A number of grievous things have gone wrong with Gorky Park, the disappointing film version of Martin Cruz Smith's savory mystery novel, in its transition from print to celluloid. But chief among them is the casting of William Hurt as the leading man. [16 Dec 1983, p.F10]

The music isn't bad, but there's something more than a little blasphemous about hearing She's Leaving Home or A Day in the Life sung by the likes of the Bee Gees.

John Schlesinger, who directed Midnight Cowboy and Marathon Man, knows how to weave edge-of-the-seat tension. But Mark Frost's screenplay, based on Nicholas Conde's occult mystery novel The Religion, is a haphazard affair of implausibility and pseudo-Voodoo.

Overall, the movie is cloddishly composed, with awkward zooms and theatrical blocking. This is one of those movies where characters speak in asides to the audience; Nunn has reinvented the proscenium arch.

Aside from Danner and Ivey, who's also miscast, performances are steady if uninspired. Silverman is engaging but hasn't yet learned to work the camera like the crowd. But all their efforts hardly matter given the surprisingly unsteady pace set by Tony award-winning director Gene Saks, who collaborated with Simon on the successful film versions of "The Odd Couple" and "Barefoot in the Park." Caught between the strictures of stage and the freedoms of film, Saks and Simon (and producer Ray Stark) compromise with an amorphous hybrid that's stagey and forced. [26 Dec 1986]

And in the leads, Danson and Mandel won't make anyone forget Laurel and Hardy, or Namath and Gifford, for that matter. Not that there's any time for them to develop any chemistry -- Edwards is always revving up the rock 'n' roll and launching into another slapstick car chase. Which makes "A Fine Mess" the best argument yet for the 55 mph speed limit.

Exquistely written but treacherously threadbare Greene. The author's style doesn't emerge through the filters of Tom Stoppard's foreshortened screenplay and Preminger's monotonous direction, which keeps the exposition at such a low energy level that the scenes feel instantly depleted. [18 Apr 1980, p.E1]

The intentional comedy in the film always seems on the verge of working, but then is quickly bludgeoned to death.

For the most part the actors' work seems incomplete because their characters are cut off before they can fully blossom. It's as if Shea didn't trust her own strengths enough to allow them to carry the movie. In giving in to the cheap thrills of the psycho genre, she's trashed the very qualities that initially made her work so impressive.

If The Kissing Booth 2 is watchable, viewers have Elle to thank; King remains the strongest component of a now-franchise that, quite frankly, might be beneath her.

John Huston's movie version of Under the Volcano, which opens today at the West End Circle, seems to run out of pictorial ideas shortly after the credit sequence, a "dance of death" with skeleton dolls that establishes the setting in and around Cuernavaca, Mexico, on Nov. 1-2, 1938, during the Day of the Dead ceremonies. [13 July 1984, p.E4]

The film's depicted cruelties (the rape and disembowelment of a woman, a pillow suffocation of a boy after Poelvoorde has chased the terrified tyke through the house) grossly overshadow their satiric purposes.

It's resounding bunk, candied over with the lush music of Johnny Clegg and hyped to death by director John ("Rocky") Avildsen.

But this whore-and-the-innocent friendship, set in Shanghai during the 1930s, is too trite to pull us in. And the gangster scenario around it (Bi Feiyu wrote the script) is similarly unconvincing.

Now and Then, the story of four girls coming of age in the summer of 1970, drags like a bad summer vacation—it floats hazily, ends suddenly and leaves you feeling crabby: How can it be over? Nothing happened.

The ballplayers themselves are a well-drawn, enjoyably kooky bunch, but it's absolutely impossible to believe that they would accept Billy's leadership. (If you believe this premise, then you probably believe Marge Schott doesn't look like a Saint Bernard.) And of all the child actors in the movie, the scrawny 13-year-old star shows the least presence.

It's certainly harrowing to sit through. Talk about your grizzly misadventures.

Raggedy Man is starved for scenes that might fill out our scanty store of information--for example, a little more about the marriage, the love affair, her identity as a mother. Even the location needs to be filled out, since one forms the misimpression that Gregory is not so much a small town as a ghost town. Next time, the Fisks owe it to themselves to bite off enough material to chew. [03 Jul 1982, p.B3]

The only thing wrong with John Woo's American debut, Hard Target, is that it's too American and not enough Woo.

