The biggest hit of 1990, Ghost is part comedy, part romance, part supernatural thriller. Patrick Swayze, previously best known for Dirty Dancing, stars as Sam, the banker who is killed following a mugging. Caught in a limbo between here and the afterlife, he uses Whoopi Goldberg's fake psychic as an intermediary to warn wife Molly (Demi Moore) that his death was no accident but a murder and that she is in danger too. Ghost's original popularity and notoriety originally arose not from its dealings with the supernatural but the scene involving Moore fondly astride her potter's wheel fashioning a somewhat phallic-shaped vase, with Swayze fondly astride her. So infamous did this scene become that it's now more likely to raise a chuckle than a sultry sigh. As for the rest of the movie, it still somehow manages to engage despite the awkward juxtaposition of lachrymose melodrama and zaniness. Demi Moore, whose massive Hollywood success was always a mystery to some, is a little flat as the tomboy-coiffed Molly, her tears occasionally seeming onion-induced. Swayze, however, delivers as Sam while Whoopi Goldberg turns in the best performance of her career, delivering the requisite zip and sass to what otherwise might have been a morose movie. On the DVD: Though well restored, DVD enhancement has only served to emphasise the slightly quaint feel of the special effects here--Ghost was made just prior to the digital era. Otherwise, this is a good package and an essential purchase for fans. There's a 22-minute featurette, "Remembering the Magic", in which scriptwriter Bruce Joel Rubin explains that the film was inspired by the scene in Hamlet in which the Prince meets his Father, and how initially appalled he was that his masterpiece of the supernatural was to be directed by Jerry Zucker, previously responsible for Airplane!. They also reveal that Tina Turner was originally cast for the Goldberg role. Zucker and Rubin team up for a funny commentary track. --David Stubbs
Director Garry Marshall's 1988 drama Beaches about the 30-year friendship between two women, one wealthy (Barbara Hershey) and the other (Bette Midler) seeking her fortune in show business, is well written (based on the novel by Iris Rainer Dart) and nicely textured in its contrast between the characters' separate destinies. When Hershey becomes ill with cancer, the film takes a predictably sentimental course, yet Marshall brings out the best in both actresses and catches some very fine drama. Beaches is a little too long, perhaps, but overall it is a fine experience. --Tom Keogh
He says sex she says romance. He says relationship she says marriage. He says he won't but she hopes he will: lucky they both agree they've fallen in love! Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth Perkins are competing journalists who find love and success as battling co-hosts of their own talk show. But the friction that makes the show a hit threatens to cancel the romance as the lovers discover each has a completely different concept of commitment. This breezy comedy-of-the-sexes looks at
Starring Dick Van Dyke as Rob Petrie Mary Tyler Moore as Laura Petrie Morey Amsterdam as Buddy Sorrell and Rose Marie as Sally Rogers. Rob Buddy and Sally are TV writers for the Alan Brady TV show with Laura as the domestic wife waiting for Rob to come home. This is their story... Never Name A Duck: Rob brings home two ducks that his son instantly falls for and when one of them dies it's as if they lost a family member. The Bank Book: Rob is taken aback when he disc
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