Word: scripted
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Wood script, by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski (based on Rudolph Grey's excellent 1992 biography, Nightmare of Terror), posits Wood as a classic American optimist, a Capraesque hero with little to be optimistic about, since he was also a classic American loser. That's a fine start, but the film then marches in staid chronological order: Ed made this bad film, then this one, then a third. It focuses on the director's curious cast of hangers-on (played here by Bill Murray, Jeffrey Jones, Lisa Marie and others). They were all, as Wood's psychic sidekick Criswell intones...
...Steve has instead is awful, desperate Al (Brooks is, of course, a peerless portrayer of all the great American falsities -- piety, humility and the good cheer with which we habitually mask desperation). Steve also has his own violent innocence, which tests the limits of Al's smarminess hilariously. The script, by Brooks, Andrew Bergman and Monica Johnson, draws a specific parallel between Steve and another primitive creature imported to amuse jaded New Yorkers -- King Kong -- and it is a measure of director Michael Ritchie's deftness that he gets the right kind of laughs from the device. Ritchie avoids...
However, the script that connects these excerpts together struggles to justify its own presence in the structure of the play. Although necessary for setting the chronology of excerpts, the script cannot adequately compete with the eloquence of Wilde's own words. True, Wilde did lead an interesting, often humorous, personal life, but simply retelling the major points does not complete the script...
Rather than enhancing the effect and meaning of Wilde's works, the script functions all too often as an inconsequential filler between excerpts that does little to maintain the cohesiveness of the play...
...guess the rest before it happens, since Denis O'Neill's script is rudimentary. Wade soon proves to be a great deal less than he seems (he and Terry are grand larcenists on the wilderness lam). They need Gail's skill and bravery to get them through the Gauntlet (hushed tones whenever it's mentioned) -- a nasty set of falls, rapids and whirlpools. Tom takes a little ) more time to prove that he is a great deal more than he seems, a tenacious defender of (shall we say) family values...