Sophisticated but smug comedy of midlife crisis, a not-too-far-from-the-mainstream directorial debut for painter David Salle, about a small-scale wheeler-dealer from provincial Florida who, under the spell of self-help self-hypnosis, wants to leave his mark on the world, wants to do something of permanent value, wants specifically to make a film adaptation of an Ayn Rand-ish novel by a new-age TV psychobabbler. (The conversing between elephantine tubas and tinkly piano in the opening theme is a bad sign, and the casting of Dennis Hopper as the TV guru is a worse one.) Because the man in crisis is Griffin Dunne, his increasingly weird and dangerous escapades call to mind Martin Scorsese's After Hours -- and Scorsese himself is here in the role of executive producer, as well as in the bit-part of an IRS pencil-pusher, to encourage the comparison. Christopher Walken and John Turturro are certainly convincingly weird as, respectively, a shady New York businessman and a shadier New York businessman. A high point: Walken's up-tempo, tap-dancing rendition of "Red River Valley" at a Japanese restaurant. With Illeana Douglas, Rosanna Arquette, Ethan Hawke. (1995) — Duncan Shepherd
This movie is not currently in theaters.