St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 61

3F ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8,1991 REVIEWS FILM The Weather Is Sunny In Steve Martin Land Irish Love Of The Land Mined For Melodrama- I JPiMlSC. I A 7 HI a Jkr. 'LA. STORY" 'THE FIELD' lions nod in approval.

Martin and English director Mick Jackson are not afraid to push the fantasy to its limits, and only occasionally do they go too far. If they were not willing to take chances, they never would have had the guts to film what is probably the most memorable scene in a movie full of good scenes: Martin and Tennant are wandering through a Los Angeles cemetery when they come upon a cockney gravedigger (yes, that's Rick Moranis), and they suddenly find themselves in the middle of the "Alas, poor Yorick" scene from "Hamlet." The most astonishing thing about, this scene is that there is none of the heavy mugging and winking that, say, Mel Brooks would bring to it it is played straight, and goes right to the heart. I'm not the only one who is reminded of "Annie Pall" by "L.A. Story," but you have to understand that Martin and Jackson are dealing with Southern California, not New York, and so the movie has a fluffier, more Cheer- Rating: PG-13, Running time: 1:28 By Harper Barnes Post-Dispatch Movie Critic THIS IS a wonderful movie. "L.A.

Story" is a cheerfully zany romantic comedy about love, lies and Los Angeles. Steve Martin wrote the script and stars as Harris K. Tele-macher, a weatherman who makes up for the repetitious quality of the climate by doing "wacky" stunts. He even tapes weather reports ahead of time so he can go away for the weekend. Unexpected changes in the weather lead to severe revisions in his life, and you have to feel that he is better off in the long run.

Telemacher, who hides the soul of a poet beneath his Hawaiian shirts and jokes about cold fronts, gets fired and falls hopelessly in love with a British journalist (played by Victoria Tennant she and Martin are husband and wife). The two enter a goofy romantic universe in which budding flowers open and smile as they pass, and stone Steve Martin as a TV weatherman and Victoria Tennant as a British journalist in "LA. Story." it off. A wealthy young (Tom Berenger) arrives (in thei only car in the movie) tp against McCabe. He wants to pave the field as a staging area for quarr.n lying the mountains.

The cast also includes Brendan Fricker, who won an Oscar for her fine performance as the mother "My Left Foot" and who nately has almost no lines in "Them Field," and John Hurt, who tunately has a lot of them. usually a fine actor, plays a gap-1 toothed village layabout, and his leering performance makes the whole affair slide perilously close to parody. "The Field," with its symbol-laden, sodden Irish angst McCabe poses like Christ in the rain and even battles the sea with his shllle lagh, like Cuchulain, the mythic-defender of the Irish land some-, times seems almost like a fiendish-. ly clever put-on by Monty Python.) It is hard to imagine that the successful play upon which the movie was based could have been quite so pretentious or so filled withempty thunder. (Tivoll.) i Harper Barnes Rating: PG-13.

Running time: 1:55 RICHARD HARRIS has been plaguing the talk shows, trying to promote himself into an Oscar nomination for his performance as a tough, bitter old Irishman in "The Field." Unfortuntely, this" turgid melodrama about a battle between two stubborn men over a small mountain pasture is so slow and grim and heavy-handed that it is hard to separate Harris' performance from the general unpleasantness. In "My Left Foot," with its paralyzed protagonist growing up profoundly misunderstood in dire poverty, director Jim Sheridan showed that compelling drama could be pulled out of the most depressing circumstances. This time, however, Sheridan fails to transcend the gloom, or endow it with dramatic power. The movie is set in the late 1930s in a remote part of western Ireland. Harris plays Bull McCabe, who has devoted his life to working the field.

Then, the widow who Inherited the land decides to auction great affection. There are no Crips and Bloods in this LA it is a fantasy land created by unfettered dreams. Martin's movie-set version of the city may be imaginary, but it is a delightful place to spend an hour and a half. (Chesterfield, Esquire, Hails Ferry, Kenrick, Northwest Square, Ronnie's, St. Charles, St.

Clair, Union Station.) ful tone than any but the very earliest Woody Allen movies. There are dozens of satirical jabs' at Los Angeles and its lifestyle, some of them happening so fast and so far in the background that you would have to see the movie several times to catch them all, and yet the basic attitude of the movie about Los Angeles is one of Tale Of A Wife's New Life Is Its Own Worst Enemy Amusing (If Corny) Parody Of Drive-in Horror Movies "POPCORN" a more meaty role, that of an abused wife who fakes her death off Cape Cod and runs away to Iowa to begin a new life. Unfortunately, she is saddled with a third-rate, dishonest screenplay and second-rate, unexciting direction, so it's difficult to know where to level the blame, but the result is a hard-to-believe performance in a movie that promises one thing and delivers something far less impressive. We're led to believe that "Enemy" involves a battered wife, and it does, but that's only about a fourth of the film. From the time that Roberts disappears from the sailboat, "Enemy" is merely another story of a murderer tracking a victim.

