The Miami Herald from Miami, Florida • 1056

gg SUNDAY OCTOBER 28 1990 THE MIAMI HERALD AT THE MOVIES INTERNATIONAL EDITION Quincy buddies give reasons to Listen Up zers cocks an eyebrow toward the camera and quips "His childhood? I know anything about that He never asked me about mine" And the irrepressible Ray Charles asked to identify himself for viewers cracks up: myself? Ooooh never had to do Like the scenes of Charles record- ing a vocal (feet dancing beneath his piano bench body pretzeling with every soulful phrase) shots of Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie just being Miles and Diz are wonderful reminders of all the great characters lurking beneath the unfolding evolution of African-American music Whatever its flaws Listen Up deserves a look for its messages of self-determination and racial pride for its terrific music and for its human glimpses of legends at ease Be sure to bring the kids their best works from Billie Holiday to Ice-T The joyous clips of inspired musicians in action are interwoven with the often dark story of Jones' life Raised in poverty in a Chicago ghetto Jones lost his mother to a mental hospital at age 6 eventually lost three wives through his own career obsession and neglect and survived two aneurysms of the brain that statistically should have killed him Early scenes of surreally flapping curtains and deserted staircases in childhood home are overdone and the psychoanalysis by his daughter gets heavy-handed at times But Listen Up takes several welcome digs at the cliches of the biodocumentary form Billy Eckstein another of the charming jazz gee and matching cap recalling how taught his band the rhythm for one six-note phrase: it like saying mother Terry recalls with a twinkle "No one had ever explained it to me exactly that way And Flavor Flav of the rap group Public Enemy looking like a down with gold teeth goofy cap and outsized glasses saying some profound things about a man whose influence on modern music cannot be overstated It was who nudged Michael Jackson to full-blown greatness by producing his solo albums Off the Wall Thriller and Bad It was who got an impossibly diverse crew of superstars to their egos at the door" and record the charity song We Are the World It was who helped unique talents create tjDOUQADRIANSON Herald Music Writer Here's the biggest longest loudest most expensive gold watch anyone could want in gratitude for four decades of exceptional music As the centerpiece for an industry testimonial dinner a knockout As a commercial film competing against Marked for Death tor your dollars and time it got a prayer Which is a shame While Listen Up: The Lives of Quincy Jones sometimes gets too arty or melodramatic for its own good as it traces the life and works of the composerarrangerrecord producer full of great music and priceless little moments from several generations of jazz pop and rhythm-and-blues superstars Jones (universally called MOVIE REVIEW LISTEN UP: THE LIVES OF QUINCY JONES (PG-13) CmL Quincy Jones Ray Charles Miles Davis Ella Fitzgerald Flavor Flav Dizzy Gillespie Michael Jackson Melle Mel Frank Sinatra Sarah Vaughan many other musical stars Director: Ellen Weissbrod Producer Courtney Sale Ross Music: Quincy Jones A Warner Bros release Running time: 1 10 minutes Brief rude language Q) gently hugging the late Sarah Vaughan as she scat-sings one of her last incomparable choruses into a studio microphone trumpeter Clark Terry a wizened gnome in white mustache QUINCY JONES: Exceptional music for more than 4 decades Plot actors lift Hot Spot Sibling Rivalry Cleverness stops short at the end Don Johnson is outstanding as Texas small-town con man MOVIE REVIEW THE HOT SPOT (R) Cast: Don Johnson Virginia Madsen Jennifer Connelly Charles Marlin Smith Director Dennis Hopper Producer Paul Lewis Screenwriters: Nona Tyson and Charles Williams based on his novel Hell Hath No Fury Cinematographer Ueli Steiger Music: Jack Nitzsche An Orion Pictures release Running time: 130 minutes Vulgarity nudity By RYAN MURPHY Herald Staff Writer Dennis The Hot Spot a scorching cinematic slice of film noir is the type of movie that demands to be shown only in well air-conditioned cineplexes The first unfurling frames a sensual panorama of the arid Texas desert sets the pace for the fv entire production From there things only get hotter Chief among the molten components