With his feature film debut Heathers, director Michael Lehmann set the world of high school comedies ablaze with his timelessly satirical examination of the horrors of the teenage experience. With its blisteringly pitch-black tone and its razor-sharp dialogue, one of the biggest reasons Heathers continues to resonate with audiences—whether it’s fans who first saw it three decades ago or new generations of fans who continue to discover it to this very day, thanks to the home media market and various streaming platforms that feature Heathers—is the film’s engaging and ingenious cast, who were all able to bring both the memorable characters and screenwriter Daniel Waters’ iconic dialogue to life.
While the entire ensemble of Heathers all played their part in establishing the film as a cult classic in the making, it’s the core quintet of young actors—Winona Ryder (Veronica Sawyer), Christian Slater (J.D.
While the entire ensemble of Heathers all played their part in establishing the film as a cult classic in the making, it’s the core quintet of young actors—Winona Ryder (Veronica Sawyer), Christian Slater (J.D.
- 4/17/2019
- by Heather Wixson
- DailyDead
Internal Affairs (1990) is an excellent stone cold thriller. The costumes are a subtle tease, revealing personal information that the characters never say out loud. Like many movies released in the late 1980s/1990s, Internal Affairs radiates uneasiness caused by shifting societal attitudes – anything that threatens a straight male chauvinist black-and-white world.
Costume designer Rudy Dillon punches through this black-and-white world with ensembles that poke fun at the status quo and subsequently subvert them with eroticism, perhaps ironically using only a colour scheme of black and white.
Andy Garcia as Raymond Avilla and Richard Gere as Officer Dennis Peck: the suit and the uniform.
Dennis with Van Stretch (William Baldwin) sporting popped tough guy collar and light, but very tight denim jeans.
The straight white male chauvinist is Dennis Peck (Richard Gere), a police officer in Los Angeles who controls his colleagues by involving them in extortion and other illegal acts.
Costume designer Rudy Dillon punches through this black-and-white world with ensembles that poke fun at the status quo and subsequently subvert them with eroticism, perhaps ironically using only a colour scheme of black and white.
Andy Garcia as Raymond Avilla and Richard Gere as Officer Dennis Peck: the suit and the uniform.
Dennis with Van Stretch (William Baldwin) sporting popped tough guy collar and light, but very tight denim jeans.
The straight white male chauvinist is Dennis Peck (Richard Gere), a police officer in Los Angeles who controls his colleagues by involving them in extortion and other illegal acts.
- 12/6/2014
- by Lord Christopher Laverty
- Clothes on Film
Filmmaker and costume designer Sophie Black recounts her personal interpretation of Heathers, a film defined by vivid visual interpretation.
It is just a coincidence that the first time I saw Michael Lehmann’s Heathers (1988) was within hours of the first time I saw David Lynch’s Blue Velvet (1986), and I immediately made comparisons between the two films which I may have not noticed otherwise. More people are quick to compare Heathers to the work of Tim Burton, because of the associates he had on the film (producer Denise Di Novi and star Winona Ryder, to name but two) and the fact that the candy-coloured suburban setting mirrors that of Edward Scissorhands (1990). But the picket-fenced world of Blue Velvet equally does so, and preceded both films, and only Blue Velvet matches Heathers in its extremity at portraying unusual characters, and capricious changes in editing and tone.
One cannot also help but...
It is just a coincidence that the first time I saw Michael Lehmann’s Heathers (1988) was within hours of the first time I saw David Lynch’s Blue Velvet (1986), and I immediately made comparisons between the two films which I may have not noticed otherwise. More people are quick to compare Heathers to the work of Tim Burton, because of the associates he had on the film (producer Denise Di Novi and star Winona Ryder, to name but two) and the fact that the candy-coloured suburban setting mirrors that of Edward Scissorhands (1990). But the picket-fenced world of Blue Velvet equally does so, and preceded both films, and only Blue Velvet matches Heathers in its extremity at portraying unusual characters, and capricious changes in editing and tone.
One cannot also help but...
- 10/4/2013
- by Christopher Laverty
- Clothes on Film
A distaff "Count of Monte Cristo" -- with Ashley Judd making a bid for stardom as a vengeful mother for whom "murder isn't always a crime" -- Paramount's fall thriller has some slam-bang action sequences but won't connect big with mainstream audiences, though a relatively open field could help it run up a big score early.
Named for a law that says one cannot be tried twice for the same crime, "Double Jeopardy" is directed coherently by Bruce Beresford, but those hoping for a seat-grabber like "The Fugitive" will be disappointed to find a somewhat bedraggled Tommy Lee Jones showing up 34 minutes into the movie. As a tenacious parole officer, however, he helps the film achieve a crowd-pleasing level of hokum that bodes well for ancillary revenue.
Two of the three scribes who brought us "The Rock", "Double" writers David Weisberg and Douglas S. Cook, take way too many shortcuts to achieve their goal of creating a smart, sexy protagonist who would not only win money on the TV game show "Jeopardy!" but also literally kick her opponents' butts.
There's nothing like being wrongly convicted of murdering your two-timing husband and then locked in prison for years to change a person -- no secret there. But the film sheds most of its credibility early when once super-happy Libby (Judd) surrenders far too meekly and quickly to the oily machinations of our imperfect justice system after a fateful trip with her husband on their recently acquired yacht. From glowing wife of northwest businessman Nick (Bruce Greenwood) and mama of little Mattie (Benjamin Weir) to inmate, parolee and fugitive, Libby blossoms into a deadly lady with a mission and presumably our sympathies.
