This is a pretty good rendition of the famous H.G. Wells story. Burt Lancaster plays the mad scientist who oversees an island where he experiments on animals trying to make them human-like; Michael York is the unfortunate man who finds himself stranded on said island. Both of them are well-cast in their roles and are well matched in their battle of wills, but what is particularly fascinating in the film is the believable depictions of the human-animal hybrids.     

I find John Ritter exceptionally likable and have an affinity for his role as Jack Tripper. I keep trying his films hoping to find one that lives up to his promise. This really isn’t it. After being caught cheating on his mistress and wife, his life spirals into drinking and more womanizing. I enjoyed seeing Zap from American Gladiators in an acting role and there is a rather amusing scene involving glow-in-the-dark condoms, but the rest is sadly John Ritter as a man-child regretting what he ruined.

I really enjoy the portrayal of the mind-numbingness of office drudgery at a credit company and the bonding between the four female temps who find themselves working there. It’s filled with 1990s indie flair. Parker Posey, Toni Collette, Lisa Kudrow, and Alanna Ubach are perfect in each of their roles inside this quartet. There is a realness to the two aspects of the story, especially that it doesn’t shirk from also portraying the cruelty that can creep up in office culture and female relationships.

I went into this with fair warning, but it’s sad with the cast it has, that this film about the behind the scene antics at a daytime soap opera is not good. Sally Field is the aging actor worried about keeping her job, while producer Robert Downey Jr. and his girlfriend Cathy Moriarty connive to get her kicked off the show. The whole thing is way over the top, particularly the writing, acting, neon sets, and everything. Whoopi Goldberg has the only bit of sanity in the whole production and remains its bright spot.

An epic in duration and time portrayed, Once Upon a Time in America portrays the interactions between a quintet of gangsters and sets up a mystery that spans the decades. As distasteful as I find the glorification of children as low level gangsters, I enjoyed the clever and intriguing time transitions during the first part of the film and also the bonding and camaraderie of the characters as young boys. When they reach adulthood is where the story loses me, every action made by the characters is grosser than the last and the mystery unveils to an unsatisfying end. Robert De Niro and James Wood as the leaders of the bunch have nothing but disdain for each other as adults and brutalize the women in their lives as if to one up each other. It’s almost a shame that the cinematography is so gorgeous and Ennio Morricone’s score is as beautiful as always.