COMING SOON:

May 19 -- Star Wars: Episode I-The Phantom Menace

May 21 -- Endurance, The Love Letter, Lovers of the Arctic Circle, The Castle

May 28 -- The 13th Floor, This Is My Father, The Swindle, Notting Hill

OPENING:

Black Mask -- Lewis & Clark, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center, Varsity

The Empty Mirror -- Metro

A Midsummer Night's Dream -- Factoria, Guild 45th, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center

Tea With Mussolini -- Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11, Seven Gables

Trippin' -- Grand Alderwood, Pacific Place 11, Southcenter

REPERTORY & REVIVAL:

12 Monkeys -- Egyptian

Blade Runner -- Cinerama

Children of the Camps -- North Seattle Community College

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas -- Egyptian

FRENCH FILM NOIR -- Seattle Art Museum

Jazz on a Summer's Day -- Little Theater

Nelly and Monsieur Arnaud -- Seattle Art Museum

Radley Metzger's Erotica -- Grand Illusion

ROBERT BRESSON FILM SERIES -- Grand Illusion

Super 8 Films -- Alibi Room

Tangos: The Exile of Gardel -- Little Theater

Wife To Be Sacrificed -- Grand Illusion

10 Things I Hate About You -- High school remake of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew.

12 Monkeys -- Terry Gilliam's futuristic fantasy with Bruce Willis as (what else?) an action hero battling a deadly, worldwide virus with co-stud Brad Pitt. Thurs May 13 at 7. Egyptian

Alaska: Spirit of the Wild -- More of a nature documentary than a ghost story. Omnidome

Analyze This -- Paul Vitti (Robert DeNiro) is a New York mobster with problems: the pressure is killing him! With a big meeting of all the New York families coming up, he needs to get rid of his anxiety about [insert Italian stereotype here]. Enter Ben Sobel (Billy Crystal), a Jewish family therapist with [insert Jewish stereotype here]. Vitti wants Sobel to help him. Sobel just wants Vitti to leave him alone. What are they both to do? Analyze This is a [insert sarcastic film reviewer comment here], with a few laughs, but never anything special. Basically, it's exactly what you'd expect. (Bradley Steinbacher) Grand Alderwood, Metro, Pacific Place 11

Black Mask -- Jet Li stars in this wacky, action romp. Lewis & Clark, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center, Varsity

Blade Runner -- Nothing like playing an old favorite to break in a new theater. Try this sci-fi film, coming straight from it's 15th appearance on this year's Egyptian calendar. Cinerama

Children of the Camps -- An hour-long documentary about the 120,000 Japanese-Americans who were forced into internment camps throughout the United States during WWII. Over half of those in the camps were children. This film examines one of the lowest (and most embarrassing) points of U.S. Government history. Sat May 22 at 1, FREE. Baxter Student Center. North Seattle Community College

Cookie's Fortune -- Robert Altman has taken a slight but enjoyable story and applied his familiar techniques of oblique angles, ragged narration, and busy ensemble casts. A suicide is covered up, and a man is imprisoned because of it. Other stories play out about the small town of Holly Springs. Plot, however, is not the main concern of the film. If you want them, there are plenty of thoughtful, even rueful, themes floating around the movie: idealized, hypocritical notions of the past and of honor, and the way family secrets hurt the person keeping them even more than the person who ferrets them out. When I think of this film, though, I keep coming back not to any ideas, but to its very last shot. Altman movies end with death so often it's practically a cliché, but here, after everything gets sorted out without too much harm to anyone, there's just a long, peaceful look at a lake, with fishing lines bobbing gently. As I said before, relaxed and mellow. Add to that: masterly. (Bruce Reid) Grand Alderwood, Metro, Uptown

* The Dreamlife of Angels -- Isa (Elodie Bouchez) is a 20-year-old drifter, traveling from town to town picking up odd jobs and selling postcards that she makes out of magazine pictures. At a factory job she meets Marie (Natacha Regnier), a girl living alone who's about her age. The girls are opposites -- Isa disarms people with her smile, while Marie puts people off with a frown -- and they end up complementing each other perfectly. Being a French film, the story has a loose, life-like, "unstructured" structure, which I have to admit is refreshing after so many canned Hollywood films. Characters take center stage here, and they are well-rounded enough to hold everything together. (Andy Spletzer) Broadway Market

