Video/ DVD
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COMEDY
AUSTIN POWERS IN: GOLDMEMBER (12) 90min 0.
Fart gags and dick jokes abOund in Goldmember. the latest spy caper from lover of all things swinging sixties-like. Mike Myers. As do celebrities — the all- action opening sequence features Tom Cruise. Gwyneth Paltrow. Kevin Spacey and Danny De Vito. while the film, if you can call this gag-fest that. incorporates the talents of Britney Spears. Beyonce Knowles (playing Austin's sexy 70s sidekick Foxxy Cleopatra) and the Osturnes.
In fact it's Ozzy Osturne. who in his characteristically astute manner. observes that this film Just makes the same fuckin' gags the last two made. Which it does and this time around. they're only just funny. (Entertainment VHS and DVD rental) lCatherine Bromley)
HORROR RESIDENT EVIL (15) 98min .0.
Fact: movres based on video games are shit. But Paul WS Anderson is trying to break the mould. as he attempts his second vrdeo game ‘adaptation' after Mortal Kombat. It's full on action mode as Milla Jovovich heads (in a
round about way. seeing she has amnesia) a strike force to neutralise a virally infected research complex. Of COurse this virus presents itself in the form of turning people into mindless cannibalistic zombies. Add a few genetic mutations. a crazed master computer and a few other nasties and yOu have a pretty slick if emotionally devoid action movie. (Pathe VHS and DVD rental) (Henry Northmore)
TRUE CRIME ROBERTO SUOCO
(18) 120min COO
1986. While the north of England grappled with the gruesome iniquities of the Yorkshire Ripper. France had its own travelling psycho in Roberto Succo. Italian mental institution escapee and pathological liar. Succo was a random. Surprisingly democratic serial killer.
Director Cedric Kahn's thorough recreation of this singularly dislikeable yOung man's reign of terror takes its lead from Ricky Togna'x/i's 1993 film La SCOrta in allowing the procedural banalities of the chase to take up as much screen time as Succo's crimes themselves. Stephano Cassetti and lsild Ie Besco shine. as France's public enemy no I and his clueless rnoll respectively. This DVD has few features to write home about. (Artificial Eye VHS and DVD retail) (Paul Dale)
SCIENCE FICTION ROLLERBALL (15) 94min 0
Who remembers the glorious James Caan
23.71,], :2: I- I I
original? A scathing criticism of society With a nice line in brutal sci-fr sports. EIIJOV it? If so avoid this like the plague.
How ceiild they take a basic concept of a super Violent spectator sport invoIVing people battling it out on motorbikes and rollerblades and actually make it boring? How could one of the masters of trash action John McTiernan (Die Hard) have got it so wrong? Will Hollywood ever make another intelligent action flick? For the answers to these and other non-essential questions don't rent this vrd. Not Just boring but dull. wooden and at times utterly confusing due to a bit of over excited editing. lColumbia Tristar VHS and DVD rental) (Henry Northrnore)
HORROR SESSION 9 (15) 92min 0.
Taking their inspiration from the likes of low budget do-rt-yourself shockers such as The Blair Witch Project. Brad Anderson and Stephen Gevedon's psychological chiller was shot on a shoestring. using digital Video and an abandoned mental hospital in Massachusetts. There. however, any resemblance between the films ends.
What's surprising is the cast the boys have managed to pull
Video/ DVD
SCII‘NCI IICIION MINORITY REPORT (12) 142min 0.0
Very nearly a wonderful film
With AI, Steven Spielberg received a mixture of acclaim and scorn for being deft with his futuristic detail and an able hand at bringing out strong performances from his famed actors, but a total sucker when it comes to laying on an overly sentimental flourish. In Minority Report (this time he’s tackling sci-fi writer Philip K Dick after his shot at Brian Aldiss), the detail, performances and sentimentality are a virtual carbon copy. While there is much to admire in a dreamy Spielberg work, the feeling persists that there is no one in his inner circle with the clout to water down his more excessive creative notions.
Tom Cruise’s John Anderton is a tortured man, despite being at the top of his professional tree as a law enforcer in a futuristic utopian society where crimes are detected before they are committed. This is thanks to a trio of ‘pre-cogs’ (including the ever excellent Samantha Morton) whose visual aids help the cops out on those clean streets. Anderton is also at war with his soul after the disappearance of his son under his nose years previously. When he discovers that he is about to murder a man he has never met, Anderton goes on the run from his colleagues and onto a desperate search for the truth.
Minority Report is a film about ideas (does a world free of crime necessarily mean a free world?) and provides a further insight into Spielberg, the man and the moviemaker. His utter belief in the sanctity of innocent youth prevails; a perfectly admirable value but one that makes his works increasingly predictable, and here mars what was very nearly a wonderful film. (Brian Donaldson)
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’Iiyir g to steer two [HIV/Kati} plot strands -- one concerning a brutal crime on the Island of Shoals a century ago. the other the efforts of an unhappy married couple ICatherine McCormack and Sean Penn) to rekindle therr relationship during a sailing trip about the same island » proves unmanageable men for the director of such fine thrillers as Near Dark and Point Break. And your) f'nd Penn's ridiculous posturing either hilarious or tortuous. (Momentum VHS and DVD rental) (Miles Fielder)
together With such modest means: in the leads Peter Multan and former NYPL) Blue star Davrd Caruso. Unfortunately. the story of an asbestos removal team going bonkers in an old nut house is old hat. while the execution of the plot plods along With very little happening until the wholly unsurprising conclusion. What was Mullan thinking? (Universal VI IS rental) lMiles I'ielder)
por’teritous thriller
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THE WEIGHT OF WATER
(15) 109min 00
surprising is director Kathryn tiigeioi'. should he heriiiing such a
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L>iu .. . .Ja'i THE LIST 121