Movie Review: Postcards From The Edge (1990)

Genre: Dramedy  

Director: Mike Nichols  

Starring: Meryl Streep, Shirley MacLaine, Gene Hackman, Dennis Quaid, Richard Dreyfuss  

Running Time: 101 minutes  

Synopsis: Movie actress Suzanne Vale (Meryl Streep) is abusing drugs, and is eventually checked into rehab by her mother, Hollywood legend Doris Mann (Shirley MacLaine). After recovering, Suzanne moves in with her mother as an insurance requirement as she tries to rebuild her career with an unbecoming role in a low-budget film. She has to deal with her mother's alcoholic narcissism and a deceptive suitor (Dennis Quaid), but finds support from a caring director (Gene Hackman) and an emergency room surgeon (Richard Dreyfuss).

What Works Well: This adaptation of Carrie Fisher's semi-autobiographical book features two reliably excellent performances from Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine. The focus is on stardom-induced self-absorption translating into unintentional pressure passed down from mother to daughter, amplifying dysfunction in both generations. While the dramatic moments are genuine, director Mike Nichols also has fun portraying quirky on-set dynamics as Suzanne navigates the idiosyncrasies of directors and producers.

What Does Not Work As Well: A nonchalant attitude results in frivolous treatment of important topics, including addiction, parenting, workplace toxicity, and exploitive men. The absence of meaningful secondary characters and glorified cameos from Gene Hackman and Richard Dreyfus add to an overall sense of dismissiveness. Some bizarre narrative choices result in three songs being performed in full, betraying a lack of conviction in the core strength of the material.

Key Quote:

Doris: I was such an awful mother... what if you had a mother like Joan Crawford or Lana Turner?

Suzanne: These are the options? You, Joan, or Lana?

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Movie Review: The Long Riders (1980)

Genre: Western  

Director: Walter Hill  

Starring: James Keach, Stacy Keach, David Carradine, Keith Carradine, Robert Carradine, Randy Quaid, Dennis Quaid, Pamela Reed  

Running Time: 99 minutes  

Synopsis: After the Civil War, the James-Younger gang is fueled by Confederate resentment and embarks on a crime spree in Missouri, holding up banks and trains. Jesse and Frank James (James and Stacy Keach) lead the gang, with support from Cole, Jim, and Bob Younger (David, Keith, and Robert Carradine). Clell Miller (Randy Quaid) stays with the gang even after his brother Ed (Dennis Quaid) is kicked out. In-between heists the men seek domesticity and the company of women, including Cole seeking comfort with prostitute Belle Starr (Pamela Reed). But as their list of victims grows, Pinkerton detectives descend onto the area to stop the gang's activities by any means.

What Works Well: Based on actual events, this is a stylish, lyrical, and violent chronicle of the famous outlaw gang. Actual Hollywood brothers portray the Jameses, Youngers, Millers, and Fords (Christopher and Nicholas Guest), with Stacy Keach as Frank James and David Carradine as Cole Younger emerging as the most grounded and charismatic characters. In the quieter scenes the script excels at filling-in the men's personalities, allowing human emotions to surface but never resorting to heroic portrayals. With the botched Northfield, Minnesota bank raid a stunning highlight, director Walter Hill and cinematographer Ric Waite deliver exceptionally gripping action scenes infused with stuntwork, slow motion, and no shortage of blood. 

What Does Not Work As Well: The production quality deserved a longer running time to more fully define the era and round-out more characters.

Key Quote:

Cole Younger: When this is all over, I'm goin' to write a book; make myself more famous than I already am.

Frank James: I trust you'll give me a copy.

Cole Younger: Nope. You gotta pay, Frank; you gotta pay.

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Movie Review: Midway (2019)

Genre: Historical War Action  

Director: Roland Emmerich  

Starring: Ed Skrein, Luke Evans, Dennis Quaid, Aaron Eckhart, Woody Harrelson, Patrick Wilson  

Running Time: 138 minutes  

Synopsis: Japan attacks Pearl Harbor in December 1941, but fails to destroy American aircraft carriers. The United States enters the war and Japan's Admiral Yamamoto starts planning an attack on Midway Island to achieve dominance over the Pacific. The US intelligence team headed by Lieutenant Commander Edwin Layton (Patrick Wilson) intercepts enemy communications and starts to piece together the Japanese attack plan, allowing Admiral Nimitz (Woody Harrelson) to mobilize a defence. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle (Aaron Eckhart) leads an air raid on Tokyo to unsettle the enemy, while Vice Admiral William "Bull" Halsey (Dennis Quaid) and ace Navy pilots Dick Best (Ed Skrein) and Wade McClusky (Luke Evans) are involved in the escalating war in the Pacific. 

What Works Well: This is an unapologetically old-fashioned World War 2 action movie, faithful to historical fact and dedicated to celebrating heroism, sacrifice, and determination under fire. Despite an ambitious scope covering several major battles and culminating at Midway, writer Wes Tooke admirably maintains cohesion in melding strategic Yamamoto and Nimitz-level maneuverings with the front-line exploits of Best and McClusky, among many others, effectively capturing the critical strategic decisions and in-the-heat of the moment actions upon which history turned. Director Roland Emmerich delivers several stirring naval combat scenes, and maintains focus on individual sub-stories within the chaos of attack, defense, and counter-attack at sea. 

