The Road to El Dorado starts off as a lighthearted, rollicking tale of the misadventures of two con men in 16th-century Spain but ends up as just another action-adventure movie, albeit animated and with tunes by Elton John. It's entertaining enough and will divert youthful viewers, but as feature-length toons go, it lacks the psychological depth of The Lion King, the romantic sweep of Beauty and the Beast or the flat-out laughs of the Toy Story series.
The title is no accident, though the movie's target audience (and even most of their parents) will miss the reference. Beginning in 1940 with Road to Singapore and lasting through 1962, Bob Hope and Bing Crosby together made six buddy comedies, all of which found the pair heading to some exotic locale on a road paved with mishaps, lovely ladies (most often Dorothy Lamour) and breaks for a few catchy and bright musical numbers. The Road to El Dorado is a direct descendant of those pictures, retooling the formula to accommodate its animated Hope and Crosby stand-ins, the pragmatic Tulio (Kline) and impetuous Miguel (Branagh).
The movie's plot kicks into gear when these two, while throwing dice, win a map that purportedly shows the route to El Dorado, the fabled city of gold in Central America. Once the duo arrive there, the locals mistake them for gods, bow low and make offerings of gold. "An entire city of suckers," Miguel gloats. But when evil forces (a monster, a nasty native priest and a greedy Spanish conquistador) threaten El Dorado and its residents, Tulio and Miguel's mettle must overcome their lust for precious metal.
Very much like Hope and Crosby, Kline and Branagh riff off each other with an appealing breeziness, particularly in the early scenes. Although Elton John sings five of the film's six songs (all of which he cowrote with Tim Rice), the musical high point comes when Kline and Branagh trade verses on the hilariously self-mocking "It's Tough to Be a God." (PG)
Bottom Line: Worth traveling, but this Road is mostly surface
John Cusack, Iben Hjejle, Jack Black, Todd Louiso, Lisa Bonet
Featured attraction
When his live-in girlfriend checks out of his Chicago apartment, Rob Gordon (Cusack) responds by reorganizing his massive record collection, switching from an alphabetical filing system to an autobiographical one. "I want to show," he says, holding up an LP lovingly encased in a plastic protective sleeve, "how I got from Deep Purple to Howlin' Wolf."
High Fidelity, a piquant, romantic comedy directed by Stephen Frears (The Snapper) and based on British author Nick Hornby's popular 1995 novel, is a hip, knowing look at how certain young men put off growing up until they are finally too miserable to postpone it any longer. The story's sardonic, self-pitying protagonist has good reason to be blue: He's edging into his 30s, can't keep a girlfriend and is the reluctant owner of a ramshackle record shop. In the role, Cusack is enormously appealing, finding just the. right mix of dry humor and melancholic self-absorption. And Catherine Zeta-Jones, though unbilled, contributes an amusingly sexy turn as a posturing bohemian. (R)
Bottom Line: Deserves extended play
Sandrine Bonnaire, Catherine Deneuve
With the war over in 1946, a Russian doctor living in France heeds Stalin's call urging all true patriots to return and rebuild the motherland. The doctor brings along his French-born wife (Bonnaire) and their little son. They no sooner arrive than the Iron Curtain clangs down and traps them in a life of privation and suspicion. While the husband, wormier by the minute, seems to accept Party discipline, the wife plots to escape.
The French-made East-West, Oscar-nominated for best foreign film, is a strangely conflicted epic. The narrative sweep (months, then years fly by) feels very Russian. But the psychological tension—subtle, taut, unpitying—is decidedly French. Yes, the wife endures hardship, even prison. But in her scheming she more or less seduces a much younger man (Serguei Bodrov Jr.) lodged in her dilapidated tenement, winning him to her side, while she constantly undermines her husband's career—that is, endangers his life. Noble yet opportunistic, headstrong yet calculating, she is at times une petite creep.
Deneuve swoops in and out as an actress who takes up the woman's cause. Normally I'd be content to watch her slurp borscht, but she's not very good here. (PG-13)
Bottom Line: Unsatisfying tale of fools Russian in
Leelee Sobieski, Chris Klein
Shamelessly stealing from 1970's Love Story doesn't mean never having to say you're sorry. The filmmakers responsible for this turgid teenage weepie owe a major apology—I want it in writing!—to any non-adolescent moviegoer cursed to sit through it.
Just as in Love Story, a preppy boy (Klein) falls in love with a less-privileged girl (Sobieski) despite the objections of his moneybags dad. These kids share a passion for Robert Frost and awkward sexual innuendo (She: "You could be arrested." He: "Will there be handcuffs?" She: "Do you want handcuffs?"). Both harbor tragic secrets that are so blatantly foreshadowed, they would be hidden from only the most naive viewer. To their credit, the talented Klein (Election and American Pie) and Sobieski (TV's Joan of Arc) dive headlong into this goop as if it mattered, which just goes to show that they're both young (and foolish) enough to believe. (PG-13)
Bottom Line: Won't be a dry 14-year-old eye in the house
>Erin Brockovich Tremendously entertaining, and inspirational as well. Julia Roberts is at her impressive best as a lowly law-firm filing clerk who helps uncover a utility company's clandestine polluting. Based on a true story. (R)
The Filth and the Fury Were the Sex Pistols, England's notorious 1970s punk band, heirs to such cheeky music-hall performers as Benny Hill? That's the sole interesting conceit in this annoyingly glib documentary. (R)
Final Destination Teen supernatural thriller about a youth (Devon Sawa) who has a premonition that an airplane will go down. It does. So does the movie shortly thereafter. (R)
Mission to Mars Pretty thin, and we're not just talking about the air up there. Strictly for sci-fi junkies. (PG)
The Ninth Gate Johnny Depp is hot on the trail of Lucifer. Starts off well but then turns silly. Directed by Roman Polanski, who better served the Devil with Rosemary's Baby. (R)
Wonder Boys Appealingly shaggy tale of an English prof (Michael Douglas) whose life is spinning out of control. (R)
- Contributors:
- Tom Gliatto.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
