A couple of Harvard coeds (graduate students, actually) decide they want to find out if any progeny resulted from their donation of eggs at an infertility clinic. Of course, the only way to accomplish this goal is by breaking the law: assuming fake identities to find jobs at the clinic, stealing access cards, hacking into the computer system, and so on. Nothing illustrates the utter implausibility of this story more than the fact that the women not only allow just one day for this adventure, but actually succeed in that timeframe. Oh, and they uncover shocking secrets, too, from cloning to murder.
**
A couple of Harvard coeds (graduate students, actually) decide they want to find out if any progeny resulted from their donation of eggs at an infertility clinic. Of course, the only way to accomplish this goal is by breaking the law: assuming fake identities to find jobs at the clinic, stealing access cards, hacking into the computer system, and so on. Nothing illustrates the utter implausibility of this story more than the fact that the women not only allow just one day for this adventure, but actually succeed in that timeframe. Oh, and they uncover shocking secrets, too, from cloning to murder.
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** High school stud (Freddie Prinze, Jr.) bets he can turn an outcast (Rachel Leigh Cook) into the prom queen in six weeks, but doesn't count on falling in love with her. Teen romantic comedy aims no higher than the built-in appeal of the premise, nearly sabotaging that modest goal with uninspired dialogue and a meandering storyline. Not helped by the main supporting characters, who include an obnoxious actor (Matthew Lillard) and a rather tame bitch (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe). Prinze, however, comes off as better than the material. Written by R. Lee Fleming, Jr. and, though uncredited, M. Night Shyamalan. Sarah Michelle Gellar is seen briefly as a student in the high school cafeteria. *** Psychology professor (William Hurt) using psychoactive drugs and an isolation tank to probe genetic memory discovers the means of externalizing past states of existence. Ultra-serious tone accompanied by earnest performances and Ken Russell's surreal imagery makes for an entertaining first half, but the film loses momentum in the second as special effects take over en route to dissatisfying and unimaginative "ultimate truth." With Blair Brown, Bob Balaban, and Charles Haid. Written by Paddy Chayefsky (as Sidney Aaron), based on his own novel. **** Japan-bashing at a mile a minute. When a beautiful young woman is murdered at the Los Angeles headquarters of a powerful Japanese corporation, the L.A. cops send in super-sleuth John Connor, their resident, if semi-retired, expert on Japan. His Watson, a Special Liaison officer with only rudimentary knowledge of his suspects, tells the story, which hinges as much on the subtleties of Japanese culture as the dangerous naiveté of American government. Oh, yes, Crichton bashes America, too, often just by comparison. An exciting, thought-provoking, opinionated thriller, with plenty of plot twists and two of the author’s most engaging characters. Made into a film in 1993, starring Sean Connery and Wesley Snipes. *** Perfect plot storm of horror, revenge, and familial despair as Lionel Barrymore hunts down the men who sent him to prison 17 years before with the aid of a scientist and her process for shrinking people to doll size, meanwhile trying to reconnect with the daughter who doesn't know he was falsely imprisoned and hates him as a result. The dolls in the early going are clearly dolls, but once the trick photography kicks in, all is good. Barrymore, an escapee, spends most of the film disguised as an old woman, playing it almost too well, as his creaky bones tend to slow the whole picture. Still, an admirable job all around, with a horrific (if unexplored) twist to the doll-people: will-less, they can do nothing unless mentally directed by someone of normal size. Written by Browning, Garrett Fort, Erich von Stoheim, and Guy Endore (whose famous novel, The Werewolf of Paris, was published three years earlier). ***** Superb supernatural thriller starring Bruce Willis as a child psychologist who sets out to help a young boy overcome his fears as a way of atoning for a previous professional failure. The first, and best, of the modern wave of gimmick films -- precisely because the gimmick here is so fully integrated into the plot that knowing it has no adverse effect on one's enjoyment of the picture. (For all that, though, it's a remarkable bit of prestidigitation.) Haley Joel Osment gives a terrific performance as the boy and Willis is perfectly subdued as his would-be doctor. Suspenseful and emotionally engaging. Also written by Shyamalan. * Carter's first Thongor book reads like juvenilia but was marketed as adult fantasy, lending unwelcome credence to the old idea that fantasy has no real literary value. Derivative, superficial, and repetitive. Fight, capture, rescue: the pattern repeats itself over and over as Thongor and friends pursue their quest to save the ancient world of Lemuria from destruction. All sorts of bad guys seek to sacrifice Thongor to their pet deities, but, as the wizard eventually points out, Thongor leads a charmed life. Meaning: the only thing that gets sacrificed here is suspense. This revised edition includes an introduction in which Carter tells us that this, his first published book, was the seventh he had written. Those first six must have been real beauties. ** The amusing irony of this film, which is about the search for non-existent WMD in Iraq just after America’s invasion in 2003 (the very same weapons of mass