8-Foot Reviews

Oliver's Travels (1995– )

Good news: finally available on DVD!!!

[10/10 · 18 December 2004]

I've shared the prior lamentations that "Oliver's Travels" was neither available on home video nor, to my knowledge, had it been repeated on PBS. Now, try AcornOnline--dot--you-know-what or, alternately, see the Amazon listing (less $$) for March 2005 delivery.

This miniseries is a delightful, skillful blend of humor, mystery, suspense, intrigue, crime, romance, history, and travelogue. Crosswords and anagrams also figure as important plot elements. (Oliver can make an anagram out of almost anything but his own name.)

At the story's center is a villainous multinational corporation which has sucked many of the characters into its vortex. Although details of this operation remain vague and shadowy to the end, the conclusion is nonetheless satisfying.

The "Travels" concluded in the Orkney Islands, and by then, I was ready to hop on the next plane to there.

So enjoyable on many levels! Absolutely first rate!

Columbo: Last Salute to the Commodore (1976) Season 5, Episode 6

Columbo shifts gears from "Hedunit" to "Whodunit."

[8/10 · 6 May 2002]

This departure from the basic Columbo script works out well, for once. For reasons not revealed here, Columbo's singular murder suspect has to be dropped from consideration. From then on, the show becomes more like a classical whodunit. After some twists and turns, the conclusion has Columbo in a room full of potential culprits, smoking out the guilty one. Columbo is as clever, adept, and at home with this tactic as in his usual one-on-one battles. And there's no skimping on the touches that make "Columbo" a unique and special detective show.

Columbo: Columbo Goes to College (1990) Season 10, Episode 1

Murder is committed with the culprits sitting right in front of Columbo! How can that be???

[9/10 · 18 March 2002]

Columbo is guest lecturer for a criminology class. The students invite him along for their after-class get-together. Transiting the nearby parking garage, they discover their regular teacher, next to his car, dead from a gunshot wound. (No, Columbo was not after the man's job.) As a class project, Columbo involves the students in his sleuthing.

Two students, tentatively identified by the viewer as culprits, were in the lecture hall for the entire class. Furthermore, surveillance camera tapes of the parking garage show that no one other than the professor entered or left after he was last seen unexpectedly departing the lecture hall.

Reversing the normal routine, Columbo is the one that is pestered by the evil (?) duo, eager for progress reports and an ear for their theories. Forensic evidence is almost nonexistent. Solution of the case hinges on some eventual and interesting good luck.

On first viewing, it seemed that Columbo had swallowed whole the culprits' misdirection; however, on repeat viewing, small details revealed that not to have been the case at all.

This reviewer has yet to tire of "Columbo Goes to College."

Jane Doe (2001 TV Movie)

Made-for-tv claptrap; makes the commercials look good!

[3/10 · 12 December 2001]

A mulligan stew, inherently of low expectations: throbbing music; lots and lots of different locations, sometimes interesting but fleeting; abundant gun play; a plethora of characters (more than indicated by IMDB); wild camera angles, till they tire of them; deceit and treachery all over, with vaporizing loyalties; super high-tech weapons; and something about intelligence agencies, computers, encrypted passwords, and critical databases doctored by the good (???) guys for sale by the bad guys to unseen other bad guys of murky pedigree. At the end, the only true good guys stand alone.

Teri Hatcher has the lion's share of acting duty. Sorry girls, there's not as much of Rob Lowe as you'd expect from his star status: just enough to preserve his star billing but not enough to break the budget or really exercise his talent.

Fine production values and good acting. BUT: why, oh why, can't they spend less on frills and more of the budget on a decent, respectable script; shouldn't that ALWAYS be the first priority?

By the way, we never learn how Jane Doe (Teri Hatcher) came by her legal name, nor what that has to do with anything.

Columbo: No Time to Die (1992) Season 10, Episode 5

Better title: Columbo and the Turned-off Viewer.

[4/10 · 22 November 2001]

Whenever a Columbo story deviates from the familiar plot (colorful killer commits crime, Columbo smokes out killer, Columbo becomes a pest in the process), the writers somehow are never able to match the quality and interest of most traditional episodes. This episode deviates in the extreme, and the result is a major flop.

