Mary Colquhoun Movies

In this darkly comic film noir from writer/director David Atkins, Steve Martin revisits dentistry -- an occupation he'd explored 15 years prior, in the camp musical Little Shop of Horrors. Novocaine casts Martin as a much more mild-mannered D.D.S., Dr. Frank Sangster. Engaged to a prim and delicate hygienist, Jean (Laura Dern), Sangster leads a placid, upper-middle class existence, save for the occasional visit from his deadbeat artist brother Harlan (Elias Koteas). But Sangster finds his life turned inside out from the moment the alluring Susan (Helena Bonham Carter) plops down in his reclining vinyl chair: Complaining about her molars, she's really more interested in the refrigerator of narcotics the good dentist keeps on hand for his patients in pain. Once they manage to get Sangster's guard down, Susan and her brother (Scott Caan) rob him blind -- and worse yet, frame him for the theft. When a dead body turns up in Sangster's sleek suburban home, he finds that clearing his name will be a difficult proposition indeed. Novocaine marks the directorial debut of screenwriter Atkins, who first made his mark with the script for Emir Kusturica's oddball cult favorite Arizona Dream (1993). ~ Michael Hastings, Rovi

In this supernatural thriller, Tom Witzky (Kevin Bacon) is a fairly typical working-class guy living in Chicago with his wife Maggie (Kathryn Erbe) and his son Jake (Zachary David Cope). One night at a party, Tom gets into a lively discussion with his sister-in-law, Lisa (Illeana Douglas), who believes in psychic communication and the power of hypnosis. He challenges Lisa to hypnotize him, and she plants in him a post-hypnotic suggestion to be more open-minded. But the results aren't quite what Lisa or Tom expected; Tom now senses an air of terrible dread throughout his house and is convinced that evil lurks just around the corner. He also sees the spirit of a girl from the neighborhood who disappeared months ago -- and Jake sees the spirit as well. Stir of Echoes was based on a novel by Richard Matheson, whose work inspired such disparate films as Somewhere in Time and The Incredible Shrinking Man; it was written and directed by David Koepp, who wrote the screenplays for Jurassic Park and Mission: Impossible. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Brian DePalma directed this taut thriller, set in Atlantic City, where a corrupt cop investigates a political assassination. Outside an Atlantic City arena-hotel-casino, a TV news reporter stands in a pre-hurricane storm to report on the heavyweight boxing match about to begin inside. A transition to the stadium interior focuses on Atlantic City homicide Detective Rick Santoro (Nicolas Cage), a father with a wife and son, yet also a dishonest cop who maintains a mistress and cheerfully accepts bribes. DePalma's Steadicam follows Santoro on a fast-paced tour of the stadium as the laughing, yelling detective travels stairs and hallways, talks to a gal with a between-rounds placard, visits the dressing room of champ Lincoln Tyler (Stan Shaw), rides down an escalator to squeeze money from a small-time hood, enters the arena of 14,000 fight fans, talks on his phone with his girlfriend and wife, and sits ringside next to his lifelong buddy, Navy Cmdr. Kevin Dunne (Gary Sinise). Behind Dunne, the U.S. Secretary of Defense Charles Kirkland (Joel Fabiani) is seated alongside billionaire casino owner Gilbert Powell (John Heard). As the fight gets underway, Dunne abandons his position protecting the defense chief to pursue a suspicious redhead. From his ringside vantage point, Santoro has a close view of the champ, curiously conscious despite taking a kayo punch. At that moment, an assassin fires at Kirkland. Santoro immediately concocts a good cover story for his pal (to explain why Dunne left his post protecting Kirkland). Just after the shooting, Dunne kills a Palestinian extremist, the apparent killer, and Santoro orders the stadium doors locked, hoping he can locate other suspects among the fleeing crowd. One such is Julia Costello (Carla Gugino), an injured woman in a blond wig who spoke with Kirkland seconds before the gunfire. After a video replay reveals the champ took a fall, going down to the floor from a punch that never touched him, Santoro becomes more curious and suspicious, comparing witness accounts, and he attempts to locate Julia, convinced she's the key to truth behind the assassination. As it all comes to a head, Santoro peels through successive layers of corruption, ultimately confronting himself in a self-examination of his own values. Filmed at Montreal's old Forum. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

Friends star Jennifer Aniston made her debut as the leading lady of a feature film in this romantic comedy. Kate (Aniston) is an art director with an advertising agency whose personal and professional life is stuck in neutral; while her work is good, her boss Mr. Mercer (Kevin Dunn) won't give her a promotion, and while Kate is attracted to co-worker Sam (Kevin Bacon), he's not interested in her. Kate learns that Mercer is loath to promote single people, because without permanent attachments they're free to leave whenever they wish. Kate's friend Darcy (Illeana Douglas) comes up with a possible solution: use a photo of Kate with handsome stranger Nick (Jay Mohr) to convince Mercer that she's engaged to be married. The ruse works -- Kate gets her promotion, and Sam, who's attracted to women who are already spoken for, starts showing her some attention. But soon Mercer wants to meet Kate's husband-to-be; Kate tracks down Nick and persuades him to pose as her intended for an evening, but Nick decides at the end of the night that he's in love with her. Picture Perfect was written and directed by Glenn Gordon Caron, who created the TV series Moonlighting. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

