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Fifteen-year-old William Miller, the hero of this terrific comedy drama, is a journalistic prodigy. At an age when most kids are still learning to write a topic sentence, he is on the road reporting on a rock band for Rolling Stone. Which is what really happened back in 1973 to writer-director Cameron Crowe (Jerry Maguire), who has turned (and slightly fictionalized) his own story about coming of age at the end of the Age of Aquarius into the best, most appealing movie of his already noteworthy career (his output includes Say Anything...and Singles).
What makes Almost Famous so engaging and ultimately rewarding is that it isn't merely the tale of a boy reporter getting the story behind the music. The film is really about William (Fugit, a talented newcomer with a keen, wide-open gaze) coming to terms with the complexities and contradictions of the people around him. This group includes his loving mother (McDormand), a widowed college professor who frets about her son's safety in rock's drug-filled world; Russell Hammond (Crudup), the band's charismatic lead guitarist; Penny Lane (Hudson, who's Goldie Hawn's daughter), a 16-year-old groupie who is sleeping with Russell; and Lester Bangs (Hoffman), a real-life rock scribe (Bangs died in 1982) who becomes William's mentor, just as he was Crowe's. Bangs cautions William against becoming too friendly with his subjects because a true journalist must always be "honest and unmerciful" in his writing.
In dramatizing his past, Crowe heeds the call for honesty but shows mercy and much humor. He likes his characters, even when they are being selfish, self-destructive or deceitful and, in the end, so do we. It is Crowe's compassion, as well as the superb performances he has elicited from McDormand, Crudup and Hudson–who signals with her radiant turn here that she's ready for major stardom–that makes this trip back to the '70s such an enjoyable ride. (R) Bottom Line: Almost perfect
Ryan Phillippe", Benicio Del Toro, Juliette Lewis, Taye Diggs, James Caan
Parker (Phillippe) and Longbaugh (Del Toro), career thugs, think they've found a big score when they hear about a surrogate mother (Lewis) who's agreed to have a baby for a rich couple. They promptly kidnap her and demand a $15 million ransom–only to learn the husband has Mob connections.
If the names Parker and Longbaugh sound vaguely familiar, it's because they're the last names of outlaws Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. But director-writer Christopher McQuarrie (who wrote The Usual Suspects) has ensured that no one will ever confuse Gun, a talky, twisty and trigger-happy crime drama in which everyone has an ulterior motive, with the lighthearted 1969 romp starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford. He fairly pistol-whips viewers into understanding that real violent criminals, as opposed to sympathetic movie felons, are irredeemably nasty guys who do vile things for no good reason other than to enrich themselves and be ornery. If Gun, McQuarrie's first effort as a director, seems more an exercise in style (How rotten can you make your leads? What's the best way to frame a gunfight?), it is still showy and smart enough to mark him as a filmmaker with a future. (R) Bottom Line: Mostly on target
Christopher Lambert, Adrian Paul
The heroes of the Highlander movies may be immortal, but let's hope they won't be swinging their swords into perpetuity. Endgame, the inane third sequel to 1986's Highlander, again improbably stars that most stolid of Frenchmen, Lambert, as Connor MacLeod, a Scotsman who has been fighting off foes who would behead him (the only way to kill an immortal) since the 1500s. Here, he is joined in contemporary Manhattan by a clansman, Duncan (Paul, star of TV's Highlander series), also immortal but a century younger, Handsome Paul, whose roguish charm makes him a contender for 007 should Pierce Brosnan ever weary of shaken martinis, adds pep to the foundering cycle but can't save it. Though the sword fights are inventively staged, Endgame's plot–Connor confronts an old enemy and Duncan finds an ex-flame–is a confusing mess. (R) Bottom Line: Scots on the rocks
Pras, Ja Rule, Vondie Curtis Hall
In an interview, Pras, a founding member of the Fugees who plays the sullen hero of this feeble gangsta drama, has wishfully compared his first major movie to Prince's Purple Rain (1984). Both films are about ambitious, talented musicians who have troubled relationships with their fathers. But Pras's character, a would-be rapper named Diamond, moonlights as muscle for a drug dealer and, during the course of Turn It Up, cavalierly shoots dead a half-dozen rival hoods. Not only does crime pay for Diamond, but he never pays for his crimes.
While I'm not arguing that every film must have a moral and show justice being served, it would make sense that Diamond might be grilled by a cop about at least one of these killings. But that would add a dose of reality to a film that has Diamond sauntering about in a silky designer jacket, driving a hulking SUV and living solo in a vast, expensively furnished New York City loft apartment at the very same time that he is supposedly too strapped for cash to make the demo tape that might kickstart his recording career. (R) Bottom Line: Deserves a bad rap
Backstage Documentary about a concert tour with rappers DMX and Jay-Z–both of whom come across as hardworking, dedicated artists–shows many of their fellow rappers smoking weed and groping groupies. (R)
Bring It On Teen satire with Kirsten Dunst views race relations through the prism of cheerleading. Like, really. Give mean F, a U and an N.(PG-13)
The Cell Throw away the key. Jennifer Lopez stars as a psychologist who enters the mind of a killer. Vivid visuals can't mask weak story and characters. (R)
Nurse Betty Expect the unexpected in this engagingly offbeat tale of a waitress (Renée Zellweger, in her best performance yet) who, after inadvertently witnessing a murder, gets amnesia and becomes convinced that she's a character on her favorite soap opera. (R)
The Original Kings of Comedy Laughter reigns as stand-up comics Steve Harvey, D.L. Hughley, Cedric the Entertainer and Bernie Mac let loose. (R)
The Replacements Formulaic football comedy stars Keanu Reeves, who's easy on the eyes. (PG-13)
Saving Grace Mellow British comedy about a widow (Brenda Blethyn) who grows marijuana to pay off her debts. (R)
Space Cowboys Clint Eastwood's a blast as an old astronaut. (PG-13)
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!