Would you believe: Columbo never faces the villain till the very end?!!

Frankly, I was tempted to turn it off about two-thirds through.

Oh, the sacrifices we self-appointed reviewers make!!!

Columbo: A Trace of Murder (1997) Season 10, Episode 11

This "Columbo" continues with its trademark enjoyable prime suspects: Barry Corbin impresses.

[7/10 · 5 November 2001]

In addition to slow-to-unravel plots and Columbo's simultaneously folksy and irritating (to suspects) manner, many episodes in the Columbo saga also feature colorful prime suspects played by felicitously chosen actors. Often, a delightful chemistry develops between Columbo and his quarry.

Once again, great chemistry! Barry Corbin delivers as a brawling, coarse, mince-few-words business tycoon with no patience for irritations.

The Wedding Dress (2001 TV Movie)

Superior made-for-tv movie. Multiple love stories ensue as the dress winds its way on a somewhat fantastic voyage.

[8/10 · 2 November 2001]

The uniquely beautiful wedding dress of the title makes its way through multiple lives and romantic relationships, even though used only twice. The journey is a rather improbable closed loop, via chance and small-world-isn't-it connections of the disparate characters. An awfully lot of story is packed into 90 minutes or so, yet because of its serial nature is not hard to follow or decipher. Details will not be supplied here; the ending will not be surprising, only the means by which it is eventually reached. While unabashedly sentimental, this story never becomes sappy. O.K., maybe just a tad sappy near the end.

So much second, third, and fourth rate stuff is out there that it's a joy to see first-class movie story telling. Acting is superb throughout, with a large and rewarding cast.

(In case you've missed Neil Patrick Harris' latter-day works, as I have, our "Doogie Howser, M.D." is now indisputably an adult, fully normal, and still a good actor.)

PT 109 (1963)

A helluva good action-suspense-feel good war film.

[9/10 · 3 September 2001]

Since movies based on true life stories often are less than memorable, my expectations here were minimal. However, after viewing this film (finally!), I was very impressed. This story is very well done, with minimal obvious Hollywood embellishments. (No, I've not read the underlying book, of the same title, but now I'd like to.)

In the big scheme of World War II, the events depicted here would have been forgotten except that the central heroic figure, John F. Kennedy, would later become U.S. President. For those of us who lived through the Kennedy years, this portrait of JFK in his 20's is quite consistent with the JFK we later saw when he became nationally prominent and subsequently president. (If "Private Ryan" deserves a movie, then JFK and his shipmates are surely no less entitled.)

The story begins when JFK arrives in the Pacific and is given command of a PT ("Patrol Torpedo") boat. PT boats were fast wooden craft with a crew of 12 and carried four torpedos and some small-bore guns, capable of quickly getting in and out while operating in shallow waters and doing various odd jobs on short notice. Without a lucky torpedo shot, any one boat was not going to be noticed by history.

PT 109 operated into an area of Pacific waters and small islands mainly controlled by the Japanese. One of Kennedy's first missions was to provide covering fire onto shore and extricate some stranded Americans. The boat remained under enemy fire until the rescue was complete, notwithstanding casualties both to crew and those rescued.

On PT 109's final mission, during darkness and limited visibility (radar was not yet on most PT boats), a Japanese destroyer, perhaps unwittingly, slices through PT 109, half of which sinks while the other half capsizes, but not before JFK and surviving crew members make an arduous swim to shore, taking along their wounded---and shoes. Aerial reconnaissance later sights the wreckage and reports "no survivors."

How the PT 109 crew is finally saved results partly from good luck and partly from daring, ingenuity, exhausting swims, and a refusal to give up. Yes, this is also a feel-good movie!

(The movie also acknowledges the part played and risks taken by "coast watchers," isolated individuals who infiltrated islands in Japanese-controlled areas, maintained lookouts from high ground, and radioed back critical information on enemy movements.)

Columbo: A Bird in the Hand (1992) Season 10, Episode 6

A different twist: two bodies more than usual.

[7/10 · 27 August 2001]

This episode may have been weakened by three people being killed off, with possible multiple culprits.

As in some other episodes, there is delightful chemistry between Columbo and his quarry, in this case played by Greg Evigan. Evigan's reactions and timing are impeccable.