What Does Not Work As Well: The CGI effects are impressive but predictably over-done, and the out-of-uniform lives of the characters are essentially non-existent. The cast members do their job with minimum fuss, but quantity defeats quality and none are provided the opportunity to rise above basic representations.

Key Quote:

Edwin Layton (to Nimitz, in reference to Pearl Harbor): Sir, I'm the intelligence officer responsible for overseeing the greatest intelligence failure in American history.

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Movie Review: Reagan (2024)

Genre: Biography  

Director: Sean McNamara  

Starring: Dennis Quaid, Penelope Ann Miller, Jon Voight, Mena Suvari  

Running Time: 141 minutes  

Synopsis: A veteran Soviet KGB agent (Jon Voight) recounts his long history tracking the career of Ronald Reagan (Dennis Quaid). He was first noticed by the Soviets in the 1940s when his Hollywood acting career faded but he ascended to the presidency of the actors' union and pushed back against communist sentiments. Upon retiring from acting he turned his attention to politics, studiously learning about the Soviet threat and running for Governor of California with the support of his wife Nancy (Penelope Ann Miller). By the 1970s the White House beckoned, with Reagan focused on winning the Cold War.

What Works Well: Enough incidents are packed into the life of one man to maintain basic engagement.

What Does Not Work As Well: Despite huffing and puffing for 141 minutes, this inept hagiography reduces Reagan's life to quips and soundbites signifying nothing. The script deftly avoids any meaningful probing of the man's skills, dilemmas, coalition building talents, political acumen, and shortcomings. Instead, recreations of newsreel highlights and photographs are soullessly stitched together, with plastic mimicry mistaken for acting and cringe-inducing dialogue crowding out substance. Reagan is simplified into a caricature image (communists bad, nuclear weapons bad), with his most famous words written by others, and the KGB perspective is wasted on adversarial reverential worship.

Key Quote:

Reagan (to Soviet leader Gorbachev): As I see it, we don't mistrust each other because we're armed. We're armed because we mistrust each other.

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Movie Review: Truth (2015)

Genre: Biographical Political Drama  

Director: James Vanderbilt  

Starring: Cate Blanchett, Robert Redford, Dennis Quaid, Stacy Keach, Bruce Greenwood, Topher Grace, Elisabeth Moss, Dermot Mulroney  

Running Time: 125 minutes  

Synopsis: Ahead of the 2004 US presidential election, 60 Minutes television show producer Mary Mapes (Cate Blanchett) investigates President Bush's National Guard service record during the Vietnam War era. She works with anchor Dan Rather (Robert Redford) and a team consisting of Mike Smith (Topher Grace), Colonel Roger Charles (Dennis Quaid), and Lucy Scott (Elisabeth Moss). Retired and ailing National Guard member Bill Burkett (Stacy Keach) produces copies of documents that tarnish Bush's record. But after the story airs, doubts are raised about the documents' authenticity, placing Mary's team under intense scrutiny.

What Works Well: The adaptation of Mary Mapes's book unfolds in two distinct chapters: the first half is the lead-up to the broadcast of the 60 Minutes episode about Bush's military service record. The much better second half is the aftermath, as the team of CBS journalists and their managers deal with immediate blowback. Once doubts are cast upon the critical documents, the investigative team switches from offense to defence, and the forces aligned against them prove formidable. Cate Blanchett's powerhouse performance contains space for the murky conflict between personal beliefs and journalistic integrity, while Robert Redford's sage presence invites reflection on the rise and fall of corporate television news. 

What Does Not Work As Well: The opening 45 minutes are occupied with a deadline-driven rush to investigate the President's record, and become cluttered with too many names of too many incidental characters, the search for details getting in the way of good story telling. And while the reporters are scurrying about in a frenzy, no one pauses to ponder the relative insignificance of a story about skipping obscure National Guard duties 30 years prior.

Conclusion: And dare.



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Movie Review: Soul Surfer (2011)

Genre: Biographical Drama  

Director: Sean McNamara  

Starring: AnnaSophia Robb, Dennis Quaid, Helen Hunt, Carrie Underwood  

Running Time: 106 minutes  

Synopsis: In Hawaii, Bethany Hamilton (AnnaSophia Robb) was born with a love for competitive surfing. She is home educated by her loving parents Cheri and Thomas (Helen Hunt and Dennis Quaid), and enjoys a life-long friendship with fellow-surfer Alana (Lorraine Nicholson). In 2003, 13 year-old Bethany is winning amateur competitions and about to turn pro when she loses an arm in a shark attack. Despite the setback, she is determined to resume competitive surfing.

What Works Well: Based on actual events, Bethany Hamilton's story is wholesome, inspirational, and capable of scaling emotional peaks. Director Sean McNamara gives the faith-based elements due prominence, with Carrie Underwood appearing as a church youth leader, but most of the focus in on a young woman dealing with a most unexpected personal trauma. The harrowing shark attack and its immediate aftermath are handled with shocking elegance, before the drama shifts towards emotional recovery and reset. Passable special effects are used to obscure AnnaSophia Robb's post-attack arm, while gorgeous cinematography enlivens the frequent surfing scenes.

What Does Not Work As Well: An army of writers contributed to the script, resulting in predictably cringey tonal choppiness. While AnnaSophia Robb grows into the role, the adult acting oscillates between competent and one-take expediency.