is the performance rfsUr Don John- Hopper A smooth grifter in a natty suit Johnson is Harry Madox a con man who drives into the sleepy town of Landers Texas with no attachments only a motive In the course of a couple days he singlehandedly transforms the stifling burb into a hotbed of activity Fires are mysteriously set A bank is looted Blackmail is uncovered And two women the languid Virginia Madsen and the virginal Jennifer Connelly are put in compromising positions In the case of Virginia Dolly Harshaw the positions are eagerly anticipated and relished A platinum minx with an insatiable appetite for sex and power she is match in every way Their coupling is a dangerous one however for she is the wife of employer a crusty car salesman with a heart condition Caught in the middle of their combustible tryst is Connelly the car good-natured accountant who possesses a sweet spirit and a dark past The two-way race to tame and capture the dark heart of Madox By JUAN CARLOS COTO Herald Entertainment Writer In comedy the set-up is thing and what a set-up ling Rivalry has The movie stars Kirstie Alley (Cheers) as Marjorie Turner a faithful but bored housewife who sleeps with a stranger (Sam Elliott) on impulse only to have him die during the romp The movie puts its characters into one of the most hilarious predicaments seen in a while But the punch line deliver Sibling Rivalry coasts through its first half drawing plenty of laughs even surprising us Then something gives Like one of its characters the movie gets rigor mortis Director Carl Reiner and screenwriter Martha Goldhirsch spend so much time building up the discovery of the corpse that when it happens we can feel the movie deflate Suddenly the characters are clueless and Reiner know whether to take the death seriously or laugh it off as 1 another gag Even the breakup of marriage to a workaholic doctor (Quantum Scott Bakula in his big-screen debut) seems unimportant By the end the filmmakers are trying to convince us that Marjorie needs to realize her dream of becoming a great writer Uh-huh Before the last act when performance turns into an overdone crybaby version of Lucille Ball she carries most of Sibling Rivalry with great style And wonderful against Bill Pullman as Nick the down-and-out window-blind peddler who thinks he has accidentally killed Elliott Pullman who was the blond dolt in Ruthless People plays a nerd with an off-kilter hairdo in KIRSTIE ALLEY: Portrays a faithful but bored housewife Sibling Rivalry doing his imitation of Crispin Glover as Michael father in Back to the Future but hilarious nonetheless Other actors so clever Ed (Married with Children) seems flat as straight-laced brother a cop trying to run tor chief of police Carrie Fisher has only a few choice lines as doc-torsister (he comes from a family of doctors actually) and Jami Gertz as sister is enchanting in the first half invisible in the second At least we can give Sibling Rivalry credit for not becoming a brainless hide-the-corpse comedy a la The Trouble with Harry or the recent Weekend But maybe why Sibling Rivalry suddenly stops being lively MOVIE REVIEW SIBLING RIVALRY (PG-13) Cast: Kirstie Alley Bill Pullman Carrie Fisher Jami Gertz Scott Bakula John Randolph Ed O'Neill Sam Elliott Director Cart Reiner Producer: David Lester Don Miller LizGIotzer Screenwriter Martha Goldhirsch Cinematographer Reynaldo Villalobos Music: Jack Elliott A Columbia Pictures release Running time: 85 minutes Vulgar language sexual situations one scene of gore gives way to seething intrigue and always interesting situations a sort of three-way version of Body Heat To reveal more about The Hot clever convulsive plot would be criminal but this much can be said: Don Johnson delivers his best screen portrait yet In a film of such high extremes Johnson wonderfully keeps himself in check His is a modulated graceful performance a quite nicely balanced one In a way also a cerebral turn for most of the acting that Johnson does here is reflected in his eyes which in The Hot Spot burn with sexual menace and torment Johnson is in fine form Equally impressive are the giddy Madsen as a well-groomed sociopath in a push-up bra and the direction of Hopper Although the middle third of this film will probably be a bit too slow for most tastes Hopper still manages to craft a thriller that is original and dare we say it? hot stuff