Tyne Daly works hard, but not too convincingly at first, at being a middle-aged boozy ditz. However, when her husband is killed, she takes control of his football team and his money, the latter always needed by her younger lover, Evigan, for gambling debts; this transformation has a perverse appeal.

Noteworthy, too, is a scene when Columbo, in his rumpled coat, walks into a very proper Rolls Royce showroom and is all over the engine compartment and underneath the car threatening to take something apart, all this to the delight of a gathering sidewalk crowd.

Trapped (2001 TV Movie)

Las Vegas meets "The Towering Inferno," "Fire! Trapped on the 37th Floor," "The High and the Mighty," and...CLICK!

[4/10 · 25 July 2001]

Stir together (a) a bunch of people, each with their own trite story, forced together when their escape routes are cut off in a burning high-rise Las Vegas hotel; (b) everything going wrong; (c) lots of smoke and fireballs; (d) lots of screaming, crying, and fear; (e) the obligatory true confessions; (f) confrontations and recriminations; (g) elevators; and (h) lots and lots of pulse-pounding music, and you've got "Trapped" --- or any of numerous slapped-together potboilers that you've already seen.

Did someone say "plot"? Who needs a plot when you've got pervasive bedlam? The few original touches make minimal difference in the end result. Also, with your powers of recall, you can be first on your block to know how these people will escape, Las Vegas style!

Competently put together, with lots of effort spent on special effects, stunts, firemen, and the score, but not much on a good story.

Black River (2001 TV Movie)

A town under the thumb of a do-good but out-of-control computer. Good people wasted on a poorly tied together weak script.

[4/10 · 7 July 2001]

Here we have another egotistical super-intelligent computer; this one goes by the name of "Pericles" and has somehow continued to function after termination of a supposedly failed development project. (Doesn't anyone know where to find the plug for these machines?) In a fit of conscience, Pericles wants to set a better example than its storied predecessor computers, e.g., "Hal," whose misdeeds had given their ilk a bad name. Its mission is to create a cultural oasis in its home town of Black River. To this end, it not only lures desirable residents but captures, though not necessarily captivates, selected others wandering through the town.

Jay Mohr plays a successful novelist passing through, while Lisa Edelstein is a promising architect lured to the town. While Jay likes Lisa, that pull can't offset his desire to escape Pericles' machinations that prevent his leaving. Local color, you might say, is displayed by the waitress, real estate agent, police chief, and mayor, not to mention the telephones.

This all sounds better than it is. In "2001," Hal's actions were totally within the bounds of what an advanced computer controlling a spaceship could do. Alas, Pericles goes so far overboard, albeit sometimes in interesting ways, that the required suspension of disbelief is not achieved. That and the poorly managed tension and flow keep "Black River" far out of the top ratings, especially after having just seen some top classics and in recalling "2001."

"Black River" has a good start and a conclusion that slightly offsets the lengthy middle disconnect with the viewer. However, don't feel guilty if you bail out early on; the time you save is your own. 'Twas an idea that with more work might have turned into something good---or not.

The Presidio (1988)

The TV listings said "suspense;" I say "yawner."

[3/10 · 18 February 2001]

An utter waste of time, where the sum of the parts is close to zero.

The biggest problem with this movie is that it tries to tell a half-dozen or more separate stories, each in isolated compartments. This does not make for a single integrated, engaging tale.

Nominally, the plot is a search for the killers of an on-duty Army MP of no further relevance to the plot. The quest keeps getting shoved aside by separate stories about (a) the antipathy between detective Mark Harmon, as an ex-MP, and his military former superior, Sean Connery; (b) the severe tensions between Connery and Meg Ryan, as his eligible only daughter; (c) the rocky courtship of Ryan by Harmon, and the deep psychology behind the difficulties; (d) Connery's also-deep unresolved issues over the long-ago loss of his wife; (e) the friendship between Jack Warden and Connery, apparently a result of some heroic actions in Viet Nam, and explored in several leisurely scenes; (f) the relationship between Ryan and quasi surrogate father Warden; (g) a Major that Harmon previously roughed up while an MP and still hates; (h) a businessman who owned the killers' getaway car and has a drink coaster lying in his office (are either he or the Major a part of the plot or not?); (g) Connery's innate combativeness, as demonstrated in an extended bar fight totally extraneous to the plot; (h) various other scenes intended to remind us that, really, relationships have not been left out of the story; (i) the mystery of Connery's peculiar speech: a real accent or just an idiosyncrasy, and if real, from where; etc. --- Now, do you remember what the plot is about???

