P.S. the other two stink
Movie reviews of "Being John Malkovich," "Mission to Mars," "Hanging Up"
Being John Malkovich****
Head Games
Craig Schwartz (John Cusack) is a puppeteer who watches colleagues flourish while he flounders. His passionless marriage to the frumpy Lotte (Cameron Diaz), a pet store employee, is as dismal as their dumpy apartment. Craig takes a meaningless filing job on the seventh-and-a-half floor of an office building, where he works under the batty and secretive 105-year-old Dr. Lester (Orson Bean), his ditsy, hearing-impaired receptionist Floris (Mary Kay Place) and the sexually aggressive office worker Maxine (Catherine Keener). When a folder drops behind a filing cabinet in the Deep Storage room, Craig discovers a small doorway with a glass knob. In a scene right out of Alice in Wonderland (or, better yet, “The Twilight Zone”), he enters and finds himself inside actor John Malkovich (playing himself), reading the morning paper and munching on a piece of toast. Craig observes life through Malkovich’s eyes for 15 minutes before being dumped in a ditch on the side of the New Jersey Turnpike. The rest has to be seen to be believed!
Unrivaled as the most inventive and conceptually wild movie of 1999, there’s just no way to explain Being John Malkovich without it sounding too weird to be real. As the debut film of director Spike Jonez, Being John Malkovich garnered Academy Award nominations for Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress (Keener). The entire cast is simply terrific, particularly Cusack and Keener, but special credit must be given to John Malkovich for taking on the dicey proposition of playing himself! A superbly entertaining film, Being John Malkovich is a head-trip you’ll enjoy taking.
Mission to Mars*
Mission Implausible
In the year 2020, the first manned rocket to Mars meets with mysterious disaster. A rescue mission is launched to investigate and bring back survivors. Jim McConnell (Gary Sinise), is a former astronaut who couldn’t make the grade, and whom is given a second chance when he is appointed leader of the effort. Fellow astronaut Luke Graham (Don Cheadle) is languishing in his wait to be saved. A special team of Luke’s rocket-scientist friends (Tim Robbins, Jerry O’Connell and Connie Nielsen) joins the recovery mission, which witnesses an amazing discovery upon reaching the Red Planet.
Director Brian De Palma has misfired across the board, as Mission to Mars is clearly flawed. Better known for copying the films of master director Alfred Hitchcock, this time De Palma seems to have drawn on the work of the late Stanley Kubrick. The characters are barely one dimensional, the script is abysmal and the soundtrack by Enrico Morricone is baffling. Not even the talents and screen appeal of Sinise and Robbins can rescue this zero-gravity melodrama from a painful death at the box office. The film’s pace is too slow for moviegoers seeking the thrill of the more recent Armageddon and the plot is too simplistic for those who crave the philosophical enigma of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Science fiction aficionados may enjoy the special effects for about five minutes, but the film’s lack of originality will sink in sooner than later. Houston, we have a problem. Mission to Mars should have been scrubbed.
Hanging Up*
Disconnection
Hanging Up is the story of life, death and the telephone conversations in between. The film centers on three sisters and their elderly father (Walter Matthau), who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease. The oldest daughter, 50-something Georgia (Diane Keaton), is the publisher of a best-selling magazine. Middle daughter Eve (Meg Ryan) is a perky wife and mother, who runs a party planning business while caring for her ailing father. The youngest, Maddie (Lisa Kudrow), is an up-and-coming soap opera actress. Mom (Cloris Leachman) hasn’t been around for a long time, having walked out on her family 20 years ago, and, by all accounts, hasn’t been seen much since. The sisters rarely meet in person, choosing instead to spend a copious amount of time talking to each other on cell phones, often rushing through conversations and hanging up so they can make another call. When their father’s health begins to fail, the sisters are forced to find a way to go on without him.
After seeing the previews of this movie, you might believe that Hanging Up is a comedy similar to The First Wives Club, but don’t believe it. It’s a drama, and a bad one at that. Disjointed and annoying, as much a result of Keaton’s poor direction as the ill-conceived screenplay (by sisters Nora and Delia Ephron, from the latter’s novel), this film is a waste of time and talent. Sorry, wrong number.