Conclusion: Rides the waves with humble swagger.



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Movie Review: American Underdog (2021)

Genre: Biographical Sports Drama

Directors: Andrew Erwin and Jon Erwin 

Starring: Zachary Levi, Anna Paquin, Dennis Quaid, Bruce McGill

Running Time: 112 minutes

Synopsis: In the early 1990s, Kurt Warner (Zachary Levi) is a back-up quarterback at the University of Northern Iowa, struggling for gametime. With his dream of being an NFL draft pick fading, he meets and falls in love with Brenda (Anna Paquin), a divorcee with two kids. After he fails a tryout with the Green Bay Packers, Kurt and Brenda struggle with poverty, and he accepts a job stocking supermarket shelves. A chance to star in the fledgling Arena Football League revitalizes Kurt's career, and he is offered an opportunity with the St. Louis Rams under legendary coach Dick Vermeil (Dennis Quaid).

What Works Well: Based on actual events, this is an inspirational and polished late bloomer drama. By focusing on Warner's professional wilderness years between leaving college and finally getting his NFL shot, directors Andrew and Jon Erwin deliver a human-based story about keeping the faith. Themes of overcoming adversity, finding love, and learning to value what really matters find heart through Warner's warm bond with Brenda's legally blind young son. The on-the-field scenes arrive at the right time and in the right doses, and carry the requisite bone-crunching authenticity.

What Does Not Work As Well: Despite a stoic performance, Zachary Levi at age 40 is too old to represent Warner starting from his early twenties. Both Kurt and Brenda are portrayed as near-perfect, which may very well be true, but nudges the movie towards a hagiography.  

Conclusion: A heart-warming, feel-good touchdown.



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Movie Review: On A Wing And A Prayer (2023)

Genre: Drama

Director: Sean McNamara

Starring: Dennis Quaid, Heather Graham

Running Time: 102 minutes

Synopsis: Successful and benevolent Louisiana businessman Doug White (Dennis Quaid) is happily married to Terri (Heather Graham) and father to daughters Bailey and Maggie. When his Florida-based brother becomes the latest family member to succumb to a heart attack, Doug starts to question his faith. The family charters a flight home from the funeral, but tragedy strikes when the pilot suffers a heart attack. Doug barely has any flight experience, but now has to pilot and land the plane, assisted by Terri and various flight control officials.

What Works Well: Director Sean McNamara generates occasionally decent tension based on actual events, as a likeable family confronts a crisis with grim prospects, culminating in a competent crash-or-land climax.

What Does Not Work As Well: This faith-based drama suffers from a rudimentary script and one of Dennis Quaid's most painfully superficial performances. The second half offers a hodge-podge of uncoordinated and seemingly incompetent on-the-ground response, in-flight fumbling, and bizarre time spent with a couple of kids who monitor the crisis but are otherwise irrelevant.

Conclusion: The small plane has insufficient cargo space for competent storytelling.



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Movie Review: The Intruder (2019)

Genre: Suspense Thriller

Director: Deon Taylor

Starring: Michael Ealy, Meagan Good, Dennis Quaid

Running Time: 102 minutes

Synopsis: Successful San Francisco-based marketing executive Scott Howard (Michael Ealy) and his wife Annie (Meagan Good) decide to move to the countryside. They buy a traditional Napa Valley house from long-time owner Charlie Peck (Dennis Quaid), a widower who claims to be relocating to Florida. But after Scott and Annie move in, Charlie repeatedly shows up uninvited, seemingly unable to break his attachment to the house. His intrusions evolve from inconvenient to something more sinister.

What Works Well: Dennis Quaid has fun with an unabashed performance full of unhinged intent hiding underneath a sympathetic facade. The societal metaphors induced by a psychotic older white man in a red cap refusing to accept change are available for debate.

What Does Not Work As Well: Both the Howards (trust issues) and Peck (business troubles) have backstories, but these are handled with cursory contempt. Director Dean Taylor fails to add any moments of flourish or authentic suspense, and the plot is otherwise linear, repetitive, witless, and dependent on a steady stream of bad judgment.

Conclusion: Unwelcome and unoriginal.



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Movie Review: The Day After Tomorrow (2004)

A disaster epic, The Day After Tomorrow shortchanges character depth but compensates with genuinely spectacular special effects.

Paleoclimatologist Jack Hall (Dennis Quaid) and his team uncover evidence in Antarctica supporting the theory that climate change could trigger an ice age by disrupting North Atlantic currents. At a subsequent conference, his warnings are unheeded by Vice President Becker (Kenneth Walsh), but Scottish oceanographer Terry Rapson (Ian Holm) is intrigued and starts to share data with Hall. Soon thereafter ocean temperatures start plummeting, and extreme weather events strike without warning, including a hailstorm in Tokyo and multiple tornadoes in Los Angeles. 

Three massive storms then form over the northern hemisphere. Hall's son Sam (Jake Gyllenhaal) and his college friends including classmate Laura (Emmy Rossum) are in New York when the city is submerged by a massive tsunami. They take refuge in the public library and have to keep warm as temperatures plummet to extreme freezing levels. Jack has to provide advice to the President by developing new climate models, while also planning a rescue for Sam.

A throwback to the large-scale disaster movies of the 1970s, The Day After Tomorrow deploys the latest CGI technology with impressive results. Director and co-writer Roland Emmerich crafts an often stunning vision of nature flipping upon itself and establishing a new normal in short order, the northern hemisphere plunging into a new ice age within days. The science is dubious and the speed of transition questionable, but the magnificence of the screen spectacle is not in doubt.

Emmerich and the army of computer wizards enjoy destroying both Los Angeles and New York in separate catastrophes. Numerous mammoth tornadoes leave Los Angeles in ruins, before the film's coup de grâce: a humongous tsunami crashes into Manhattan, the visuals creating a terrifying wall of water forcefully invading the great metropolis. The hailstorm in Tokyo, a triple helicopter crash, and the quick-freeze visuals add a never-a-moment-to-rest gloss.

Amidst the high quality artistry, the humans are understandably short-changed, and the plot points are often groan-inducing. A sick kid in the care of Hall's wife (Sela Ward) is the most nauseating attempt at smarmy manipulation, but another unnecessary interlude involves an inconvenient infection necessitating a medication search interrupted by wolves-on-the-loose. The father-son tension between Jack and Sam is haphazard, and Jack's entire icewalking trek from Washington DC to New York City is just loony. Other than taking potshots at inept politicians, the government response subplot is elemental, leading to a tepid denouement.

The performances are generally as plastic as the characters, although Jake Gyllenhaal does make an impact as a young man starting to find his voice. Regardless, The Day After Tomorrow does not need good acting nor perceptive character motivations to impress: this is a joyride vision of global disaster, masterfully rendered.



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Movie Review: Traffic (2000)

A multi-story crime epic, Traffic is an unblinking look at the illegal drug business on both sides of the US-Mexico border. Law enforcement officials, traffickers, addicts, and their families intermingle in overlapping hard-hitting narratives.

In the US, Judge Robert Wakefield (Michael Douglas) of Ohio is appointed as the President's new drug czar, leading the government's "war on drugs". Wakefield is unaware his high achieving 16-year-old daughter Caroline (Erika Christensen) and her friends are dabbling in hard drugs. When Caroline's addiction becomes obvious, Robert's work and private lives collide and his relationship with wife Barbara (Amy Irving) is strained.

In Mexico, Tijuana police officer Javier Rodriguez (Benicio del Toro) and his partner Manolo Sanchez (Jacob Vargas) are in the middle of a turf war between two drug cartels. Javier is recruited by the powerful General Salazar (Tomas Milian) to help federal anti-drug efforts. On Salazar's instructions, Rodriguez arrests cartel assassin Flores (Clifton Collins, Jr.) who is then tortured for information. Wakefield seeks allies in Mexico and identifies Salazar as a potential force for good.

In San Diego, police officers Montel (Don Cheadle) and Castro (Luis Guzmán) arrest businessman Eduardo Ruiz (Miguel Ferrer), who uses storefronts as cover for a drug distribution network. In return for leniency Ruiz identifies the wealthy Carlos Ayala (Stephen Bauer) as the powerful representative for one of the Tijuana cartels. Ayala is promptly arrested, stunning his pregnant wife Helena (Catherine Zeta-Jones) who is living the high-society life oblivious to her husband's real business. Montel and Castro have to keep Ruiz alive long enough to testify, while Helena gets only slimy support from Ayala's lawyer Arnie (Dennis Quaid) and turns to the assassin Flores for more potent help.

Featuring an ensemble cast, brisk pacing and enough content to easily justify the 147 minutes of running time, Traffic delves into the high-profit, high-risk, high-damage drugs business from multiple perspectives. Written by Stephen Gaghan and directed by Steven Soderbergh, the core message promotes pragmatism about the depth of the problem and the inefficacy of simplistic solutions. The loosely connected stories shine the light on unlimited supply, insatiable demand and unimaginable profits fuelling a business larger than most governments. Not surprisingly, slogans, blunt initiatives and even good intentions fold under the pressure of corruption, addiction and violence.

Traffic is about an underworld filled with ruthless behaviour, but avoids any traditional action scenes. Gaghan and Soderbergh maintain focus on individuals, personalizing the dilemmas and boiling down a gargantuan industry to a human scale. From Ayala's smug confidence that he is untouchable, to young Caroline throwing away her future in search of the next hit, passing through Rodriguez realizing everything right is wrong, the futility of declaring war on a health crisis made worse by bad laws is laid bare.

As the drama jumps between various stories, Soderbergh (also the cinematographer) uses colour to signal locales. The scenes in Mexico start with an overexposed palette of reds and yellows, while Wakefield's journey of learning about his daughter is bathed in deep blues. Helena's scenes resemble a glossy magazine representing unearned wealth and privilege.

Some narrative weaknesses creep in at the edges. Judge Wakefield becomes an unlikely private investigator, taking to the scuzzy parts of town and barging through doors to try and save his daughter. Helena's transformation from clueless wife to shrewd operator is also remarkably swift.

But with the stellar cast in top form, Soderbergh navigates towards faint optimism within individual moments of hope. One victim is at least temporarily saved and some kids get to play a ball game. In a massive sea of despair, small victories have to matter.

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Movie Review: Suspect (1987)

A second-rate courtroom drama, Suspect suffers from far-fetched character behaviour, stilted dialogue and uninspired performances.

In Washington DC, respected senior judge Justice Lowell (Thomas Barbour) shockingly takes his own life. Soon after, Justice Department clerk Elizabeth Quinn (Katie O'Hare) is found murdered. The main suspect in the Quinn case is homeless hobo Carl Wayne Anderson (Liam Neeson), a Vietnam War veteran rendered deaf and dumb by post-war afflictions.

Overworked public defendant Kathleen Riley (Cher) is assigned to defend Carl, with Judge Helms (John Mahoney) presiding at the trial and Charlie Stella (Joe Mantegna) prosecuting. Enterprising milk industry lobbyist Eddie Sanger (Dennis Quaid) is on the jury and starts discretely helping Kathleen by uncovering evidence that could prove Carl's innocence. Kathleen and Eddie also start to get attracted to each other, threatening the integrity of the trial.

While the talent on both sides of the camera suggests a quality production, Suspect never convinces. Writer Eric Roth scrounges for obscure ideas and arrives at a slick lobbyist deciding, for never explained reasons but maybe having something to do with irritation at being unable to avoid jury duty, to play amateur detective, contaminating the trial not just by colluding with the public defendant but also pursuing her romantically.

Elsewhere the accused Carl Anderson as a deaf and dumb victim of an uncaring society is an interesting angle, but director Peter Yates is never quite able to navigate to a place where the disabilities are just a plot enhancement and not a cinematic hindrance. Liam Neeson, by not saying a word, elevates himself above most of the rest of the material. 

As for the larger conspiracy surrounding Elizabeth Quinn's death, Riley and Sanger eventually uncover corruption from years past involving powerful people, although not powerful enough to remove incriminating evidence from a filing cabinet drawer accessible to any lowly clerk.

The courtroom verbal sparring borders on bland, both Cher and a disinterested Joe Mantegna defaulting to conviction-free blank line readings and fake over-emoting. A couple of badly executed and tension-free action scenes are thrown in, including Cher running around in an empty building with an assailant in pursuit for what seems like an eternity. The very next day she is back in the courtroom, but really, with a rushed and raucous ending flattening all remaining plot credibility, she need not have bothered.



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Movie Review: Far From Heaven (2002)

A drama about turmoil beneath the veneer of suburban normalcy, Far From Heaven is too busy with theatrical stylistic overtures to register the necessary emotional tones.

The setting is Hartford, Connecticut in the late 1950s. Cathy and Frank Whitaker (Julianne Moore and Dennis Quaid) are superficially the ideal and successful married couple with two young children. She is a full-time homemaker, while he is a hardworking executive with an electronics firm. Cathy has a circle of close friends, including Eleanor (Patricia Clarkson).

The veneer of perfection cracks when Cathy catches Frank with a male lover. He starts therapy sessions to try and treat his homosexuality, and their relationship suffers. She embarks on a friendship with her Black gardener Raymond Deagan (Dennis Haysbert), a well-educated small business owner and the widowed father of a young daughter. But suburban Hartford is not ready for interracial friendship, and Cathy is soon the subject of vicious community gossip.

Despite poking at important social topics and enjoying a shiny aesthetic, Far From Heaven is burdened with an off-putting self-aware artificiality. Director and writer Todd Haynes is less interested in recreating the actual 1950s but rather presents a nostalgia-tinted view filtered through the flicker of dramatic movies from the era. The result lands somewhere between mocking and mimicking the cinematic creations of the Eisenhower years, Far From Heaven carrying stiff and unrealistic dialogue, exaggerated acting, indulgently coordinated women's outfits, and over-zealously saturated colours.

The phony facade overwhelms the attempts at viable social commentary. Haynes takes aim at two obvious targets in the form of painfully outdated attitudes towards homosexuality and racism lurking beneath liberal pretense. The themes compete for screen time and neither gains meaningful traction. Frank's sexuality fades in and out of the film, Haynes choosing not to enter the therapy room. And the tentative romance between Cathy and Raymond does not earn the attempts at a poignant resolution, flailing instead in over-torqued territory.

Julianne Moore and Dennis Quaid struggle against the material but buckle under the strain of bewildering mannerisms and stiff conversations, their performances distinctly derivative. Far From Heaven overinvests in flair, and strays far from substance.



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Movie Review: Enemy Mine (1985)

A science fiction story of survival and emerging friendship, Enemy Mine contains good intentions but is hampered by a desperately poor script and gauche execution.

Late in the 21st century, humanity has united and is busy colonizing distant planets. An alien species known as Dracs is in their way, competing for the same resources. After an aerial dogfight, human pilot Willis Davidge (Dennis Quaid) and Drac pilot Jeriba Shigan (Louis Gossett Jr.) crash land on Fyrine IV, an uninhabited and dangerous planet.

The two men are initially hostile towards each other and Willis sets out to find and kill his foe. But they soon realize they are stranded in dangerous terrain, where the threats include subterranean monsters and severe meteor storms. They start cooperating to survive, learning each other's language and culture in the process.

Echoing other enemy-combatants-turn-friends films such as 1968's Hell In The Pacific, Enemy Mine sets out to explore themes of solidarity across living species, and the imperative to look past superficial differences to seek commonalities. The film metaphorically represents every conflict between humans, and by casting Louis Gossett Jr. as the alien and featuring a subplot of Dracs exploited as slaves by human interplanetary scavengers, the film does not stray far from a homegrown call for interracial harmony.

Despite all good intentions, director Wolfgang Petersen struggles to deliver an engaging experience. The alien planet landscapes and the overall special effects are questionable, border on amateurish and reek of a grade B production. Humans and Dracs need space suits in their own fighter spacecraft but can both breathe and survive just fine on the surface of Fyrine IV.

The Dracs are hermaphrodites, but otherwise remarkably human-like in many characteristics, including movement, sleeping, eating and temperature sensitivity. Jeriba (or Jerry, as Willis insists on calling him) is never convincing as anything other than Louis Gossett Jr in a rubbery suit not far removed from the Creature From The Black Lagoon.

Worse still is a script by Edward Khmara filled with stilted dialogue that was old on planet Earth in 1985, with not a hint of evolution neither in human thinking nor basic technology. Late in the 21st century, humans are apparently still using cliched 1980s language expressions and firing pistols with bullets at each other deep in space.

Dennis Quaid is horribly miscast, alternating beyond angry but dim pilot mode and aw-shucks good-old-boy mannerisms. Louis Gossett Jr fights through the layers of bad cosmetics to frequently rise above the material.

Enemy Mine advocates tolerance, but the message is delivered with awkward inelegance.

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Movie Review: In Good Company (2004)

A romantic comedy with a backdrop of whirlwind corporate politics, In Good Company competently delivers all the necessary ingredients for harmless entertainment without shining in any of them.

In New York, Dan Foreman (Dennis Quaid) is the middle-aged head of the advertising team at leading magazine Sports America. Dan is happily married to Ann (Marg Helgenberger), and the father of two daughters including Alex (Scarlett Johansson). With Ann unexpectedly announcing  she is pregnant again and Alex heading off to NYU, financial pressures are mounting.

At work, a corporate takeover turns Dan's life upside down. He is demoted and asked to report to 26 year old Carter Duryea (Topher Grace), a smug young executive on the fast-track to success. Team layoffs and cutbacks follow, with Dan toiling to adapt to a boss half his age. But Carter himself is also struggling, unsure of what he is doing and with his marriage crumbling. Things get a lot more complicated when Carter and Alex start an intense relationship behind Dan's back.

Directed and written by Paul Weitz, In Good Company is a modestly successful lightweight comedy. A romance mixed with middle-age angst and company intrigue, plenty is going on at any one time, and Weitz invests enough in the characters of Dan, Carter and Alex to keep things interesting. Sparkling New York City locations and plenty of supporting characters provide depth and animation in the corners.

The story is more engaging than expected thanks to Dan and Carter being provided with an almost equal opportunity to occupy centre stage. Carter could have been relegated to a snotty and obnoxious young boss parachuted in by the new corporate parents, and indeed he starts off as just that. But Weitz is also interested in delving into the psyche of a young man and the insecurities eating away at his seemingly perfect life, and In Good Company is a much better movie for it.

Carter builds a romantic relationship with Alex but also, slowly, a working relationship with Dan, and gets to see corporate life from a new perspective. Meanwhile Dan is dealing with too many new things at once, and the film's wackiness and comic moments are derived from the sheer number of simultaneous crises that can be flung at one man.

The performances are steady without being spectacular, Quaid and Grace playing off each other as unlikely older guy-younger upstart competitor-buddies. Johansson, one year on from Lost In Translation, sticks closer to serious tones as a young woman tolerating her father's insecurities. David Paymer, Selma Blair, Philip Baker Hall and an uncredited Malcolm McDowell round out the cast.

In Good Company blows kisses up and down the corporate ladder, delivering a breezy attitude but not a lasting impression.

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Movie Review: The Words (2012)

A drama about the thin line between truth and fiction, The Words is a finely crafted story of success, guilt and self-justification.

Celebrated author Clay Hammond (Dennis Quaid) is delivering a reading of his latest bestselling novel The Words in front of a live audience. The book is about young New York-based author Rory Jansen (Bradley Cooper), who achieves overnight success when his short novel becomes an unexpected literary hit.

For many years Rory and his wife Dora (Zoe Saldana) had struggled on meagre incomes, waiting for his career to take off, but Rory experienced nothing but rejections. After they honeymoon in Paris, Rory stumbles upon an old typewritten manuscript in an old satchel bag. Dora mistakes it for his work, he claims it as his own, and it turns into his big break. But the appearance of an old man (Jeremy Irons) threatens Rory's success, while at the reading event, young literary student Daniella (Olivia Wilde) tries to seduce Clay into revealing the true meaning behind The Words.

Co-directed and co-written by Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal, The Words is a clever story within a story within a story, with the multiple layers revolving around the creative process of putting words onto paper. The fictional Rory is the film's fulcrum, the manuscript he finds hides an old and deeply personal Parisian family tragedy of love found and lost, and the author Clay is the creator of both Rory's dilemma and the discovery that makes him famous.

Klugman and Sternthal jump around in time and alternate between the fictional world of Rory, the old man's haunting background and Clay's here-and-now reality, and easily manage to keep all three interlaced stories coherent. With one established author, one emerging author and one writer who never was, the film tackles several worthwhile themes, and poses some piercing questions about what constitutes success, the value of owning an experience, and the various guises of inspiration.

Rory feels he did not earn his fame and is undeserving of the accolades, and guilt will haunt him as he strides to the forefront of the literary world. The words he wrote are not his own, but they did fall into his laptop, unclaimed. The old man has to contend with his bittersweet experiences, hitherto only living within him, gaining widespread and unexpected exposure. And Clay conceives of this story perhaps as a mechanism to cleanse his soul, Daniella representing his interrogator as she probes the secrets underpinning the famous author's success.

Understandably, not all parts of The Words work equally well. The scenes in Paris are bathed in sepia tones and are a touch too emotionally utopian, while the interaction between Clay and Daniella is marginally forced. With Bradley Cooper, Zoe Saldana and Jeremy Irons all in fine form, the central story of Rory, Dora and the old man is the most powerful, and fortunately this is where the film invests most of its time.

Thought-provoking, nuanced and delicate, The Words shimmer off the page and onto an enjoyable screen experience.

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Movie Review: D.O.A. (1988)

A murder mystery, D.O.A. possesses some obvious style but is badly let-down by a weak script.

In a rainstorm at Christmas time, Professor Dexter Cornell (Dennis Quaid) stumbles into a police station and announces that he has been murdered. He recounts the past 36 hours of his life and the rest of the film unfolds in flashback. Dexter teaches English literature, and his talented but troubled student Nick (Robert Knepper), an aspiring writer, shockingly appears to commit suicide by throwing himself off a campus building roof. Dexter and his wife Gail (Jane Kaczmarek) are going through a painful divorce, while his friend Hal (Daniel Stern) is celebrating a promotion and the upcoming publication of a book.

After a night of heavy drinking with his attractive and starstruck student Sydney (Meg Ryan), Dexter discovers that he has been poisoned and has just hours to live. His frantic investigation leads him to Nick's funeral, where Nick's sponsor Mrs. Fitzwaring (Charlotte Rampling), her daughter Cookie (Robin Johnson) and the family chauffeur Bernard (Christopher Neame) are hiding shocking secrets of their own.

Co-directed by Annabel Jankel and Rocky Morton, D.O.A. is as remake of the 1949 film noir. The 1988 version finds modest success with a few stylistic elements, but overall sinks into a sea of familiar and overstuffed plot elements. The mystery is uninteresting, the perpetrator easy to guess, and the evil plot, once revealed, borders on the ridiculous.

The opening 20 minutes are promising enough. The opening scene hits the target, a near-collapse Dexter storming into the police station and announcing his own murder. The professor and his surrounding circle of students, colleagues and family are introduced with admirable efficiency planting the seeds for what could have been an engaging story. Dexter has given up on writing, Gail has given up on the marriage, Nick is tortured and seeking affirmation, Sydney is salivating for a shot at her professor (despite Meg Ryan, at 27, being too old for the role) and the circle of academics contains the usual wolves in tweed clothing.

But after Nick's death, D.O.A. unravels quickly. Both Dexter's behaviour and his emotions are poorly written and sloppily executed, and the film descends into a series of contrived conflicts, more crimes and murders, and clumsy attempts at suspense. The story wades knee deep into convolutions that may have worked with more talent, in black and white, and in the 1940s. Here, the sordid affairs of Mrs. Fitzwaring, her multiple husbands, out-of-control daughter and menacing chauffeur are tiresome and derivative distractions.

The body count mounts at an alarming pace, and if it wasn't already too easy to guess the murderer, it gets much simpler as the rest of the cast members are methodically knocked off, seemingly without attracting a single investigative police officer.

Dennis Quaid struggles against the weak material and comes up empty, and the rest of the cast members barely register. It may not exactly be dead on arrival, but D.O.A. expires early in any event.

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Movie Review: Breaking Away (1979)

A coming of age comedy drama about young men encountering the realities of life, Breaking Away is filled with heart, soul, and bicycle wheels spinning in all the right directions.

In the small town of Bloomington, Indiana, four young men have completed high school and have no future plans. Referred to as Cutters (the town used to be best known for limestone stonecutters), Dave (Dennis Christopher), Mike (Dennis Quaid), Cyril (Daniel Stern) and Moocher (Jackie Earle Haley) spend their days at the scenic water reservoir carved out of the quarry, lamenting their lack of life prospects.

Mike was the high school quarterback and carries a chip on his shoulder as he sees the world passing him by. Cyril is tall and goofy, Moocher is short and planning to get married early. Dave has developed an obsession with cycling and everything Italian. Much to the horror of his car salesman (and ex-stonecutter) father Ray (Paul Dooley), Dave is immersed in Italian culture, trains hard on his bike, and is very excited that the Italian Cinzano team is coming to town for a race. He also romantically pursues college girl Katherine (Robyn Douglass).

The Cutters tangle with snooty college boys including Rod (Hart Bochner), before Dave is exposed to the true colours of professional cyclists and the outcasts are invited to compete in the annual Little 500 college bike race.

Directed by Peter Yates and written by Steve Tesich, Breaking Away is loosely inspired by real events. The film carries a distinctive small town charm, building and maintaining likability momentum. The story of underdogs who deliver when it matters is far from new, but Yates and his cast of then unknowns polish the narrative with the warmth of a sun-drenched reservoir and a large heart pumping the eternally optimistic Dave towards his pedal dreams.

The four young Cutters capture a cross-section of outcasts, and Yates efficiently draws out distinctive personalities without resorting to melodramatics. While Dave pursues both cycling and the girl with a disarming intensity, Mike is the angry young man who knows his life peaked in high school. Moocher will always fight against taunts about his lack of height, but is nevertheless determined to settle down with a wife at a young age. Cyril is quiet, tall and maybe the sleeper in the group, hiding potential behind his superficial dopeyness.

The film benefits from a multi-pronged perspective on the challenges facing Dave. He never questions his own ability, but has to overcome severe cynicism from his father and the arrogance of the college community. But the most unlikely blow comes from his supposed heroes, Dave getting an early lesson in the cutthroat world of high level competition.

The young cast members bring the Cutters to life and launch their careers towards varying degrees of success. Breaking Away proved to be a highlight achievement for Dennis Christopher and Jackie Earle Haley, but more of a starting point for Dennis Quaid and Daniel Stern. All four bring an appealing naturalness to the film.

Deploying humour in just the right amounts, Breaking Away is a winning sprint to the finish line of youth.

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Movie Review: Movie 43 (2013)

A distressingly bad comedy, Movie 43 features 14 unrelated sketches, a galaxy of star names who should know better, and maybe one genuine laugh.

The one common thread is a struggling writer pitching this movie to a producer on a Hollywood lot. The sketches include a blind date between an anxious woman and an eligible bachelor with a testicle-like growth on his neck; two lovers quarreling in the supermarket while the announcements microphone is on; a young adolescent girl getting her first period while at the house of a friend; an all-black high school basketball team getting ready for their first big game against a white team; a blind date which descends into a high stakes truth or dare fiasco; two men kidnapping a leprechaun; a digital music device in the form of a full-sized naked woman with the potential to mangle male anatomical parts; and a woman competing for her man's attention against a vicious animated cat.

Some of this sounds funny in writing, but thanks to witless execution and sloppy writing, none of it is remotely funny on-screen. An army of writers and directors put this mess together, with Peter Farrelly the culprit-in-chief. The stars briefly on parade include Kate Winslet, Hugh Jackman, Gerard Butler, Emma Stone, Elizabeth Banks, Richard Gere, Dennis Quaid, Uma Thurman, Halle Berry, Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber and Chloë Grace Moretz.

Movie 43 descends quickly to the land where cheap vulgarity and rampant offensiveness are mistaken for laughs, and while there may be an audience pathetic enough for this kind of dross, what remains incredible is that so many respected names chose to associate with this fiasco. Filmed over several years and with none of the actors having full visibility or understanding of the full project, this will remain an embarrassing blot on many resumes.

Movie 43 has a title that means nothing, and is an exercise in execrable excrement.

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Movie Review: Vantage Point (2008)

A clever action thriller, Vantage Point rises above the routine thanks to a patient structure that reveals the twisty plot from the viewpoints of several key characters.

A diplomatic anti-terrorism summit is being held in the small town of Salamanca, Spain. Early in the public ceremony witnessed by large crowds and covered by the international media, United States President Harry Ashton (William Hurt) is shot twice by an unseen assassin; then two explosions rock the city, causing mass casualties and panic, and killing opinionated reporter Angie Jones (Zoe Saladana).

The events are presented from the perspective of multiple witnesses, including television producer Rex Brooks (Sigourney Weaver), secret service agent Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid), local police detective Enrique (Eduardo Noriega) and American tourist Howard Lewis (Forest Whitaker). Gradually the threads of the conspiracy are revealed, and Barnes stumbles onto a much more complex plot involving layers of decoys, distractions and subterfuge.

Directed by Pete Travis, Vantage Point maintains a high level of energy thanks to slick production values, an intriguing mystery, and a puzzle-like structure. Although the rewinds and repetitions begin to become a bit tiresome about halfway through, there is enough juice in the story to maintain strong momentum.

The film's hook resides in the convoluted plot that is only gradually teased out of the multiple perspectives. Each retelling of the events at the public square pushes a bit deeper into the background and consequence, and it becomes apparent nothing is what it seems to be, no matter how many people witnessed the murderous atrocities. There are layers of deception and counter-deception at play, a chess game unfolding on the public stage but planned in the conspiratorial shadows.

The plot spends as little time as possible on politics and motives, and focuses instead on thrills and spills. An attack on a hotel is a smooth demonstration of one against many, while a long urban car chase recreates Bourne-style intensity but with less manic editing. Meanwhile the large explosion in the square is viewed from multiple angles but never loses its jarring impact. And the film finds a frantic yet tidy conclusion, all the vantage points coming together at the same time and place.

The ensemble cast shares the chapters, and gradually Dennis Quaid moves into centre stage. His character Thomas Barnes is provided with a brief background as a secret service agent still healing from the emotional scars of having taken a bullet to save the President's life during a previous assassination attempt. Given the fragmented scheme unfolding around him, Quaid does well to inject some character intensity into his scenes. Barnes' partner Agent Kent Taylor (Matthew Fox) and initially peripheral characters Veronica (Ayelet Zurer), Sam (Saïd Taghmaoui) and Javier (Édgar Ramírez) gain in prominence as more is revealed about the plot.

Vantage Point defines its ambition and stays within it, delivering a controlled multi-angled barrage of thrills.

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