Dennis Quaid, Jake Gyllenhaal
Softball-size chunks of ice rain down on Tokyo, as if the ice dispenser on a giant refrigerator in the sky had gone haywire. Tornadoes rip up Los Angeles. A gargantuan wave engulfs Manhattan. Soon the entire northern half of the earth is imperiled by a new Ice Age, which is just what climatologist Jack Hall (Quaid) had warned could happen if global warming got out of hand.
A lame environmental thriller, The Day After Tomorrow neither improves upon nor stretches the disaster-movie formula. To generate suspense, it sends Hall on a perilous trip from Washington, D.C., to Manhattan to rescue his stranded 17-year-old son (Gyllenhaal). This gives Quaid a chance to bark out such unintentional howlers as "Unpack the snowshoes. We're walking from here." For pizzazz, Day relies on destroying beloved landmarks such as the Hollywood sign and the Empire State Building, a trick director-cowriter Roland Emmerich used before (and much more effectively) in 1996's Independence Day. The special effects here are indisputably cool, but it's all too ice and easy.(PG-13)
CHILLER THRILLER
Kate Hudson, John Corbett
This movie is like the rubber hot water bottles mothers used to apply for children's tummy aches: It's warm and a little clammy, and one keeps thinking there has to be a better way.
Raising Helen is about a glamorous single Manhattan woman (Hudson, see page 90) who slowly grows up after becoming guardian to two young nieces and a nephew after their parents are killed in a car accident. Our heroine faces many obstacles—the kids misbehave, she loses her job—but all are easily conquerable. And there's always that cute Lutheran pastor (Corbett) lurking in the background wearing a goofy, lovesick smile.
Assertively heartwarming, this gooey sugar bun from director Garry Marshall (Runaway Bride) relies heavily on the presumed adorability of its leading lady. While Hudson is indeed likable, that trait alone isn't enough to carry either her character or the movie. To be fair, she gets little help from a mediocre script that lurches from scene to scene, making the same obvious points repeatedly. In supporting roles, Corbett is blandly affable as her would-be suitor, while the usually reliable Joan Cusack, playing a bossy older sister, pushes too hard. (PG-13)
COMEDY
Baadasssss!
Shrek 2
Saved!
Hypocrisy at a Christian school is satirized in an energetic comedy. There are adept turns by Macaulay Culkin, Eva Amurri and—big surprise—Mandy Moore (see page 109) as a conniving Goody Two-Shoes. (PG-13)
The red carpet leading to Cannes's Grand Palais theater has been rolled up for another year, but the debate over the films shown there has only just begun. A few starting points:
Temperature's Rising The nine-person jury, headed by director Quentin Tarantino, sparked controversy when it awarded Cannes's top prize to Fahrenheit 9/11, Michael Moore's scathing attack on President George W. Bush and the Iraq war. Is his documentary art or agitprop? Both—and it deserves to be seen. Particularly damning is footage showing a spooked Bush seemingly waiting to be told what to do—he continues reading to schoolkids—for a full seven minutes after hearing that the second WTC tower had been attacked.
Eastern Influence Asian films dominated, displaying an impressive flowering of subjects and styles. One with commercial promise: China's sumptuous martial arts drama House of Flying Daggers.
Anything Goes Sheryl Crow, Elvis Costello and others crooning Cole Porter tunes were the highlight of De-Lovely, a flaccid look at the songwriter (played by Kevin Kline) that closed the festival.
- Contributors:
- Leah Rozen.
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!
