Disney loved to mix live action with animation (Mary Poppins, Bedknobs and Broomsticks), but this 1977 effort falls on its face. The turn-of-the-century story concerns an orphaned boy whose only friend is a cartoon monster. While the latter is entertainingly rendered, the rest of the film strains to be enchanting and the cast overreaches in a big way. Not for anybody over the age of ten. --Tom Keogh
A triple bill from actor/writer/director Christopher Guest: Waiting For Guffman (1996): The sometimes dry sometimes bubbling satire of Middle America which chronicles Corky Corkoran's efforts to put on a spectacle commemorating the town of Blain's 150th anniversary. A mockumentary style film Corky drafts an odd assortment of local talent to bring his historical revue to life including the local dentist and a travel agent couple. The film spoofs the 'artistic' pretensions of
Starla Grady (Jane McGregor) an ultra girlie Texan babe is the most popular girl at Splendona High School. That is until French foreign-exchange student Genevieve LePlouff (Piper Perabo) comes to stay with Starla's family. When Genevieve first arrives she is a beret and glasses wearing plane Jane who seems to be in awe of Starla's amazing life and joins Starla's friends in praising her talent and beauty. However when Genevieve's story of misfortune and lost love is featured in
When Chad gets a chemistry set for his birthday he doesn't realize that a pair of bumbling thieves have hidden a secret formula inside the box. When his dog drinks the strange liquid he amazingly turns invisible. For Chad and his dog this is a lot of fun but the thieves want the formula back and with his parents away Chad is home alone when the thieves break in and he must defend his home any way he can. The Invisible Dog is a fast moving funny and exciting movie for all the family.
Thomas Jane stars as Beat writer and Jack Kerouac-crony Neal Cassady in The Last Time I Committed Suicide, a promising film that quickly flops. Based on a letter Cassady wrote to Kerouac, this highly stylised feature from director Stephen Kay pretty much follows the former around as he does not much of anything at all. Keanu Reeves is incomprehensible as a friend of Cassady, and Kay's jazzy, angular, colliding style does nothing to illuminate the Beat icon's all-important internal life. If you're new to the whole Kerouac-Cassady-Beat world, this is not a good first stop; slightly better is John Byrum's 1980 Heart Beat, which at least introduces some of the principal figures. --Tom Keogh
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