destruction that were the ostensible reason for the war in the first place), is that it tries very hard to convince us of its authenticity while, at its core, it’s just an excuse for another thriller that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. In the field, where Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller (Matt Damon) spends most of his time, the movie looks good, it sounds good, and it is, for all we know, historically accurate. But after a promising beginning, during which Miller must contend with the chaos of looting Iraqis and a pesky sniper only to come up empty yet again, the soldier’s frustration and mounting sense of moral outrage propel him (and us) on a bizarre journey of insubordination and inexplicably lax military discipline. Miller seemingly can do whatever he wants (including abandoning his unit) and go wherever he wants (to prove his suspicion that the war was a fraud) without fear of interference from his superior officers (who conveniently disappear after the first half hour or so). Not that he doesn’t encounter resistance; he does. It comes in the form of a high-ranking politico who rates his own special hit squad yet somehow can’t muster the clout to get Miller tossed into the brig where he belongs. ** The Who's double album has several good songs and a couple of great ones, but most of the rest depend a great deal on its operatic concept, which is much more persuasive in the abstract. Ken Russell shows us that adding visuals to the music does nothing to improve its eloquence. On the other hand, the Ken Russell visual is a surreal, flamboyant thing, so perhaps it isn't a fair test. In one scene late in the film, Ann-Margaret, who plays Tommy's mother, rolls around on the floor while first a thick column of soap suds then a mighty stream of liquid chocolate flows out of a television set and washes over her. It's all a metaphor for the selfishness and greed that have sullied her soul, but it goes on forever, and anyway, the last time she was truly clean was during the Overture. It is, in a word, excessive, a condition that afflicts the entire film. Still, you might think there's some good music anyway. In fact, there's surprisingly little. Russell makes the decision to have his actors sing and that takes care of that. Far and away the best few minutes of the film are during "Pinball Wizard," when, in a casting masterstroke, Elton John sings the song wearing mile-high boots and over-size glasses. Mr. Russell, meet Mr. John. The two of you were made for each other. Tommy relates the fall and rise of a young deaf, dumb, and blind boy who bedevils his parents until he brings them fame and fortune as a pinball champion. Shortly thereafter, he is miraculously cured, becoming a sort of guru to thousands; his teaching method involves eye-shades, ear-plugs, and "you know where to put the cork," as well as endless pinball machines. Tommy, however, wasn't born lacking his senses. He loses them one night when he goes into shock after witnessing his step-father kill his biological father, a soldier everyone thought had died in the war. The story is absurd, of course, but it has a certain pathos because Tommy, unlike his family, is a genuinely decent fellow. In addition to Elton John, the movie features Eric Clapton as a preacher whose cult worships Marilyn Monroe, Tina Turner as the "Acid Queen," a prostitute who tries to free Tommy with an iron maiden that injects LSD, and Jack Nicholson, who plays the doctor who diagnoses Tommy's affliction as psychosomatic but would rather be jumping his mom. Oh, and Keith Moon as Uncle Ernie, a slimy pedophile who molests Tommy. You may find it difficult to reconcile this film with a kind and loving God. That is, if you watch it sober and drug-free. ** Compendium of two volumes originally published in French by Le Rouge in 1908 and 1909, translated by David Beus and Brian Evenson, and presented here as part of the University of Nebraska's Bison Frontiers of Imagination series. Note, however, that the provenance of the books is never discussed, with the translators pretending that the story is real, tossing off "sizable" third act gaps in the first volume as holes in the historical record. The conceit, though reprehensible, is, from a literary standpoint, almost justified, as Volume One is an episodic work that doesn't greatly suffer from the loss. Together, the two books tell the story of Robert Darvel, a brilliant French engineer, who is stranded on Mars and of his friends and ladylove, back on Earth, working to bring him home. Stilted and facile, yet not altogether without merit. The detailed manner in which Darvel reaches Mars -- a combination of science and the focused willpower of hundreds of Indian Brahmins -- has the grandiose flair of a mad scientist, a Herbert West, and one or two other ideas point to what could have been an exciting horror story. Ultimately, though, this is science fiction, and that is its undoing. Guided by Le Rouge's idea that there is nothing new under the sun (a strange thought for this type of story), Mars turns out to be another Earth, with much the same flora and fauna, albeit differently colored. Significantly, Le Rouge spends almost as much time rhapsodizing over the wonders of Earth as those of Mars. Meanwhile, the vampires themselves are little more than overgrown vampire bats. With a few lengthy yet irrelevant asides -- including an Allan Quartermain-type adventure of lost treasure and, incomprehensibly, the backstory of a chef -- and a hero who, at one point, dismisses the horrible deaths of his brave but simpleminded saviors as the insignificant loss of a bunch of "savages." |
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