Philadelphia Daily News from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Page 52

Friday. Sept. 30, 1988 Page 52 jFWK MA 1 Mist" is not dull. This is thanks to two things Sigoumey Weaver and the gorillas. Many things about Weaver's performance are commendable the way she eschews all "glamour" without making Fossey dowdy, the way she suggests the rhanopc in the rhnrnrtor ewiav i in ij ft Ur? 'LfSi- IP rir ts- it in if UM 1 sons (River Phoenix, left and Jonas Abry) in "Running on Empty' WEAVER NEAT APING FOSSE By Ben Yagoda Chnstine Lahti flees with her two Sidney Lumet from a screenplay by Naomi Foner, is quite shrewd in its observation of the compromises and sacrifices the Popes have made in keeping their family together.

As a former colleague observes when he visits them, their existence couldn't be more middle-class; except for a vestigial vegetarianism and a reflexive questioning of authority, their lifestyle could come right out of a Norman Rockwell painting. The biggest irony of all concerns their sons. Arthur and Annie tell themselves they've stayed on the run so as to keep the family together, but they seem not to be aware of the effect it's had on the boys. When Annie suggests that Danny be allowed to drop out and try to have something of a normal life, Arthur barks, "You are letting your feelings affect your judgment!" He doesnt realize what a terrible thing it is to have to conduct a family without feelings. After a lifetime of hiding out, Danny is in danger of becoming invisible, someone with no reactions, no commitments, no identity.

He practices the piano on a wooden keyboard that doesnt make -a sound it's a perfect emblem for his life. "Running on Empty" is not without faults. Occasionally, the moping threatens to get out of control. The visit from the more radical friend is a slow and unfocused interlude. The heart-to-hearts between Danny and his girlfriend go on too long.

And I sometimes felt that Foner had taken too much poetic license: what if Danny hadnt turned out to be a genius, what if Annie's family weren't incredibly wealthy, what if someone had been killed instead of injured in the bomb blast and it was no accident? The issues raised by the movie would be just as valid, but getting to them would be a tougher and more rewarding road. But "Running on Empty," helped by uniformly excellent performances, is a thoughtful, moving and, yes, dramatic look at a family's struggle to stay together. Best of all, no one drinks any coffee. RUNNING ON EMPTY: A drama istarring Judd Hirsch. Christine Lahti and River Phoenix.

Directed by Sidney Lumet. Screenplay by Naomi Foner. Running tone: 113 minutes. A Warner Brothers release. At area, theaters.

Parental gukto: Rated PG-13. Off-color language. 2 FULL TANK OF SOLID DRAMA By Ben Yagoda Daily News Movie Critic omeone talked me into watching a few episodes of "thirty-something" recently, and it's led me to think about the difference between drama and soap opera. Soap opera of which "thirty something" is the state of the art is when people stand around and talk about their feelings; often, they drink coffee. Drama is about feelings too, but the feelings come out in ways that are indirect, subtle, not always expected, provocative, moving, dramatic.

"Running on Empty" is drama very good drama. It's about Arthur and Annie Pope (Judd Hirsch and Christine Lahti), who as college students in the early 70s bombed a campus building as a protest against the Vietnam War. They didnt know that a janitor was inside the building; he was blinded and paralyzed in the blast They immediately went underground with their 2-year-old son. Cut to the present. The 2-year-old, Danny, is now 17 (River Phoenix) and has a 10-year-old brother (Jonas Abry).

They've spent their lives in a succession of towns, living under aliases, always moving on when it looks like the FBI is getting warm. The parents get occasional help from the underground network and always find jobs that pay in cash; Arthur's turned into a pretty decent short-order cook. But packing up and leaving is going to be harder this time. Danny's fallen in love with a girl (Martha Plimpton) in the New Jersey town that's the family's latest stop, and is also turning out to be a very talented pianist. If he goes away to music school to study the instrument, he will quite literally blow his parents cover.

The movie, which was directed by Dian Fossey (Sigoumey Weaver) -I years of the film, the way she indicates without making it blatant that Fossey's devotion to the gorillas would become an unhealthy obsession. (Fossey is shown physically abusing' a boy who has some knowledge of poachers, burning a villaup iiicjr iivcu aiiu a mock hanging on one of them.) But the trulv remarkable thino about this film, which was shot on location in the African nation of Rwanda, is the way Weaver and di- rector Michael Apted Miner's Daughter," "Gorky have used actual Trvtillae U7a con Cnccau at "iot observing a group of them, getting closer and closer until she actually touches them and then, most amazing of all, becomes an accepted member of the group. There are scenes in "Gorillas in the Mist" of Weaver relating to the gorillas mimicking them, caressing them, grooming them that are breathtaking. At the very least, they top anything I've seen on "Nova." GORILLAS IN THE MIST: A drama starring Sigoumey Weaver. Directed by Michael Apted.

Screenplay by Anna Hamilton Phelan. Running time: 126 minutes. A Universal release. At area theaters Parental guide: Rated PG-13. Bad language and discreet sex.

THIS COMEDY'S A REAL SCREAM By Ben Yagoda Daily News Movie Critic Dt's been said that inside every fat person is a thin person struggling to get out. If it's also true that inside every grown-up is a 14-year-old struggling to get out, then "Elvira, Mistress of the Dark" will win a lot of fans. It's a movie calculated to appeal to the adolescent in all of us. If you're not familiar with Elvira, she's the randy, eye-rolling horror hostess whose" late-night show is a syndicated television hit. As portrayed by Cassandra Peterson, she's a See ELVIRA Next Page Cassandra Peterson: Elvira I 'I Mil Daily News Movie Critic efore I saw "Gorillas in the Mist," I didn't know very much about its subject, Dian Fossey only that she was a woman who did important research about African gorillas and that she was mysteriously and savagely murdered.

Yet except for a few details, I could have written the synopsis for this movie. You see, I had already seen "Out of Africa," "The Big Blue" and "Never Cry Wolf." I knew that Dian would suffer culture shock she arrived in Africa, would have to shed her Western ways, would develop a deep relationship with a loyal but not subservient na- -tive aide, would be enchanted by the gorillas, would eventually become obsessed with them to the 'point of renouncing the love of humans. Sure enough, all of these things happen in "Gorillas in the Mist." When we first see Dian Fossey (Sigoumey Weaver), she is attending a lecture by the famed anthropologist Louis Leakey and begging him for a job. Impressed by her persistence, he relents, and soon she is in Africa. When she sees her first mountain gorilla, it is love at first sight.

Not content with studying the animals, she is determined to save them from the certain extinction they face at the hands of poachers. In this task she gets help from the loyal, sage tracker Sembagare (an excellent performance by John Omirah Miluwi, who until the filming of this movie was employed by the Mount Kenya rescue team). And nothing not a local conflict that she refers to with typical condescension as "some little civil war," and not love, in the person of a National Geographic photographer who doesn't share her total devotion to the cause (Bryan Brown will keep her from the task. But she makes a lot of enemies over the years, and eventually one of them the culprit has never been identified creeps into her tent and stabs her to death. Despite its predictability (and its excessive length), "Gorillas in the is ordered to leave the Congo during a revolution.