After Bruce Lee's death, a gaping hole plagued the martial arts genre, but former karate champ Norris helped close that gap.

In less assured hands, this could have wound up as a disaster, but director Edouard Molinaro was skillfully able to film the long-running play and wring every drop of humor from it.

Director William Richert has turned Richard Condon's novel about the insanity of the American power structure into a wickedly funny black comedy spiced up by some deliciously off-the-wall performances.

Neat and quirky, this is undoubtedly one of the freshest black comedies around.

This sweet and innocent movie about teen romance won't fail to bring a tear and a smile in its heart-tugging finale.

For every bit that works there are three that don't, and the movie becomes somewhat tedious at times. Hamilton, however, is obviously having a good time with his role and has a field day with the Bela Lugosi accent.

The film uses the locations well and Gazzara's performance is an actor's dream. But SAINT JACK never quite becomes the "important" film it seems to aspire to be. The story is told in too meandering a style and the many well-acted characterizations never mesh together.

An updated version of the more gritty original, given an inappropriately lush look by director Zeffirelli.

Nicely directed with a great sense of the oppressiveness of the outdoors. Nature is the villain in this well-filmed second feature by Australian director Eggleston.

The sometimes self-conscious and too-earnest Fonda and the occasionally hammy Lemmon both rise beautifully to the occasion, delivering performances that are among their best.

As senseless as the story is the film contains several memorably creepy scenes, as is to be expected from any film in which mannequins spring to life.

The battle of wits is peppered with funny lines and the suspense seldom flags.

There is much to recommend in this film, and sheer energy pours off the screen in every frame.

Deft comedy set in a neurotic town. People may argue about the relative merits of Annie Hall vis-a-vis Manhattan, which is a better and more fully realized film. By this time Allen had forsworn the glib one-liner and spent more time developing well-rounded characters.

The script is a jumbled bag of war-movie cliches, and hack director J. Lee Thompson--who surpassed himself precisely once, with Cape Fear--is on auto-pilot throughout.

Boring, contrived, and manipulative.

Real Life delivers a pointed critique of the influence of media on our lives; it is also one of the funniest looks at filmmaking ever put on screen.

The simple story is enlivened by an intelligent, compassionate screenplay, whose sole deficiency is that it makes no attempt to represent the management point of view. Field's performance is flawless.

The Warriors is a visual feast. Director Hill fills the frame with vibrant colors, bright lights, and nonstop motion. The uniforms of the various gangs are unique, funny, fearsome, and more than a bit theatrical. The exciting fight scenes are brilliantly choreographed, and instead of focusing on the violence, Hill concentrates on pure movement (most of the cast were actually dancers).

Though the script is a bit dense and the film slightly overlong, it's exciting and engrossing on all levels.

An entertaining thriller that stumbles occasionally on overlong dialogue sequences.

An exceedingly beautiful film, PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK seems to aspire to be an existential thriller of some sort. At times the film seems to tread in BLACK NARCISSUS territory with its depiction of barely controlled sexual hysteria and its eccentric lyrical quality. It's all pretty overheated and underexplained but this arty, vague, and possibly supernatural movie lingers on in the memory.

Whatever its flaws, this is one of very few American films to deal with fundamentalist beliefs about predestination, faith, and sin with empathy and intellectual acuity.

Ice Castles collapses under the weight of sentimental overkill.

The film collapses midway--because of unsure and sloppy direction, splintered story continuity, and the overacting of Adams, Cartwright, and others. The battle between Sutherland and the aliens in the "pod factory" at the end is simply absurd and sophomoric.

There's no accounting for the success of this over the failure of Eastwood's infinitely superior Bronco Billy. The year 1978 was the year of heavy pictures, with The Deer Hunter, Coming Home, and Midnight Express. Perhaps people just wanted to sit back, eat some popcorn, and have a good old evening of cheer and laughter.

Although this film suffered from some miscasting--especially the choice of Shields, whose performance is more than mildly distressing--King of the Gypsies offers an often fascinating look at gypsy culture in America.

The film burdens itself with too many story lines and an overlong (though beautifully photographed) prologue, but things really get moving when Reeve takes the screen.