An ex-mercenary (Tom Berenger) becomes a take-no-prisoners teacher in a drug-ridden, gang-infested Miami high school in this campy morality tale about restoring lost American virtues to the inner city. Berenger's character, Shale, has no first name, a shadowy past as a patriotic gun-for-hire, and is temporarily unemployed and living with an idealistic teacher, Jane Hetzko (Diane Verona). Jane has angered a school gang leader, Juan Lucas (Marc Anthony), by asking the principal to get him transferred after he has threatened her in the schoolyard. After Jane is kneecapped by a gang member, Shale fakes a resume and becomes a substitute teacher, Mr. Smith. He lectures his class on the lessons of Vietnam ("We were fighting Communism") while looking for a way to get revenge on Juan. When he challenges the school's tolerance for student misbehavior, Smith is fired by the slimy principal, Claude Rolle (Ernie Hudson), an ex-cop who is running for City Council and doesn't want to rock the boat. Shale stays because he cites a union rule requiring two weeks' notice. During that period, tensions escalate and eventually Shale intervenes in a gang war that degenerates into a school-destroying inferno of violence. ~ Michael Betzold, Rovi

A crime fighter created in the 1930s and popularized in movies, pulp novels, and a radio show starring a young Orson Welles, The Shadow came back to life in 1994 in this slick, well-cast production. Alec Baldwin stars as Lamont Cranston, a murderous opium dealer reformed by a Tibetan mystic, who teaches him how to use his keen mental powers to manipulate others. As penance for his past misdeeds, Cranston masquerades as a degenerate New York City playboy by day and secretly plays the heroic Shadow by night, staving off evildoers with a network of agents and a cab-driving sidekick (Peter Boyle). A greater challenge arrives when Cranston must fight Shiwan Khan (John Lone), the final descendent of Genghis Khan, who has received training from the same Tibetan master who instructed Cranston. Shiwan plans to use atomic weapons to take over New York and then the world. At the same time, Cranston meets socialite Margo Lane (Penelope Ann Miller), and, although he's instantly enamored of her, he discovers that her psychic abilities render his secret identity vulnerable. The Shadow was directed by former music video creator Russell Mulcahy, whose feature film debut Highlander (1986) was a cult classic. ~ Karl Williams, Rovi

Kim Basinger plays a burglar ex-con who's just been released from a 10-year stint and intends to go straight, when a big-time Atlanta crime boss kidnaps her six-year-old son and forces her to pull one last heist. She concocts an elaborate bank job but goes one step further and outwits both the bank and the mobster. ~ Rovi

Todd Graff wrote the screenplay for this eccentric romantic comedy in the spirit of Moonstruck that exchanges pasta for matzo balls. The film takes place in Queens in 1969, where Pearl Berman (Shirley MacLaine) has just arrived back from the funeral of her husband. As her dysfunctional family kvetches in the living room, the dapper Joe Meledandri (Marcello Mastroianni) arrives. It seems that Joe has admired Pearl from afar for a number of years, ever since he met her husband in a bar and persuaded him to return to his wife. He invites Pearl for coffee, provoking the wisecrack from her mother (Jessica Tandy): "She got picked up at her own husband's funeral." As Pearl is wooed by Joe, she has to deal with her lonely, overweight daughter Bibby (Kathy Bates) and her prettier daughter Norma (Marcia Gay Harden), who suffers from such a lack of self esteem that she assumes the personalities of Marilyn Monroe, Jackie Kennedy, and Bonnie Parker. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

Howard Zieff directed this comedy-drama about the emotional awakening of a young girl in a small Pennsylvania town during the summer of 1972. Anna Chlumsky plays eleven-year-old Vada, a quiet child living with her widowed father Harry Dultenfuss (Dan Aykroyd), a local mortician who prepares bodies in his basement. Vada feels responsible for the death of her mother, who died giving birth to her, and lives in an emotional cocoon, her only friend being a personable local boy, Thomas J. Sennett (Macauly Culkin), who suffers from allergies. Like Vada, Harry keeps to himself, until a freelance make-up artist, Shelly DeVoto (Jamie Lee Curtis), comes to town and gets a job working with Harry. Shelly and Harry fall in love and Vada feels threatened by her presence. But then a personal tragedy forces Vada to come out of her emotional shell. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

Shock to the System is a black comedy about a middle-aged advertising executive (Michael Caine) who loses his long-awaited promotion to a younger man (Peter Reigret). In frustration, Caine accidentally pushes a panhandler in front of a subway train--and he gets away with the death. Realizing that committing murder might be a little easier than he previously had thought, he begins plotting the murder of several of his corporate enemies. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rovi

After 20 years of marriage, Steve Giardino (Alan Alda) and his wife Jackie (Ann-Margret) agree to a divorce in this situation comedy. The focus is on both of them as they suffer through matchmaking, blind dates, and their new life as eligible singles. Donna (Mary Kay Place) is Jackie's friend, while Mel Arons (Hal Linden) is the confidante of the vain but likeable Steve. Steven worries that he will never find anyone decent to date until he meets the pretty Dr. Kay Hutton (Veronica Hamel). Jackie is enamored with a sculptor (John Shea) before his glaring faults become too much for her. While Jackie's new relationship is on the outs, Steve prepares for a new life with Kay. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

Michael J. Fox once more makes a courageous effort to shed his nice-guy image in Bright Lights, Big City. Fox plays an impressionable Kansan who comes to the Big Apple to take a job at a major magazine. It isn't long before he falls into the twin traps of drug and alcohol abuse. His only hope for redemption is in the hands of Vicky (Tracy Pollan), the cousin of his scuzzy drinking buddy Tad (Kiefer Sutherland). Jay McInerney's bestselling novel does not translate easily to the big screen, but Fox strives hard to please, as do all of his costars. The white stuff snorted by Fox wasn't really cocaine, but powdered milk. Watch for Frasier's David Hyde Pierce in a small role and Jason Robards in a significant unbilled cameo. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi