FILM / Critical Round-up

CITY OF JOY

'It brims with respect for the energy and resourcefulness of her (India) people, embracing the seething contradictions of the sub-continent with confidence and courage . . . So hats off, and maybe even turbans too.' Hugo Davenport, The Daily Telegraph

'City of Joy pays more attention to the box office than any previous Joffe film. Swayze turns out to be more believable than you expect, but his pin-up image remains a hurdle. (It) works best when the plot mechanism is left idling, and words are spared the burden of being meaningful.' Geoff Brown, The Times.

BITTER MOON

'I found this film monstrously funny: a Ship of Fools hijacked by the Marquis De Sade, a Poseiden Adventure turned turtle from upright family entertainment to murky erotic adventurism. There is something perversely splendid about a movie that keeps gazumping its own excesses.' Nigel Andrews, The Financial Times.

'Polanski's handling leaves us panting for cinematic excitement. As the ship noses through endless seas, never reaching any port, it seems the perfect symbol for a film, and a career, headed nowhere.' Geoff Brown, The Times.

CARRY ON COLUMBUS

'This voyage hardly sets sail before its crew . . . is attacked by savage comparisons with the old Carry Ons and by man-eating memories of Kenneth Williams, Sid James and Co.' Nigel Andrews, The Financial Times.

'The film doesn't so much fill the sails with gales of laughter as languish in the doldrums of fitful titters. When it can find the titters to fit, that is.' Hugo Davenport, The Daily Telegraph.

'A shadow of what it might have been.' Derek Malcolm, The Guardian.