NOW AND THEN
A film review by Ben Hoffman
Copyright 1995 Ben Hoffman
In a few respects, NOW AND THEN, is much like Rob Reiner's STAND BY ME. It is about four youngsters (age twelve) and their friendship. The big excitement is that they are seeking to find out how Johnny, a friend their age, died. The part I enjoyed was that it was about girls whereas STAND BY ME was about boys. For a change, the girls are given the chance to show they can act.
Sadly, unlike the excellent STAND BY ME, not much else good can be said about this film. The girls meet at night at the cemetery where the boy Johnny is buried. This, in itself, is an unlikely scenario. I could be wrong but it strikes me as very contrived to have the girls visit a cemetery at night. There they pledge to always be friends and never lose track of each other.
The film's title derives from the story about how the young girls were THEN and what they turn out to be NOW. Samantha as a young girl is played by Gaby Hoffmann with Demi Moore as the adult, a novelist. Teeny is played by Thora Birch and Melanie Griffith who becomes a successful movie actress. Christina DeWitt is played by Ashleigh Aston Moore and Rita Wilson who becomes a housewife and has a child. Christina Ricci and Rosie O'Donnell star as Roberta who becomes a doctor.
Flashbacks keep us informed about the "Then" and the "Now" but nothing very interesting happens in the film. The fine cast, all good actors, are wasted on an uninteresting story where you find that you do not really care what happens to them. While some of the kids look like they could look something like the grownups they are supposed to eventually be, Christina Ricci looks nothing like Rosie O'Donnell. The big news is that Demi Moore is never nude in the film. Is that a first or isn't it?
Directed by Lesli Linka Glatter
2 Bytes
4 Bytes = Superb
3 Bytes = Too good to be missed.
2 Bytes = So so.
1 Byte = Save your money.
-- Ben Hoffman
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews