Archive
UP CLOSE & PERSONAL – Thomas Newman
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Up Close & Personal is a romantic drama film directed by Jon Avnet that sought to turn the then-incandescent star power of Robert Redford and Michelle Pfeiffer into Hollywood gold. The film was written by husband-and-wife team Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne – highly acclaimed, prize-winning journalists – and was originally intended to be an adaptation of Golden Girl: The Story of Jessica Savitch, a 1988 book about the troubled life of American news anchor Jessica Savitch. However, over the course of many years and numerous revisions, the film was altered substantially to the point that the finished product bears almost no resemblance to Savitch’s life. Read more…
BEFORE AND AFTER – Howard Shore
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
It’s always fascinating to me how a movie, on paper, can have the absolute best possible pedigree in terms of filmmaking and acting talent, and yet completely flop at the box office and immediately fade into obscurity. Before and After is one of those films. It’s directed by Barbet Schroeder, who received an Oscar nomination for directing Reversal of Fortune in 1990, and later went on to make Single White Female in 1992. It was adapted from the original novel by Rosellen Brown by Ted Tally, who won an Oscar for writing The Silence of the Lambs. The cast is led by Meryl Streep and Liam Neeson, alongside Alfred Molina and Edward Furlong, fresh from his breakout role in Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Read more…
MARY REILLY – George Fenton
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review byJonathan Broxton
In the mid-1990s there were a series of big-budget Hollywood films which adapted classics of the horror genre to the big screen, with the most famous being Bram Stoker’s Dracula in 1992 and Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein in 1994. One of the films which is now somewhat forgotten is this one: Mary Reilly, an adaptation of a 1990 novel by Valerie Martin, which was itself inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson’s 1886 novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The twist here is that this story is told from the point of view of Henry Jekyll’s housemaid, the Mary of the title, who falls in love with her master, but then makes an enemy in the form of Jekyll’s “assistant,” Edward Hyde. The film stars Julia Roberts as Mary, John Malkovich as Jekyll and Hyde, and has an excellent idiosyncratic supporting cast that includes Michael Sheen, Glenn Close, and Michael Gambon, plus British TV stalwarts like George Cole of Minder and Kathy Staff of Last of the Summer Wine. It was written by Christopher Hampton and directed by Stephen Frears, who had previously worked together on Dangerous Liaisons in 1988. Read more…
CITY HALL – Jerry Goldsmith
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
An underrated movie co-written by Nicholas Pileggi, the former investigative journalist best known for his work on Goodfellas, City Hall is a political crime thriller directed by Harold Becker. Set against the murky political landscape of New York City, the film stars Al Pacino as Mayor John Pappas and John Cusack as his idealistic deputy mayor, Kevin Calhoun, alongside a supporting cast that includes Bridget Fonda, Danny Aiello, and then-recent Oscar winner Martin Landau. The story begins with a tragic shooting in which a young boy is killed during a botched police operation targeting a suspected Mafia figure. The incident appears to be a routine case of excessive force, but Calhoun begins to suspect that the circumstances surrounding the event are more complicated than they initially appear. As he digs deeper, Calhoun uncovers a tangled web of connections linking the police department, the district attorney’s office, organized crime figures, and even members of the mayor’s own administration. Read more…
HEAT – Elliot Goldenthal
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Widely considered one of the best action thrillers of the 1990s, and notable for marking the first time that legendary actors Robert De Niro and Al Pacino appeared together in the same scenes on screen (they were both in The Godfather Part II but did not feature in the same scenes), Heat follows the intense cat-and-mouse conflict between a meticulous professional thief and a relentless police detective in Los Angeles. De Niro plays Neil McCauley, a highly disciplined career criminal who leads a small crew of expert thieves. After a planned armored car robbery goes disastrously wrong, the gang attracts increased attention from law enforcement in the shape of Vincent Hanna (Pacino), an LAPD robbery-homicide detective. As Hanna becomes obsessively focused on tracking McCauley and his team – alienating his wife and daughter in the process – McCauley’s crew prepares for an even bigger and more dangerous bank heist, placing both men in each other’s crosshairs. Read more…
RESTORATION – James Newton Howard
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Restoration is a period drama film directed by Michael Hoffman, adapted from the 1989 novel of the same name by Rose Tremain. The film is set during the Restoration period in England, which began in 1660 when Oliver Cromwell’s Commonwealth – which had overthrown the monarchy of King Charles I a decade or so previously – came to an end and Charles II was restored to the throne as king. The restoration was known for its cultural renewal, scientific curiosity, and political change, but also for its sometimes vulgar and obscene decadence, something which stood in polar opposition to the dourly stringent and sometimes cruel Puritan morality that Cromwell enforced during his time in power. The story follows the experiences of Robert Merivel, a young aspiring physician from a lowly background who, after he inadvertently saves the life of the king’s dog, is summoned to the royal court, and quickly becomes surrounded by a new world of wealth and indulgence. Read more…
BALTO – James Horner
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Balto is an animated adventure film very loosely inspired by true events that happened in Nome, Alaska, in 1925, during an especially harsh winter. Balto is a half-wolf, half-husky who lives on the outskirts of town and is teased by other dogs because of his mixed heritage; his only close friends are a goose named Boris, two polar bears named Muk and Luk, and a young human girl named Rosy. When a diphtheria epidemic breaks out, threatening the lives of the town’s children – including Rosy – the townspeople organize a relay team of sled dogs to bring a lifesaving antitoxin from a remote railway station to Nome. Balto enters a race to join the team, and initially wins, but is later disqualified when a rival dog named Steele reveals his wolf ancestry. However, the sled team carrying the serum gets lost and stranded, and so Balto – with the help of his friends – sets out to find the team, navigate treacherous terrain, and bring the medicine back to Nome. Read more…
MR. HOLLAND’S OPUS – Michael Kamen
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
I have always had a soft spot for films about inspirational teachers – Dead Poet’s Society is one of my all-time favorite films – and 1995’s Mr. Holland’s Opus is another one that offers a similar sentiment. Directed by Stephen Herek and written by Patrick Sheane Duncan, the film stars Richard Dreyfuss as Glenn Holland, a talented but struggling composer in Oregon in the 1960s who becomes a high school music teacher, intending to do the job temporarily to earn money so he can finish his symphony. At first, Holland’s students are bored, but he begins to inspire them by incorporating rock and roll and other popular music into his lessons; over the course of the next 30 years his role at the school becomes central to his identity, even as he struggles to balance his career with his personal life, most notably his relationship with his son Cole who is born profoundly deaf. Read more…
SABRINA – John Williams
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Sabrina is a modern remake of Billy Wilder’s 1954 romantic comedy which starred Audrey Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart, and William Holden, and which was itself based on the stage play Sabrina Fair by Samuel Taylor. Directed by Sydney Pollack, the story follows Sabrina Fairchild (Julia Ormond), the shy and awkward daughter of a chauffeur who works for the wealthy Larrabee family on Long Island. Sabrina has spent her life quietly pining for David Larrabee (Greg Kinnear), the charming but superficial younger son. After a transformative stay in Paris, she returns home confident and stylish, immediately catching David’s attention, just as he is about to marry a woman whose family is vital to a major business deal. To protect the merger, David’s older brother Linus (Harrison Ford), the work-obsessed head of the Larrabee corporation, inserts himself into Sabrina’s life to distract her. His plan is to win her over and then send her back to Paris, but as they spend time together, Linus unexpectedly falls in love with her, and she discovers her long-standing infatuation with David has been eclipsed by a deeper connection with Linus. Read more…
NIXON – John Williams
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
I am not a crook! — Richard Nixon, November 17, 1973
I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow — Richard Nixon, August 8, 1974
Director Oliver Stone’s film Nixon is an epic biographical drama tracing the life of the 37th President of the United States, Richard Nixon. Structured as a psychological portrait, the film moves back and forth in time, depicting a number of major turning points: his humble California upbringing in the 1930s and 40s, his early political rise in the 1950s and his stint as Vice President under Dwight Eisenhower, his triumphant election victory in 1968, the pressures of the Vietnam War, and above all the widening shadow of the Watergate break-in and subsequent cover-up which led to his eventual downfall and his resignation as president in 1974. Stone presents Nixon as both deeply ambitious but profoundly insecure, a man shaped by personal trauma and driven by a desire for power and recognition that eventually turned to paranoia, criminality, and disgrace. Watergate, for those who don’t know, refers to an event where a group of Nixon operatives broke into the Democratic National Committee’s headquarters in the Watergate office complex in Washington DC in order to illegally plant surveillance equipment, ostensibly to obtain political intelligence on the Democratic Party prior to the 1972 election. Read more…
SENSE AND SENSIBILITY – Patrick Doyle
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
“I come here with no expectations, only to profess, now that I am at liberty to do so, that my heart is and always will be… yours.”
Although she had always been popular, 18th century English writer Jane Austen received a new surge of publicity in 1995 following the release of adaptations of two of her best-known works: the BBC mini-series based on Pride and Prejudice starring Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle and featuring that swimming scene, and this film, adapting her 1811 novel Sense and Sensibility. The story of Sense and Sensibility follows the Dashwood sisters – practical and reserved Elinor, passionate and romantic Marianne – after their father’s death leaves them in reduced financial circumstances. Forced to relocate to a modest cottage in Devon, they navigate love, heartbreak, and the constraints placed on women of their class in Georgian-era England; both sisters are expected to marry to secure their family’s future, and while Elinor quietly longs for the earnest Edward Ferrars, Marianne falls deeply for the dashing but unreliable John Willoughby, overlooking the steadier Colonel Brandon. Read more…
FRANKIE STARLIGHT – Elmer Bernstein
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
An adaptation of the best-selling semi-autobiographical novel ‘The Dork of Cork’ by Chet Raymo, Frankie Starlight is a nostalgic comedy-drama film directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, written by Raymo with Ronan O’Leary. The film stars Corban Walker as Frank Bois, a writer with dwarfism who is looking back over his life. The film charts his experiences as a child with his mother Bernadette (Anne Parillaud), a French woman who, toward the end of WWII, stows away on an Allied troop ship bound for America, but is taken to Ireland instead. There she meets Jack Kelly (Gabriel Byrne), a customs officer who eventually becomes a surrogate father to Frank, teaching him about astronomy, nurturing in him a lifelong passion and mystical obsession with the cosmos, and giving him his nickname ‘Frankie Starlight’. Later Bernadette meets Terry Klout (Matt Dillon), an American GI, and the three of them move to Texas; however, life in America doesn’t feel like home, and as he grows up Frankie dreams of returning to Ireland. Read more…
TOY STORY – Randy Newman
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
To infinity and beyond!
There are only a few films that you can point to as marking a genuine turning point in the history of cinema, but 1995’s Toy Story is one of them. Directed by John Lasseter and produced by Pixar Animation Studios in collaboration with Walt Disney Pictures, it was the first entirely computer-animated feature film, and as such is a landmark of the genre. Pixar’s roots trace back to Lucasfilm’s Computer Division, founded in 1979. Among the early team members was John Lasseter, an animator who had previously worked at Disney but was dismissed after pushing too hard for computer animation in an era when Disney remained committed to traditional hand-drawn techniques. At Lucasfilm, Lasseter found a place where computer graphics were the focus, and he began experimenting with short animated sequences that combined storytelling and new technology. Read more…
JUMANJI – James Horner
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Jumanji is a children’s fantasy action-adventure film starring Robin Williams, Bonnie Hunt, Kirsten Dunst, Bradley Pierce, and Jonathan Hyde, directed by Joe Johnston, based on the 1981 illustrated children’s book by Chris Van Allsburg. The titular object is a mysterious and dangerous board game that brings jungle hazards to life. In 1969 a young boy named Alan Parrish discovers an ancient board game buried at a construction site. When he plays it with his friend Sarah strange supernatural events occur, and Alan is suddenly sucked into the game after rolling the dice. Sarah, terrified, flees, and the game is left behind. Years later, in 1995, siblings Judy and Peter Shepherd move into the now-abandoned Parrish house with their aunt. They find the dusty board game and begin to play, unwittingly releasing Alan – who is now an adult and has been trapped inside the game’s jungle world all these years. As the game’s curse continues every roll brings new dangers into the real world, from rampaging animals to a hunter named Van Pelt, and in order to end the chaos Alan, Judy, and Peter must find Sarah and persuade her to finish the game with them. Read more…
THE AMERICAN PRESIDENT – Marc Shaiman
THROWBACK THIRTY
Original Review by Jonathan Broxton
Looking back now, considering where we are today in terms of what the American political landscape has become over the past decade, it seems almost unbelievably naïve and quaint to think that, in the 1990s, people were still making films about US presidents who were good, upstanding people who cared about their jobs and the electorate that voted for them. The American President is one of those films; written by Aaron Sorkin and directed by Rob Reiner, the film is a romantic drama set in the White House. Michael Douglas plays President Andrew Shepherd, a widower nearing the end of his first term. He is well-liked, pragmatic, and politically savvy, but cautious about jeopardizing his public image. Things change when Shepherd becomes romantically involved with Sydney Wade (Annette Bening), an environmental lobbyist who comes to Washington to push for a bold emissions-reduction bill. Their relationship quickly becomes serious, but because it unfolds under intense media scrutiny, it also becomes a political liability. As Shepherd’s approval ratings fall, his opponents – especially conservative senator Bob Rumson (Richard Dreyfuss) – exploit the situation, framing the relationship as unpresidential. Shepherd initially tries to keep politics and romance separate, hoping the story will fizzle out, but before long public pressure forces him to choose between maintaining power and standing up for the values he claims to represent. Read more…
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