St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 36

SILDUIS POST-DISPATCH Oct. 5,1984 Movies, Review Review 12C A SoIdlPr'ft Stm-v' Insight than the young sailor. U1U1CI 8 Oiury Riley offers the key to the sergeaat The biggest danger in adapting a when he comments, "Anybody whe play to the screen is that the writer, dont know where they belong is and director will "open" the action toaIready In a whole lot of pain." the point where the most important Another standout and a possible part of the play the dialogue is Oscar nominee along with Caesar, is 'Places in the Heart' The country movie, rapidly proving that actresses can be convinced that lack of makeup and unstylish clothes equal sincerity, and with the common theme of "We'll do anything to save the farm," continues Its march. The latest Is "Places In the Heart." In which writer-director Robert Benton relives his Texas boyhood. Sally Field, re-creating large chunks of "Norma Rae," Is this week's gutsy heroine.

She's the wife of the sheriff of Waxahachie, Tex, In 1933. She and her husband and their two children are just sitting down to a post-church Sunday dinner. Their prayers have been offered. Suddenly, a deputy arrives with the word that a local black drunk has done It again and Is down by tie railroad tracks, reeling around. He also Is carrying a gun.

Why the sheriff allows Sunday Review dinner to be disturbed Is one of many unanswered questions. The drunk Is a knows town character who has done this before. It seems as though the deputy could handle It Matt Dillon would have sent Chester. But the sheriff leaves dinner (Field covers his plate with a napkin) and is. of coarse, shot and killed, though Benton shows it as an accident The sheriff Is buried and the killer is lynched.

That leaves Field with her two children and the mortgage, and brings up the second, and most Important unanswered question. No one rallies to her aid. none of the small-town loyalties are visible. The church Ignores her, city officials Ignore ber. The only person to show up Is the banker, who tells ber she obviously cannot keep up the payments and be will foreclose.

He advises ber to sell the bouse and spilt the family among various relatives. Benton may be remembering his own boyhood, as some accounts have It but I find it hard to believe that the sheriffs family would be left as indigent in any small town. Help arrives in the person of Danny Glover, a wandering black man, who gets a couple of meals from Field and chops some wood. He also steals some silverware, but when the police bring him and the silver to confront her, she fabricates an excuse and puts him to' work. Charity arrives In the person of John Malkovicn, the banker's blind 'brother-in-law, who becomes a boarder.

And then the fight to bring In the cotton crop and save the farm begins with, of course, the mandatory tornado along the way. There's some outstanding acting in "Places in the Heart" Field is strong, even when saddled with some banal dialogue. Malkovich and Glover are wonderful, always believable and showing that wonderful touch of dignity that is so necessary and so difficult to produce. Both roles easily could have become caricatures, and it is a tribute to the men that they bring warmth, love and strength to the story. Field's children, Yankton Howard Rollins Jr.

in his first major film role since "Ragtime." for which he also received an Academy Award nomination. Rollins' role is far more difficult He is the, black officer sent from Washington to Investigate the murder. He is the first black officer many of the men on the post both black and white ever kave seen. He must be the personification of cool, and Rollins succeeds beautifully. His sunglasses just like the ones MacArthur may hide his eyes, but Rollins Is a superior actor who shows his feelings in other ways, all small, but all magnified under Jewtson's direction.

Rollins knows he is in a no-win situation, especially when he learns that the sergeant had a confrontation with two white officers on the night he was killed. Rollins Is as angry here as he was in "Ragtime," but this role insists that he remain in total control at all times, and he comes across as If he were bound by wire. It's exciting work. "A Soldier's Story" was filmed in and around Fort Chaffee, with marvelous cinematography from Russell Boyd. Jewlson has brought beautifully balanced ensemble work.

All the men in Caesar's platoon are Impressive Denzel Washington as the rather sophisticated, big-city black; Art Evanns as the sycophantic Pvt Wilkie; David Alan Grier as the peacemaking Cpl. Cobb. Dennis Lipscomb also is effective as the white company commander and West Point graduate who must deal with the visiting black officer. The result Is more thnn a mystery with an effective twist; it's a gripping, powerful story that shows change in its characters and necessary reassessment of individual values in a totally satisfying way. (Running time: 1 hour, 41 minutes.

Rating: PG. At the Westport) Joe Pollack lost along the way. Therefore, all hall writer Charles Fuller and director Norman Jewlson, who have taken the Pulitzer Prtze-wlnnlng drama, "A Soldier's Play," and made it into an exciting, dramatic brilliant film, "A Soldier's Story." They did not give us a filmed play, either. The story is opened to show vividly what the smaU Louisiana town outside the Army post is like, and to give a few moments of baseball, and to allow us to see the black soldiers in their off-post hangout providing a small role for Patti LaBelle. Those scenes serve to underline the rest of the story.

Fuller's powerful drama that succeeds on two levels as a solid mystery of who killed the sergeant and as a character study of the same sergeant a man whose vision was occasionally clear but whose methods were unconscionable. Adolph Caesar, who created the role of Sgt Vernon Waters on the stage (and was here at the American Theatre last spring), is again superb. The man reeks of power, and he epitomizes every platoon sergeant or drill sergeant that any soldier or marine ever quivered before. Caesar, a career Army man haunted by a World War I experience, knows that things will be different for the black man after World War II, but he also knows that the game will be played on the white man's turf, and that the black soldier better prepare for unfamiliar ground rules. At the same time, his irrational feelings toward some members of his own race become his Achilles heel.