Slapdash Sidney Lumet directs this misbegotten three-star vehicle, an overpowered tricycle of a tale with Sean Connery, Dustin Hoffman and Matthew Broderick unconvincing as successive generations of the genetically eclectic McMullen clan.

The imposing Sean Connery lends an undeserved dignity to A Good Man in Africa, an otherwise unpleasant and cringe-worthy cinematic botch of William Boyd's 1981 novel about the misadventures of British diplomats in a newly independent West African nation.

It's brutal, horribly manipulative, and we've seen this stuff before in better pictures.

Indian Summer would like to be to the '90s what "The Big Chill" was to the '80s. But something is missing, namely a superior cast, a more engaging group of characters, a far smarter, more focused script, and Lawrence Kasdan's expertly timed direction. This is a wan knockoff.

The lead character ostensibly is Coach Sam Winters, but the film never really focuses on the ethical compromises he needs to make and steers away from him. Thus, James Caan -- playing the coach -- appears in what amounts to a series of cameos. In fact, Caan seemingly just walks through his role, perhaps wondering how he got from "Brian's Song" to this thing.

Unfortunately, Bosworth couldn't act his way through the Seattle Seahawks and he's not likely to act his way into a film career based on this first outing.

Screenwriter Robert Getchell and director John Badham (whose resume includes the fallen "Bird on a Wire") wouldn't know a believable moment if it hit them. Fonda's transformation to lethal weapon, her affair with Mulroney and the implied romance with Byrne are all lukewarm, lazily outlined conceits. There have been deeper human relationships in TV commercials.

An amiably dopey teen movie.

Edwards wants to leap deliriously between gender roles and stereotypes. But he treads on every possible corn, from heterosexual to lesbian.

This Dr. Giggles has a lot of hearts and no brain.

Frankly, those wonderfully corny old high-in-the-sky Airport movies were more dramatically satisfying than this, a barren adaptation of Piers Paul Read's nonfiction bestseller, directed by Frank Marshall.

Only mildly exciting as it grinds toward its conclusion, Sniper falls apart in the last reel as writers Michael Frost Beckner and Crash Leyland dispense with credibility by turning the rebel and drug lord's forces into the Keystone Kartel, invoking a Magic Bullet and attempting an Oliver Stone denouement. Unfortunately, director Luis Llosa is no Oliver Stone.

Monte Merrick's script is an unspectacular, cliche-riddled voyage from start to finish, with everyone lugging their own tote-bags of facile character idiosyncrasies.

Lacking in both inspiration and ingenuity, it doesn't so much spoof the conventions of the genre as dumb down famous -- and in some cases, forgotten -- scenes from a slew of other movies.

Alan Silvestri's score is the worst mix of ersatz Jerry Goldsmith and schlock pop tunes, and the acting is pretty weak, though the filmmakers get good marks for using Calegory, a real-life disabled 11-year-old who brings a healthy authenticity to his role.

A shameless, uneventful rehash of the classic Western "Shane," "Nowhere to Run" miscasts Jean-Claude Van Damme in the old Alan Ladd role -- an outlaw outsider gradually drawn into both unexpected familial warmth and predictably violent conflict with a greedy land baron...While it boasts better supporting actors and technical credits than other Van Damme projects, the film nonetheless founders, a victim of its own lugubrious pace and misguided efforts at turning the bulging Belgian into a romantic lead.

Sign oath in blood promising stars they will not have to bother creating characters and can just coast on old tricks.

Annaud, who wrote the adaptation with frequent collaborator Gerard Brach, showed more consideration for the cub in "The Bear" than he does for young Miss March, who is shamefully overexposed. True, Leung's bodacious, cantaloupe-colored bottom is showcased, but the only thing we miss of March's is the skin between her toes. Never mind that in portraying passion, the two seem to be demonstrating the proper use of the Salad Shooter.

But this hackneyed stalker-rama, which pretends to be a call for gun control, ultimately is little more than an excuse to turn the bad guy into a human colander. The better to strain the moral pasta.

This movie's "Flashdance" on blades, an unending series of rock videos posing as a story. It's so slick, so loveless, so efficient, you almost take your hat off to the filmmakers.

Despite the threatened NC-17 rating, there's nothing remotely sexy about this stone-cold escapade. It only reaffirms the stodgy reputation of the British, who think hot to trot means let's go fox hunting.