Except for some routine San Francisco car chases, not even the participants are in a hurry to solve this case, since to compare notes they schedule meetings for breakfast the next day.

A penultimate scene involving automatic weapons in a bottled-water warehouse could have been staged for more spectacle, though that would not have saved this unstitched patchwork quilt of a non-story.

The Last Producer (2000)

High-class cast in dreary, no-class script. 'Nuff said!

[4/10 · 8 February 2001]

In search of funding to purchase a dynamite script before his option runs out, Burt Reynolds' has-been title character goes through the movie begging, wheedling, and trying to consummate a deal with various devils.

Never mind the plot. Though there is a race against time, it certainly doesn't feel that way. What is served up is a large Hollywood A-team cast as a bunch of unlovable and largely colorless characters that are pathetic losers, bimbos, or professional crooks or that have it in for anyone over 35. Rod Steiger makes his character, who annoys everyone by speaking in platitudes, into the least uninteresting of the bunch.

"Last Producer" doesn't deserve this many words and certainly not your time.

Man of Her Dreams (1997)

Unless you're already asleep, bail out at first inclination; it absolutely gets no better.

[1/10 · 23 December 2000]

This movie is so empty and vacuous it's hard even to comment.

"Man..."/"Fiance" falls into the suspense---you wish---psycho serial killer genre. Everything suffers from terminal malnutrition: the plot, the dialogue, the direction, the acting, the score, not to mention each of its two titles ("The Fiance"??? Really!). The actors are pros but have absolutely nothing to work with nor any apparent direction. The characters connect neither to each other nor to the plot, the bones of which have no meat on them and barely connect to each other. No effort is wasted on creating or building tension; when someone gets killed, it's a non-event.

One minimal plus: a couple of slightly interesting outdoor locations. (Ha! Now you can leave or go back to sleep.)

Pathetic!

First Target (2000 TV Movie)

Tense, above-average save-the-day action-suspense potboiler.

[6/10 · 22 October 2000]

Gregory Harrison and Doug Savant return as U.S. President and outdoors adventure guide, respectively, in this sequel to "First Daughter" (1999 TV). Daryl Hannah appears as the take-charge head of the President's Secret Service detail and Savant's love interest. This time, it's the president who's the target of one or maybe more assassins, and again it will be the outdoorsman, not the Secret Service, who facilitates the save. Naturally.

Almost to excess, there is treachery all over the place---the details won't be divulged here---but then you have to grudgingly admire the reaching. Consequently, dead bodies abound as the action takes off early and proceeds to its suspenseful conclusion. Production values are first rate.

In the end, this potboiler is a better way to kill time than most of its ilk. Let's hope that our country never faces the situation depicted here.

-----

Watchers of technical details will wonder why a brand new aerial tramway has peeling paint; also, how you can have doors turning into splintered bullet-hole sieves without endangering participants in a Secret Service training exercise.

Runaway Train (I) (1985)

First-rate cinematic story telling; a gem!

[10/10 · 23 July 2000]

This is a gritty, totally dramatic, suspenseful, unhappy, sometimes foul-mouthed, drama in which several story elements converge and play out on a runaway string of four locomotive units. The acting of both Jon Voight and Eric Roberts, especially, and Rebecca De Mornay is intense and superb. Every camera shot heightens the drama. Photographed in Alaska on the Alaska Railway, it's winter, the skies are leaden, the ground snow covered, the locomotives ice encrusted, and real snow falls on the train as it traverses the isolated countryside. Action scenes of the train, both distant and close up, are truly remarkable. (Train enthusiasts will not be disappointed!)

The only thing phony is the suggestion that the Alaska Railway is a more complex system than it likely is. That quibble noted, everything else rings essentially true, and the filmmakers (thankfully) find no need to throw in a plethora of gratuitous complications, as occurs in so many lesser impending-disaster movies.

