Janet Hirshenson Movies

Much attention was given to the Robert Mapplethorpe photographs that became the center of controversy when they were exhibited at the Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center in 1990, but less was known about Dennis Barrie, the museum director responsible for the exhibit. Barrie's obscenity trial and condemnation by right-wing conservatives are the focus of this Showtime telepic. Played by James Woods, Barrie is shown standing up for his museum's right to display controversial art and coping with the toxic windfall that surrounded his actions. Diana Scarwid gives plenty of support as Dianne, Barrie's wife, and interviews with personalities ranging from Susan Sarandon to Salman Rushdie are interspersed with the film's narrative. Thanks to the cooperation of the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, a number of the actual photographs that were at the heart of the controversy were used in the production. ~ Rebecca Flint Marx, All Movie Guide

In October 1991, a dying tropical hurricane from Bermuda collided with a cold front from the Great Lakes, resulting in a "perfect storm" of previously unknown destructive impact that resulted in 100-foot waves; tragically, the crew of a fishing boat was lost in the midst of the fearsome storm. Based on the best-selling book by Sebastian Junger, The Perfect Storm tells the story of the ship's brave and hard-working crew. Billy Tyne (George Clooney), captain of the Andrea Gail, hasn't had much luck finding catch on his most recent trips to sea, and with money short, he and his crew -- Bob Shatford (Mark Wahlberg), Dale Murphy (John C. Reilly), and David Sullivan (William Fichtner) set out again when they hear that the fish are running. Billy's hunch proves correct, but when the ship's refrigeration system goes haywire, they have to return to shore as quickly as possible before the fish spoil, sending them into the middle of the worst storm in history. The supporting cast includes Mary Elziabeth Mastrantonio, Diane Lane, Bob Gunton, and Karen Allen; Wolfgang Petersen, whose breakthrough film was the aquatic wartime drama Das Boot, directed. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

My Favorite Martian stars Jeff Daniels as Tim O'Hara, once a newspaper man and now a struggling television producer in Santa Barbara. Tim has a crush on vapid news reporter Brace Channing (Elizabeth Hurley) while overlooking his feelings for Lizzie (Daryl Hannah), a technician working at the station. Driving home one night, Tim wanders upon the crash landing of a spaceship from Mars. The Martian inside (Christopher Lloyd) has come to Earth searching for a fellow Martian who had been lost here 35 years ago. After the crash, he hides on the beach and shrinks his spaceship to the size of a toy to avoid detection; Tim finds the ship anyway, and takes it home. With little choice, the Martian, aided by his sentient and very neurotic spacesuit, follows Tim home and reveals himself. Tim sees the alien as his ticket to the big time, but the Martian, now masquerading as Tim's Uncle Martin (thanks to some Martian gum that transforms his appearance to that of a human) thwarts Tim at every turn. Just as he gets the video he needs for his story, O'Hara develops a friendship with his planetary neighbor and new "Uncle." The two suddenly find they are racing against the the clock -- a government team, led by a wacky scientist (Wallace Shawn), hunts Martin down, and the spaceship (a rental) is on a timed sequence to self-destruct if it cannot be repaired in time. Along the way, Tim loses his infatuation with Brace and finds his true feelings for the loyal Lizzie. Martin might also find his lost friend on Earth, just as he has found new ones. ~ Ron Wells, All Movie Guide

Claire Cooper (Annette Bening), has been having psychic visions all of her life, though she's never been clear of what they mean. Now an adult, she lives an idyllic, small-town life in a Massachusetts farmhouse with her airline-pilot husband Paul (Aidan Quinn) and her young daughter Rebecca (Katie Sagona), while Claire illustrates children's books. A psychopath (Robert Downey Jr.) has been kidnapping young girls in their area, and one is currently missing. Claire has a recurring dream about the killer walking with a girl through an apple orchard. Paul tells police detective Jack Kay (Paul Guilfoyle), who doesn't believe him, as the girl's body had been found at the bottom of the lake. Claire's vision was actually a premonition, starting a chain of events that would create a two-way link to the killer. The key to the mystery is the lake itself, of which Claire dreams, created when the old town of Northfield was flooded to make a reservoir. As her psychiatrist Dr. Silverman (Stephen Rea) does not understand her now waking dreams, Claire alone must now lose herself to the visions. She must relive the killer's memories to find his identity and location. Director Neil Jordan has explored the nature of dreams in a more Freudian manner in his Company of Wolves. ~ Ron Wells, All Movie Guide