Edge of Seventeen -- After-school special meets soft-core porn in this coming-of-gayness sentiment-fest. Set in 1984, when androgynous glam rock made it OK to look gay without actually being gay, Seventeen follows Eric Hunter (Chris Stafford) through confused affection for his female best friend Maggie (Tina Holmes) to confused attraction to summer job co-worker Rod (Andersen Gabrych). As Eric's hair becomes blonder and his clothes become glitzier, Maggie becomes whinier and mom casts suspicious looks. Writer Todd Stephens doesn't give in to an easy ending, which is the saving grace of this otherwise bland film (well, that and the sex scenes). (Traci Vogel) Broadway Market

* Election -- This brilliant dark comedy -- about an unctuous overachiever's campaign for student council president, and the high school teacher determined to foil her -- will undoubtedly be seen by many as the prosaic cousin of Rushmore. But where that film's dazzling style spoke primarily of its maker's skill and ambition, Election's style serves to plunge us completely into its characters' tiny, highly-charged world, rendering pathetic human pettiness on a nearly operatic scale. Director/co-writer Alexander Payne has infused his miniature world with enormous creativity and meticulous attention to detail: every character is unnervingly humane, the supporting cast is uniformly perfect, and you've never seen a contemporary high school so uncannily rendered. As the charmingly atrocious Tracy Flick, Reese Witherspoon gives an indelible performance; finally she has a role to compete with her star-making turn in the little-seen Freeway. And Matthew Broderick lays the ghost of Ferris Bueller to rest once and for all with his lovely portrayal of Tracy's beleaguered, would-be nemesis. (David Schmader) Factoria, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center

The Empty Mirror -- Hitler imagines his life as though he were in some off-off-off Broadway play. Metro

Entrapment -- Sean Connery is an ass man. His "character" spends the whole movie looking at the ass of Catherine Zeta-Jones (The Mask of Zorro). Not that there's anything better to do. Entrapment is a high-tech crime thriller chock full of double-crosses but short on thrills. Everybody's a master thief or a federal agent... or both! The information for every crime is flawless, the gadgets never fail, nothing ever goes wrong. Boring! Connery coasts through his role, as does Ving Rhames, but Zeta-Jones turns out to be a real disappointment. How can she be a master thief if she's so prone to temper tantrums and breakdowns? She does have a nice ass, though. (Andy Spletzer) Factoria, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Northgate, Redmond Town Center

The Eruption of Mount St. Helens -- The mountain blew up in 1980, and has been blowing up on film ever since. Omnidome

Everest -- The first IMAX footage ever shot on top of the world. Pacific Science Center

* eXistenZ -- Like all the best science fiction, eXistenZ seems to be taking place about five minutes from now. Cronenberg's is a world where virtual reality games have become so commonplace that most people think nothing of drilling a "bioport" directly into their spine in order to plug in. The games run off of a fleshy, biomechanical pod, and once a game starts, the player becomes a cast member in an artificial world where everything looks and feels "real," where some actions are preprogrammed and others are not. The biggest celebrities of the day are game designers, and none is bigger or more brilliant than the reclusive Allegra Geller (Jennifer Jason Leigh), whose latest, greatest achievement, eXistenZ, has inspired somebody to put a death sentence on her head. David Cronenberg is working from his first original script since Videodrome, and what he's come up with is, in some ways, a revisitation to that movie's themes, and this is one of the wittiest, most perceptive movies about movies and how we think they affect us since Videodrome. (Bruce Reid) Pacific Place 11, Varsity

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas -- Terry Gilliam's underrated film of Hunter S. Thompson's "autobiographical" book. Lotsa drugs and alcohol, with a strong undercurrent of sadness and regret. Thurs May 13 at 4:40, 9:25. (Andy Spletzer) Egyptian

Forces of Nature -- Ben (Ben Affleck) is trying to get to Georgia for his wedding. On the plane he meets Sarah (Sandra Bullock), a wild, bewitching woman with heavy eye-liner and streaks in her hair. The plane crashes and the two of them are forced to go by land, trapped together as one "hilarious" mishap after another thwarts their journey. Along the way, they sorta fall in love, but not really. Forces of Nature is every pathetic man's fantasy, not a female empowerment vehicle, which is surprising since it was directed by a woman. With the stable, pretty fiancé waiting for him at home (Maura Tierney), Ben struggles with his feelings for the irresponsible, sexy woman he stumbles across. In the end, love (not lust) conquers all, which is pure bullshit. (Bradley Steinbacher) Grand Alderwood

FRENCH FILM NOIR -- Seattle Art Museum's tribute to the French masters of ironic fatalism and atmospheric, poetic realism. The series continues with Le Samourai, Jean-Pierre Melville's story about a lone hitman and a cabaret murder mystery (Thurs May 13 at 7:30), and The Clockmaker, Bertrand Tavernier's father-son drama (Thurs May 20 at 7:30). Call 625-8900 for more info. Seattle Art Museum

Go -- I don't know why movies that intertwine a number of disparate stories (Mystery Train, Pulp Fiction) so often pick three as the magic number, but here we go again. Three successive tales: a teen grocery clerk takes a stab at dealing ecstasy; a fellow clerk and his rowdy buddies head out on a road trip; and two actors agree to take part in a drug bust to clear their record. There's some funny scenes, though none of them manage to avoid either cliché, or a hip, ironic take on a cliché. Zero points for originality, then, but don't write the movie off entirely. There's a clutch of good performances (especially Sarah Polley as the would-be dealer, and William Fichtner as a cop), and a few moments do an excellent job capturing the madcap rush of adrenaline when you're young and stupid enough to think you can get away with anything. (Bruce Reid) City Center, Metro

Hideous Kinky -- Set in the early 1970s, Julia (Kate Winslet) is a Londoner living out the hippie dream of "getting your head together" by leaving her faithless boyfriend in London and dragging her kiddies to Marrakech, Morocco. She searches for spiritual enlightenment, but that doesn't pan out too well (she does have recurring paranoid dreams, however). What she does find is a life of near-poverty and an on-again/off-again affair with a hunky street performer (Said Taghmaoui), while her relationship with her children nearly disintigrates. The main theme seems to be that you can't necessarily expect to find yourself in another culture just because it seems exotic to you -- but that ain't much of a message, is it? This is the type of film where you say, "Well, at least it was beautifully photographed." (Gillian G. Gaar) Metro

Into the Deep -- An IMAX film in 3-D, putting you right into the aquarium. Pacific Science Center

Jazz on a Summer's Day -- A new 35mm print of concert footage taken from the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival. Highlights that are sure to impress jazz purists include performances by Thelonius Monk, Dinah Washington, Louis Armstrong, and Mahalia Jackson. Thurs-Sun May 20-23 at 5:30, 7:30, 9:30. The Little Theater

The King of the Masks -- This is one of those subtitled films that's perfect for people who hate subtitles: it's simple, melodramatic, filled (but not overflowing) with local color, and aims straight for the heartstrings. Zhu Xu stars as the title character, a street performer whose act involves rapidly removing a series of brightly colored masks. Old and childless, he's desperate to pass on the secrets of his art, and thinks he's made quite a wonderful match when he adopts a young boy. But the boy turns out to be a girl, one whose brutal guardian made her lie about her sex (boys being much more highly desirable in China than girls). The third act -- which trots out some irrelevant child kidnappers and the police -- goes on way too long, and is never suspenseful because you know from the start this is one of those films that ends happily. Story flaws aside, the acting of the two leads is perfect, and the side streets and mighty rivers of China are as lovely as always. (Bruce Reid) Harvard Exit

Kristin Lavransdatter -- A smash hit in Norway when it was released in 1995, Liv Ullmann's tale of a 14th-century Norwegian woman has finally made it to Seattle. Based on the first part of a trilogy written in the 1920s by Nobel Prize-winner Sigrid Undset, the story revolves around Kristin's struggle to marry the man she loves rather than the man her father has chosen for her. Ullmann has done an amazing job of transforming the tired cliché of resistance to an arranged marriage into an historically appropriate yet timeless drama. One can truly empathize, for example, with Kristin's desire to please her kindly father. It's unfortunate that nearly 1/4 of the film was cut (against Ullmann's wishes), as the early missing scenes supplied a needed context for Kristin's later preoccupation with sexual shame. Nevertheless, with famed cinematographer Sven Nykvist's lush settings, this version is certainly worth seeing on a big screen. Thurs May 13 at 5:30, 8:30. (Melody Moss) Grand Illusion

