocaust. [10 Aug 1986, p.4]

In a brash, beautiful, deeply American film, Kaufman has combined the resources and ingenuity of movie making with the freewheeling, damn-the-conventions style of of the New Journalism and come up with a generous, high-spirited look at the bravery and lunacy that was that era.