The story begins with two vicious antagonists in an Alaska prison. One, John Voight's character, convicted of violent crimes and prior escapes, has just won a court order for release from three years of being welded in his dark cell. The thwarted warden, played by John P. Ryan, is equally vicious, with even less of a heart than Voight, who loses no time before escaping again. Reluctantly, Voight takes along Roberts, as a younger, low-IQ, petty criminal with grandiose plans for his freedom. Voight is advised to not let himself be brought back alive.

Voight and Roberts make it to a railroad yard and into the last of the four locomotives. In the first, the engineer starts the train, has a heart attack and stumbles off the train. Voight realizes that the train is out of control when no horn sounds and after it hits a caboose that didn't clear the main track in time. Then DeMornay, having been napping forward, assesses the situation, and stumbles into the last unit for greater safety. In this confined setting there are dramatic scenes between the two men and among all three.

DeMornay, as a locomotive mechanic, advises that control resides only in the front unit and that because the number two unit is different (a streamliner), there is no passage to the front. She has a way to curb the train's excessive speed, which narrowly averts one crash opportunity, but it is still out of control. The control center can only shunt the runaway and other trains onto different tracks so as to postpone the inevitable crash and pick a location for least collateral destruction.

Meanwhile, the warden, after demonstrating his viciousness at the railroad control center, boards a helicopter and effects a transfer onto the moving train, reuniting the two antagonists in a face-to-face final confrontation as the train races to its impending demise.

The conclusion can't be happy, but it is nonetheless satisfying. --- Outstanding!!!

Longitude (2000)

Absolutely first rate!

[10/10 · 10 July 2000]

Despite its feared four-hour length (including commercials as shown on A&E), "Longitude" gets my top rating. Totally engrossing, with absolutely no false or phony notes. Acting, photography superlative.

(Available on home video without commercials and with additional footage.)

Consenting Adults (1992)

A case of murder, with clever beginning but un-clever, unsatisfying resolution.

[6/10 · 24 April 2000]

Kevin Kline is cleverly framed for the murder of his best friend's wife, with a seemingly airtight case against him. Equal cleverness in working out this story seemed called for. Instead, the frame-up basically unravels by improbable happenstance and concludes with trite Hollywood-isms, finally throwing in the towel with a few assault-weapon blasts. Real subtle, yes?

Not too bad a way to pass the time, but ultimately a let-down.

Fans of Forest Whitaker ("The Crying Game") will be pleased to see this talented actor appearing as a very southern, shy, soft-spoken insurance investigator.

The Cable Guy (1996)

How many Jim Carrey movies can one take in a lifetime?

[1 April 2000]

Anyone else get the feeling that when you've seen one Jim Carrey movie, you've seen them all? Here, you start out with a rather weak premise that loses credibility as it proceeds. Then, as is the practice of so many other would-be Hollywood storytellers, instead of a well thought out ending, throw a bunch of excesses at the viewer, and maybe something will impress. Ha! Bah!

Buffalo Soldiers (1997 TV Movie)

Title implies more than delivered; the subject deserves better.

[4/10 · 1 February 2000]

From the title, I expected a good overview of the Buffalo Soldiers. Instead, we get a drawn out, soap-opera-ish tale of hunting down a single Indian villain. Since I missed the first minute or two of opening credits, this script may have been pure fiction for all I know. As one complaint, there is no mention of John Pershing's (of World War I fame) association with these troops.

As could be expected, the wrongs and conflicts from racism are well set forth. Nonetheless, the Buffalo Soldiers, many ex-slaves, proudly risk their lives and stay in the cavalry by choice.

The acting is commendable, particularly that of Danny Glover as the central character. Some '90s idioms (the 1990s, that is) find their way into the dialog.

Given the title and the general ignorance (myself included) about the Buffalo Soldiers, this tv movie was very disappointing. Surely, these men did a lot more on the frontier than they are credited with here.

Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993)

Dreary, tedious - forget it!