Life -- Life is not as bad as most critics say it is. In fact, Life happens to be a great Martin Lawrence film. Lawrence plays a young and stuck-up bank teller with a promising future until, on one fateful night, he crosses paths with a petty criminal (Eddie Murphy), and both end up in prison for life. This is Lawrence's best work since Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing. Who in a thousand years could have guessed that he could play an anal snob to such perfection? Lawrence is so extraordinary that Murphy seems to step back and give him all the room he needs to expand and explode. Life really falls apart late in the movie. One gets the sense that the director, Ted Demme, shot a much longer film, one which had to be cut down so as to keep under the two hour limit. One also has the impression that he didn't get "final cut," because of the huge holes in the plot. No doubt, a longer director's cut would confront some of the complex existential questions Life begs to answer. (Charles Mudede) Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16

Life Is Beautiful -- Like any good comedian, Roberto Benigni (and his co-writer Vincenzo Cerami) knows how to plant the seed for a gag early on, let it sit, then return to it much later for the payoff. The opening, which seems so frivolous, is all groundwork for what Benigni knows will be the toughest sell of his life: comedy in the Nazi camps. Employing the understatement and flair for timing that comedy requires, Benigni captures detail after detail in a far more devastating way than more earnest films on the subject could manage. (Bruce Reid) Broadway Market

The Living Sea -- It's alive! See fish and waves and whales and jellyfish, all in that big-screen IMAX format. Omnidome

* Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels -- The coolest fucking British film you will see this year. Period. Set in the East End of London, it's a fast, frantic, and frequently flippant ride through the social strata of gangland as four wide boys send one of their number, cardsharp Eddie (heartthrob Nick Moran), to take on local crime boss Hatchet Harry (P. H. Moriarty) at poker. They soon find themselves in debt to the sum of half a million nicker, and they're not helped by the fact that Harry has put his debt collector Big Chris (soccer hardman Vinnie Jones) on their tails. It's a tidy movie -- all the dead bodies are shot and accounted for -- and it's also got a wicked, very English sense of humor. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels makes Tarantino look like the art school, panty-waisted wuss he undoubtedly is. (Everett True) Varsity

* The Matrix -- Morpheus (Laurence Fishburn) has been searching for the One, a cyber-Christ who will destroy the Matrix and wake people out of their preprogrammed idea of life. He thinks he has found Him in Neo (Keanu Reeves). With the knowledge that the Matrix is a computer-created dream, Morpheus and his rebels (with equally stupid names: Trinity, Cypher, Switch, Apoc, etc.) can run and jump and fight with superhuman power, but are hunted down by super-agents who want to cleanse the system. Sure, the character names are stupid, the barroom metaphysics ("Hey, what if life is just a dream?") are simplistic, and the cyber-Christ story is predictable, but the action scenes -- even the ones that use that 180 degree near-freeze frame -- make this otherwise boring movie worth seeing. From the directors of Bound. (Andy Spletzer) Factoria, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Neptune, Oak Tree, Redmond Town Center

A Midsummer Night's Dream -- Apart from its small successes and larger failures, the question looming above the latest screen version of A Midsummer Night's Dream has to be: what is Stanley Tucci doing playing Puck? I like Tucci, but he's not a mischievous sprite. Actually, most of the fairies and follies of this Midsummer are strangely earthbound. Director and adapter Michael Hoffman has an intensely melancholy take on the material; his idea of whimsy is to have Tucci take a piss against a cave like some mythical barfly. The rest of the great cast deliver uneven results. Following Hoffman's lead, Kevin Kline is too somber as Bottom. Michelle Pfeiffer's Titania is fine, if a bit too grand. Calista Flockhart as Helena is, surprisingly, the only actor who consistently manages to hit the right tone (despite some McBeal-type pouts); she's as airy and just as sweetly heartstricken as the rest of this well-intended but plodding film should be. (Steve Wiecking) Factoria, Guild 45th, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11, Redmond Town Center

The Mummy -- Big, blatant rip-off of Raiders of the Lost Arc, by the director of the vastly under-rated Deep Rising. Reviewed this issue. Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Lewis & Clark, Meridian 16, Metro, Oak Tree

