SUPERMAN IV: THE QUEST FOR PEACE (1987)

Most blame the low-budget (yet still effective) production studio Cannon Films for SUPERMAN IV: THE QUEST FOR PEACE being such an awful movie, but it's instead the fault of Christopher Reeve for the very reason he did the movie in the first, second and third place...

Set in the mid-1980's during the Reagan Administration: when Russia had nukes aimed at America and vice versa... only here the superhero plot demands the kind of urgency where The Cold War's turned into an impending/existential threat... which it NEVER was... an idealistic and childish plot with schoolchildren calling for Superman to get rid of all the nuclear missiles, and Gene Hackman has returned as Lex Luthor, burdened with godawful teenager Jon Cryer as a geek-punk nephew, so it doesn't even feel like Hackman's involved: His goal to sell nukes to opposing countries while having somehow gained the scientific knowledge to create his very own superhero, Nuclear Man, something so corny even a TV-movie would avoid it...

Meanwhile, Margot Kidder has returned, and even flies around with Superman, but she's wedged in during a romance with b-villain Sam Wanamaker's rich girl daughter Muriel Hemingway, who tries her best only she's stuck in the wrong picture... So don't blame Cannon for a lead actor attempting to manipulate audiences into thinking The Cold War was actually red hot... and by 1987 that anti-nukes concept was tired and dated anyhow. Grade: F

LILITH (1964)

title: LILITH
score: *1/2

Now if this movie were really good, or great, or somewhat daring, they'd have cast an actress who wasn't a perfect 10 (like Jean Seberg) to play a young woman who seems to "mysteriously" enchant all the males (and one sultry female) in the mental home where rich crazy people live, and sporadically, annoyingly cackle in random group sessions, and where Warren Beatty works, and of course being so handsome, falls for the titular enchantress who's as beautiful as he is: Why on Earth else would this movie matter? And yet it doesn't matter really at all... And if this insanely gorgeous girl were hanging out at a rat hole bus stop in downtown Toledo she'd "enchant" just the same: only there wouldn't be such artistic depth to rely on: But in a movie, be it art-house or mainstream, characters need to be genuinely interested to be interesting. Not even a young Gene Hackman doing an off-kilter Andy Griffith impression leaves much an impression... But he and Warren would work together again... Here, though, both seem like guests at someone else's funeral...

FRENCH CONNECTION II

title: THE FRENCH CONNECTION II year: 1975

cast: Gene Hackman, Fernando Rey rating: ***

There's a guilty pleasure watching, for nearly a half an hour, a thinned-down Gene Hackman as New York's iconic tough cop Popeye Doyle being force-fed heroin in a Euro-slum and then kicking it cold turkey, squirming, vomiting, and screaming about Mickey Mantle. We begin in France and this time remain there. Hackman can't get a decent whiskey buzz, finds it impossible interrogating perps, and is without partner/anchor Roy Scheider (although French partner Bernard Freeson, who resembles Vic Morrow, does a great job). The maze-like cat-and-mouse between the ragged good guy Doyle and classy villain Charnier (Fernando Rey) is more blind crippled dog vs lazy lion this time around. Perhaps because Charnier (who speaks English, ruining his mysterious quality) is too comfortable while our hero has nowhere to turn. This grungy sequel, which does merit some excellent handheld camerawork, feels like a visitor game without much of a home team. But at times the claustrophobic journey is somewhat interesting. Perhaps it wasn't meant to be enjoyed, but rather, experienced. And the last frame (five or so seconds) is, I have to admit, much more satisfying than the original's benign cliffhanger.

THE FIRM

title: THE FIRM

year: 1993

cast: Tom Cruise, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Gene Hackman, Wilford Brimley, Hal Holbrook, Gary Busey, David Strathaim, Holly Hunter, Jerry Hardin, Steven Hill, Ed Harris, Paul Calderan, Tobin Bell, Terry Kinney, Paul Sorvino

rating: ***

Tom Cruise is the best fighter pilot. Tom Cruise is the best bartender. So why not be the best lawyer (actually, one person got a higher score on the bar exam, but he probably cheated). This film, directed by Sydney Pollock and based on yet another dolphin-lawyer-swimming-in-shark-filled-water book by John Grisham, is stylistic, classy, and perfectly vapid. Cruise, straight out of Harvard (yet he had to work hard to make it through, and, like all of Cruise's characters, has a troubled past he must make up for), gets a lucritive job at a firm that not only caters to the mob, but is part of their own crime syndicate. After he and wife Jeanne Tripplehorn (in an effective performance aimed at opening night audiences) are given a new house, a new car, and a great new paycheck, Cruise, after realizing the firm's corruptness, slowly figures out a loophole to beat them at their own game. What he does to strike back is confusing and would probably take a lawyer to understand (or someone who read the book), but it doesn't matter. Fun is fun, and this movie, if taken too seriously, could be thoroughly despised. Especially if you ask certain questions: Why would the firm's lead hitman be over six feet tall with shockingly blonde hair and albino eyes (Tobin Bell) i.e. easy to remember? Or why is Cruise's character able to do acrobatic sommersaults (in perhaps one of the silliest moments in film history)? So just give in to this handsomely filmed lightweight thriller with a straight-through piano score and some great actors dumbing down for the sake of being in a Tom Cruise blockbuster. Gene Hackman, as Cruise's personal mentor... a charming, womanizing lawyer who loves the vacationing aspect of his job... David Strathaim, as Cruise's glibly laidback jailbird brother... Terry Kinney, as a seemingly innocent lawyer who initially puts Cruise at ease... And Gary Busey as a fast talking private eye help elevate things: at least for as long as they're on screen. But the show belongs to Cruise, who, as usual, delivers this pizza with tons of cheese and, unless you're expecting steak or caviar, it'll fill you up as needed.