Reviews

I'm a huge fan of John Irving, and have been ever since I read "The World According To Garp" back in the early 1980's. I've read most of his novels, but none of them have moved me in the same way as "The Cider House Rules."

Naturally, I was a little leery about seeing one of my all-time favorite novels dramatized. The casting really caught my eye, especially Michael Caine as Wilbur Larch (I originally pictured Richard Harris in the role, for some reason), and Charlize Theron as Candy. I have a lot of respect for Ms. Theron as an actress, and she's very easy on the eyes.

It also helped that John Irving himself wrote the screenplay ... and took a LOT of time (ten years) to do so. I can understand why, too ... the story arc within the novel spans something like forty years ... more like eighty, if you figure in Dr. Larch's biography as well. To present the core of a story that massive within a two-hour block of time, without losing any major elements of the story, was quite a challenge.

Well, Mr. Irving was up to the challenge, and the movie was wonderful. The actors were convincing, the dialogue was good, the pacing of the story was very good. I was surprised at some of the changes, certain elements that had been left out, situations that the characters reacted to differently on screen than they had in the novel. What surprised me even more was that all of these things worked, and made the story work as well, if not better than, in the original story.

SPOILERS BELOW

Now, as to the "agenda" of the story: My girlfriend has referred to it as "the feel-good, pro-choice movie." I think that Mr. Irving does have a very strong opinion about abortion, and he does express it within the story, but there's a deeper message to it; that people have to make moral and ethical judgements about laws, and decide for themselves which ones are worth following and which ones are better off ignored or only followed for the sake of appearances.

Dr. Larch has decided that, since women will seek out abortions whether they are legal or not, he will perform an abortion on whoever asks, in a time when abortion was completely illegal; this is better than the potentially fatal alternatives, which are spelled out in graphic detail in the novel, and mentioned several times in the movie.

So, he's risking his medical licensure, his job, and his freedom in order to provide a service in a way that will save the lives of women who might otherwise be severely injured or die.

Regardless of your personal views of this hot-button issue, you have to respect the character of Dr. Larch for continuously risking so much to do something, just because he feels that it's the right thing to do.

I never even heard of this movie during its theatrical release, I have no idea why ... I first caught it on cable a year or so ago. When I saw the previews for it, I wasn't impressed, but the special effects looked good (natch, since this is a Zemeckis film!).

So I sat down and got sucked into a REALLY fun movie. Michael J. Fox (who I've always admired) was extremely good as a paranormal investigator and con artist, and the supporting cast was also extremely good here (stand-out: Jake Busey as a homicidal maniac).

Nope, I'm not going to drop any spoilers ... this is just a fun and suspenseful movie, well worth the price of a rental.

This was not only the first I'd heard about the whole Dorothy Stratten story (I was a young teen when this movie first came out), and it was also the first time I'd seen Jamie Lee Curtis in any movie (somehow I avoided seeing "Hallowe'en" until the late 'Eighties).

It's a biopic about Playboy centerfold Dorothy Stratten, from her life in small town ... Washington? Oregon? ... to her rise to fame as a nude model, and her turbulent relationship with her psychotic husband. They divorced, she tried to keep away from him; her husband finally killed her and committed suicide.

I seem to remember that the movie was very engaging; maybe it's just that I thought JLC was a hottie. Anyway, I thought it was really well-acted and pretty straightforward; looking back on it now, I can see that it wasn't too horribly sensationalized, an aspect of another biopic of her ("Star 80") that really turned me off.

... then this is an excellent movie. FB (in an early role) portrays a young teen in a small southwestern town, discovering herself and falling in love for the first time, and meeting her father who has been absent from her life for as long as she can remember. Having lived through a very similar experience to that, I'd have to say that the way it was written and performed was unsentimental and realistic. Ione Skye also shines as the troublesome (and troubled) older sister with the bad reputation, and FB's ongoing attempts to set up her mother (Brooke Adams) with a nice guy are touching and heartfelt. But the movie never descends into saccharine sweetness ... that's the major strength of the script, and the performances. There's very little Hollywood in this flick, but there is a lot of heart, and it's worth seeing more than once.

**** out of *****