Her goal, as sketched by another spouse-dispatcher (Roma Maffia) in the joint, is simple. Libby was convicted of killing Nick once. Now she could do it for real in broad daylight and not even be arrested. Having learned that the scumbag is not dead and has taken up with her devious best friend Angie (Annabeth Gish), with Mattie making it a threesome, the lead has a while to brood and prepare for her conditional release after a quick six years.
With little nudges from sympathetic strangers and alert analysis from cynical halfway-house boss Travis Jones), out-on-parole Libby knows the risks but sets out to find Nick, Angie and Mattie, who have disappeared. Travis nabs her once, but she escapes during the film's best sequence, involving cars plunging off a ferry. On the lam, Libby hits up her unworried farmer mom for a roll of bills buried in the vegetable garden and heads for Colorado.
Her final destination is New Orleans, where Nick has a new name and same bland personality. Angie is no more, and Mattie is the focus of Libby's quest, with Travis risking his job to track her and becoming convinced that she might, by golly, be innocent. At a snob-choked auction, dressed in a slinky new Armani gown, Libby stops short of blowing his brains out and instead makes a lousy deal with Nick, which results in her making an unpleasant visit to the cemetery. Nick is definitely asking for it now.
Judd is strongest when her character is most vulnerable, with genuine emotional responses to the stress and shock of her rapid downward spiral. The actress is less convincing as a gun-toting, crazy-smart mommy, and the film becomes a drearily familiar tale with an NRA-approved payoff.
DOUBLE JEOPARDY
Paramount Pictures
A Leonard Goldberg production
Director: Bruce Beresford
Screenwriters: David Weisberg, Douglas S. Cook
Producer: Leonard Goldberg
Co-producer: Richard Luke Rothschild
Director of photography: Peter James
Production designer: Howard Cummings
Editor: Mark Warner
Costume designers: Rudy Dillon, Linda Bass
Music: Normand Corbeil
Casting: Deborah Aquila, Sarah Halley Finn
Color/stereo
Cast:
Libby: Ashley Judd
Travis: Tommy Lee Jones
Nick: Bruce Greenwood
Angie: Annabeth Gish
Margaret Skolowski: Roma Maffia
Mattie, Age 4: Benjamin Weir
Evelyn Lake: Davenia McFadden
Running time -- 105 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
Named for a law that says one cannot be tried twice for the same crime, "Double Jeopardy" is directed coherently by Bruce Beresford, but those hoping for a seat-grabber like "The Fugitive" will be disappointed to find a somewhat bedraggled Tommy Lee Jones showing up 34 minutes into the movie. As a tenacious parole officer, however, he helps the film achieve a crowd-pleasing level of hokum that bodes well for ancillary revenue.
Two of the three scribes who brought us "The Rock", "Double" writers David Weisberg and Douglas S. Cook, take way too many shortcuts to achieve their goal of creating a smart, sexy protagonist who would not only win money on the TV game show "Jeopardy!" but also literally kick her opponents' butts.
There's nothing like being wrongly convicted of murdering your two-timing husband and then locked in prison for years to change a person -- no secret there. But the film sheds most of its credibility early when once super-happy Libby (Judd) surrenders far too meekly and quickly to the oily machinations of our imperfect justice system after a fateful trip with her husband on their recently acquired yacht. From glowing wife of northwest businessman Nick (Bruce Greenwood) and mama of little Mattie (Benjamin Weir) to inmate, parolee and fugitive, Libby blossoms into a deadly lady with a mission and presumably our sympathies.
Her goal, as sketched by another spouse-dispatcher (Roma Maffia) in the joint, is simple. Libby was convicted of killing Nick once. Now she could do it for real in broad daylight and not even be arrested. Having learned that the scumbag is not dead and has taken up with her devious best friend Angie (Annabeth Gish), with Mattie making it a threesome, the lead has a while to brood and prepare for her conditional release after a quick six years.
With little nudges from sympathetic strangers and alert analysis from cynical halfway-house boss Travis Jones), out-on-parole Libby knows the risks but sets out to find Nick, Angie and Mattie, who have disappeared. Travis nabs her once, but she escapes during the film's best sequence, involving cars plunging off a ferry. On the lam, Libby hits up her unworried farmer mom for a roll of bills buried in the vegetable garden and heads for Colorado.
Her final destination is New Orleans, where Nick has a new name and same bland personality. Angie is no more, and Mattie is the focus of Libby's quest, with Travis risking his job to track her and becoming convinced that she might, by golly, be innocent. At a snob-choked auction, dressed in a slinky new Armani gown, Libby stops short of blowing his brains out and instead makes a lousy deal with Nick, which results in her making an unpleasant visit to the cemetery. Nick is definitely asking for it now.
Judd is strongest when her character is most vulnerable, with genuine emotional responses to the stress and shock of her rapid downward spiral. The actress is less convincing as a gun-toting, crazy-smart mommy, and the film becomes a drearily familiar tale with an NRA-approved payoff.
DOUBLE JEOPARDY
Paramount Pictures
A Leonard Goldberg production
Director: Bruce Beresford
Screenwriters: David Weisberg, Douglas S. Cook
Producer: Leonard Goldberg
Co-producer: Richard Luke Rothschild
Director of photography: Peter James
Production designer: Howard Cummings
Editor: Mark Warner
Costume designers: Rudy Dillon, Linda Bass
Music: Normand Corbeil
Casting: Deborah Aquila, Sarah Halley Finn
Color/stereo
Cast:
Libby: Ashley Judd
Travis: Tommy Lee Jones
Nick: Bruce Greenwood
Angie: Annabeth Gish
Margaret Skolowski: Roma Maffia
Mattie, Age 4: Benjamin Weir
Evelyn Lake: Davenia McFadden
Running time -- 105 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
- 9/20/1999
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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