That's Entertainment comes back, bouncingly, for a second encore
That's Entertainment III didn't sound like an appealing prospect. Part two of... More>>
If ever there were an avant-garde film that tested a cinephile's resolve, it's Blue: 75 minutes of a swimming-pool shade of the titular color... More>>
I wish I could've seen the looks on the suits' faces at MGM, the studio behind Blown Away, when they first saw Speed. We were robbed, they must... More>>
As its title indicates, Combination Platter fits nicely into the Chinese-American food-film genre, joining Dim Sum, Eat a Bowl of Tea and The... More>>
"Sometimes bad things happen and there's nothing you can do about it." This sobering message -- only one of several downbeat pronouncements in... More>>
When seated in front of a three-hours-and-then-some movie, impatient filmgoers sometimes begin a mental editing process, wishing that the story... More>>
Fear of a Black Hat is no Spinal Tap -- but it comes close
By Peter Szatmary,
June 30, 1994
While there's no deep meaning in a rap song entitled "Come Pet the P.U.S.S.Y.," the fictional rap group that performs it in Fear of a Black Hat... More>>
A pistol-packing Pole takes on the new European reality
By David Theis,
June 30, 1994
White has been billed (if that's not too strong a term for a film that's arriving this quietly) as the sequel to Krzysztof Kieslowski's Blue and... More>>
A chubby little Slav learns there's more to life than Tito
By Peter Szatmary,
June 23, 1994
Cheery samba music certainly isn't the soundtrack you'd expect to accompany newsreel footage of Marshal Tito, the former Yugoslavian dictator,... More>>
Speed proves there's still life in the old car chase
By David Theis,
June 23, 1994
If you want to be sure that the Reagan-Bush era has finally ended, look to Speed. Instead of having a killing machine at the heart of what may... More>>
Wolf was preceded by enough bad vibes to set me on my guard. Early press releases stated -- yikes! -- that Jack Nicholson's character becomes... More>>
Bruce Brown goes back to the beach to hang ten, again
By Peter Szatmary,
June 16, 1994
If you know what "gank" means, you're the target audience for Bruce Brown's The Endless Summer II. As its title suggests, this movie is a sequel... More>>
Glenn Gould gets a film portrait to match his genius
By Peter Szatmary,
June 09, 1994
In a posh hotel room in Hamburg, dashing classical pianist Glenn Gould (Colm Feore), with rumpled clothes and abstracted gait, is feeling too ill... More>>
Plot summary is normally the lazy way out of a movie review; not so with Kika. The latest by Spanish director Pedro Almodovar has a story arc... More>>
Rice's festival of non-talkies shows that silence can be golden
By David Theis,
June 09, 1994
Middle-aged Americans such as myself likely got their first taste of silent films by watching the '60s television program Fractured Flickers. For... More>>
What's with all these summertime Westerns? The cheesy Maverick and the stilted Even Cowgirls Get the Blues have already tumbled into town, while... More>>
If awards were given on the basis of inoffensiveness, Maverick's would fill a trophy case. Who could get mad at the sight of Mel Gibson mugging... More>>
The recent short films of River Oaks native Alex Georges have been a mixed bag. A Bit of Chartreuse was a small, very stylish black comedy, while... More>>
Spike Lee returns to old haunts, and old ways, in Crooklyn
By David Theis,
May 19, 1994
What is it about movies that causes them, or at least their essential ideas, to so often appear in matched sets? Until a few weeks ago, I had... More>>
Blue examines what it means to be truly on your own
By David Theis,
May 12, 1994
At first blush, Blue sounds terribly over-conceptualized. Most ominous is that this is the first in a movie trilogy by Polish filmmaker Krzysztof... More>>
