Year: 1999

(On VHS, September 1999) I’ll automatically recommend anything featuring the gorgeous Andie MacDowell, but that shouldn’t make me blind to the weaknesses of Michael. John Travolta may star as an angel having a good time on Earth, but what could have been an original comedy is reduced to inconsequent sight gags about a mildly wacky angel, with a romantic tag that seems tacked-on. The whole film is like that, oscillating between different things until it never knows where it should be. The country soundtrack doesn’t help. Still, Michael manages to score a few fun lines and some formulaic-but-sweet romantic moments. That’s probably good enough.

(On VHS, September 1999) Nifty premise, meandering execution. A hundred various criminals are locked inside a high-tech prison. The prize? The three survivors get ten million dollars. Buckets of guns and bullets rain down on the initial hundred, and the fun begins. What follows is, roughly, a non-stop firefight barely interrupted by some half-hearted character development. Think of The Killer, though without emotional content and without John Woo’s superb eye for pulse-pounding action sequences. A cheerfully subversive mambo soundtrack is bound to bring a grin to your lips. Unfortunately, that’s pretty much the only cool or funny thing in the film, despite the darkly comic potential of the story. This film would have been a first-class classic in the hands of Woo or Robert Rodriguez. Christopher Lambert and Ice-T both shine in roles we completely expect them to play as they do. A pure B-movie worth a look on late-night TV.

(In theaters, September 1999) Wickedly funny French film, reasonably well-subtitled in English. The theatrical origins of the film are obvious from the one-set location and the superbly convoluted script that does miracles with simple elements. Wildly unpredictable, interestingly directed and well-supported by the rather good acting. The ending is a bit of a letdown, as the film desperately tries to be nice and mean at the same time, with mixed results. Worth tracking down at your local video store.

(On VHS, September 1999) An interesting experiment. An Italian hitwoman (played by the beautiful Kendra Torgan) is hired to do a job in England. Due to complications, she’s forced to wait for her prey in a hotel room, literally “killing time” as various hoodlums try to murder her. The situation is made more difficult by the fact that she initially doesn’t speak a word of English. What would have been a terrific Nikita episode is stretched out to 89 looong minutes. The action sequences don’t really shine and the minimalist script is annoyingly contrived. Though the end result is still of some marginal interest (no doubt due to the strong screen presence of the lead actress), it’s simply too long and too indifferently directed to be enthused about.

(On VHS, September 1999) I was initially cautious about this film, and all the Academy Awards it received, which seems to relate a lot to external factors: Robin Williams was overdue for something (so he got the Supporting Actor nod) and Hollywood has the curious tendency to reward actors who write scripts (which would explain the Ben Affleck/Matt Damon win for Best Original Screenplay, though the script doctoring by William Golding is almost never mentioned) But that would be belittling the all-around pretty good film that is Good Will Hunting. It has a lot of heart, interesting characters and simply a good grasp of what is a satisfying story. The acting is uniformly good and the conclusion is suitably bittersweet.

(On VHS, September 1999) The unlikely pairing of Dennis Rodman and Jean-Claude van Damme would at first appear to be an exercise in cinematic awfulness critical mass. But Double Team ends up, strangely, as a curiously enjoyable piece of “guilty pleasure” B-cinema. Helping out is the effective direction of Hong Kong-expatriate Tsui Hark, who knows how to film an action scene. Otherwise, the script offers enough logical howlers and missing scenes to elicit gales of hilarity. Watch out for the deux-ex-Coke-machina ending! Not enough is done with Rodman’s character, but hey—at least he doesn’t embarrass himself.

(On TV, September 1999) So what is this film? As serious SF, it fails completely, never being able to convincingly explain its very framework. As satirical SF, it would have worked… in the fifties, and then again would have been re-written another time. (Though it does go through the motions of creating a different future.) As action, it’s almost a bore, given that we’ve seen all of it in other films, and more often than not, in other Sylvester Stallone films. As a comedy, it does have its moments, though those are dispersed between a mass of limp material. To the film’s credit, Stallone is okay and Sandra Bullock (“Lenina Huxley” is one of the few clever elements of the film) is adorable… but otherwise we’ll have to fall back on set design to say nice things about this movie. An acceptable divertimenti if you haven’t yet seen it, but otherwise not an essential.

(On TV, September 1999) One learns a lot from a movie while doing the dishes while it plays on TV. First; made-for-TV films are never of superior quality. Two; beautiful actresses can make you look at the screen even if what they’re doing isn’t really interesting. Three; it’s a very bad sign if you can’t remember the end of the film only two days later. Four; There is still no reason to disprove the axiom that “any movie title containing cyber is sign of a rotten script”. Five; When making a film about a pop signer, don’t repeat the same song four times, especially if it bears an uncanny resemblance to a Republica song. Six; washing dishes while watching a completely empty film still gives you the feeling you’ve accomplished something.

(On TV, September 1999) It’s hard to see where a soft-porn film about car crashes can go wrong for any young male, but David Cronenberg’s film never amounts to anything beyond a collection of brief sex scenes. And even then, most of those are cut so quickly as to be insignificant. If it’s supposed to be an exploration of sex versus machine, it doesn’t do a whole lot of exploring. The lack of development is such that once the superfluous is cut out, there can’t be much more than fifteen minutes of plot left. (At least Deborah Kara Unger is very hot, so much that she makes plain-looking Holly Hunter look ridiculous in comparison.) Say what you want about porn films, but most of them contain both more plot and more excitement -and, possibly, more realism- than Crash.

(On TV, September 1999) This may not be the most convincing thriller out there, but it works despite the numerous logical flaws, editing glitches and coherence problems it contains. The script scream “contrivance!” each time a new oh-so-dangerous situation emerges, regardless of previous continuity. The tough-but-sensitive protagonist role seems custom-built for Sylvester Stallone, who turns in a convincing performance. Director Renny Harlin obviously knows how to build a thriller, and Cliffhanger includes several money shots that elevate this action film from fair to good.

(On TV, September 1999) In an industry often incompetent enough to be unable to turn out decent product, it’s a refreshing change to see a perfectly good thriller so well-done. No earth-shattering villains, no save-the-world histrionics; just an ordinary guy looking for his wife, and battling plain blue-collar baddies. The pacing is superb, the direction is surprisingly competent and Kurt Russell turns in a fine performance. Though not without significant plot flaws (relying too much on coincidences in the first half-hour), Breakdown remains a superior, unassuming little thriller done strictly according to the rules of the genre. And that’s more than good enough.

(In theaters, September 1999) This works pretty well, provided you do consider it as what it is; an updated Beverly Hills Cop taking place in the same sunny fantasy Los Angeles world where police headquarters are architectural models and everyone fires heavy artillery at the slightest provocation. Martin Lawrence is surprisingly sympathetic as the protagonist. The script has numerous plot holes, but the comedy is funny and the action scenes are engaging. A perfect example of “a good time at the movies”, Blue Streak is -in the end- just enough fun.