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Arts & Entertainment
With a cricket named Jiminy as his official conscience, Pinocchio, a puppet-come-to-life,
learns to be brave, truthful and unselfish in Walt Disney’s animated classic, “Pinocchio.”
Pinocchio revisits theaters
By Stacie Hakel
Staff Reporter
If you wished upon a star for the
return of the Academy Award win
ning “Pmocchio,” your wish has
come true.
This beautifully animated pic
ture with its vibrant colors has
re turned to theaters to capture view
ers’ hearts for years to come.
Producing his firs! fthn, the ever
popular “Show White and the
Seven Dwarfs” which was released
in 1937, did not inhibit the busy
Walt Disney from releasing
“Pmocchio” in 1940. Since then.
Disney Studios has practiced it*
wizardry at animation with movie*
such as, “Bambi,’’“Dumbo,’’“Fan
tasia,” and the latest “Beauty anc
the Beast.”
Introduced on a frst-ever Dolby
Stereo track, the film has been
enhanced not only in sound, but
visually. Taken frame by frame,
the film has been restored over a one
year period to up-grade the film qual
ity.
The quaint little village where the
story begins is the home of the wood
craftsman Geppetto (voice of Chris
tian Rub).
i
Narrated by (he small insect, Jiminy
Cricket (voice of Cliff Edwards),
Geppetto creates the puppet Pinocchio
while talking to his clulzy feline Figaro
and loving goldfish Cleo. After put
ting the finishing touches on his be
; loved puppet, he retires to bed with a
' wish that Pinocchio (voice of Dick
Jones) wiII come to Iifc and be his son.
After Geppetto falls asleep, The
Blue Fairy (voice of Evelyn Venable)
arrives and brings Pinocchio to life as
a puppet, who dubs Jiminy Cricket as
his conscience. As Geppetto awakes
lo the racket, the characters re
joice on this wish come true.
But Pinocchio cannot become a
real boy until he has proved to be
brave, truthful and unselfish.
The next day Pinocchio is sent
off to school, but is challenged
with aH sorts of temptations. Jimmy
Cricket attempts to stay with
Pinocchio and help him through
his adventures in hopes chat he wiH j
listen to him.
From the story of CarloCoModi, ,
‘Tmocchio” broke through the ani- j
malion barriers. With its extraor
dinary detail, imaginative design
and carefully picked vocals, the
story has become an all-time fa
vorite for people of all ages, and a
example for future film-makers.
The creative, fanciful, sweetly
musical production of “Pinocchio ’
is back and will remain alive in the
hearts of many, with its positive
feedback to always “wish upon a
star.”
Movie deals with death
Sheldonfilm searches for life’s answers
By Jill O’Brien
Staff Reporter
With elements of both pain and
humor, Jan Oxenberg’’s “Thank You
and Good Night” questions how to
deal with death.
The film searches for answers to
questions brought about by a Jewish
grandmother’s impending death.
After Mae Joffe is diagnosed with
diabetes and cancer, Granddaughter
Oxenberg captures interviews and
memories of Joffe on film. As
Oxenberg narrates incidents and gives
background information on the fam
ily, Grandmother Joffe comments,
sometimes cynically and sometimes
humorously.
mOVAfewy
Oxenberg’s childhood memory of
her grandmother is preserved and pre
sented by a life-size paperdoll figure
of Scowling Jan, “a rotten kid” who
makes her own observations about
life and death.
The appearance of Scowling Jan
remembering the times grandma took
her to movies or carnivals, serves lo
lighten the Oxcnbcrg’s morbid task of
documenting the illness and death of
a loved one.
The film, though painful at times
as Oxenberg’s mother and other fam
ily mcmbcrscomc lo grips with Joffe’s
death, is not without humor.
When Oxenberg asks her grand
mother if there is anything she
(Oxenberg) can do, grandma says,
“Yes... get married.” No, no, some
thing other than that, Oxenberg says.
“Get on a game show,” grandma an
swers.
Oxenberg’s imagination takes her
lo a game show where she is asked
questions about grandma’s life. The
prizes arc grandma’s possessions, her
collection of salt and pepper shakers,
her ceramic dogs and of course,
grandma’s color television.
Following grandma’s death,
Oxenberg’s mother suggests every
one make up a list of things lo do
during the next few days to help them
cope with her death.
“1 must have heard her wrong — I
made up a list of things I didn’t do,”
Oxenberg says.
Her list, compiled from guilt, in
cluded remorse for not helping
grandma build a shelf for her salt and
pepper shakers.
Although the scenes move
smoothly, at times the questions
Oxenberg asks about life and death
seem to drag on.
At one point, Oxenberg, so ob
sessed with making the film, pesters
grandma with questions. One touch
ing scene, bordering on annovance, is
when Oxenberg asks her frail, dying
grandmother, “Tell me, grandma, do
you have any words?”
“Yes,” grandma says, “I love you.”
As if that isn’t enough, Oxenberg
persists, “Do you have any other words
for prosperity? Any messages you
want to give out?”
Poor grandma strains to be heard
as she whispers, “Yes, I love you so
much.”
However, as the viewer begins to
wonder if grandma Joffe a redly a
victim of Oxenberg’s documentary,
grandma’s spunkiness is momentarily
revived when she tells Oxenberg,
That s about all lor tonight, and to
my public, I wish to say, thank you
and good night”
Following “Thank You and Good
Night” “Deadly Deception: General
Electric, Nuclear Weapons and Our
Environment," an academy award
winning short by Debra Chasnoff was
presented, documenting GE’s role in
building nuclear weapons.
In 19 at the Hanford, Wash,
nuclear piant, GE conducted secret
experiments, releasing radiation into
the air and water. ■
This 30-minute film opens with a
“tour” of the neighborhood that has
come to be knot* as Death Mile,”
where 27 of 28 families taffered in
curable cancers and birth defects.
Today, near Schenectady, N.Y. at
the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory,
GE employees continue to be negli
gently exposed to radiation and can
cer-causing asbestos.
The film, well-narrated and punc
tuated with interviews by GE victims
and employees, casts a gruesome
shadow over GE’s slogan, “We bring
good things to life.”
Both films are playing at the Mary
Riepma Ross theater in the Sheldon
An Gallery through Sunday.
Movie makes an ‘Unlawful Entry’ as a box office hit
“Unlawful Entry”
By Gerry Beltz
Staff Reporter
Once again Ray Liotia of
“Goodfcllas* and “Article 99” deliv
ers a terrific performance, this lime in
the spine-tingling thriller “Unlawful
Entry” (Lincoln 3).
Liotta plays Los Angeles police
man Pete Davis, who is called to the
home of Michael Carr (Kurt Russell
of“Backdraft”and“Tangoand Cash”)
and his wife Karen (Madeleine Stowe
from “Stakeout” and “The Last Of
The Mohicans”) after an attempted
burglary.
The Carrs arc very happy to meet
someone like Davis, who truly cares
about their safety and well-being.
Davis is also pleased with the Carrs’
hospitality because he has gotten used
to the altitude that it was “cops versus
everyone else”... except when one is
needed.
Eventually, the professional rela
tionship evolves into an overly-per
sonal one.
Davis’ previously-unknown
imbalanced behavior comes out, show
ing that he feels that Karen would be
safer with him than with her husband,
and that’s when the movie kicks into
high gear.
Directed by Jonathan Kaplan (“The
Accused”), the same type of suspense
and terror exists that was seen in
“Pacific Heights” and “Cape Fear,”
where the bad guys use the rules to
their advantage to make the good
guys powerless.
What is really scary about this is
that these arc realistic situations; things
like this could feasibly happen. Kaplan
builds up the suspense to a white
knuckle ending.
Russell and Stowe perform suffi
ciently in their roles as the couple
whose personal and professional lives
arc being lorn apart by Lioua, but it is
nothing overly spectacular.
It is Lioua that walks away with
this movie, as he is the star of every
scene he is in. 1
He has the perfect physical charac
teristics for this role; debonair smile,
“apple-pie” innocence in the eyes —
where in actual ity he is as ruthless and
brutal as some of the criminals he
arrests.
Lioua handles his two-faced char
acter with ease,one minute beating up
on an innocent bystander, and the
next minute talking to a group of
schoolchildren about being “a friend.”
Good stuff here, so check it out. It
may seem too real.