Komorowska, Liliana

Screamers

Her Alibi

To see why Tom Selleck's movie career has been a constant uphill battle, look no further than this tepid mystery/comedy from 1989. Selleck plays a successful mystery novelist who cures a persistent case of writer's block by visiting the courtroom trial of a young Romanian woman named Nina (played by late '80s supermodel Paulina Porizkova) who has been accused of murder. He supplies the alleged murderer with an alibi--she can claim she was having an affair with him at his Connecticut country home at the time of the murder--and then he brings her to Connecticut to make the alibi look legitimate. Is she in fact a killer? Did she serve poisoned casserole to a group of dinner guests? You'd have to be a major fan of Selleck or Porizkova to want to find out what happens next, because despite a few light moments of engaging comedy this is the kind of nonsensical fluff that quickly wears out its welcome. --Jeff Shannon

The Assignment

This intense thriller is a work of fiction with a factual basis. Aidan Quinn stars as Annibal Ramirez, an American naval officer with a striking resemblance to real-life international terrorist Carlos "the Jackal" Sanchez, the scourge of innocent people all over the world in the 1970s and '80s. Mistaken for Sanchez by the Israeli Mossad, Ramirez is arrested but subsequently recruited by the Mossad and the CIA to pose as Sanchez and set him up as a traitor to his underwriters. Ramirez leaves his family, receives training in all aspects of Sanchez's life, and is pulled into the netherworld of terrorism and espionage. Director Christian Duguay (Screamers) wisely emphasizes character growth over obligatory action, drawing compelling portraits of an American intelligence official (Donald Sutherland) preoccupied with Sanchez, his Israeli counterpart (Ben Kingsley), and Ramirez himself, a man whose identity has merged with a monster's. --Tom Keogh

The Art of War

The Art of War is the first action movie with a hero who works for the United Nations--the U.N. Covert Operations Unit, to be specific. Who knew there was such a thing? Wesley Snipes plays Shaw, their top operative, who's unafraid of dropping several stories from one ledge of a skyscraper to another. When the Chinese ambassador is assassinated, it threatens the stability of an impending trade agreement that the secretary-general (played by Donald Sutherland) has worked so hard to achieve. Shaw gets arrested for the assassination, but who's really responsible? Is it the wily Chinese capitalist? A seemingly affable FBI agent? Only a lovely U.N. interpreter (Marie Matiko) believes he's innocent, especially when someone tries to knock her off and Shaw is the only person she can turn to... well, you get the idea. The script is neither original nor comprehensible, but that's not why you'd want to watch a movie like The Art of War--it's the action. And the action is pretty good, particularly earlier on when the confusions of the plot don't matter as much. Michael Biehn (The Terminator, The Rock) does a serviceable job as one of Shaw's associates, Anne Archer (Fatal Attraction, Clear and Present Danger) tries to seem complicated as the head of the Covert Operations Unit, and Maury Chaykin (The Mask of Zorro, Devil in a Blue Dress) is dependable as ever as the FBI guy. --Bret Fetzer

While on assignment during a UN trade meeting, the Ambassador to China is suddenly killed by an assassin's bullet. Unable to speak of his true identity, top agent Neil Shaw has been set-up for the murder and on the run to prove his innocence.

Funky Monkey

A CIA agent (Modine) and Clemens, a super intelligent chimp trained in martial arts, break out of a secret testing lab which turns primates into soldiers. With evil henchmen on their trail they go into hiding in the house of a local boy and his mother. Clemens is captured and the new friends team up to attempt a daring rescue. With hilarious animal antics and exciting action, Funky Monkey is fun the whole family can enjoy.

Extreme Ops

When an extreme-sports filmmaking team sets out to make a commercial featuring a gold-medal skier outrunning an avalanche, they run afoul of a Serbian war criminal hiding out in a mountain resort. So it's snowboards vs. bullets on steep slopes of snow--and if that's your thing, Extreme Ops is for you. There are also subplots about the high-class skier (Bridgette Wilson-Sampras, House on Haunted Hill) trying to prove herself with the rough-and-tumble snowboard scamps, and various romantic sparks flying, but the only real point to this movie is lengthy shots of stuntpeople zipping down the mountainsides. Though it could stand to have less plot and more action, there's a good dose of spectacle nonetheless. Rufus Sewell (Dark City), Devon Sawa (Final Destination), and the cast do a serviceable job, but poor Brit Rupert Graves (excellent in Mrs. Dalloway) was forced to act through a terrible American accent. --Bret Fetzer

The Royal Scandal

Based on Arthur Conan Doyle's First Sherlock Holmes Story.

The Sherlock Holmes Collection

The Bottle

The Assignment