Word: witting
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This nasty little film is veteran director Sidney Lumet's uncharacteristically amateurish attempt at medical satire. Its flaws lie not in the performances (the degree of talent represented in the picture is substantial), but in Steven S. Schwartz's misguided screenplay. Rather than tackle issues with wit and intelligence, Schwartz chooses to use insultingly phony characters to reveal the faults of the modern health care machine through their broadly drawn flaws. A painful exercise in unrealized potential...
...steals the show as the head of a truly diabolical New York law firm that snags Keanu Reeves' hotshot Souhtern lawyer and quickly enmeshes him in a half-kinky, half-campy world of sin and decadence. Borrowing from The Firm and Rosemary's Baby without quite matching either in wit or originality, it tends to flag whenever Pacino's off screen. Fortunately, he's never away for long and treats us to a devilishly good time with his rip-roaring over-the-topic antics...
Even after his years in a brutal South African penal system, the now gray and increasingly grandfatherly Mandela was endearing. We were glad to see that he had lost none of the sharp wit which we had come to expect after the famed Rivonia Trials which resulted in his life-sentence. Some of Mandela's statements during his American tour, however, were less endearing than others...
...Baily plies millions of viewers with his simple charm. When Brackett cuts abruptly to a commercial, both guitar and Baily are unceremoniously replaced with a garish sneaker advertisement. The spell is suddenly broken and the effect is undeniable: we realize we've been played, effortlessly manipulated by a half-wit and a cheesy soundtrack...
Safire responded to a quip from another veteran journalist, Shorenstein Center Director Marvin Kalb, who introduced him last night, with characteristic wit...