Additional kudos should be paid to his choice of background incidental music scary intense-sounding trombones and gospel wails that reverberate with tension and set the tone for most of the film Hopper has an eye for detail everything about this film seems intimate and real and has coaxed strong performances from every last one of his actors Earlier this month Johnson was HOT ITEM: Harry Madox (Don Johnson) carries on with his wife Dolly Harshaw (Virginia Madsen) in Hot Spot quoted in one particular interview saw what the reaction would as saying he going to be be doing any press for this film until he Don talk Kins of New York: Bleak melodrama At Halloween time for Dracula MOVIE REVIEW Still King of New York does have Walken punching up the screen in a plum role As fresh-out-of-jail career criminal Frank White (can we get some more social symbolism in that name?) the knight of this movie but he wear shining armor unless you count the handgun stuffed behind his belt Even before out of the Big House White with the help of black gang leader Jimmy Jump (the scene-robbing Larry Fishburne) goes after his goal wiping out other crime bosses so he can donate drug profits to a Bronx hospital facing budget cuts This is Robin Hood with the emphasis on hood Think of it as A1 Capone coming back from the dead to settle our budget-bill mess The makers of King of New York must be happy to see Gotham and its predicted descent into oblivion getting mucho press lately Ferrara has made a strong statement on the Big rotting and Walken is a convincing worm At one point a bad guy dies in New York traffic a true poetic moment So be warned: King of New York is trash but trash with an attitude By JUAN CARLOS COTO Herald Entertainment Writer In King of New York an unflinching bul-lets-and-blight melodrama about decline the demented crime lord of the title (Christopher Walken) tells a cop: country spends $100 billion a year on getting high not your problem just a It's a moment of contrived moralizing but it have come at a better time when pie-in-the-sky fantasies such as Steven Marked for Death have us winning the war on drugs and the cleaning up at the box office Marked in which Seagal plays a retired DEA agent who breaks a drug back on his knee was No 1 last weekend earning nearly $30 million in three weeks The business for King of New York be nearly so brisk Like Marked gung-ho but for all the wrong reasons bleak and blunt and sometimes haunting just what we needed i Unfortunately King of New York tear itself from its low-rent heart Director Abel Ferrara who helmed two first-season episodes of Miami Vice and the pilot for Crime Story force-feeds us an hour of end- KING OF NEW YORK (R) Cask Christopher Walken David Caruso Larry Fishburne Victor Argo Wesley Snipes Director: Abel Ferrara Screenwriter: Nicholas St John Cinematographer: Bojan Bazelli Producer: Mary Kane Music: Joe Delia New Line Cinema Running time: 103 minutes Violence vulgar language nudity gore less pans dimwitted dialogue and throwaway scenes for one soul singer Freddie Jackson playing himself at a high-society benefit before we get to the good stuff Even then Ferrara seems so unsure of himself that soaking the scenes in blue light and rain For every strong performance such as Victor Argo as the older dogged cop on tail a wasted one: Giancarlo Esposito a stock Spike Lee player in a thankless role as a Walken flun-kie For every great idea gore seen a jUlion times ByJEFFSEIKEN Knight-Ridder News Service His entrance is unforgettable He strides down the staircase trailing his silky black cape curling his lips and fixing the camera with a hypnotic stare As if any doubt to his identity could possibly exist he offers a simple declaration: am With that brief pronouncement Bela Lugosi established himself as a movie icon His performance in the 1931 Dracula typecast him for life making his name synonymous with the king of the undead whom he managed to bring so uncannily to life Lugosi however was not the first actor to impersonate the bloodsucking count nor of course would he be the last For while Dracula always met his demise at the end of the film he invariably rose again a movie monster to suit all times: Handsome powerful and utterly immoral Langella he personifies the seductive side of evil Unlike screen villains from Frankenstein to Freddy he attracts as much as he repels us Moreover his reach extends into the innermost of sanctums the bedroom where he strikes his victims when they are most vulnerable in their sleep Is it any wonder that Dracula has become so fixed in the fabric of our film nightmares? With Halloween fast approaching the time could not be more opportune to renew acquaintances with Dracula in one of his many screen incarnations You may be too old for trick-or-treat but no one ever outgrows the pleasures of a good scare Although growing a little long in the tooth the 1931 rendition of Dracula remains a classic sustained by Bela mesmerizing portrayal of the immortal count Lugosi delivers a performance that is a masterpiece of minimalism He conducts himself onscreen with the studied deliberate movements of a cat hunting its prey radiating menace with every gesture or glance Better than any actor Lugosi embodies the cruel remorseless spirit that lies beneath the suave and cultured veneer The 1931 Dracula was actually adapted from a theatrical version of Bram novel and the movie betrays something of its lineage in the staginess of the production Yet the static nature of the scenes only adds to the brooding atmosphere The immobile cameras seem to lock the characters into a tableau that offers them no escape from the ageless evil that stalks them The picture falters only at its finale which brings the confrontation between the count and his arch-nemesis Professor Van Helsing to a disappointingly abrupt conclusion Otherwise it is a nearly flawless mood piece inspiring a sense of dread that grows more palpable with each passing minute This Dracula aims to terrify rather than horrify a subtle distinction lost in the gory and graphic excesses of later vampire films success spawned a plethora of offspring but fans of the genre will have to fast-forward to 1979 to find another movie that approaches the quality of the original That year a stage version of Dracula was again brought to the screen this time with Frank Langella in the title role Comparisons with his predecessor are inevitable but Langella makes his symbolic break with legacy in one of the first scenes snapping the trademark cape off his shoulders as he strides into a room Going beyond superficial differences though Langella gives full expression to the sexuality that Lugosi no more than suggests He portrays Dracula not so much as a predator but as a seducer glib charming debonair a little bit the dandy but of course unquestionably a lady-killer in every sense Grim Prairie Tales Old West horror stories MOVIE REVIEW tales worthy of Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling meld strong horror elements with icons of the Western enticing us with an irresistible pulp creepiness Coe also includes the requisite zinger ending Unfortunately enjoying stories means putting up with and Dourif ranting between tales Their contrived arguments may be the biggest cock-and-buil moments of the movie There's some overacting here too After a while we get to thinking that with all this bickering we may be watching the direct ancestors of those TV film critics you know the Fat Guy and the Skinny Guy Mmmm Siskel and Ebert Meet Guns-moke Definitely Low Concept By JUAN CARLOS COTO Herald Entertainment Writer In Hollywood when a power player talks "high that means he wants to hear your idea in a catchy phrase For example: Top Cun Meets the Indy 500 Grim Prairie Tales could be described as Twilight Zone Meets Wild Wild West though it's much better on screen than on paper An auspicious debut for writer-director Wayne Coie this anthology film centers on Morrison (James Earl Jones) a bounty hunter and Farley (Brad Dourif) an intellectual who meet in the desert one night in the Old West The two get to but without guns they decide to out-yarn-spin each other We get four ditties three by Morrison one by Farley The first follows a man GRIM PRAIRIE TALES (R) Cask James Eari Jones Brad Dourif Will Hare Marc McClure William Atherton Writer -director: Wayne Coe Cmsmatographsr: Janusz Kaminski Producer Richard Hahn Music: Steve Da ncz A Coe Hahn release Running time: 88 minutes Violence gore vulgar language bnet nudity- through a sacred Indian burial ground another has a traveler meeting a pregnant woman on the prairie the third puts a frontier family in a twisted version of the American dream and the final story is about the greatest gunfighter (or so he thinks) I.