And I'm not giving away any plot information, either; clues abound that he will find her. The husband, Patrick Bergin, is of the staring-eyes school of acting, and he's good at it, though not at anything else. Kevin Anderson is Ben, the college drama teacher who lives next door to Roberts in Iowa, and who protects her. "Enemy" started turning me off early. Roberts talks about expanding her part-time library job to full-time, and Bergin mentions her love of books.

Their house has neither a book case, nor a book, and when she gets to Iowa, that house has no books, either. Roberts and Bergin seem to live In a vacuum, and Roberts remains a loner after she moves, though neighbor Anderson tries to be friendly. Director Joseph Ruben puts us through a patently absurd sequence when Roberts visits her mother and brings the picture to life only once, when Roberts and Anderson play jn the drama department costume shop. It's a joyous scene, emphasizing Roberts' beauty, and it looks as though it should have been in "Pretty Woman." Ronald Bass' predictable screenplay gives Roberts no brains at all, which is an injustice. When she sees her towels perfectly aligned, which was a Bergin trait, she should be out looking for help, not prowling the house until she sees her canned goods in rows like a military drill team, by which time it's too late.

It was too late for the audience much earlier. (Alton, Clarkson, Des Peres, Esquire, Eureka, Halls Ferry, Kenrick, Mid Rivers, Northwest Square, Ronnie's, St. Charles, Union Station.) "SLEEPING WITH THE ENEMY" Rating: (wife abuse, terror, sex). Running time: 1:38. By Joe Pollack Of the Post-Dispatch Staff HOLLYWOOD mathematicians use a strange equation: If you act in a movie that makes a lot of money, you're a star, and you're also a great actress.

The list of those who lave disproved it is longer than Jesse James' criminal record, but Hollywood keeps pushing the same theme. Like "Sleeping With the Enemy." And Julia Roberts. Roberts showed a nice comedic touch in "Mystic Pizza," and a body that was impressive both in and out of clothes in "Pretty Woman." "Flatliners" gave her an opportunity to be angry, and sometimes frightened. She showed the emotions, but only on the surface. "Sleeping With the Enemy" should have supplied some of the bad things in themov: ies such as a man being sucked dry by a killer mosquito actually'' happen, and Sarah's dreams turn out to have a basis in the past.

Fans of drive-in horror flicks of the 1950s and '60s, with such gim-n-micks as seats wired to deliver shock, will probably find "Popcorn" fairly enjoyable. (Eureka, Halls Ferry, Mid Rivers, Northwest Plaza, Ronnie's, St. Charles, St. Clair, Union Station.) Harper Barnes Rating: violence, language. Running time: 1:28 6O0PC0RN" is not in the same jT league with "Tremors," last year's great horror spoof, but this low-budget, low-concept farce does have amusing moments of parody.

Jill Schoelen stars as a college film student who is having scary dreams. When she and some classmates stage a festival of cheapo horror flicks at an old theater, BUDGET BEDDING SALE TWIN SET FULL SET QUEEN SET vhM IS AS QUEEN SIZE SOFTSIDE WATERBEDS QUEEN SIZE (ALL SIZES QUEEN SIZE ON SALE) DUEL MATTRESSHEATERS '599" SIMMONS 'I! POWERFUL 'THE FIELD' IS A MOVING AND MPMfVR ART WfW UU IvVl MAXIPEDIC ON SALE METAL BUNKBEDS 7 PC. SUITS $QQ99 INCLUDES BOOKCASE WATERBED WITH LIGHTS MIRROR dresser; SPECIAL PURCHASE Ill RICHARD HARRIS tf 2" HUTCH AND mniiii.l i I illlllllll HHisS. in Mill fNIGHTSTAND IS REMARKABLE." HEAVY l.jrn,T. l.ANNHT SfttS StKVkl 2 PC.