Nelly and Monsieur Arnaud -- An old man and his young, beautiful nurse develop an emotional but restrained bond, tinged with eroticism and longing. Starring French actress (and Mission Impossible hottie) Emmanuelle Beart. The last screening in the Northwest Alliance for Psychoanalytic Study's film series "Eros and Transformation." Fri May 14 at 7, $7. Call 443-1831 for more details. Seattle Art Museum

Never Been Kissed -- After about 20 minutes, I was getting to thinking about how much I hate Drew Barrymore: her smug, cloying superciliousness, the way she always plays the same saccharine, flaw-free character. After an hour, I was in love with her again. There's something about her smile, her rosy cheeks, the way she bites her lip when pushed, her... DAMN IT ALL! Never Been Kissed's basic premise is this: Drew is 25, she's never been kissed (yeah, right), and she works at the Chicago Sun-Times. She needs a break, so she's sent as an undercover reporter to her old high school where... no, you must have peeked! She gets kissed! Can you believe it? Or how 'bout this? Executive producer Drew Barrymore decides to do a movie for all the ugly people out there, to show just how sympathetic she is to our plight. Gee, thanks Drew. (Everett True) Grand Alderwood, Pacific Place 11

Pushing Tin -- This is a therapy film for guys in the same way that Good Will Hunting was. John Cusack plays an air traffic controller with the emphasis on "control." He's the best there is, at least until Billy Bob Thornton shows up. The movie has a perfect opportunity to branch into comedy, but it decides to do drama. Not a terrible choice, necessarily. Billy Bob's character has a pretty, young, unstable wife (Angelina Jolie), and is a reformed alcoholic (which, mercifully, never really comes into play). Thornton also brings crack comic timing to every scene that calls for it. Cusack is the main character, however, and it is his wandering eye and overblown expectations of self-control that ultimately lead to trouble with his wife and a breakdown. You see, men need to give up control in order to find themselves. I'm not sure at all how women will take to this film, but men who are cheating on their significant others should not see it with them.... (Andy Spletzer) City Center, Redmond Town Center

Radley Metzger's Erotica -- Call it what you want -- "arthouse erotica," "tasteful stag films," or "artistic porn" -- but the two-week Radley Metzger retrospective at the Grand Illusion will satisfy your craving for "classy" smut. Week one includes screenings of The Lickerish Quartet, Radley's first film to receive an X rating, and Camille 2000, which is resplendent with S&M parties, inflatable furniture, and a European Chateau as a locale. Reviewed this issue. Grand Illusion . It features Jeff Fahey, star of many straight-to-video action films. Pacific Place 11

* ROBERT BRESSON FILM SERIES -- Many film critics consider Robert Bresson's Au Hasard Balthazar his greatest achievment. Bresson displays the cruel harshness of man through the life of a donkey, who is repeatedly abused by a chain of cruel owners. Another gem from the Grand Illusion's Bresson series, and the greatest film ever made starring a donkey. Sun May 16 at 1, 3. Grand Illusion

Shakespeare in Love -- Certainly the idea is appealing: one of history's immortals, shown in his still-struggling youth, with eye-catching period details and a cast uniformly professional enough to carry it off with whimsy. But the film strains too much to flatter and please the audience, setting up predictable conflicts and getting out of them through the easiest ways possible. It's clever in a very simple way, content to show its hero as a great-man-in-waiting and its heroine as so improbably perfect she could only be a muse. (Bruce Reid) Metro, Uptown

Star Wars: Episode I -- Not very much information available for this movie (outside of early reviews, friends who've seen it, and websites full of questionable information). Apparently it's about a guy who goes on a rampage when his facial tattoo doesn't turn out like he wanted it to, and the little boy who just might save him. Keep your eyes peeled for cartoon characters "seamlessly" integrated into the story. Cinerama, Neptune

* Super 8 Films -- Emerald Reels' Super 8 Lounge has been selling out lately, so get there early (especially for this one, since it's the last of the Spring series). Including one of Anne Robertson's super 8 diaries, some new films by the inimitable Martha Colburn, and more. Mon May 17 at 9, FREE. Alibi Room

