Timothy Hutton, Molly Ringwald, Ali MacGraw, Chazz Palminteri, Stephen Baldwin, Richard Dreyfuss, Mickey Rourke, Jimmy Smits, Pierce Brosnan, the late John Candy and those animated "Land Before Time" dinosaurs are a few of the stars whose movies have bypassed theaters and gone straight to video.
Hutton, Dreyfuss, Smits and Palminteri all turn up in "The Last Word," in which Hutton plays a married journalist who falls for a stripper (Michelle Burke). The R-rated film also features Cybill Shepherd and Tony Goldwyn.Baldwin and Rourke play neurotic bank robbers with a Leopold-and-Loeb relationship in stage veteran Paul Warner's "Fall Time," a pretentious film noir about a coincidental collision between these professional criminals and three high-school graduates (Jason London, Jonah Blechman, David Arquette) in mid-1950s Wisconsin.
"Malicious" was supposed to be a big-screen comeback vehicle for Ringwald, who dropped out of teen movies, moved to Paris for several years and turned up again in the Stephen King miniseries, "The Stand." In a role reminiscent of Glenn Close in "Fatal Attraction," she plays the obsessed lover of a baseball star.
MacGraw, who also dropped out of movies for awhile, turns up again in "Natural Causes," a thriller about a political assassination attempt in Southeast Asia. Linda Purl plays a doctor whose mother (Janis Paige) is involved in smuggling Vietnamese nationals into the United States.
"Canadian Bacon" turns out to be a better movie than John Candy's last picture, "Wagons East!," which did get a national theatrical release shortly after his death last year. Despite some funny gags and a clever premise about the U.S. president (Alan Alda) invading Canada because he needs a boost in the polls and a fresh scapegoat, it's directed in ham-handed fashion by Michael Moore, whose talent for satirical documentaries ("Roger & Me," "TV Nation") doesn't translate to handling comedians in a fictional script.
But it's still more entertaining than "The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving," a 71-minute cartoon, priced at $20, that no doubt moved plenty of tapes off shelves during the holidays. Unfortunately, it's a dumbed-down sequel filled with stupefying songs, charmless animation and a dim story about baby dinosaurs solving a water shortage caused by a meteor.
Last year's direct-to-video cartoon, "Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure," sold four million copies. The enjoyable 1988 original, which introduced Little Foot, Cera and the other dinosaur tots, was created for theaters by Don Bluth, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg - none of them involved with the follow-up films.
Other sequels making their debuts on video: "Detonator II: Night Watch," based on an Alistair MacLean story and starring "GoldenEye's" Pierce Brosnan as a United Nations spy (it's a sequel to a made-for-cable movie), and "Witchboard the Possession," the third installment in the popular supernatural-thriller series that began with a 1985 theatrical film.
Also bypassing theaters:
- "Frankenstein Sings." Musical horror spoof based on the play, "I'm Sorry the Bridge Is Out, You'll Have to Spend the Night," with Candace Cameron and Ian Bohen as a young couple forced to seek shelter in an old dark house on a dark and stormy night. Anthony Crivello is Dracula and Jimmie Walker plays the manager of Dead Elvis.
- "The Nostradamus Kid." Australian film based on writer-director Bob Ellis' experiences with Seventh-day Adventists in the 1950s. Noah Taylor, the star of "Flirting," plays an oversexed teenager who meets an eloquent heretic who declares that the end of the world is near.
- "Born Wild." Brooke Shields plays a fledgling documentary filmmaker on assignment in Africa in this family movie, which won the top prize at the Santa Clarita Valley International Film Festival. Martin Sheen is her demanding boss, and conservationist John Varty plays himself.
- "Timemaster." Writer-director James Glickenhaus ("Shakedown," "The Exterminator") made this PG-13 science-fiction fantasy starring Noriyuki "Pat" Morita as a kindly inventor who used to recruit players for deadly virtual-reality games. Jesse Cameron-Glickenhaus and Veronica Cameron-Glickenhaus play the orphans he protects.
- "Twin Sitters." The bodybuilding Barbarian Brothers, Peter and David Paul, co-star in this family comedy about two waiters who want to open their own restaurant. They're hired to protect twin 10-year-old nephews (Christian and Joseph Cousins) who are being pursued by a criminal (George Lazenby, who was the first James Bond after Sean Connery).
- "From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler." Lauren Bacall stars in this 1995 remake of the 1973 Ingrid Bergman movie. Both are based on E.L. Konigsberg's prize-winning novel about a mischievous millionairess and two pre-teens who run away from home to live in the Metropolitan Museum.
- "Johnny & Clyde." A boy-and-his-dog story about a 10-year-old who manages to make an enemy of the school bully on his first day at a new school. Clyde is the dog he's forced to watch for a day.
- "Rent-a-Kid." Family comedy with Leslie Nielsen as a streetwise salesman who comes up with a plan for an orphanage to "rent the merchandise." Christopher Lloyd plays a high-rise doorman.
NEW RELEASE
VOODOO - Bless Corey Feldman's pointed little head. He's trying his best to rebuild his shattered career. He won't get a lot of mileage out of this horror flick, but to tell the truth, this voodoo-themed cheapie is better than average for its genre. The former child actor is a college boy who's mixed up with a fraternity whose pasty-skinned brothers are kissing cousins of the living dead. R, A-Pix.
- Max McQueen
(Cox News Service)