Jeff Jensen Movies

A hard-drinking, hard-living cop assigned the task of transporting a small-time criminal to the nearby courthouse finds that a simple, 16-block drive can be the longest ride of his life in director Richard Donner's urban action thriller. Hung-over, has-been cop Jack Mosley (Bruce Willis) has seen better days, and all that the force expects out of him these days is to stay out of trouble while he's on the clock. Eddie Bunker (Mos Def) is set to testify before a grand jury at 10:00 a.m., and it's up to Mosely to make sure that Bunker makes it to the courthouse in one piece -- a job that Mosely estimates will take a maximum of 15 minutes. A black van has been trailing the pair unnoticed, though, and after stopping off at a nearby liquor store to pick up some breakfast, Mosely emerges from the store just in time to save Eddie from the lethal bullet of a determined assassin. When backup arrives in the form of Detective Frank Nugent (David Morse), Mosely quickly realizes that the detective on Nugent's team is the same cop that Bunker is set to testify against. Now faced with the tough task of dodging bullets and eluding a massive onslaught of corrupt cops, Mosely must keep Bunker alive long enough to get him before the judge and ensure that justice is served. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

The acclaimed Trainspotting trio (director Danny Boyle, producer Andrew Macdonald, scripter John Hodge) reunited for this update of '30s screwball comedies and '40s fantasies, such as Here Comes Mr. Jordan(1941), Angel on My Shoulder(1946), Down to Earth(1947), and the 1946 Stairway to Heaven (co-directed by Macdonald's grandfather, Emeric Pressburger). Tossed together for $12 million, the result is a combination salad, a surreal salmagundi with an added animated sequence for lagniappe. In Heaven, Gabriel (Dan Hedaya) sends angels O'Reilly (Holly Hunter) and Jackson (Delroy Lindo) down to Earth to make two people fall in love. If the angels fail, they must remain on Earth. The target couple: well-to-do Celine (Cameron Diaz) and impoverished, aspiring novelist Robert (Ewan McGregor), a janitor at the corporation owned by her wealthy father, Naville (Ian Holm). Robert loses his job, kidnaps Celine, and the two retreat to a mountain hideout where they discuss splitting the ransom. O'Reilly and Jackson plan to make Robert and Celine love each other by putting them in jeopardy, so the two angels get hired on by Naville as bounty hunters. Although Robert and Celine argue, they also sing and dance together at a local karaoke bar, a scene evocative of both Dennis Potter's Karaoke and the memorable karaoke performance by Cameron Diaz in My Best Friend's Wedding. The angels make few gains, but when Jackson is on the brink of killing Robert, Celine comes to his rescue. Naville cancels Celine's credit card, so she robs a bank. Robert is shot during the robbery, and Celine has dentist Elliot (Stanley Tucci) remove the bullet. Robert awakens, finds the two together, and knocks out Elliot, prompting an argument that leads Celine and Robert to separate. Plagued by their own problems, the angels kidnap Celine themselves, and as complications mount, Gabriel eventually has God intervene. Filmed in Utah, although Hodge originally planned the story to take place in France and England. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

A new '90s expressiveness regarding homosexuality in movies is gently mined for laughs in this 1993 comedy that predates the similar but much more raw Chasing Amy and slightly more humorous Threesome. With her straight greasy hair, semi-paranoid outlook, and leather jacket she wears like a shield, Connie (Kelly Lynch) already seems a bit unhinged. Then her girlfriend, Ellen (Sherilyn Fenn), breaks up their relationship and Connie loses it. In her grief, she hits upon a bizarre plan: Why not hire male prostitute Joe (William Baldwin) to seduce Ellen, then break her heart? Wouldn't that make Ellen rush back into Connie's arms? Of course not. For one thing, Joe's life is complicated by his protective yet sinister pimp (Joe Pantoliano) and a thug who mistakenly believes Joe set him up for a prison sentence. And Joe and Ellen fall in love. Yet an odd, sibling-like friendship develops between Joe and Connie that steers them through the repercussions of Ellen's discovery of their deceit, the thug's attack on Joe, and Joe's desire to give up prostitution. By the story's end, they've lost Ellen, but they have one another, and have learned to step beyond the protective relationships they have lost. Three of Hearts solidified William Baldwin's ascent to leading-man status (along with brothers Stephen and Alec) after 1991's Backdraft. ~ Nick Sambides, Jr., All Movie Guide

