Once again, Philip Glass composes one of his insistent scores -- and again the effect is pretentious, considering the circumstances. Director Bill Condon has a sense of style but a heavy hand with actors -- you can all but hear them telling themselves to hit their marks and punch out their lines. [17 Mar 1995, p.H28]

Mamaengaroa Kerr-Bell, who plays Grace, had never acted before, and neither have a couple of the other key players. But under the careful direction of television veteran Lee Tamahori, they all do credible and forceful work.

If you can convince yourself that this movie has a reason to exist (I can't), then this big-screen recycling of the popular early-'70s TV series is not half bad. [17 Feb 1995, p.13]

With sufficiently intelligent plotting and an A-list cast led by Sean Connery, Just Cause rises above many standard-issue thrillers with enough momentum to grab and hold your attention. [17 Feb 1995, p.I34]

The movie is a stylized collection of well-timed shockers, helped along by the contributions of its capable cast, especially Neill, who plays the detective in a hard-boiled manner that suggests 1940s film noir. [03 Feb 1995, p.H31]

There's a welcome lack of blarney (Mason Daring's score is never cloying) and a freshness about the performances that makes the movie feel contemporary. [17 Feb 1995, p.I30]

It's a good thing this third and presumably final Highlander film will appeal only to those who've bothered to see the first two, because an uninitiated viewer wouldn't be able to make even the slightest sense out of it. [28 Jan 1995, p.C5]

In Benton's able hands this authentic, engagingly humane movie evolves into a casual treasure of stolen moments, where nothing much happens and yet everything happens. Because Benton knows that life can best be found in a silent expression, a camouflaged turn of a phrase, and in the simple acts of compassion that make the next day worth waking up for.

It's trashy to the bone, but director Ernest Dickerson targets just the right tone for tension and comic relief, and keeps the whole thing rolling in Grand Guignol style. It may be disposable, but "Demon Knight" is never boring. It's consistently hilarious and just outrageous enough to make Gaines spin happily in his grave. [13 Jan 1995, p.H26]

Historians now believe George III's bizarre symptoms (which came and went, until his 1820 death) arose from porphyria, a metabolic imbalance. Whatever their origin, they've inspired a marvelous film. [27 Jan 1995, p.H22]

Sommers is so busy spinning his camera, crowding the soundtrack with animal noises and piling on the cheesy visual effects that he can't stop for a reflective moment or a character-revealing touch.

A chaotic, juvenile slag-heap of semi-futuristic action that should make at least a few Hollywood idiots think twice about adapting another video game.

This jokey fantasy-comedy is so formulaic that even its wittier lines and casting choices aren't enough to overcome a numbing sense of deja vu. [21 Dec 1994, p.E4]

The script by sports-movie veteran Ron Shelton is an understandable but rather monotonous attempt to deal with the differences between hard truth and media-created mirages.

As welcome as a race riot on Christmas Eve, this excruciating comedy is destined not to become a year-end television perennial. [02 Dec 1994, p.I32]

By the time he's hiding at a pregnancy retreat disguised as a former female Olympic athlete, Junior has pretty much hit the bullseye. [23 Nov 1994, p.D3]

Haneke carefully and ingeniously presents the boy's point of view without sympathizing with him. He then does the same with his horrified but protective parents. [18 Nov 1994, p.G35]

The Swan Princess may be derivative but it clicks, as ex-Disney animator Don Bluth's latest films ("Thumbelina," the video-bound "Troll in Central Park") have not. With just one movie in release, Rich is starting to look like the only other animation game in town. [18 Nov 1994, p.G33]

Jackson uses seamless, state-of-the-art visual effects to capture the girls' shared fantasies. One would expect nothing less from the director of the technically proficient horror movie, "Dead/Alive." The surprise here, and the key to the film's success, is his casting and handling of the young unknowns playing the girls. [23 Nov 1994, p.D3]

Oleanna the movie remains faithful to the charged 1992 play in Mamet's original Off Broadway production. It features outstanding performances by a pair of expert actors. And Andrzej Sekula's beautiful cinematography firmly inserts their encounters into the musty, hallowed interiors of an Ivy League college. [04 Nov 1994, p.i34]

MTV veteran and first-time director Jim Yukich makes the most of the flashy if uneven visual effects, which usually have a state-of-the-art quality but occasionally look as phony as matte paintings in 1950s biblical epics. [04 Nov 1994, p.I39]

There are moments in Love Affair that take your breath away, sending you back to a time when class and discretion were the movie rule, and not the rarefied exception. [21 Oct 1994, p.H36]

If there is any problem with Wes Craven's New Nightmare, it's the fact that analyzing the film is potentially more fun than the film itself. But that's OK, because it means Craven has put enough thought into his work to make it worth thinking about. [14 Oct 1994, p.H40]

Filmed in Oregon and Montana by a first-rate crew, The River Wild puts you in the hot seat of its white-water climax, and through a combination of deft camera work, snappy editing and genuine derring-do, the stellar cast is right there with you. Even when you know it's filmmaking trickery, you'll wish you'd brought a wet suit. [30 Sep 1994, p.H3]

It may take more than Caro Diario for Americans to acquire the Moretti taste. [21 Oct 1994, p.H42]

Unfortunately, everyone's trying too hard to recapture the original's wry tone, and Culkin lacks the gawky, impish charm that Billingsley brought to Shepherd's childhood alter ego. [06 Jul 1995, p.E1]

The movie ends up playing like a series of skits and one-liners, some of them pointed and funny, that strain to achieve structure, substance and a workable ending. Fortunately, Judy Davis and Peter Weller are Tolkin's stars, and they're capable of providing a center for almost anything. [23 Sept 1994, p.H3]

As charted by a brilliantly incisive script by former lawyer and Washington Post film critic Paul Attanasio, the ethical crises of "Quiz Show" radiate from that anguished moment when Van Doren takes the bait. [16 Sept 1994, p.C3]