Wednesday, January 29, 1992 — Norih Shore News - 2%

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FOOTWEAR FOR THE
ENTIRE FAMILY

Grand illusions

Ensemble cast terrific in Lawrence Kasdan’s
ambitious look at contemporary American life

Grand Canyon * * % (20th Century Fux) Rated Mature (at a

Cineplex Odeon cinema near you)

so fascinating, openings are cut in fences at construc-

- UNNY THING about big holes in the ground. They're

tion sit

es so you can gaze at them. If that’s the atten-

tion the garden variety man-made pits command, imagine
the cosmic significance of the globe’s biggest or ifice, the

Grand Canyon.

Meanwhile, in that cultural
void, Los Angeles, Mack (Kevin
Kline) has found a friend who will
give his life purpose. When Simon
(Danny Glover) appears, Mack is
having car troubie ina
neighborhood where kids don’t
just cruise at night — they prey.

One narrow escape from a gang
later, a grateful Mack begins med-
dling to improve Simon's lifestyle.
Not content to simply matchmake
the likable philosopher with the
only other black he knows, Jane
(Alfre Woodard), Mack puts
Simon's sister into a safer
neighborhood where door-to-door
salesmen don’t peddle children’s
funeral insurance.

Suddenly, other miracles begin
popping up.

Mack’s wife, Claire (Mary
McDonnell), finds an abandoned
baby and a cure for her empty-
nest syndrome on the heels of
their teenage son’s imminent
departure. ..

And Mack's long-time friend,
Davis (Steve Martin), is suddenly
re-examining his career as a direc-
tor of mega-budget splatter films.
Sure, psychos wielding major fire-
power are guaranteed box office,
but is that viscera on display really
art?

Director Lawrence Kasdan has

Mon-Sat.
9:30-6:00pm

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742 Westview Shopping Centre, North Van.

made that decisien.

Not content with the pure enter-
tainment of his genre films like
Body Heat and Silverado, he has
moved on to more personal vi-
sions in The Big Chill, The Ac-
cidental Tourist and now Grand
Canyon.

The movie is a laudably am-
bitious lock at urban violence and
individual kindness, the gulfs de-
tween rich and poor, black and
white, children and parents and
how bridges are built by random,
or perhaps prede*ermined, events.

But Kasdan and his wife, Meg,
have written a movie with enough
strange events and metaphors
about the Grand Canyon to fill
that yawning cavity.

With earthquakes, shootings and
heart attacks randomly looming,

986-1341

it’s sometimes hard to tell if we're
experiencing one of the charac-
ter’s numerous dreams or an
overactive script.

Fortunately, the humor is more
successful and the ensemble cast
is terrific, expecially Giover, Kline
and McDonnell. There are also
some very evocative shats of
police helicopters circling tike
vultures over nighttime L.A.

In the end, though, Grand Can-
yon is better as a landmark than a
movie.

Body Heat * % * 32 (Warner
Home Video) Rated R

Kasdan’s debut film is more than
a stylish tip of the fedora to the
film noire genze, it’s a clever up-
dating of the torrid classic Double
Indemnity.

William Hurt is a not-so-bright
lawyer who helns gorgeous
Kathleen Turner (in her debut)
bump off her inconvenient hus-
band. The spellbinding mood of
heat, sex and mystery is expertly
handed by Kasdan and his
murderous twists and turns keep
right up to the last shot as the
perfect crime pays off ... or does
it?

Showtime Hotlines:

Famous Players 681-4255

Cineplex Odeon 687-1515

= 802

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