[4/10 · 28 November 1999]

Okay, so there's a dead body, and questions arise about whose and why. However, 80% of this movie consists of just Woody and Diane doing what seems like third-rate improv which fails to advance the story and tells us little except that their bickering is second nature. Allen witticisms sparsely strewn about fall totally flat for lack of timing, good delivery, and suitable contextual mood. When Alan Alda and Anjelica Houston enter the scene, the contrast between professional delivery of scripted lines and ad-libbed(?) banalities is jarring.

It wouldn't have taken a Hitchcock to develop this small murder plot into a good, if minor, suspense flick. The mystery is why talent and resources were wasted on this .

Titanic (1953)

Nothing that "A Night to Remember" doesn't far surpass.

[5/10 · 18 September 1999]

The Titanic story obscured by !stars!. The film is not bad per se, but amazingly, it provides little tension for its characters or suspense for the viewer. It is pale on its own and certainly so in comparison to "A Night to Remember" (1958).

As the voyage begins, Clifton Webb and Barbara Stanwyck are in a shattering marriage, held together only by their son(*) of about 12 years; this is the central theme.

Oh, by the way, the Titanic strikes an iceberg, is sinking, and there aren't enough lifeboats for all. This motivates Webb and Stanwyck to rethink their lives and to reunite just in time to be permanently parted by the sinking.

Other stars appear as real or composite characters whose various life situations are revealed as the disaster unfolds. (Included is Thelma Ritter of oh-so-many movies, with her same old penetratingly-voiced, wisecracking character.)

This story formula---a disaster envelops fictional characters whose life stories unfold and resolve as the crisis plays out---is a standard, e.g., "The High and The Mighty" (1954), the later "Airport" movies, et al.

(*)apparently omitted from the foregoing credits.

Never Talk to Strangers (1995)

RUN, lest you get sucked in.

[2/10 · 4 September 1999]

A few minutes in: "NOT credible. What idiot wrote this?"

But, "What's going on...who's the bad guy...then there's that Rebecca De Mornay." Time passes....

THE END.

"NOT CREDIBLE. What IDIOT actually watched the whole *@#! thing!"

Ghosts of Mississippi (1996)

Important bit of American history relived with accuracy.

[8/10 · 21 August 1999]

For those of us who lived through the fifties and sixties, this film refreshes our recollections while detailing the long-delayed (nearly 30 years) triumph of justice---where whites could murder blacks with impunity in Mississippi and throughout the Deep South---in the killing of black civil rights activist Medgar Evers. Younger viewers be aware that this film provides mainly a single glimpse of past outrages and racial injustice.

Of special impact to me were actual tv speeches by Evers and President Kennedy plus mention of other contemporary atrocities that shocked the country back then.

Contrast the original two all white male (hung) juries, so typical of the 1960s South, with the 1990s jury of black and white, male and female. In the first trial, racist ex-governor Ross Barnett was allowed to make a courtroom entrance and embrace defendant de la Beckwith in front of the jury, interrupting the testimony of Evers' widow. (Only a year or two earlier, Barnett's treachery in response to a court order to admit James Meredith to Ole Miss resulted in a major riot with catastrophe for Meredith and the outnumbered US Marshals narrowly avoided.)

Lack of more information as to how the legal obstacles, such as right to a speedy trial, death of many witnesses, disappearance of much original evidence, etc., were overcome made the 1990s trial scenes less exciting and the known outcome seem less inevitable than it should have.

Fine acting by Whoopi Goldberg, Alec Baldwin, and many others. A fine tribute to those in Mississippi who did the right thing, though still not without personal cost even in the 1990s.

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992)

Outstanding music track; one for Twin Peaks tv fans.

[8/10 · 5 April 1999]

Upon seeing this a second time, it became apparent how sensitively and affectingly the music illuminated the action. Outstanding work!

Twin Peaks on television dwelt with the question, "Who killed Laura Palmer?" who appeared only as a corpse in the first episode. This movie followed the tv series and answered the questions of who was Laura Palmer, how she came to her untimely end, and who would reach out to her in death to understand and to bring justice.

I can't predict how someone not familiar with Laura Palmer's milieu in the tv series might respond to this follow-on effort. Suffice it to say, this movie was made with the same care, originality, and quirkiness as the tv series.

Definitely a must for Twin Peaks devotees.