The Stop Button
blogging by Andrew Wickliffe
Category: Directed by Phillip Noyce
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Not noir noir about architect Richard Moir discovering there might be something shady about the shady property developers he’s designing for. He teams up with community organizer (and initial foe) Judy Davis to figure out what’s going on. The occasional extreme stylizing is fine but not as impressive as how fast director Noyce keeps the…
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The Saint is a delightful mess of a film. Director Noyce toggles between doing a Bond knock-off while a romantic adventure picture. Val Kilmer’s international, high-tech cat burglar falls for one of his marks, Elisabeth Shue’s genius scientist. Jonathan Hensleigh and Wesley Strick’s script, even when it puts Shue in distress, never actually treats her…
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Patriot Games has a mess of a plot. After introducing Harrison Ford as the lead, it veers into this period where not only does Sean Bean–as Ford's nemesis–get more screen time, but also everyone in Bean's IRA off-shoot plot. It might work if fellow group members Patrick Bergin and Polly Walker had better written roles…
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Sliver is a beautiful film. It’s got Vilmos Zsigmond photography, it’s got Phillip Noyce directing, it’s got a great score from Howard Shore–it’s just a bad movie. The story has two things going on. First is Sharon Stone’s recent divorcee moving into a high rise apartment building where she discovers there have been a bunch…
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The big problem with Nightshift, an episode of “The Hitchhiker,” is how William Darrid’s teleplay handles the protagonist. Margot Kidder plays a retirement home nurse who preys on her charges–little mean stuff, stealing their jewelry. The script isn’t playful with its presentation of Kidder. If Darrid had made her true nature a reveal instead of…
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I’ve been meaning to see Blind Fury again for twenty-one years or so. For a while, I assumed it would be pretty good (not entirely trusting my opinion at age ten) because Phillip Noyce directed it. Unfortunately, Noyce directs it with all the enthusiasm of a cologne commercial. It’s not like there’s much he could…
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Watchable–thanks to good acting and direction–and beautifully designed melodrama about the rugged 1950s Australian newsreel cameramen and their manly pursuit of the capital n news. Sometimes hard to believe melodrama–often involving William Motzing’s music ruining scenes. There’s also the problem with how the authentic newsreel footage mixes in. Very assured, but to no good end.…
The Stop Button 