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 IN & OUT. Mainstream cinema seems to have embraced
the coming-of-gay story, and the fact that it's moved from "serious"
melodramas devoid of same-sex kissing to this light comedy replete
with a hot smooch between he-man Tom Selleck and funny guy Kevin
Kline is proof that homosexuality has become acceptable enough
to be joked about. In fact, there are more jokes in this film
than in the average episode of Laugh-In, and about the
same percentage (1 in 6) hit the mark. Still, that's 1,246 percent
more laughs than all Pauly Shore movies combined. Even the obligatory
"touching" ending seems to work OK, neither gaining
laughs at the expense of the emotional weight of the issue, nor
becoming so sappy as to ruin the flow of the film. While this
film is never great, and the directing by Frank Oz always has
a muppet feel to it, it's better than most of what's at the movies
these days; and did I mention the long lip-lock between Selleck
and Kline? And that Selleck looks like a Tom of Finland
character who shed the chaps for Brooks Brothers suits? And that
he and Kline kiss? For a long time? Mmmmm. --DiGiovanna
KULL THE CONQUERER. Kull is essentially a porno film without
the hardcore: hyper-muscular guys, and women in bad Frederick's
of Hollywood outfits mouth inane dialogue that they seem to have
just memorized, all in the name of getting to the sex scenes.
Kevin Sorbo, TV's Hercules, plays Kull, who goes from barbarian
peasant to King in the first five minutes of the film. He then
moves swiftly to marry evil goddess Akivasha, played by Tia Carrera's
leather-uphostelered breasts. This is obviously a big mistake,
and leads to a number of swordfights choreographed to heavy metal
music. In fact, with all the men in long hair, bangs and codpieces,
Kull sometimes seems to be a collection of MTV videos from the
late '80s. In spite of all this, Kull is campy in a way that's
not overly cute and moves at a swift enough pace to keep adults
from falling asleep while junior thrills to the manly fight scenes
and makes faces at the yucky parts where Kull kisses girls. --DiGiovanna
L.A. CONFIDENTIAL. Glamour girls! Scandal! Gunplay! Nose
Jobs! The place is the City of Angels; the time is the 1950s.
The thrills starts when honest but prissy officer Ed Exley (Guy
Pearce) opens the door to the men's room of the Nite Owl Café
and finds a half dozen bullet-pierced bodies strewn across the
linoleum. From then on it's seedy characters, clever plot twists
and bracing moral dilemmas as a precinct full of cops harass,
pummel and caress each other and the smelly underbelly of Los
Angeles. Ed Exley goes head to head with his nemesis, fellow officer
Bud White (Russell Crowe), a thug known for his brawn but not
his brains. The two tackle the Nite Owl mystery with a passion
while their suave, detached colleague Jack Vincennes (Kevin Spacey)
coolly observes. L.A. Confidential courses down the same
clotted drainage ditch as Chinatown, but without Polanski's
dark and brooding spirit. L.A. Confidential is sort of
like Chinatown lite--a taut and rousing thriller that's
well worth seeing. --Richter
PILLOW BOOK. Peter Greenaway applies his lush, layered
cinematic style to the customarily austere Japanese aesthetic,
with mixed results. Pillow Book is an extravagantly beautiful
film, but like Nagiko (Vivian Wu), the empty, self-obsessed fashion
model at the center of the story, it's doubtful whether all this
beauty means anything. When she was a young girl, Nagiko's father
used to paint calligraphic characters on her face for her birthday;
as an adult, Nagiko is obsessed with having her lovely body written
upon as a sort of Whitman-esque celebration of herself: "I
need writing," she says. "Don't ask why. Just take out
your pen and write on my arm." Later, Nagiko becomes an author
and starts inking up the bodies of men, notably Ewan McGregor,
who along with a host of other taut young men, graces us with
that rare, sought-after cinematic moment: Full-frontal nudity.
Greenaway's slavish devotion to form is dazzling, but the lack
of content becomes painfully apparent as this two-and-a-half hour
movie winds along. --Richter
SHALL WE DANCE? This elegant, sweet-spirited comedy focuses
on Shohei Sugiyama (Koji Yakusyo), a quiet-tempered 42-year-old
businessman who starts secretly taking dance lessons to ward off
his mid-life crisis. As his dancing gradually improves, he begins
feeling less empty, and that's great for him but not for his wife,
who worries he's having an affair. Which, in a way, he is--though
you can bet they'll be two-stepping by the end of the movie. Writer/director
Masayuki Suo's use of dancing as a metaphor for marriage and life
certainly qualifies as corny, but the story addresses its characters'
need to rise above their regimented existence with
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