In The Fan, Robert De Niro would kill for the Giants -- literally
By Joe Leydon,
August 22, 1996
Tony Scott, the auteur of such blunt-instrument entertainments as Top Gun and True Romance, is not a director for whom subtlety is a way of life.... More>>
Ed Burns returns to the subject of sex and sibling rivalry
By Joe Leydon,
August 22, 1996
Talk about beating the sophomore jinx: Ed Burns, the multihyphenate fi filmmaker who burst onto the scene last year with The Brothers McMullen,... More>>
At once brutally cynical and romantically nostalgic, Robert Altman's Kansas City is a moody and bluesy pipe dream of a movie. Altman describes it... More>>
Shelton and Costner team up again for more sporting success
By Joe Leydon,
August 15, 1996
Now that Kevin Costner has gotten Wyatt Earp and Waterworld out of his system, and Ron Shelton has gotten Cobb out of his, it's good to see both... More>>
And the hits just keep on coming from Jane Austen, the early 19th-century novelist who's become a late 20th-century hot property. In the past two... More>>
Matilda is a girl wise beyond her years; Jack, a boy trapped in a man's body
By Joe Leydon,
August 08, 1996
Everyone from Oprah Winfrey to William Bennett agrees that, given the societal changes of the past two decades, today's children have to grow up... More>>
Once again, director Claude Sautet constructs a tantalizing mystery without a solution
By Joe Leydon,
August 01, 1996
Pierre Arnaud (Michel Serrault) is an aging Parisian gentleman of courtly manner and considerable means. Elegant in his speech and impeccable in... More>>
John Grisham wrote A Time to Kill long before he became a fixture on the bestseller lists, and he continues to claim it as his personal favorite... More>>
When's the last time you saw John Astin, America's beloved Gomez Addams, in a film? He's here, in Peter Jackson's The Frighteners -- and so is... More>>
No, says Multiplicity, you don't want to be two places at once
By Joe Leydon,
July 18, 1996
In Groundhog Day, director Harold Ramis set forth a charmingly provocative proposition: even the most obnoxious and self-absorbed person could... More>>
The "starring Meg Ryan" line suggests that Courage Under Fire is the moppet's annual Oscar bid (a la Flesh and Bone or When a Man Loves a Woman).... More>>
Since 1974, Louise Fitzhugh's Harriet the Spy has been a hit in libraries. Our heroine is serious and uncute, an obsessive notebook-keeper and a... More>>
Independence Day has a concept. What it needs is a plot.
By Edith Sorenson,
July 04, 1996
Quite a summer for flying cars -- much-hyped summer movies such as Eraser, Mission Impossible and Twister have sedans flipping like pancakes. But... More>>
Striptease captures the essence of Carl Hiaasen's darkly funny novel
By Joe Leydon,
July 04, 1996
Greater love hath no mom than the mom who takes off her clothes at the Eager Beaver.
From this dubious premise, author Carl Hiaasen fashioned... More>>
Just nine months after Hollywood Pictures released Powder, a sentimental science-fiction fable about a sweet-natured outcast with magical mental... More>>
If you can't get away to the rolling hills of Tuscany this summer, you can enjoy the next best thing by spending a couple of hours with Bernardo... More>>
Welcome to the Dollhouse is not a wacky "revenge of the nerds" movie. This is a delicate, unhappy story about being 11 years old and not being... More>>
The Cable Guy reveals Jim Carrey's dark side -- but not enough of it
By Joe Leydon,
June 20, 1996
It's usually safe to assume that a comic is speaking metaphorically when he talks about "murdering the audience." With Jim Carrey, however, you... More>>
The Rock tests the hypothesis that moviegoers like 'em fast, splashy and loud
By Joe Leydon,
June 13, 1996
Don Simpson is gone -- he died last January at 52, the victim of prodigious self-indulgence -- but, as The Rock indicates, his influence lingers... More>>