Cross What's up Doc with Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia and you get this dark screwball comedy of murder and lost luggage. Mafia hitman Tommy Spinelli (Joe Pesci) is flying to San Diego with a bag that holds eight severed heads, which he's bringing to his superiors to prove that some troublesome rival mobsters are permanently out of the picture. Medical student Charlie Pritchett (Andy Comeau) is headed to Mexico with his fiancée Laurie Bennett (Kristy Swanson) to meet her parents. Charlie's suitcase is identical to Tommy's, and it's not until Tommy arrives in San Diego that he discovers that there are no heads in his bag, while Charlie realizes his duffel most certainly does not contain his vacation wardrobe. Tommy finds Charlie's address in the bag and heads to the fraternity house he calls home, where he drafts Charlie's friends Ernie (David Spade) and Steve (Todd Louiso) into finding him some replacement heads post-haste. Meanwhile, Laurie's parents (Dyan Cannon and George Hamilton) are a bit miffed to discover that their future son-in-law is travelling with a bag full of rotting heads, while Laurie is ready to give Charlie his walking papers. Eight Heads in a Duffel Bag was the directorial debut of screenwriter Tom Schulman, who won an Academy Award for his script for the movie Dead Poets Society. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Just when you'd think that scientists would realize dinosaurs and humans don't mix, along comes The Lost World: Jurassic Park to prove you wrong. In this sequel, John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) summons chaos theorist and onetime colleague Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) to his home with some startling information -- while nearly everything at his Jurassic Park had been destroyed, engineers were also operating a second site, where other dinosaurs, resurrected through DNA cloning technology, had been kept in hiding. Hammond has learned the dinosaurs on the second island are alive and well and even breeding; Hammond wants Malcolm to observe and document the reptiles before Hammond's financiers can get to them. Malcolm declares he had enough of the dinosaurs the first time out, but decides to make the trip when he finds out that his girlfriend, paleontologist Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore), is already there. However, Ian and Sarah aren't the only visitors expected on the island; a camera crew led by ecological activist Nick Van Owen (Vince Vaughn) is on the way, as is Roland Tembo (Pete Postlethwaite), a world-class wild game hunter who is supposed to round up the dinosaurs and who hopes to bag a prehistoric trophy for himself in the process. This sequel to Jurassic Park boasted even more impressive special effects than the first film, though the acting and screenplay aren't always at the same level. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Popular comic and television personality Ellen DeGeneres had her first starring role in a feature film in this black comedy. Martha Alston (DeGeneres) is a thirtysomething single working as a producer for a talk show. Ever since Martha's younger sister got married, her parents have been after her to settle down, but Martha has had little luck finding the right guy. On Valentine's Day, Martha is depressed and drinking at a bar when she meets Whitman Crawford (Bill Pullman), who seems like the perfect man -- he's good looking, sensitive, intelligent, and affectionate. However, when she makes the mistake of telling her new beau that he can be himself around her, she discovers the real Whitman -- he's a horrible poet, he likes awful music, he enjoys shoplifting ("Stolen beer just tastes better!"), and he's a borderline psychotic who doses her with LSD for fun. What's more, his mother (Joan Plowright) and ex-girlfriend (Joan Cusack) hate Martha's guts and don't mind telling her so. So how can Martha convince her friends and family that she wants nothing to do with the man of her dreams? More importantly, how does she convince Whitman? ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

The classic 1955-59 sitcom The Phil Silvers Show (also known as "You'll Never Get Rich" in its first few episodes) became this high concept comedy with an all-star cast. Steve Martin stars as U.S. Army Master Sergeant Ernest G. Bilko, a conniving motor pool supervisor who uses his position to finance various get-rich-quick schemes, including illegal gambling, at a Kansas military base. His commanding officer, Colonel Hall (Dan Aykroyd) is mostly oblivious to Bilko's antics. Trouble arrives when the master sergeant's old rival, Major Thorn (Phil Hartman), appears. It seems that Thorn, the butt of several past Bilko capers, is eager to settle the score by spearheading a review of Bilko's records and stealing away his fiancée Rita (Glenne Headley), who may have been left at the altar one too many times. At the same time, military engineer Major Ebersole (Austin Pendleton) is testing a new high-tech "hover tank" that may not be quite ready for deployment. Directed by light comedy specialist ($Jonathan Lynn, who brought a similar touch to My Cousin Vinny (1992) and Greedy (1994), the updated Sgt. Bilko costarred Cathy Silvers, daughter of the TV show's late star, as Lieutenant Monday. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

