FILM REVIEW
Gazza just proves what we knew all
along: all the best vampires are European. Schreck. Lugosi. Lee.
Kinski. Deneuve . . . Frank Langella. eat your heart out with star-spangled fangs. The List
; assesses Oldman’s endeavours and
; reviews all the new films opening in
Scotland in the next fortnight.
I Bram Stoker's Dracula More a gothic love story
than out-and-out horror. but at least Coppola has pulled the legend closer to its fictional roots. The film
maestro‘s grand visual style is once more out of its cage. so there is always somethingon which to feast the eye. Britain's Gary ()ldman draws on
his own dark. sexy. stormy
nature to create the perfect Vlad Tepes and. while not delivering the definitive screen version ofthe Stoker original that many had hoped for. Coppola does succeed in giving us a literate. fulfilling vampire movie forour times.
I Folks Prepare yourself for the worst film ever. ever. No family reunion that you have been forced to squirm through can be as painfully embarrassing as this misguided offering. If you liked Parenthood. you‘ll hate this. lfyou liked anything. you‘ll hate this. Tom Selleck‘s comfortable world begins to fall apart when he is framed for insider dealing. has his bank account frozen and is called to his parents home in South Florida when his mother has to undergo a fairly routine operation. While taking care ofhis now senile father (Don
Ameche). he becomes the
punch-bag for a series of humiliating and cruel
L___.__.-._ -_ -.-_,-_ -, ._. 18The List 29January— 11 February 1993
I ComputerWorld The Edinburgh Filmhouse‘s season of recent video work continues with two
programmes of
compute r-gene rated images. On Tue 2J1” Points ()n The Map speeds through the contemporary computer
’ animation field. showing
that modern technology
HONEY, | BLEW UP THE KID
The presence of Reanimator and Trancers exploitation luminaries Stuart Gordon and Albert Band as executive producers is easily the most surprising aspect of this inevitable, and perhaps inevitably inferior, Disney sequel to the jaunty miniaturised frolics of Honey, I Shrunk The Kids. Boasting characters originally created by Gordon and Society schlockmeister Brian Yuzna, the breezy central notion here is to do an Attack Of The Fifty Foot Woman with
a cutesy-pie toddler, who goes on the
rampage through Las Vegas in the final reel. Three years after unintentionally
shrinking his beloved offspring, nutty
inventor Wayne Szalinski (Rick Moranis) has been taken on board by a petrochemicals multinational to
continue with his work. When,
however, he takes baby Adam to the office one weekend to tinkerwith his latest experiment, the mischievous wee brat manages to get itself zapped by daddy’s newlangled enlargement ray. Back at home again, a chance encounterwith a microwave speeds up
the kid’s growing process, as he sprouts to eight feet in a matter of
has blurredthetraditional
distinctions between video. computer graphics and virtual reality. The following week. on Tue 9. New Visions. New 'l‘erraim‘ goes further into areas of computer research. where new ground is being broken almost daily. Sec Listings for times and prices.
.2“: . :1. ‘ ‘ u
; slapstick injuries that soon involve his dad burning
down the house. an
' over-long visit from his
selfish sister and her obnoxious kids. and an all-out battle in a shoe shop. Now. any film in
which Tom Selleck isthe best thing is undoubtedly in trouble. True. there are
touching moments thanks to the veteran actor
Amcche. but it‘s all lost as the distressing blend of
unbridled sentimentality and ill-judged black ‘humour' swamps the
screen with no sense of
control whatsoever. Believe me. it's not even worth checking out just to see if it really is this bad. lt is. (AM)
seconds. it‘s hard enough keeping this a secret from the neighbours as it is, but when the titanic tot starts playing
with power lines and hits King Kong
proportions, only the combined efforts of mom Diane (Marcia Strassman), brother Nick (Robert Oliveri) and babysitterAmy (Amy O'Neill) can hope to stop him wiping out half of Nevada. As a spoof on 50s sci-ti flicks, this is
‘ amiable enough fare, filled with the
sort of broad visual humour that appeals to very young children. As the barn-sized bairn potters around trailing havoc in its wake, the rest of us might cavil at the shoddin achieved blue
screen processing and wonder whether
the screenplay might have tried a little
harder to do something new with the scenario. Butyoungerviewers will
surely lap itup and, inthis case, perhaps that's enough to ask. (Trevor Johnston)
Honey, I Blew Up The Kid (U) (Randal
Kleiser, US, 1992) Rick Moranis,
Marcia Strassman, Robert Oliveri. From Fri 5. Odeons: Glasgow, Edinburgh, Ayr. Cannons: Falkirk, Klrkcaldy, Kilmarnock. All UCls. Glasgow: MGM Parkhead. Edinburgh:
Dominion. Central: Caledonian. Fife:
Glenrothes. Strathclyde: WMR.
33s.
‘An Attack Of The
Fifty Foot Woman
with a cutsey-pie
toddler who goes on t
the rampage
through Las Vegas.’ i
.‘0
THE WATERDANCE
When Joel Garcia wakes up in hospital to discover he is a paraplegic, the successful young writer isn’t too unhappy— at least he survived the climbing accident which broke his neck. Butwhen he‘s transferred to an open ward in the rehabilitation facility the not-so-pleasant reality begins to take hold. Garcia (Stoltz) has to come
to terms with his physical disability as well as the emotional disabilitythat
afflicts his relationship with his married girlfriend (Hunt). Worse, he has to learn to love, or at least get on
with, his fellow wheelchair users on
the ward. This is a powerful film which gives
any latent sentimentality in the subject
a hefty wheel-swerve, no doubt helped by writer/directorJimenez’ own experiences in a wheelchair.
? Eschewing the soft-focus é hospital-drama track, this is actually a
buddy movie, as Garcia drinks, spins
; yarns, argues and fights with the
slobbish racist, Bloss (Forsyfhe) and tale-telling ladies man Raymond Hill (Snipes). Not that there aren‘t any moving moments, there are, butthere
is also a gallows humourto it all with plenty of astute observations. Worth seeing as a well-acted movie which tackles issues head on, and still stands up as excellent entertainment. (Thom Dibdin)
The Waterdance (15) (Neal Jiminez/Michael Steinberg, US, 1992) Eric Stoltz, Wesley Snipes, William Forsythe, Helen Hunt, Elizabeth Pena. 106 minutes. From Mon 1. Glasgow GFT.
‘a powerful film which gives any latent sentimentality in the subject a hefty wheel-swerve’
l