Search for 1997

Tom DiCillo's offbeat Box of Moonlight is a film that I wanted to like a great deal more than I actually did. DiCillo is one of those few quirky directors who loves to play with both his audience and his subject matter. Unfortunately, all the lit...

"And to all the critics who hated our last flick -- all is forgiven." -- Chasing Amy's closing credits Well, I didn't exactly hate Mallrats, but I thought it was a comedown for Kevin Smith, the talented writer/director who debuted strongly with...

Con Air, producer Jerry Bruckheimer's generic follow-up to 1996's blockbuster, The Rock, is the kind of motion picture that critics refer to when they moan about the "dumbing down" of American cinema. This movie is a perfect example of what's wron...

Contact is likely to change a lot of perceptions -- not only about the role of humankind in the universe, but about what special effects can do for a movie when they're used in the service of a story, rather than the other way around. Contact...

Where are the flying cows when you really need them? Dante's Peak is obviously predicated on the dubious idea that bigger is better. 1996's Twister brought in hundreds of millions at the box office by showcasing relatively small (if something s...

Deconstructing: To write about or analyze in a way that questions traditional assumptions about certainty, identity, and truth, asserts that words can only refer to other words, and attempts to demonstrate how statements about any text subvert the...

If you were bored by My Dinner with Andre, The Designated Mourner isn't for you. If Spalding Gray's monologues put you to sleep, prepare to snooze through The Designated Mourner. And if you think Twister is perfectly paced, give The Designated Mo...

Taylor Hackford's The Devil's Advocate has many laudable qualities, but subtlety is not among them. The story, which postulates that the devil is walking among us today, gives Satan's human alter-ego a truly obvious name: John Milton (for those w...

The advance word on The Devil's Own was, to put it mildly, not good. About a month ago, Brad Pitt went public with some extremely damaging statements about how, if he hadn't possessed an iron-clad contract, he would have bailed out on the prod...

Al Pacino in a Mafia movie feels as natural as peanut butter with jelly. Mike Newell, the director of such popular British comedies as Enchanted April and Four Weddings and a Funeral, is another matter altogether. When you think of a director...