The screenplay, contrived to suit the genre, is likewise replete with stock characters. Still, many of the actors manage to bring dignity, humor and even finesse to these tired roles. Gooding has the angelic good looks of Isiah Thomas and invests Lincoln with courageous sweetness. It's too bad the part isn't better developed.

It's a package, plain and simple: stars plus a high-concept premise, stripped down, no options. No personality, either.

Scriptwise, you'll be left thinking "if it only had a brain." Like last year's "Hardware," this British effort is simply too talky. Those who seek deeper meaning will enjoy the astrological and satanic explanations, even if they make no sense.

The second half of the film -- that is, everything after the dubious wife-swapping -- is as mindless and sloppy as the first half is sharp.

The movie loses all authority, despite wonderful work from cinematographer Peter Menzies and composer Patrick O'Hearn. In screenwriter Daniel Pyne's hands, every character becomes a disappointment. Even Dafoe loses his zest as the movie progresses.

Though creepy Jeffrey Combs and beach boy Bruce Abbott return as West and Cain, producer Brian Yusna has replaced Stuart Gordon in the director's chair, without bringing new life to the affair. Even the jokes in the Woody Keith/Rick Fry screenplay seem refried.

Housesitter wants to please everyone a little, but nobody a lot. This low-achievement approach may guarantee success in the video stores. But on the big screen, it's fully exposed. For all Steve Martin's rubbery faces, and Goldie Hawn's watery-eyed expressions, the movie just sits there.

Overall, what Mr. Destiny turns out to be is mildly sweet and amusing -- not a wonderful life, but merely an okay one.

Banal performances -- Jim is still not John and Grodin is playing a second-rate variation of the uptight guy in Midnight Express -- combine with derivative plot to tell us that yuppies are too grasping for their own good.

Stylishly gruesome and dementedly romantic, "Romeo" has its pervertedly funny moments, but in the end it's a bloody bummer that leaves a depressing aftertaste.

Such rarefied screen writing calls for the peerless talents of Arthur Hiller, a director with the comic timing of a tax auditor.

Several graphic scenes of torture and vengeance merely add to the movie's primer of inhuman brutality, and Sugar Hill's tragic, almost Shakespearean climax is undermined by a Band-Aid of a "positive" ending that rings patently and offensively false.

It's low-budget, rough-cut documentary, stained-sheet ugly moviemaking, suited to Borden's simple-minded message.

Narrow Margin feels more tired than classic, even if it manages to provide some thrills. There's just not enough there to grab us.

It's been gunned before -- and so much better.

Unfortunately, Branagh and screenwriters Steph Lady and Frank Darabont (who also adapted The Shawshank Redemption) have created a story as badly patched together as De Niro’s Creature.

Cadence might once have been pertinent, revolutionary or politically correct, but it's definitely out of step with the times

If a hero is one who perseveres and never gives up, this is one Hero that should have quit when it was ahead.

The character is again a lackluster after-thought, exploited by a new Universal assembly line that specializes in the serials manufactured for weekly television consumption.

Trapped in Paradise is a new comedy starring Dana Carvey, Nicolas Cage and Jon Lovitz, but considering that there isn't a single laugh in the whole picture, the term "comedy" must be used loosely.

Lane's comic bits are sodden, and as a result, the film is listless and fatiguing.

Quest for Camelot, the first feature-length, fully animated film from the Warner Bros. studio, is a quasi-feminist Arthurian adventure about a young woman who wants to become a knight of the Round Table. It is also, unfortunately, a derivative rip-off.

Hytner has filled the cast with good actors, but he's used them in obvious ways. Day-Lewis is not required to be anything but noble. Allen is such a purse-mouthed wife that you see why her husband ran to Ryder's nubile temptress (Hytner keeps turning Allen sideways, as if to emphasize that she has no chest). Ryder might as well have S-L-U-T tattooed on her forehead. None of these performers is bad, but what they're doing is shallow and ultimately uninteresting.

Saddled by Milius and Larry Gross's leaden script and Hill's somnambulant pace, "Geronimo" is hardly better than Ted Turner's recent fiasco.

Unless you're a junkie for mediocre rejoinders and insults ("I know loan sharks that are more forgiving than you," Leary tells Johns), this is one holiday party you'll want to miss.

