The Charlotte Observer from Charlotte, North Carolina • 73

FRIDAY JUNE 5 1998 THE charlotte OBSERVER Gross for the weekend of May 29 June 1 tojmovies $18 million Total: $993 million $142million Total: $142 million Impact" $101 million Total: $112 million Horse Whisperer" $73 million Total: $43 4 million $48 million Total: $175 million Got The Hook-UP" $33 million Total: $4 4 million $28 million Total: $2 8 million Quest for Camelot" $24 million Total: $17 million $17 million Total: $579 million and Loathing in Las Vegas" $17million Total: $73 million toprentals "As Good As It Gets" Confidential" "Boogie Nights" Jackal" Never the Girls" "I Know What You Did Last "The Full Monty" War marathon on AMC spotlights preservation When most of us talk about a film we mean bootlegging a video copy of a classic off a noncommercial TV showing American Movie Classics knows that and care less if you Lawrence spend this Tbpjpan movies in its Film Preservation Festival It's interested in raising your ness about the real preservation of movies yes and hitting you up for cash to that end From today through midnight Sunday AMC will screen three days of war films ranging from (first winner of the best picture Oscar in 1928) through Combat" its 1998 documentary about war movies Such rarities as documentaries by Frank Capra John Ford and William Wyler grace the schedule along with a restored print of the great Quiet on the Western That Oscar-winning drama a sympathetic view of German soldiers made just 12 years after the end of World War I makes the best case for preserving old movies The print has been cleaned up Extraneous music has been removed Shots have been added that make new points: A scene of soldiers cutting blood-soaked bread and dnnking wine is now followed with one in which they pass the food and drink around symbolically re-enacting the Last Supper AMC quotes film experts who guess half the 21000 shorts and features produced before 1950 are lost And many shot between 1950 and 1975 on mfenor Eastmancolor stock are fading into a sunset of pale reds and washed-out yellows The most important art form of the 20th century one that chronicles Amencan history like no other is disappeanng If that bothers you spare a little time to watch AMC (Channel 27 on Time-Wamer cable) this weekend you'll learn what you can do to help And if you can spare a little change Am unreal pokes fun at slice-of-Iife TV shows and the dweebs who watch them THE TRUMAN SHOW GRADE: A STARS: Jim Carrey Ed Hams Laura Linney Noah Emmerich WRITER: Andrew Niccol DIRECTOR: Peter Weir RATING: PG: Mild violence RUNNING TIME: 105 minutes For more stories other reviews and trailers for Truman visit wwwcharlottecomjustgo on their sofas to await the blessed event that would continue the life cycle Seven days a week 24 hours a day audiences eavesdrop on their Everyman through tiny cameras concealed around Seahaven The city along with the surrounding it is in a gigantic dome in Hollywood Everyone who lives there is an actor and the only one who know The benevolent but ratings-conscious God of this universe is producer Christof (Ed Harris) who designed town to provide him with a comfortable life yet enough anxiety to make for drama Now with ratings at their peak Truman throws a wrench into the machinery He decides to visit Fiji where an enigmatic woman he once loved (Natascha McElhone) is supposed to have gone Andrew Niccol's script can be taken many ways Maybe it questions role in this seemingly arbitrary universe: Has God like Christof (note the name) set up our world as a bizarre experiment? Maybe Niccol and director Peter Weir are warning us against giving up free thought The hollow in Seahaven depends on conformity to one idea delud- By LAWRENCE TOPPMAN Movie Writer One fine morning a stage light plummets from the sky and smashes on the street in front of Truman house in the placid city of Seahaven When he turns it over he sees that marked Canis That night Truman (Jim Carrey) stands on the beach contemplating the sea of which pathologically afraid Rain begins to fall on him Just on him not the sand two feet away in either direction For the first time in his 10909 days in this extraordinary world Truman suspects someone is playing a cosmic joke Thus begins Truman a startlingly inventive witty and gently uplifting satire of reality-based TV The title is also the title of the most popular television program which began with birth and follows him daily When he toddled on his first steps viewers around the world cooed When he graduated from Seahaven College they beamed with the pride of surrogate parents When he married Meryl (Laura Linney looking oddly like Meryl Streep) they settled back Please see JIM CARREY page HE.