Notable movies for the week of May 18, 1990
The Guardian (R)
Director William Friedkin (The Exorcist) returns to the horror
genre with an inordinately earnest gothic chiller about an evil nanny
(Jenny Seagrove) and a baby-eating tree. It's a competent,
run-of-the-mill fright flick — not terrible, but not anything to get
excited (or nauseous) about, either. These days, serving up horror
without comedy seems a bit of a folly. B-
Longtime Companion (R)
Produced by American Playhouse, this courageous and deeply
affecting drama about the AIDS crisis is a lively ensemble movie — at
once funny and tragic-that focuses on the hip, upscale fringes of New
York gay life. While the film lacks the scale of a major Hollywood
production, one is carried away by the pungent writing, and by the
fact that AIDS is treated here with such unblinking frankness and
intelligence. B+
Spaced Invaders (PG)
Set on Halloween, this intentionally cheesy sci-fi parody doesn't offer enough variety among its human characters, but its animatronic
aliens are amusingly obnoxious. If only the movie had spent a little
less time making fun of dumb rednecks. C+
Wild Orchid (R)
Packaged by the same writer-producer team that did 9 1/2 Weeks,
this ludicrous soft-core fantasia wants to be a kind of Last Samba in
Rio, but it's really just a racy perfume commercial posing as a
movie. Mickey Rourke gives another soft, impassive performance as a
monosyllabic stud. He and newcomer Carre Otis don't actually bed down
until the final scene, rendering Wild Orchid the longest film ever
made about foreplay. D-
