nun of the above

This is a GOOD flick. I was surprised because of certain misgivings about Bruce baby in anything but a "Die Hard" episode. (Yeah so "Color of Night" stunk to high heaven...) I really enjoyed this film and its great cast with Toni Collette, little Haley, good ol' Donnie Wahlberg, et al. Compared to "Stir of Echoes," "Sense" wins hands down. A few minutes into "Echoes," I could see it coming a mile off. A good cast but a typical Matheson story: melodramatic and predictable. With the big fat twist in "Sense," I was blown outta my chair. Thanks, Bruce! And lest I forget, great writing and directing by Mr. Shyamalan, too. More, more!

I know I'm gonna get it in the neck, but this one bites. Not only was it edited to death but it features two of the most wooden top-billed performances I've seen in a while: Jake Lloyd and Natalie Portman. My fingers are tightly crossed hoping that in Ep 2, Anakin will be too old for Jake to play him. Otherwise, HELP...I don't think I'll be able to sit thru 2 more with him leading the pack. At least Rick(y) Schroder was cute and natural in "The Champ." With Jake sporting a perpetual scowl like someone keyed his favorite landspeeder, no wonder Anakin turned into the biggest baddie around. And Natalie looks great but any stiffer and you could use her for siding. I hold out hope for her in future SW chapters because I know she can do better.

Was it just me or were Liam and Ewan on the verge of breaking into a Marx Brothers routine throughout the movie? They're both wonderful--elsewhere--but what do I remember about them in this flick? The friggin' wrist communicators...

So, you ask, what did I like about it? John Williams still RULES, and those roll-up destroyer droids are cool. My fave thang? The blum-blum-BLAAAAM of Sebulba's pod racer plowing through the awesome mutated landscape like a Harley-Davidson on mega-steroids. No one but Lucas can hybridize the Southwest and Africa and make it look farrrr out, man.

"Desert Hearts" makes me feel all warm and romantic whenever I think about it, and this I attribute mostly to director Deitch. Credit is also due to screenwriter Natalie Cooper for making sense of Jane Rule's molasses-thick quagmire of a novel, and to a super cast of supporting players. Alex McArthur is James-Dean-cute in his fresh and much welcome film debut as Cay's charmingly sensitive brother Walter. Audra Lindley is great as Cay's dear gruff mom Frances, and Andra Akers, new to me, purrs and scintillates as Silver. The soundtrack is one-of-a-kind wonderful with Patsy Cline, Ella Fitzgerald and on and on. I can't tell you how many times I saw "Desert Hearts" in a theater but for months after, a certain song (or a lone train whistle) would evoke sweet haunting memories...

As for Cay and Vivian, Patricia Charbonneau and Helen Shaver portray two sympathetic and instantly familiar female characters, but I've gotta give this to Donna, too. Why? Because this is the only production in which Shaver and Charbonneau (sounds good when you say 'em together!) rise above their usual below-average efforts. (I've seen enough of their film and TV work to make an admittedly personal judgment.) My gut feeling is that Deitch created a safe environment of honesty and acceptance, and encouraged and nurtured the heck out of her allegedly straight stars. In return they offered her an intimate duet of performances that, like the sleek sexy tailfins on Cay's Buick convertible, gave us a classic.