In this exciting and violent crime drama, a drug dealer turned photojournalist returns to his old stomping grounds in L.A. and ends up entangled in a new drug scheme by his former pal. After stealing a fortune in drugs from a ruthless crime lord, the photographer must flee for his life. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Peter Berg stars as Henry, a chronic gambler forever in trouble with the mob and the law. Through the auspices of his old friend Cowboy Jack (M.K. Harris), Henry is hired as an all-around flunkey by gang boss Paul Hellwart (Terence Stamp). But there's a problem: Henry is currently sexually involved with a nubile young miss (Michelle Johnson) who happens to be Hellwart's main squeeze. Disloyalty begets violence, and violence begets more violence. Anyone looking for logical character development and clever plot twists will be disappointed by Genuine Risk, though action fans will get their fill. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Casualties of War was based on a New Yorker article by Daniel Lang. This, in turn, was inspired by a true incident which illustrated the dehumanizing aspects of the Vietnam experience. Michael J. Fox plays Eriksson, a member of an American squadron stationed in the deepest jungles of Southeast Asia. Sean Penn co-stars as Meserve, the squadron sergeant, who vows revenge after his best friend is killed. He orders his men to invade a village and "requisition" a young Vietnamese girl (Thuy Thu Lee), who is repeatedly tied, gagged and gang-raped. The horrified Eriksson refuses to participate in these atrocities, and he does his best to console the girl and to attempt to free her. Before this can happen, however, Meserve orders another man to kill the girl. Once he returns to camp, Eriksson attempts to file a report on the tragedy and to bring Meserve and the others to justice, but he is stonewalled by the brass and threatened with death by his fellow soldiers. Eventually Meserve and his co-conspirators are jailed for their crimes, but Eriksson can never forget his "compliance" in the incident by failing to save the girl. The script is by well-known playwright David Rabe. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Combining influences from Tex Avery cartoons to Sam Raimi horror movies to 1940s B-movies, Joel Coen and Ethan Coen followed up the stylish film noir of their debut, Blood Simple (1984), with this frantic screwball comedy. H.I. "Hi" McDonnough (Nicholas Cage) is a philosophical but slightly dim career criminal who has been arrested so often that he gets to know "Ed," short for Edwina (Holly Hunter), the officer who takes his mug shots. Hi takes a shine to Ed and promises to go straight if she marries him. She accepts, and they move to the Arizona desert, where Hi holds down a factory job and blissfully watches the sunsets with Ed. Their serenity is shattered when the couple decides that they want a child and discover that, as Hi puts it, "Ed's womb was a rocky place where my seed could find no purchase." (One of the film's many delights is Hi's unexpectedly flowery dime-novel narration.) Ed goes into a severe depression until she sees an item in the news. Nathan Arizona (Trey Wilson), owner of a chain of unpainted furniture stores, has become the father of quintuplets, and he and his wife joke that they now have more children than they know what to do with. In what seems like a perfect "helps you, helps me" situation, Hi and Ed kidnap one of the Arizona infants, figuring that they'll have a baby and the Arizonas will have less of a burden. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

High-powered gangsters move this crime drama along at a fast pace. When two cops, Eddie Jillette (Richard Gere) and Joe Collins (Gary Basaraba), hear about a contract out on local crime boss Losado (Jeroen Krabbe), they go undercover posing as hitmen, and the result is murder. Collins and the man who hired them, Paul Deveneux (Terry Kinney) are killed, and Jillette goes looking for the assassin. He ends up in New Orleans where he locates Michel Duval (Kim Basinger), the girlfriend of Deveneux now virtually held a prisoner by Losado. Jillette has his work cut out for him. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This is the true story of Rocky Dennis (Eric Stoltz), a personable young man suffering from "lionitis," a fatal disease which causes hideous facial disfigurement. The son of freewheeling biker Rusty Dennis (Cher), Rocky is accepted without question by his mom's boyfriends and cycle buddies, but treated with pity, condescension, and disgust by much of the outside world. The local high school principal tries to get Rocky classified as brain-damaged so he won't have to enroll the boy in his school, but Rusty fights for her son's rights with the ferocity of a mother lioness. Rocky makes friends easily both at school and at summer camp. He also falls in love with Diana (Laura Dern), a blind girl who cannot see his deformed countenance and is entranced by the boy's kindness and compassion. Now that he's got his own life in order, Rocky sets about to wean his chronically depressed mother from her drug habit. Mask is the sort of story that might have ending up wallowing in its own pathos had the acting, direction and scriptwriting (by Anna Hamilton Phelan) been anything less than very good. The film proved a much-needed financial success for director Peter Bogdanovich, though unfortunately it didn't come soon enough to stave off his declaring personal bankruptcy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

A cross between a skin flick and a futuristic fantasy, this unfunny parody is set on a remote Pacific Island where the insidious Dr. Sin Do (Angus Scrimm) whose life began long ago under the name of Li Chuk, has made a pact with Satan that gives him power over the weather. Now he is tracking down the lost "Eye of the Avatar," created by the extinct race of Lemurians before their civilization disappeared -- that jewel, when combined with Sin Do's own special jewel, will endow him with indomitable power. Sent to combat the evil "doctor" are some comely female warriors (Melanie Vincz, Raven de la Croix and others) whose bodies get more screen time than the dialogue itself -- an indication of where the main interest lies. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this Spaghetti-western-like martial arts actioner, Texas Ranger J. J. McQuade (Chuck Norris) is up against the weapons-dealer Rawley Wilkes (David Carradine) after Wilkes kidnaps McQuade's partner and daughter and takes them to Mexico. McQuade's personal vendetta is encouraged by the government because Wilkes is hijacking U.S. arms shipments for his illicit weapons deals and the government wants him stopped. After the kidnapping incident, McQuade is assigned Kayo (Robert Beltran) a rookie patrolman, to accompany him in his fight, and he is also joined by FBI-agent Jackson (Leon Isaac Kennedy). Jackson and McQuade track down Wilkes' secret airstrip -- and that is when the fireworks begin. Every weapon known to human technology is brought into the picture as McQuade, also armed with his lethal hands and feet, goes ballistic. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide