REVIEW FILM
_ hunchback Horror. The source of some
slapstick comic relief, pantomime THE PAGEMASTEB ‘ style, their liveliness only underlines It’s official: the cartoon version of the blandness of gum". up against Macaulay Culkin is no less annoying pamck Stewants leathewound
3"" thi°m°5°m° "‘3" "‘9 ""9 39m" buccaneer or even Christoper Lloyd’s one. And 1994’s Christmas treat is that "wracin "Mafia", a“, he", is
both are on offer in the same movie. ,educed m a semi.skimmed Milky 3a, Perhaps kids in the audience really do Km
find him easier to identify with, post- the moral of the tale is that, by Home Alone. than any of his pint-sized confronting his fears and finding a Peetst but "‘9 eVidehce is “9'3 it" a" strong role for himself inthe land of
ONLY THE
STRONG
2,. V
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to see he Tully is afeffibl? actor. fiction, young Tylef can better in hiehaid TViei (ceikih) Is a ehlid'he'dt the real world. Books are a good thing i ‘ §
all geeky glasses and trembling knees, _ a strange message, perhaps, for a
Whose "e'V‘ius aPP'PaCh ‘0 me lavish movie - but surely some of the ~
suggests “’5 more "i need 0' stories used (Jekyll And llyde, Moby
psychiatric help than the tree-house Dick) aren’t all that familiar to the his exasperated dad has built him. A audience “is aimed at, It does,
tenet, derided hr the heighheuiheed however, jump from one to the next at kids. he stumbles timing 3 storm We a pace that will keep even those with
the local library and, thanks to a the shortest concentration span
kn00k 0" the head. tihds himseit amused and distracted from the fact .
transported into an animated world that the animation itself is really “- an. m SW, .
filled with book-inspired escapades. rather dun, (Alan Morrison) .. _ WWI}, mustn’t. Helping him on his wall are three The Pagemaster (U) (Joe Johnstone/ In the jungle that is Miami
generic characters — the blustering Maurice Hunt, us, 1994) Macaulay on _ ‘ .;.-.-; , only the strong 3mm
pirate Adventure, the sassin magical , Culkin, Christopher Lloyd. 83 mins. _ . ~ t s. Maybe. But ifyou're
Fantasy, and the blubbering From Fri 15; Generai release _ The pagemsten team,“ Cum". going to live. you have to
be rough. tough, or the i hero of a serious shirts-off
i to him. Chabrol also throws in a "meme!" Of ‘1 mam‘" arts mowe. But no
i ‘ battery of cinematic pyrotechnics, . ., ., . . i ‘ underlining the man’s increasingly £1132? ybougisgézmlil: To paraphrase Sartre, hell is other paranoid state of mind as he starts imam, to the plot. ‘ 5 people’s scripts. This latest offering trying to keep tabs on his other half Plot? Yes, there is one: tr0m Chaim". the grand Old rogue of f every single moment of the day. The muscle-bound friend of 3 the French cinema, actually derives tension builds towards the reveIation the innocent. Louis 3 from a screenplay that Henri-Georges ' — is she, or isn't she? Stevens (Mark Dacoscos) ’ CTOIIIOt (the Baltic suspense master , To give away more would be spoiling reminffiom ‘1 La.“ Who brought V0" The Wages 0t i‘ear ' things, of course; suffice to say that énifinwn tour with [hi . . , , recn Bercts to find hls i 3'“ les Iilaheitiltles) wrote and had Chabrol’s key interest seems to be in old @1001 going ,0 [he ' eVeh Started Sheeting two deeaites 0' ' pondering the extremes of the male (hut; barons, Before you i so 390. heteie succumbing to a psyche and his attentions get so callcsay ‘Eujah Hakway‘ nervous breakdown. Watching engaged by this task that little things he elicits the support of Chabrol’s tilt at the thing all these like eyedihiiity and pacing go out the his old teacher Mr
! years later. the sense or impasse in window. Unquestionably the work of a Kerrie?!" (Geoffrey i the piece is obvious. but it remains a master filmmaker, but whether it adds mm) ‘1‘“ meme
. . . . . , . . flame. Dianna (Stacey | fascinating cinematic exercise, if a , up to anything is less certain, It’s not Travis). to [each a dozen
it i somewhat less than satisfying exactly hellish, but you might get that prim, d,0p_0u,, ,he 6,0“, l entertainment purgatorial feeling about halfway an of Capoeim, This i Best known tor his rote as the through. (Trevor Johnston) being smack-full of i obsessive French jazz fan in Round Lighter (15) (ciaude ehahyoi, France, simplistic homilies. Louis ~ i Midnight, Francois Cluzet pulls out all l 1994) Emmanueue Bean, rianeois soon meets the evil cousin ; “I the stops and more as the doting Cluzet, Andre Wilms. 100 mins. ' 0* one of his (temples hotelier husband who gradually comesf Subtitles. From Tue 3: Glasgow Film . (who happen-i ‘0 We“
. versed in Capoeira
| himself). gets badly
beaten and retires to lick
his wounds with a bit of
,i the old (off-screen) sexual
l to suspect that corluettish young wife ? theatre. From Fri 6: Edinburgh L’Enfer: ‘fascinating cinematic exercise’ i Emmanuelle Béart is being unfaithful Filmhouse.
_ But this time out — surprise, surprise ; ‘ , - Gordon is forced to start from i scratch as he seems to have ;
DZ: THE MIGHTY DUCKS conveniently forgotten all the virtues
healing from Dianna. Work the rest out yourself. but don't forget that baddies always drop their
Technically, of course, this is Mighty 1 so hard learned in the last film. Worse i guns when their boss is
Ducks 2, the sequel to The Mighty ; still, he has been selected to coach , health a fair fight-
Ducks - which was released over here 3 Team USA in the Junior GOOdWiil l Jo'i“‘i‘°‘d°‘$.pi°‘ end
as Champions, but has emerged on Games - naturally the team has a high j I, V , atir‘oé'ous debl’mef-“lfe
video as Mighty books: The , Duck count -— where they wind up , _ figfhcfi’fi‘,i;‘fifa‘:§huiy
Champions. Still, alter a:l that, surely i facing the mighty lceland in a chilling. " ' fusion of dance. '
this formulaic Disney winning-against- bruising, totally predictable final. It’s acrobatics and physical
the-odds tale is good family fun? a poor movie and not just because the contact. it allows for a
Wrong. whole of the Iceland team and their half decent drum ‘n‘ bass The first film at least had the virtue smirking coach seem like Nazi extras Soundtrack- Plenty of
of being effortless - in every sense, from some crass war film, nor because gi'S‘Cnmg “‘“SC'CS and ‘1“
including the plot - and had some we find ourselves going over much of ‘Tigy‘oifc'fif'cssgbd.
degree of charm before the inevitable the same ground as before. For where ‘ 'Okm' ( mm ' m)
victory over a larger-than-life, Champions had just enough charm to
pantomime bad guy. Our hero, Cordon get by, The Mighty Ducks 2 has none ,_ ,
Bombay (Emilio Estevez), suddenly at all, and can only ingratiate and 0”“ “M “We” ( ’5)
(Slick/(m Lt'ltit‘ll, US.
l 994) Mark DUt‘tlSt'Us, Geoffrey Lelt'ix, Stacey Travis, Pam Christian
found himself coaching a hockey team irritate its way through a painful 107 of working-class kids, real no-hopers, mihs- (Ahwar Brett)
and leading them to glory against his 921 The Mighty Dueks (U) (Sam
old mentor. Getting back to his roots, Weismah. US. 1994) Emilio Estelleli I’riem. 99 mitts. l-‘rum Fri Gordon even learned a thing at two Kathryn Erbe, Michael Tucker. 107 . . IO. [L't/illhluyll: UCIS. about me as he did so, mins. From Mon 26: General release. The Mighty Ducks 2: 'a poor movie' S’"‘”/’('/."(/t‘-' U C ’31
The List 16 December l994—l2 January I995 31