Reviews

An amazingly funny satire that takes more than its share of potshots at Minnesota. But that's to be expected...after all, we are the state that elected a professional wrestler as our governor. Kirsten Dunst at her best...the one teen actress who's intelligent enough to really understand the comedy she does, both here and in "Dick".

A really hilarious film satirizing beauty pageants and small-town life. Some Minnesotans are bound to be offended (many still haven't recovered from "Fargo" yet) but they shouldn't be. After all, we did elect a professional wrestler as our governor.

Brilliant British TV series starring George Cole as Arthur Daley, a shady businessman and used-car dealer on London's "alternate economy". Dennis Waterman is Terry McCann, Daley's business associate and bodyguard, or "minder", hence the title. The show ran for several years and usually centered on Arthur hatching some half-baked scheme, only to escape just a half-step ahead of the police or British mobsters. Patrick Malahide played Det. Sgt. Chisholm, a low-rent Javert who always seemed to let Arthur and Terry slip through his fingers.

The film makes too much of Walsingham. Anybody with even an elementary knowledge of the Elizabethan era knows that the man behind Elizabeth's success was Sir William Cecil, aka Lord Burghley. Odd that he should have been played by Sir Richard Attenborough instead of a much younger actor, as Cecil was only in his late thirties when Elizabeth came to the throne.

I rented this film last week after seeing it once 27 years ago, and I was pleasantly surprised at how much I remembered, scenes such as the cello-recorder duel/duet, the cemetery, the dance, and the seaside trip. And, of course, Tracy Hyde, who was the real heart of the film. This picture should resonate with anybody who fondly (or not so fondly) remembers their early years and very first love.