The butt of these feelings is Riley, as Pvt. C.J. Memphis, a naive farm boy who is a natural athlete and a natural musician. He also has an ease of spirit and a calm attitude that tend to infuriate Caesar even more. In some respects, his character could be likened to that of Herman Melville's Billy Budd, but he seems to have more Sally Field is a woman struggling to make a life for herself and her children without accepting charity in "Places in the Heart." note somewhere between corny and ludicrous.

"The River Rat" was the first country film of the season, and it was a box office flop, at least in St Louis. Still to come are "Country," with Jessica Lange and Sam Shepard, and "The River," with Mel Gibson and Sissy Spacek, both heavy with hard times down on the farm. (Running time: 1 hour, 42 minutes. Rating: PG. At the Cinema IV, Clarkson, Halls Ferry, Mark Twain, Westport) Joe Pollack Hatten and Gennie James, are exceptional, and there's good work from Lindsay Crouse, as Field's sister.

Crouse is married to Ed Harris, and there's a sub-plot of an affair between him and Amy Madlgan. All three performers are good, but the story doesn't work, but probably was necessary to make the film long enough. As it is, there are so many cotton-picking scenes that one soon becomes restless, and when Benton brings his own vision of the future to the climactic scene, everything ends on a 'Teachers' The brothers Russo Aaron and Irwin are the producers of "Teachers." One Is a former high school teacher, the other is a high school dropout Both those backgrounds are obvious In the film, a generally entertaining, not-quite satire on the profession that fires off some mighty cheap shots, in all directions at once, along the way. Of course, the targets are easy teachers, students, administrators, labor leaders, parents, lawyers. It's impossible to be unfunny when those fish are stuffed into a barrel.

To take "Teachers" seriously would be to begin a lengthy tirade about American education, not to mention the American legal system or ail the other topics discussed by writer W. R. McKinney and director Arthur Hiller. Hiller also directed "Love Story," as well as "Hospital," a vaguely similar black comedy about the medical profession. When "Teachers" works, and it works quite often, it's due to a superior collection of actors, all of whom bring a large amount of energy and talent to the proceedings.

There's Nick Nolte, as the disaffected teacher who obviously has decided that it's more important to touch a few kids than to stroke all of them. He's angry, and rather raucous, and it's an effective portrayal. Judd Hlrsch is excellent as the school's vice principal, the man responsible for the day-to-day operation; and Ralph Macchio turns in a first-rate, nicely underplayed, properly dimensional performance as Eddie, the semi-literate troublemaker. JoBeth Williams has the right idealistic qualities as a young attorney, Lee Grant lends strength as the superintendent of schools, and Allen Garfield is fine as a put-upon teacher. And then there's Richard Mulligan, who simply steals the film.

He's a slightly unbalanced individual, just released from a mental institution, who picks up someone else's telephone one morning and accepts a job as a substitute teacher. Mulligan's fey approach is spectacular, and his variety of costumes matches it. There's even a Gen. George Armstrong Custer one, reflecting his role in "Little Big Man." The plot revolves around a lawsuit filed by a former student who graduated without learning to read. That allows Nolte to deliver a truly damning line to Williams, who seems to feel that the suit will bring solutions to all the educational problems of not only the school but also the city and the nation.

"This suit is not about education," he fumes. "It's about money." And of course he's right There are a number of other plots and sub-plots along the way, and Hitler's pacing is very good. The climactic scenes leave something to be desired, however, and, as too often happens In a comedy, no one knows how to get out of it with any semblance of neatness. Instead, It just stops. Like this.

(Running time: 1 bur, 47 minutes. Rating: language. At the Alton, Chesterfield, cinema iv, cypress Village, Des Peres, Eureka, Halls Ferry, Ronnie's Twin City) Joe Pollack From Pag 11 Gremlins; Greystoke The Legend of Tarzan. II: River Rat; Uncommon Valor. SOUTH CITY 4491 Lemay Ferry Road, 892-0600.

Until September. II: Tightrope. SOUTH COUNTY CINEMA South County Shopping Center, Lemay Ferry and Lindbergh, 487-4600. 1: River Rat. II: Irreconcilable Differences.

STAR CINEMA 1917 State Street Granite City, 451-1717. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. ($1 admission). STARLIGHT TWIN DRIVE-IN Route 111 at College Avenue, Alton, (618) 462-4921. 1: Up The Creek; Animal High; Hammer Of God.

II: Porky's II; Angels Wild Women; Silent Partner. SUNSET HILLS CINEMA Lindbergh and Highway 66, 966-4800. 1: Buckaroo Banzai. II: The Bear. Ill: The Last Starfighter, Neverending Story.

IV: Karate Kid. TIVOU 6350 Delmar. 725-0220. Friday and Saturday: Moscow On The Hudson, The World According to Garp. Beginning Sunday for one week: Gabriela.

TWIN CITY Truman Highways 61 and 67, 937-9663. 1: Teachers II: Purple Rain. Ill: TBA. VARSITY 6610 Delmar Blvd. 725-01 10.

Alice Wonderland, Between Lovers. VILLAGE Village Square Shopping Center, Lindbergh and 1-270, 895-1050. 1: Irreconcilable Differences. II: Buckaroo Banzai. Ill: The Bear.

WESTPORT CINE 1-270 and Pag. 878-8660. 1: Soldier's Story. II: Places In The WOODS MIU Highway 40 and Woods Mill Road. 434-5005.

The Bear. II: Tightrope. yt Share the spirit Share the refreshment ly 'tel. lip ij Mi' "'irtfev 'pI 10 0.8 mg. ntcotine av.

per cigarette by FTC method. 7C 7 1 Warning: The Surgeon General Has Determined That Cigarette Smoking Is Dangerous to Your Health. '''2 Of Bjm.