#47 | September 10 - 24, 1998  

Goddamnit, don't you realize there's a financial crisis going on out there-what are you doing reading about shite American movies at a time like this? The irony is, there's an unusually wide variety of trash out there to wade through right now, so I'll be as brief and blunt as Krazy Kino-ly possible.

ARMAGEDDON
In my opinion the apocalypse is close at hand for all of us (and I'm not just talking about Russia), making No.2 global-death comet flick this week's most situation-appropriate new release. Armageddon is the work of the people who did Con-Air, Crimson Tide, and Top Gun-plus it stars Bruce Willis and Steve Buscemi, so it should be a lot more exciting than Deep Impact. Sadly, though, it's just another DFC (disaster flick for chicks) at heart, with the rockets and bombs taking a back seat to a Bryan Adams do-it-all-for-love subplot involving Bruce, his daughter (played by Aerosmith daughter Liv), and Ben Affleck of Good Will Chasting Amy fame.

Final Analysis: Decent effects and roller-coaster excitement, but too long and way too much dopey goo.

PRAGUE DUET
This one's also known as Beyond the Past, which lets you choose between Americanized Kundera or third-rate Wim Wenders depending on which title you accept as the canonical one. Gina Gershon is a Jennifer Gould-esque American psychologist in Prague for a conference. Rade Serbedzijia (the Chernozovsky oligarchtician from The Saint) is a "former dissident writer" who's compelled to give up his Eastern Bloc bearded-intelligentsia playboy ways when he falls in love with her for some reason. Anyway, isn't she a lesbian or something? What's worse, she's always wearing J Crew earth tones and funny hats, has a hideous old-bag British lady friend who wishes she were still like 45, and possesses the uncanny ability to annoy that only a linguistically challenged American abroad can muster. It's possible that this last bit is the result of good acting on Gershon's part, but somehow I doubt it. The magical romance shit hits the fan when she tries to uncover her Czech roots, and it turns out allegedly half-Jewish grandpa "Emil" was actually a collaborator who helped the Nazis to corral, torture, and gas a good portion of Prague's pre-war Jewish population, including two of writer-studboy's aunts-who were just children at the time. As a clean-living American, Gershon demonstrates just how distressing this news is by taking up smoking and watching CNN. Studley, meanwhile, regresses to his former ways in the arms of a busty Dutch lit-crit-groupie. From there, it all plays out as expected to the art-house pseudo-ambiguo-semi-happy ending.

Final Analysis: Barely 90 minutes long, this duet seemed to last well over two hours.

THE PATRIOT
All I know about this one is that Steven Seagal is involved. Even without a financial crisis someone would have to pay me to go out of my way to watch this one, and right now I'm barely being paid to write this little column.

Final Analysis: Don't ask me.

DARK CITY
I doubt this will still be in theaters by the time the we hits the stands, but it's kinda cool so I'll mention it anyway. It's basically what you'd expect if David Lynch were to direct a Philip K. Dick story that had been adapted for the screen by a schizophrenic who is alternately Franz Kafka and Paul Auster. There's also a healthy sprinkling of Tim Burton Batman and Hellraiserfor stylistic flavoring. As it turns out, Dark City was written and directed by Alex Proyas (he of The Crow), and it's not quite as stellar as I might have led you to believe. For one thing there's King Tool Kiefer Sutherland, an actor whose finest days (which were pretty lame in the first place) have long since passed. Here, Kiefer hobbles around like some prematurely aged Peter Billingsley and talks like 60s TV Batman Adam West with a bad case of emphysema. William Hurt is also way too tweedy for this kind of material. And when it comes time to wrap up the whole production Proyas takes the easiest possible route, tacking on an overly optimistic ending that essentially ignores the new philosophical twists it (probably unintentionally) introduces. Still, there's a respectable amount of creepy paranoia and imaginative visuals, and Rufus Sewell does a reputable job as the tortured keystone character in the whole psychological puzzle.

Final Analysis: Sort of like The Game, but with 75-80 percent less yuppified gourmet-coffee back-patting and bullshit.

PAULIE
Another fucking DreamWorks atrocity. This one's a schmaltzy adventure for kids (god help them) about a half-digital, half-animatronic talking parrot who does more than just mimic. The bird-saddled with the whiny voice of Jay Mohr (that butt-ugly blond SNL guy who was the big dickhead in Jerry Maguire)-soon learns that his freakish mental powers only land him in trouble, but it wasn't soon enough for me. The ethnic cabby from Wings is on hand as a Pninian Russian emigre who helps birdie to locate his long-lost little-girl owner, with all the requisite happy-ending product tie-ins and foiling of bad guys' sinister plots. It's nothing you ain't seen before, and there's a lot less skill and style involved. Please don't let your kids near this one-they might actually enjoy it and you'll be forced to disown them.

Final Analysis: Do you have to ask?