At first, the movie's restraint is enticing, and even soothing. By the end, though, Tran's strategies have an enervating, numbing effect. The same methods he uses to pull us in finally kill our interest.

Watching the Care Bears' Adventure in Wonderland, the latest of the teddy superstars' animated movie escapades, is like being pelted mercilessly for 75 minutes with Lucky Charms. It's nonfatal (unless you have a sugar problem, in which case you're likely to lapse into a coma), but it's not exactly my idea of fun either.

The bitchery may be funny for its own sake, but it causes the film to lose touch with its real heroine and genre. Moreover, the Christie plot ends up so drastically foreshortened that you'd swear a reel must have been misplaced, although the sluggish direction of Guy Hamilton doesn't make one anxious to see it restored.

Some of the jokes are so raucously or goofily low-minded that you may laugh out of a kind of shocked weakness.

The state of uncertainty persists for the entire film, as you wait in vain for the director to tie the pieces together.

This is a gassy, overbearing, pretentious little bit of art-in-your face, from the director of "The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover," and it revisits some of the filmmaker's favorite places (the men's room, for example) and favorite themes (life as consumption and elimination). Most of the film's meanings are buried inside the artist's big, intellectually high-rolling metaphors.

It's obvious that Blank has been forced into many organizational shortcuts in an effort to stitch the random footage together.

A Ninja turtle soup of computer gimmicks, karate chops and kiddie Confucianism.

For all its stunning, poetic imagery, it's almost impossible to sit through.

The actors tend to think that everything they do in pursuit of character is great, wonderful and worthy of being shown. They're rarely accomplished enough to strut their stuff, nor assured enough to know when to hold back.

Watching Jean-Luc Godard's very loose adaptation of "King Lear" is like finding yourself in the middle of a poem whose meaning the poet refuses to make clear.

If Shutter Island, a gothic thriller starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo, were put to a free association test, the word most likely to come to mind would certainly be "weird."

It's all too predictable and by the book. Even with a few plot twists that aren't in the original, I was hardly shocked or awed. While it's sleeker and more sophisticated than the Chaney version, this new Wolfman isn't any scarier.

Largely relies on stale gender stereotypes and tired comedy routines that don't elicit much laughter.

This "Holmes" is just about as silly as it awesome. At times, Ritchie and company try so hard to make sure this isn't your father's "Sherlock Holmes" that it comes across as, well, cartoonish.

In the end, Daybreakers doesn't really want to make anyone think too hard. If that were to happen, they might stop to wonder why all the human survivors out there hiding in fear of their lives don't just become garlic farmers and call it a day.

Ten minutes after you leave the movie, all the battles will have blended in your memory into a ceaseless muddle of sliced-off appendages, jets of blood splashing artfully on walls, gurgling screams and flashing swords.

Planet 51 is cute, but it's no "Shrek."

It's a performance in search of a movie.

There's so much pluck and gumption on the screen you can smell it. Flesh and blood? Not so much.

In attitude, if not aptitude, Robert Pattinson in Remember Me comes across like a latter-day James Dean.

Jonah Hex may not be the longest 81 minutes you ever spend, but it might well be the most tedious.

For all the wacky, taboo, parodic situations that MacGruber plunges into, the film seems content to simply point at its hero, yell "What a schmuck!" and leave it at that.

Michael Caine delivers a stunning performance in Harry Brown, a rancid little revenge fantasy that probably doesn't deserve him.

As Balthazar, Cage doesn't disappoint. He's just manic enough to keep the character from becoming too predictable.

And the action? It's especially hard to determine who's fighting whom in "Legends," because, well, because they are a bunch of owls.

Charlie St. Cloud, like its star Zac Efron, is a gorgeous, unblemished thing. Both would be much improved with a tiny flaw or two.

A dog-frequency movie: enjoyable only to those tuned in to its particular register.

Things really slow down during the movie's ill-advised forays into drama.

So light and airy, it almost floats away on its own breeziness.

It's a highbrow romantic farce, without the laughs.

There's very little that's even kind of funny in It's Kind of a Funny Story, which can't accurately be described as a comedy but isn't a true drama, either.

No ordinary horror film. If it were, it might be a bit better than it is. As the movie stands, it's a less-than-compelling relationship drama, with aliens.