Tangos: The Exile of Gardel -- Argentinean director Fernando Solanas' tragi-comedy about a group of exiled dancers in Paris who produce a tango-ballet in memory of Carlos Gardel, a controversial figure in the history of tango. Thurs-Sun May 13-16, at 5, 7:15, 9:30. The Little Theater

Tea With Mussolini -- Franco Zeffirelli's autobiographical film, set in Florence on the brink of WWII, is about a little Italian boy who was born out of wedlock. A bastard. His father doesn't want him, so he ends up adopted by his father's English secretary, who shares baby-sitting duties with her female friends, also English. The ladies don't want to leave Florence, even after the war breaks out, thinking Mussolini won't want to hurt them. Turns out (surprise, surprise) that Mussolini doesn't care about them. Zeffirelli has never been a subtle filmmaker, but here he is so enthusiastic about stereotypes and manipulating emotions that the film is interesting until it becomes tiresome. Tea With Mussolini sentimentalizes the war years in much the same way as Life Is Beautiful did, never really acknowledging the atrocities of that -- or any -- war. As the wealthy American debutante, Cher sings one song. (Andy Spletzer) Factoria, Grand Alderwood, Oak Tree, Pacific Place 11, Seven Gables

Three Seasons -- This movie interweaves four thin short stories: a flower picker who meets her leperous master; a cyclo driver and deluded prostitute; an American ex-soldier (Harvey Keitel) looking for his long-lost daughter; and the last, the meanderings of a little boy who peddles cigarettes and lighters at local night clubs for his father. Why has this film been popular at festivals? Because it is virtually content-free. There's no action, no hunks, one prostitute with a heart of gold, no sex, and above all no plot. Tony Bui's film is not about the "new" Vietnam (as is supposed), but instead glorifies Vietnam's poverty from the point of view of an American tourist. (Charles Mudede) Broadway Market

Trippin' -- Even within the debased realm of teen sex comedies, Trippin' is pretty weak. Its young hero, about to graduate high school, naturally spends his time hounded by his parents and teachers to apply himself and figure out what he wants to do with his life. The answer, even more naturally, is hang out with his friends, try to date the girl he's had a crush on since sophomore year, and daydream a bunch of silly fantasies where he's a rap star, a ladies' man, or the definitive B ig Man On Campus. The African American setting of course changes nothing from all the other bad movies like this, except the catchphrases: if just one more person at the movie's finale at the prom went on about "keeping it real," I swear I would have screamed. Opens May 12. (Bruce Reid) Grand Alderwood, Pacific Place 11, Southcenter

Twin Dragons -- This 1992 feature, freshly dubbed into English, stars Jackie Chan in a dual role as twins separated at birth. Only the first and last fight scenes have any energy. The finale, set in an auto warehouse, almost makes up for the rest of this listless movie. Try sneaking in for the last 20 minutes; otherwise skip it. (Bruce Reid) Grand Alderwood

A Walk on the Moon -- A Walk on the Moon tries desperately to draw parallels between its everyday characters and the seemingly momentous changes going on in the nation. It doesn't work, mostly because neither the characters we're watching nor the times they live in ever feel anything more than a superficial rehash of everything you've heard and seen before. As with most actors-turned-novice directors, Tony Goldwyn does a nice job with his cast, but lets the narrative meander, even stall out at times. (Bruce Reid) Uptown

Whales -- An up close and personal look at the largest mammals on earth. Omnidome

Wife To Be Sacrificed -- Masaru Konuma's sadistic vision of a battered wife and her husband's twisted attempts at retribution. Chock full o' bondage and torture. Fri-Sat May 14-15 at 11:30. Grand Illusion

The Winslow Boy -- David Mamet adapts a play for the screen that was written long before cursing tirades were acceptable, and does an "okay" job with it. A young boy gets kicked out of military school when he's accused of stealing. We never really know if the boy, this "Winslow" boy, did it or not, but the boy maintains his innocence. The father decides to trust the boy and sue the school, causing a big public uproar in a case that nearly sinks them financially. Mamet tones down the actors' deliveries to such a point that it seems everybody is speaking in a monotone; that wouldn't be so bad if the underlying emotions were strong enough to make up for it. Ah well, it's a diverting and often dull time in the theater -- kind of like seeing a play! (Andy Spletzer) Guild 45th