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Lost Highway (1997, 135 min, R) *** - Directed by David Lynch, starring Bill Pullman, Patricia Arquette, Baltazar Getty, and Robert Blake. No, it doesn’t make a bit of sense, but try to think of it like you’re having someone else’s really weird dream. David Lynch—America’s great cultivator of the bizarre unconscious—hypnotically directs a “story” of lookalike women (Arquette), a saxophone player (Pullman) haunted by images of murder, a mob boss (Robert Loggia), shapeshifting, and a dude with no eyebrows (Blake). The movie seems to end where it began, is not above poking fun at it’s own weirdness, and is kind of a warm-up for Lynch’s “Mulholland Drive,” often claimed as his best film.
Lost in Space *1/2 (1998, 130 min, PG13) – Directed by Stephen Hopkins, starring Gary Oldman, William Hurt, and Heather Graham. Even Gary Oldman’s overacting and a superfluous shot of Heather Graham bending over can’t save this rambling and disjointed adaptation of the sci-fi TV show. A scientist, his family, and a madman on a spaceship are lost far, far from home. A chronic sufferer of committee writing, “Lost in Space” succeeds in being both stupid and hard to follow.
The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1996, 129 min, PG13) ** - Directed by Steven Spielberg, starring Jeff Goldblum and Julianne Moore. Lusterless re-hash sequel to the enormously successful “Jurassic Park” pits another group of researchers against dinosaurs on a secret island. The effects are good and Goldblum is hilariously creepy, but the movie has no overwhelming need to exist. Often called Spielberg’s weakest film.
Love Actually (2003, 135 min, R) *** - Directed by Richard Curtis, starring Bill Nighy, Hugh Grant, Colin Firth, and Laura Linney. Infectiously cheerful and charming comedy about a dozen different London romances in the weeks leading up to Christmas, including the newly-elected prime minister (Grant). Scenes are stolen right and left by a washed-up and self-pitying rockstar (Nighy). The work of writer-director Curtis, of “Bridget Jones” and “Black Adder” fame, who seems to create full-formed, flawed, and fleshed-out characters instantaneously.
Lovely and Amazing (2002, 89 min, R) ***1/2 – Directed by Nicole Holofcener, starring Catherine Keener, Brenda Blethyn, and Emily Mortimer. Two grown sisters, one a struggling artist (Keener) and the other a struggling actress (Mortimer), wonder what neuroses their mother (Blethyn) has passed onto them as she undergoes liposuction. This is an insightful, mostly light-hearted independent film about the little things we do to make other people feel bad without even knowing it.
Lawrence of Arabia (1962, 227 min, PG) **** – Directed by David Lean, starring Peter O’Toole, Alec Guinness, and Omar Sharif. The greatest of all big-budget historical epics (barring perhaps Kurosawa’s “Seven Samurai”) is about a man who loses himself in the desert in the heat of the First World War and comes out, not quite a hero, but certainly something. The high watermark for films that strive to capture both the enormous and the minute. Vast, engrossing, hypnotic—one does not watch “Lawrence of Arabia,” one is consumed by it. Oscars include Best Picture, Director, and Cinematography; 2002 “Sight & Sound” Top Ten Films of All Time; #5 on AFI’s Top 100 American Films.
The Last Samurai (2003, 154 min, R) ***1/2 – Directed by Edward Zwick, starring Tom Cruise and Ken Watanabe. An American arms dealer (Cruise) sent to modernize Japan’s army in 1876 finds himself siding with a samurai rebellion and the honor of its leader (Watanabe). Director Zwick’s admirably ambitious film doesn’t quite live up to all its potential, but it is still a gripping adventure—and splendid production—about one way of life fighting to span the bridge from one epoch to the next. Oscar nominations include Supporting Actor Watanabe, Costume Design, and Art Direction.
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003, 110 min, PG13) ** - Directed by Stephen Norrington, starring Sean Connery and Peta Wilson. Routine, joyless, and uninspired big-budget special effects extravaganza collects all the major characters of middle-to-late 19th century fiction—Alan Quatermain, Dr. Jekyll, Dorian Gray, Tom Sawyer, etc.—and pits them against the forces of evil. The cast has no chemistry and the movie fails to find any humor in how inane it is, the way a good action movie like “Hellboy” might.
Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels (1998, 105 min, R) *** - Directed & written by Guy Ritchie, starring Jason Flemyng, Vinnie Jones, and Sting. One of the more entertaining “Pulp Fiction” imitators features a swarm of gangsters, gamblers, bar owners, tough guys, hit men, and drug dealers in a maze of interlocking stories set in a wonderfully dirty London. Four friends try to pull a scam that doesn’t work; hijinks and hilarity ensue. The movie succeeds because of its lighthearted, cynical tone, and not because we can possibly follow all that’s going on or really care about the characters involved.
Lone Star (1996, 135 min, R) ***1/2 – Directed & written by John Sayles, starring Chris Cooper, Matthew McConaghey, Kris Kristofferson, Joe Morton, and Elizabeth Pena. A sprawling, large-canvas murder mystery that seems to include every resident of a Texas border town over two generations. A lonely sheriff (Cooper) investigates a conspiracy of silence surrounding a decades-old murder that may connect to his own late father (McConaghey). Numerous tangents and subplot include the sheriff’s boyhood flame (Pena), the new commander at the army base (Morton), and much examination of race relations and illegal immigration.
The Longest Day (1962, 175 min, B&W, PG) **** - starring Richard Burton, Henry Fonda, and John Wayne. Featuring an all-star cast and based on the book by Cornelius Ryan, this old school WW2 epic sees the invasion of Normandy through German, French, American, and British eyes, from the lowliest, misplaced privates to the most powerful and responsible generals. It may lack the gore-and-bones modern audiences expect from war movies, but it is still a stirring, detailed, and engrossing depiction, painted on an enormous canvas. Oscar nominations include Best Picture.
The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996, 120 min, R) ** – Directed by Renny Harlin, starring Geena Davis and Samuel L. Jackson. Good-looking action picture that left me feeling indifferent; the stunts are decent but, aside from a few decent one-liners, I couldn’t work up much feeling for anyone involved or what would happen to them next. In a knockoff of “The Bourne Identity,” a woman (Davis) with amnesia starts a new-life as a small town school teacher only to discover agents with snazzy jackets are trying to kill her—and she knows how to kill them back. She enlists a wisecracking PI (Jackson) who contributes precisely nothing to the movie except wisecracks.