William Baldwin

His writing partner was the gleefully vulgar Joe Eszterhas, who clearly timed this dirty little movie to cash in on the post-Basic Instinct Sharon Stone's newly notorious nether regions (and reissued on DVD to cash in on Basic Instinct 2). A credible actress (see Casino), Stone has always seemed willing to sabotage her own reputation by pandering to our, um, basic instincts, especially when the heavy-breathing Eszterhas is pulling the strings. Remember, this is the guy who wrote Showgirls.

Continue reading: Sliver Review

Er, well, would you believe it's not that bad? Now that your expectations are appropriately middling, you might be able to appreciate Double Bang, a reasonably entertaining cop drama about an NYPD officer (William Baldwin) who gets all upset when he crooked partner (Adam Baldwin) ends up dead. Billy heads out on a vigilante mission, interrogating the usual suspects and dishing out his own brand of justice by turning the bad guys against their own.

Continue reading: Double Bang Review

It's Park Slope, Brooklyn, circa 1986, and the Berkman family is splitting up at the mid-swing of the pendulum of the adults' professional lives. On the downswing is the father, Bernard (Jeff Daniels), a professor and once-celebrated writer. Linney plays the mother, Joan, a blossoming writer coming out from under Bernard's shadow. He's been distant and awful, she's had affairs and been generally resentful, so now Bernard is moving to a falling-down house on the far side of Prospect Park while she gets to keep the gorgeous brownstone. The kids, of course, get screwed, with split custody keeping them in one house for half the week and the other house for the rest. Ensuring that things will stay nice and dysfunctional, the kids choose sides, with teenaged Walt (Jesse Eisenberg) sticking with Bernard and even picking up his mannerisms, while younger Frank (Owen Kline) throws in with Joan.

Continue reading: The Squid And The Whale Review

How many more movies do we need about a rough neighborhood full of lifelong friends hopelessly turned to crime or worse? The enormous catalog of such movies might dissuade a filmmaker from making yet another, but here we have it. Again. Five Irish kids in NYC's Hell's Kitchen make an overemotional pact over some stolen rings on an anonymous rooftop. With teary music. And slow motion. In the film's first scene.

Continue reading: One Eyed King Review