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Firelight
: :Writer William Nicholson's (Shadowlands) directorial debut is a surprisingly refreshing art house drama. Even though Firelight has grandstanding elements of forbidden love, a bodice-ripping tryst, and the moody English countryside, the film is never trite or dreary. It's 1838 and Charles, an earnest sheep breeder (Stephen Dillane), wants an heir, but his wife is an invalid. He hires the penniless Elisabeth (Sophie Marceau, ravishing again) as surrogate mother and hopes a weekend of passionless sex will bring him a baby. The D.H. Lawrence-like love nest brings a surprise or two, as ...
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Incredible Journey
: :Imagine your pets traveling 200 miles over mountainous terrain just to see you. What would they eat? What if a bear attacked? What if they ran into a porcupine? This Disney classic answers these questions and more with style and fun, in a story the whole family will enjoy. It tells the tale of two dogs and a cat that head for home on a 200-mile journey through the Canadian Rockies, when they are separated from the family friend who's taking care of them. With a lot of teamwork, ingenuity, and ...
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Night of the Twisters
: :Imagine your pets traveling 200 miles over mountainous terrain just to see you. What would they eat? What if a bear attacked? What if they ran into a porcupine? This Disney classic answers these questions and more with style and fun, in a story the whole family will enjoy. It tells the tale of two dogs and a cat that head for home on a 200-mile journey through the Canadian Rockies, when they are separated from the family friend who's taking care of them. With a lot of teamwork, ingenuity, and ...
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Incredible Journey
: :Imagine your pets traveling 200 miles over mountainous terrain just to see you. What would they eat? What if a bear attacked? What if they ran into a porcupine? This Disney classic answers these questions and more with style and fun, in a story the whole family will enjoy. It tells the tale of two dogs and a cat that head for home on a 200-mile journey through the Canadian Rockies, when they are separated from the family friend who's taking care of them. With a lot of teamwork, ingenuity, and ...
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Die Hard 2
: :Director Renny Harlin (Cutthroat Island) took the reins of this 1990 sequel, which places Bruce Willis's New York City cop character in harm's way again with a gaggle of terrorists. This time, Willis awaits his wife's arrival at Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C., when he gets wind of a plot to blow up the facility. Noisy, overbearing, and forgettable, the film has none of the purity of its predecessor's simple story; and it makes a huge miscalculation in allowing a terrible tragedy to occur rather than stretch out the tension. Where ...
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Touched by Love
: :Director Renny Harlin (Cutthroat Island) took the reins of this 1990 sequel, which places Bruce Willis's New York City cop character in harm's way again with a gaggle of terrorists. This time, Willis awaits his wife's arrival at Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C., when he gets wind of a plot to blow up the facility. Noisy, overbearing, and forgettable, the film has none of the purity of its predecessor's simple story; and it makes a huge miscalculation in allowing a terrible tragedy to occur rather than stretch out the tension. Where ...
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Let's Do It Again
: :Back in the day, when Richard Roundtree, Fred Williamson, Issac Hayes, and Pam Grier were stickin' it to the Man, Sidney Poitier and Bill Cosby collaborated on three buddy comedies that offered urban audiences an alternative to private dicks, sex machines, and bad muthas. The Uptown Saturday Nightstars re-team for an 'outtasite' scam involving hypnosis, a hopeless beanpole boxer (Jimmie Good Times Walker), and two rival kingpins. Though in fashion and patois Let's Do It Again is a candidate for the '70s time capsule, it does hold up better than most ...
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Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song
: :Raw, jagged, and explosively angry, Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song is a landmark in American independent cinema. Melvin Van Peebles directed, wrote, produced, edited, scored, and stars as Sweetback, a passive bouncer raised in a brothel. Shot guerrilla style on a starvation budget on the streets of Los Angeles, it's a violent tale of Sweetback's journey from passive acceptance to political awareness and active defiance. He becomes the target of a manhunt when he kills two cops who beat up a young black activist, and he bounces from hideout to hideout before ...
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Mardi Gras for the Devil
: :Raw, jagged, and explosively angry, Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song is a landmark in American independent cinema. Melvin Van Peebles directed, wrote, produced, edited, scored, and stars as Sweetback, a passive bouncer raised in a brothel. Shot guerrilla style on a starvation budget on the streets of Los Angeles, it's a violent tale of Sweetback's journey from passive acceptance to political awareness and active defiance. He becomes the target of a manhunt when he kills two cops who beat up a young black activist, and he bounces from hideout to hideout before ...
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Coming to America
: :Half of the characters in this 1988 John Landis potboiler seem to be played either by Eddie Murphy or costar Arsenio Hall, swaddled in elaborate Rick Baker makeup appliances that render them unrecognizable but also weirdly immobile. As a pampered African prince who journeys incognito to Queens, New York, to find a bride who will love him just for himself, Murphy manages to look smug and naive at the same time. There are enjoyable sequences of Murphy's Prince Akeem applying his lordly manner to his new job in a fast-food emporium, ...
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