Warner Bros. attempted to revitalize its animation division with this family adventure that blended live action and animation in the style of Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), reportedly coming in with a price tag of $100 million. Basketball legend Michael Jordan stars as himself, a retired sports hero trying his hand at baseball and failing miserably. Meanwhile, the Looney Tunes gang, led by Bugs Bunny, are kidnapped by aliens called the Nerdlucks. It seems that the Nerdlucks' theme park, Moron Mountain (a barely-veiled dig at Disney) is failing to attract customers. The space invaders are convinced that the appearance of Bugs and his pals Porky Pig and Speedy Gonzalez will beef up business. Bugs makes his captors a deal -- they'll play a game of basketball for their freedom. When the Nerdlucks stack the deck by pilfering the talent of NBA superstars Charles Barkley and Patrick Ewing, the Warner Bros. heroes enlist the aid of Jordan, who returns to the court to help the classic characters. While he prepares to play, Jordan is aided by fellow celebrity Bill Murray. Director Joe Pytka previously created many of the television commercials that featured Jordan as a paid endorser. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

"Houston, we have a problem." Those words were immortalized during the tense days of the Apollo 13 lunar mission crisis, and the suspense, fear, and excitement of those days are captured in Ron Howard's epic recreation of the 1970 crisis. When the commander of the original mission Ken Mattingly (Gary Sinise), bows out due to possible exposure to measles, astronaut Jim Lovell (Tom Hanks) leads command module pilot Jack Swigert (Kevin Bacon) and lunar module driver Fred Haise (Bill Paxton) on what is slated as NASA's third lunar landing mission. All goes smoothly until the craft is halfway through its mission, when an exploding oxygen tank threatens the crew's oxygen and power supplies. As the courageous astronauts face the dilemma of either suffocating or freezing to death, Mattingly and Mission Control leader Gene Kranz (Ed Harris) struggle to find a way to bring the crew back home, all the while knowing that the spacemen face probable death once the battered ship reenters the Earth's atmosphere. Even though the outcome, in which all three astronauts miraculously survived, is historical fact, the film derives suspense from the situation itself and from the actions of the heroic astronauts and the men on the ground. Howard's taut direction, a solid ensemble of players, and eye-opening special effects all add to the overall impact of the film, which has been hailed as one of Hollywood's best historical dramas. In 2002, the movie was released in IMAX theaters as Apollo 13: The IMAX Experience, with a pared-down running time of 116 minutes in order to meet the technical requirements of the large-screen format. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide

This earnest, intelligent, and well-written romantic comedy is enjoyable and optimistic in classic Hollywood style, even if its idealism doesn't seem quite so credible against the cynical political backdrop of the Nineties. President Andrew Shepherd (Michael Douglas), an unabashedly liberal Democrat, is just gearing up for re-election when he meets an attractive and sharp environmental lobbyist named Sydney Wade (Annette Bening). The two fall in love and the President must soon deal with the political repercussions (Sydney is trying to get legislation through Congress), as well as the cynical machinations of Republican opponent Senator Bob Rumson (Richard Dreyfuss), who attempts to paint Sydney as a radical and use "family values" rhetoric to smear Shepherd. With the attacks affecting his standings in the all-important polls, and his love's legislation causing him headaches in the Capitol, Shepherd must decide whether he can risk continuing his relationship. A rich supporting cast, solid characterizations by Douglas and Bening, and an articulate approach make this an appealing, if not particularly weighty, study of the tensions between public and private life. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide

Director Ron Howard's drama follows a beleaguered reporter during a hectic 24 hours at a New York City tabloid. Michael Keaton stars as Henry Hackett, a metro editor for the struggling New York Sun. Hackett is being wooed by the Sentinel, a more upscale paper, but he's addicted to the adrenaline-stimulating, breakneck pace of the Sun's newsroom, much to the consternation of his pregnant wife Martha (Marisa Tomei. Hackett is currently pursuing a story of two minority youths who have been arrested for the murders of two men. He learns that the police think that the killings may be a mob hit. In the court of public opinion, however, the innocent suspects are being judged as guilty, and the police may bow to the pressure. As Hackett and his staff desperately work all the story's angles to find the truth, several other dramas unfold. Top editor Bernie (Robert Duvall) learns that he has prostate cancer, and tough publisher Alicia (Glenn Close) wonders if her lack of popularity is due to her cost-cutting, her personality, or the fact that she's a woman. In their only collaboration, screenwriter David Koepp co-wrote the script with his brother Stephen Koepp, a senior editor at Time magazine. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide