The Galveston Daily News from Galveston, Texas • Page 23

SATURDAY MORNING, APRIL 2,1988 THE GALVESTON DAILY NEWS 5-B op By BOB THOMAS Associated Press Writer Buck McGriff and Albaby Perkins are tough cookies. How do we know? Because they say spout obscenities at least once in every sentence. That kind of crude characterization is the hallmark of "Off Limits," a misfired Vietnam War movie that is long on macho and short on credibility. "Off Limits" deals with the bleak underside of 1968 Saigon. McGriff (Willem Dafoe) and Perkins (Gregory Hines) are military police investigating a series of prostitute murders.

Their search leads them to believe that a high American officer with a taste for kinky sex may have been the killer. The brass is alarmed, and the two cops are thwarted in their investigation. Most of the action takes place in Saigon (Bangkok provided the FILM REVIEW locations), and it never looked seedier. The same for the underworld denizens whores, pimps, cutthroats, as well U.S. soldiers on their worst behavior.

The only civilized person is a young convent novice (Amanda Pays) who counsels prostitutes and hence can help provide clues to the killer's identity. She and McGriff form a friendship that almost becomes something more. The two detectives' quest proves more dangerous as they move closer to uncovering the culprit. Buck McGriff (sounds like a name for a 1950s movie star) and Albaby Perkins are what you see. Except for Perkins' passion for college basketball, we know nothing about the.m: their homes, families, backgrounds.

The fault lies in the shallow, convoluted script of Christopher Crowe and Jack Thibeau. As director, Crowe manages a fair degree of suspenseful action. But he seems to be allowing the actors to ad lib their dialogue, and the outpouring of obscenities becomes almost ludicrous. Dafoe and Hines blend well as the buddy cops, but neither character is well defined. Too often Dafoe dominates the partnership, leaving Hines with little to do.

Fred Ward registers strongly as their helpful superior. Scott Glenn makes a brief appearance as a crazed colonel whose sudden exit is surreal and inexplicable. "Off Limits" is a 20th Century Fox release produced by Alan Barnette. The rating is R. 'Fortunate Pilgrim' misses Spring trip taken Forty-four eighth grade students from Central Middle School recently took their spring break trip via charter bus to Washington D.C.

and New York City. Eh route they visited Atlanta, Greensboro, N.C.; arid Charlottesville, Va. In Washington they will saw the Arlington National Cerpetery, Washington Monument, Jefferson, Lincoln and Vietnam War memorials, the White House, Capitol Hill, Library of Congress, the Smithsonian and more. After visiting the Empire State Building, Rockefeller Center, Wall Street, Times Square, Central 1 Park and Greenwich Village in New York, they will took a trip to the Statue of Liberty, and returned to Galveston by way of Huntsville, andVicksburg. KATHRYNBAKER AP Television Writer NEW YORK "The Fortunate Pilgrim," based on novelist Mario Puzo's, sweeping saga of an Italian immigrant family in search of the American dream, is, unfortunately, a tedious, wooden melodrama in its adaptation for TV.

NBC will air the two-part, five- hour miniseries on Sunday and Monday, April 3-4. Sophia Loren, whose husband, Carlo Ponti, produced "The Fortunate Pilgrim," stars as plucky matriarch Lucia Corbo, whose first husband is killed in a factory explosion, and whose second husband, played by Edward James Olmos of "Miami Vice," Succumbs to insanity. Her children, meanwhile, get tuberculosis, arrested and the neighbor's wife pregnant. Hal Holbrook arrives in-Part 2 as a Scotch-French doctor who romances Lucia. John Turturro, who made his mark playing malevolent types in such films as "To Live and Die in L.A." and "Five is eldest son Larry.

The movie, a period piece set in TV REVIEW the 1920s and '30s, was shot against an almost sepia-toned backdrop by director Stuart Cooper, who did the miniseries "The Long Hot Summer." This one was filmed on location in Yugoslavia, but the sets look more like a studio backlot. Also, inexplicably, the dialogue sounds dubbed much of the time. Cooper's rudimentary direction is matched only by the pedestrian script. Drama needs conflict. The fluffy "I'll Take Manhattan," even with broadly drawn characters and plotlines, worked because it at least had structure.

"The Fortunate Pilgrim" is a muddle. The central conflict seems to be Lucia's dream for a home in the country and success for her children running up against her offspring's constant moral lapses, illnesses and scrapes with neighbors and the law. An early symbol of evil is a laughably Snidely Whiplash-like landlord. The result is a meandering Orphaned organs find help, new churches NEW YORK (AP) Lawrence Trupiano saved most of the organ from St. Paul's, Hoboken everything but the bellows, which was too big to fit through any door.

"The builders had the mentality that they would last forever. They'll put things where you couldn't get to them," Trupiano said. Organs don't last without help, though; not in the smog of a big city, or in a where the furnace dries and cracks a wooden instrument. Nor do they stand up under careless tuning, or the assaults of mice tempted by the taste of horsehide glue in the bellows. The organ at St.

Paul's didn't play at all when Trupiano moved it from the New Jersey shore of the Hudson River to his shop in Brooklyn. It will sing again, though, in a church in Manhattan which is giving up high tech for the time-tested sound of pipes. Dozens of organs become orphans each year, no longer wanted because struggling churches close and prosperous churches buy new instruments. Many, like the organ from St. Paul's, turn up in new homes.

Alan Laufman, who runs the Organ Clearing House in Norrisville, N.H., has about 120 organs available at any time. "Sometimes we get a call on a Thursday afternoon saying that a church will be torn down on Monday, and can we find a home for the organ. Sometimes we can," Laufman said in a telephone in- terview. Since the Clearing House was started in 1959, Laufman estimates that more than 1,200 organs have found new homes, in one case as far away as Yokohama, Japan. Perhaps the proudest match was between the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and an organ built by Thomas Appleton of Boston in 1830.

It was found, unused, in a Pennsylvania church. Trupiano's shop returned it to playing condition, complete with hand-pumped bellows. "It was a time-capsule of information. It was just like Appleton built it," said Trupiano, who restored the organ to playing condition. "It answered a lot of unknowns from organs built at that time." "You are always trying to understand what the builder was trying to do," he said, and the surest guide is the instrument itself.

"The pipe will tell you what it wants to do." plotline composed of a series of unconnected events, most of which have no buildup or ramifications. In John McGreevey's script, as well, character development consists of simplistic dialogue, although it doesn't help us connect with them to switch actors every hour or two as the children age. A sample scene: Early in Part 2, son Vinnie goes to comfort sister-in-law Luisa who is weeping after being insulted by her husband, Larry. We have seen these two only in passing, so this is supposed to establish their characters. WEEKEND EASTER SALE! -SUN.

RIBEYE 9" CE T-BONE 9" STEAK SHRIMP 7" 6 Oz Sirloin A. Lg DELUX -jfcoo STEAK SHRIMP 10" File' Migno 5 to Shrine 12 LG. GULF SHRIMP PLATTER Fried or Sauteed ABOVEWBIG BAKEDPO ATO FRESH SALAD KIDS SPECIAL 12 Under CHICKEN FRIED STEAK 2" LONE STAR STEAKS 2122 Strand 3506 Palmer 'Stakeout' now available on home video NEW YORK (AP) One of the biggest hits of last summer was Buena Vista's "Stakeout," a cop buddy movie starring Richard Dreyfuss and Emilio Estevez. Earning $65 million, it had the longest hold in the No. 1 box-office spot and was one of the Top 10 movies of 1987.

The comedy-thriller directed by John Badham is available this month for home screens from Touchstone Home Video. It's one of two recent hit movies in which a policeman assigned to watch a woman falls in love with her. The other was "Someone to Watch Over Me," starring Tom Berenger, available from RCA- Columbia Pictures Home Video. Elsewhere, HBO Video plans a new music series called "Super Sessions." Available in May, the series will feature concerts and performances by such musical talents as B.B. King, Roy Orbison, Chaka Khan, Phil Collins, Freda Payne, Martha Reeves, Billy Ocean, Eric Clapton and Etta James.

"Roy Orbison Friends: A Black and White Night" ($19.99, will be one of the first videos released in the series. Joining Orbison on stage are Jackson Browne, Elvis Costello, Bonnie Raitt, T-Bone Burnett, Tom Waits, Jennifer Warnes and Bruce Springsteen: The concert, featuring such Orbison hits as "Only the Lonely" and "Crying," was filmed at' the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles in September 1987 and was made in black and white. Axon Video has released the Italian comedy, "Spaghetti House" ($69.95, starring Nino Manfred! and In English, the movie romps through the true story about a group of Italian waiters who are held hostage in a London restaurant. SHRIMP'N STUFF NO. 2 CLOSED EASTER SUN DAY WEEKEND SPECIALS 8 GRILLED OR 8 FRIED A SHRIMP 7 95 WITH CHOICE OF POTATO SALAD BAR WE ACCEPT CHECKS SHRIMP'N STUFF NO.

2 6801 STEWART RD. 740-2428 April! April 2nd "COUNTRY OUTLAWS" WEDNESDAY LADIES NIGHT OUPON EASTER WEEKEND SPECIALS 10 SHRIMP DINNER 5" SHRIMP GUMBO PINT 2 90 SHRIMP AVOCADO SALAD 3 74 LIMIT 8 GOOD THROUGH APRIL 15 CLOSED EASTER SUNDAY Dinners served with french fries, hush puppies, choice of salad. SHRIMP 'N STUFF 3901 Ave. 0 OPEN EVERY DAY 763-2805 Dine Over the Gulf Come join us for our 11 1 I 'I I I PHLASH HAPPY HOUR BUFFET 5 to 8 p.m. OPEN FRIDAY SATURDAY NIGHTS UNTIL 4A.M.

it tt SUNDAY DANNY KRISTENSEN PRIVATE NUMBERS With Special Guest Appearance By "THE COSMETICS" 762-9070 EVERYBODY'S HOPPIN'OVER FOR EASTER! EASTER BUFFET BRUNCH, THAT IS! 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Easter Sunday Serving: International Cheese Display Array of Fresh Sliced Fruits Garden Fresh Vegetables with Dip Cucumber, Mixed Greens Fruited Jello Molds Freshly Baked Breakfast Breads Omelettes prepared to order Baked Ham Pineapple Stuffed Chicken Breast Marengo Rice Pilaf Parslied New Potatoes Garden Vegetables Assorted Mousses, Pies, Cakes French Pastries IflRQO HOTEL ON GALVESTON ISLAND $12.95 Adults $10.95 Senior Citizens 8.95 Children (under 12) 5400 Seawall Blvd. BRUNCH in the Reef Dining Room featuring: GRILLED SALMON ROAST BARON OF BEEF BAKED VIRGINIA HAM SNOW CRAB LEGS SEAFOOD CHOWDER OMELETTES- MADE TO ORDER WAFFLES-ASSORTED TOPPINGS SHRIMP PASTA SALAD ASSORTED GARDEN SALADS VARIETY OF FRESH VEGETABLES ROLLS BUTTER CHOCOLATE MOUSSE ADULTS: $15.95 CHILD 6-12: $8.95 SENIORS: $12.95 CHILD UNDER 6: FREE 11 A.M.-3 P.M. Entertainment provided by Kate Martelli RESERVATIONS SUGGESTED FOR 8 OR MORE A 25TH SEAWALL BLVD. 762-8681.