|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|
||||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
Also this issue: Just Her Type Pleasure Principals 8 Women Screen Picks |
|
|
|
|
 |
|||||||||
September 26-October 2, 2002
movie shorts
GOODFELLAS
(Not reviewed.) A haiku:
Look out, Henry Hill!
You'll find out: Ketchup doesn't
go with egg noodles.
(Roxy)
Merci pour lE CHOCOLAT
Despite its sweet title, Claude Chabrol’s erstwhile thriller is so dry it sticks going down. Isabelle Huppert, as icily reserved and demanding as she was in The Piano Teacher, plays the third, and first, wife of a concert pianist (Jacques Dutronc). His second wife, by whom he had a son (Rodolphe Pauly), fell asleep at the wheel and drove off a cliff -- indeed, sleeping sickness seems to travel in the family. Chabrol makes no secret about who’s doing the doping, or how -- Huppert offers her rohypnol-laced hot chocolate with almost comical regularity. In fact, there are few secrets at all, just the ineluctable march to the inevitable, and utterly suspenseless, conclusion. Chabrol has spoken of his desire to “abstract” the genre, to reduce it to its essence, but the result is about as exciting as watching someone do calculus.--Sam Adams (Ritz at the Bourse)
SPACE STATION
Somewhere between the phantasmagorical revolving station of 2001: A Space Odyssey fame and the cramped quarters of a Volkswagen bug (and a major improvement over Mir -- the decrepit Soviet space home that deserved a tabloid headline of “Oy, Vey Is Mir”) the International Space Station is lofty testament to the wonders of worldwide cooperation in the name of science. It also makes for some amazing cinematography. Space Station, the latest IMAX film, gives viewers the typical IMAXian bird’s-eye view of things -- in this case, life aboard a space station -- with a twist. The film, a co-production of IMAX and Lockheed Martin, was shot by astronauts, who not only master the elements of space travel, but do a very fine job taking pictures as well. As astronaut Brian Duffy explained at a press conference, he and his fellow space travelers spent nearly three years not just training for their mission, but they learned the intricacies of filmmaking as well. All in all, Space Station is one small step for man, one giant leap for audiences.--Howard Altman (Tuttleman Imax Theater, Franklin Institute)
SWEET HOME ALABAMA
Golden girl/good sport Reese Witherspoon has been calling this lackluster romantic comedy a “return” to her own Southern roots (including her sweet home accent). But Andy Tennant’s film only revisits a pile of clichés. She plays a fancy-pants NYC fashion designer, planning to marry up-and-coming Patrick Dempsey, son of snippy, egotistical NYC Mayor Candice Bergen. But before she does, she has to go home to sort out her secret past. First, she is not the daughter of a plantation owner, but of poor folks (Fred Ward and Mary Kay Place) and second, she’s still married to childhood sweetheart (Josh Lucas), once a good old boy and now -- to her surprise -- turned cute, thoughtful and successfully entrepreneurial. This last allows her to make the right decision (the one indicated by the film’s title) and not have to live in a double-wide. The performances are pert, the characters stale and the inevitable showdown between suitors (and mothers) quite humdrum. Tellingly, the most enthusiastic audience response came not when Witherspoon and her beau clinch, but when her gay designer mentor from the city (Nathan Lee Graham) exchanges meaningful glances with her gay best friend from the country (Ethan Embry): Perhaps that’s the movie that Tennant should have made.--Cindy Fuchs (AMC Orleans; Baederwood; Ritz 16; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)
| [an error occurred while processing this directive] |
THE TUXEDO
(Not reviewed.) A haiku:
Hey Jennifer Jugs,
Jackie Chan's stuntwork is real
but your boobs are not.
(AMC Orleans; Bryn Mawr; Narberth; UA 69th St.; UA Cheltenham; UA Grant; UA Riverview)
-- Respond to this article in our Forums -- click to jump there