PADDED RAILS MATTRESS DUTY NOW PLAYING Sorry, no passes BED ONLY' PAD SET OF JOHN $1 9999 CHEST SOOQ99 SHEETS RICHARD HARRIS RED-BLUE-WHITE OPTIONAL HURT mum 4sr THE FIELD PG-13J OPEN SUNDAY OPEN SUNDAY OPEN SUNDAY OPEN SUNDAY OPEN SUNDAY OPEN SUNDAY SOUTH COUNTY CAVE ST. CHARLES FAIRVIEW FLORISSANT NORTH WEST 10626 Baptist SPRINGS HEIGHTS COUNTY ChurchRd. 1-70 STORE Hv .159 113N.Hwy.B7 CLEARANCE (IBIk.S.of (Next Door to J4 (1 Ml' STORE Lindbergh) Holiday Inn) SFlffipid. SfrKlll North of 1-270) 3447 N. Lindbergh 849-5464 928-5566 947-1177 1(618)632-7833 I 838-1789'! 298-0097 mm wmsxmm mwmm mmmm IWO A'lM'b PICTlRtS.

INC. ALL RICIITS REStRVED tTII.r.5.M.l 1 -frHJiMWIL Wr-Wi" 'Irrrniil -t'lE'l'M- STARTS TODAY TWO WEEKS ONLY 6350 del mar 725-oggo Nightly: 7:00, Sat Sun Mats: 2:00, 4:30 "rrr RIP-ROARING. The most rousing, robust and briskly entertaining Hamlet' ever." -Larry Frascella, US MAGAZINE "A 10! THIS IS THE FIRST GREAT COMEDY OF THE 90's. IT'S ONE OF THE FUNNIEST, SMARTEST, WARMEST FILMS TO COME ALONG IN QUITE SOME TIME. QUITE SIMPLY, IT'S STEVE MARTIN'S MASTERWORK." Mike Cidoni, GANNETT NEWSPAPERS 'LA STORY' IS GIDDY FUN.

STEVE MARTIN MAKES MERRY SPORT WITH THE CITY OF THE ANGELS." -David Arisen, NEWSWEEK "Oscar Mel Gibson is thrilling and exciting. Brilliantly directed." Pal Collins, WTOR-TV "A triumph!" David Patrick Slearns, USA TODAY "Glorious. Mel Gibson gives a tremendous, heroic performance and Glenn Close is wonderful." -Larry King, LARRY KING LIVE, CNN "Spectacular. A considerable personal victory for Mel Gibson." Roger Ebtrl, EBKRT K' TT its flf 4t ii i mm AJf "STEVE MARTIN'S FUNNIEST MOVIE YET! THE BEST URBAN LOVE STORY SINCE 'ANNIE HALL'!" -Pat Collins, WWOR-TV "'LA STORY IS A JOY! I LOVED IT! A WHIMSICAL, MAGICAL LOVE STORY THAT LIFTS THE SPIRITS." Pia Lindstrom, WNBC-TV A DELIGHT. AS PARODY, 'LA.

STORY' IS TO LOS ANGELES WHAT WOODY ALLEN'S 'MANHATTAN' IS TO NEW YORK." Jack Garner, GANNETT NEWS SERVICE "WEIRD, WITTY AND WONDERFUL A DELIGHTFULLY HILARIOUS TALE OF MODERN ROMANCE." Jeff Craig, SIXTY SECOND PREVIEW A ii i irnniTmrnniiiimT" mmmMmm In laiiMHimrii iiitiitii nimiw4 IJlfflll MEL GIBSON GLENN CLOSE HAMLET 1 A FRANCO ZEFFIRELLI FILM MARIO KlSSARrDANII MELMCKIXDIKPRODLi FILMS PRODUCTION STEVE MARTIN "LA. STORY" ICTORIA TENNANT RICHARD E. GRANT MARILL HEWER PETER MELMCK SS RICHARD A. HARRIS MILLER SKMARIO KASSARSTEVE MRTIN "-tSTBi MARTIN DANIEL MELMCK-MICHAEL RCIIMIL WARNER BROS, AND NELSON ENTERTAINMENT PRESENT .1 AN ICON PRODUCTION A FRANCO ZEFFIRELLI FILM MEL GIBSON GLENN CLOSE "HAMLET" ALAN BATES PAULSC0FIELD IAN HOLM HELENA B0NHAM-CARTER .1 M0RRICONE SS BRUCE WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE CAROLCO. PPG'lBkMINTISTMItfir JMICKJACKSON and rftjitKMMk arm.

ZEFFIRELLI LOVELL PWKKTAl GUQUCt HJOBFIIW STARTS TODAY ZEFFIRELLI OlltlNU JOUNDfltri UIUM Oh MIC IN M0VII MUSIC CBi OCASIUIIf ii SHOWING mm im r. vvammiii i.