Word: broderick
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...years ago, America's favorite man-child was Matthew Broderick, star of WarGames in Hollywood and Brighton Beach Memoirs on Broadway. Today Michael J. Fox holds the peach-fuzz prize. His first big movie, Back to the Future, was the box-office champ of 1985; his sitcom, Family Ties, is now the second most viewed show in Nielsen history. These two attractive actors have confronted the "cute" factor in different ways. Broderick goes off-Broadway between film gigs and appears eager to tackle adult roles that will challenge him and his fans. Fox, though, seems to enjoy being...
...Broderick had a smarter idea for expanding his career horizons: get in a good movie. Project X is the best thriller about monkeys since the original King Kong and a touching parable about parenting to boot. In a Wisconsin research lab, Teri MacDonald (Helen Hunt) is teaching sign language to her prize pupil, a chimpanzee named Virgil (beautifully played -- no kidding -- by a chimp named Willie). After two years, Virgil is shipped to an Air Force base in Florida for a top-secret experiment shepherded by Jimmy Garrett (Broderick), a bright, goof-off airman who develops the same parental bond...
...Broderick works best as a culture buzzard, circling scenes of death and derangement, identifying choice morsels by stripe and cry. His range includes a wide variety of wildlife: a condemned murderer named Germany Baker, a radical feminist with a wardrobe of obscene T shirts, an ambitious, self- absorbed television newswoman, black and Hispanic militants, limousine , liberals and Fritz Finn, President of the U.S., who has had an affair with Broderick's late sister. Jack's brother Augustine, affectionately known throughout the world as Bro, is a Benedictine priest with 14 honorary degrees, a 43-line entry...
...Leah's splashy assassinations at the hands of a crazed Viet Nam veteran are a navigational point in Broderick's looping narrative. His delivery owes something to Raymond Chandler, but rather than plot there is a proliferation of character and incident that builds to an ugly and violent mood. Dunne is a masterly setter of scenes and a merciless satirist, whether the target is an incontinent captain of industry or a criminal who has been packaged as a black revolutionary and needs an investment adviser: "The Merc and I were thinking more along the lines of Ornstein and Shay...
...agent: "You can say what you want about communism, but those boys know how to structure a deal." A caterer on the subject of specialty bar mitzvahs: " 'Mr. Wonderful' is one of our biggest themes . . . Of the traditional variety. Top hat, white gloves." There are even old jokes. Broderick: "What's real money to the rich? she would ask. Usually in bed. A dollar ninety-eight, I would say. Talk of money always made me uncomfortable...