ArticleIP_1311.txt

   
   
      
         
            Winter Movie Roundup

             

            
               
                  Jackie Brown
               
(Miramax). Quentin Tarantino's first film since Pulp Fiction reinforces
reviewers' mixed opinion of him as clever but self-indulgent. His trademark
dialogue--street toughs riffing about daily trivia with pseudoprofundity--still
delights critics. They also welcome his rehabilitation of '70s blaxploitation
heroine Pam Grier, who stars as a money-laundering stewardess trying to scam
both her boss (Samuel L. Jackson) and a federal agent (Michael Keaton). But
most critics say Jackie Brown lacks Pulp Fiction 's inventiveness
and drags on too long (2 and a half hours). Tarantino, says Newsday 's
Jack Mathews, has taken "one of Elmore Leonard's lesser novels and draw[n] it
out as if it were Chekhov." (
                  Slate
               's David Edelstein likes
Jackie Brown . And click here for the official site.)

            
               
                  Wag the Dog
               
(New Line Cinema). Critics crown Barry Levinson's film the wittiest of the
recent political comedies. A spin doctor (Robert De Niro) and a Hollywood
producer (Dustin Hoffman) orchestrate a fake war to divert attention from a
presidential sex scandal. Hoffman is said to have given "one of the most subtle
and precise comic performances ... since Tootsie " (Joe Morgenstern, the
Wall Street Journal ). Critics also like David Mamet's screenplay for its
jabs at the news media, out-of-touch liberals, and "everything that's awful in
American life nowadays" (Richard Schickel, Time ). Dissenting, The New
Yorker 's Daphne Merkin bemoans the film's "sophomoric" humor and its "cozy,
video-ready cynicism." (See the official site. Also see Jacob Weisberg's dissection of Hollywood's narcissistic take on Washington.)

            
               
                  As Good As It
Gets
                (Sony/TriStar). Reviewers split over James L. Brooks' romantic
comedy about an obsessive-compulsive, misanthropic writer (Jack Nicholson) and
a struggling waitress (Helen Hunt). Some say it "echoes the quirky appeal of
[Brooks'] Broadcast News " (Janet Maslin, the New York Times ) and
call Nicholson's performance his best in years. Others say the film's schmaltzy
dialogue and contrived plot have the "staying power of cotton candy" (Merkin,
The New Yorker ). (The studio plugs the
film.)

            
               
                  The Postman
               
(Warner Bros.). Near-unanimity on the verdict: Actor-director Kevin Costner's
latest is "truly awful" (Stephen Holden, the New York Times ). The
post-apocalyptic Western about a band of mailmen who save the United States is
faulted for its ridiculous premise, mawkish dialogue, and megalomaniacal
directing, among other things. It would have been "a half-hour shorter without
Costner's close-ups of his own horizon-scanning mug," says the Washington
Post 's Rita Kempley. Some hope the film will convince Hollywood studios to
stop letting actors direct. (The trailer is available here.)

             

            
               
                  Tomorrow Never
Dies
                (MGM/United Artists). Despite a critical drubbing, the
18 th James Bond film still grossed $66 million in its first two
weeks. Reviewers say the film, a "conventional techno-thiller" (Roger Ebert,
the Chicago Sun-Times ), lacks its predecessors' tongue-in-cheek charm,
and they insist it's time to retire the Bond franchise. As the sixth Bond,
Pierce Brosnan is said to be debonair but not strong enough to overcome the
film's clichés. Another common complaint: egregious product placements--"enough
blatant endorsements to make the film itself incidental" (John Anderson,
Newsday ). (An official site celebrates the Bond franchise.)

            
               
                  Kundun
               
(Touchstone Pictures). Critics pronounce Martin Scorsese's biopic about the
young Dalai Lama beautiful but dull. They admire the film's scenic mountain
vistas and elegiac tone, saying the latter resembles "a meditative and
incantatory piece of music" (Pico Iyer, the New York Review of Books ).
Most critics respectfully note that the lack of a plot and the lengthy scenes
of Buddhist priests in prayer don't make for high excitement. "[E]verything a
movie about the Dalai Lama should be except dramatically involving" (Kenneth
Turan, the Los Angeles Times ). The New Yorker 's Louis Menand says
that despite surface differences, it's just another Scorsese "guy" flick:
"Kundun is Casino with Buddhists." (See 
                  Slate
               's
review and the film's site.)

            
               Recent
"Summary Judgment" columns
            

            Dec.
24:

            "The Year
in Review in Review"

            Dec.
17:

            

               Movie -- Titanic ;

            

               Movie -- Deconstructing Harry ;

            
               Movie -- Scream
2 ;

            
               Television -- Ally
McBeal (Fox);

            
               Art --"Gianni Versace"
(Metropolitan Museum of Art);

            
               Architecture --Museum
of Modern Art (New York City);

            

               Book -- Hogarth: A Life and a World , by Jenny Uglow.

            Dec.
10:

            

               Movie -- Amistad ;

            
               Movie -- Good Will
Hunting ;

            
               Television -- Breast
Men (HBO);

            
               Theater -- The Diary
of Anne Frank ;

            

               Opera -- Amistad ;

            

               Book -- A Certain Justice , by P.D. James.

            Dec.
3:

            
               Architecture --J. Paul
Getty Museum (Los Angeles);

            
               Theater -- The Old
Neighborhood , by David Mamet;

            

               Movie -- Flubber ;

            
               Movie -- Welcome to
Sarajevo ;

            
               Television -- Public
Housing (PBS);

            
               Book -- Release 2.0:
A Design for Living in the Digital Age , by Esther Dyson;

            

               Photography --"Weegee's World: Life, Death, and the Human Drama"
(International Center of Photography Midtown).

            

               --Franklin Foer