Mrs. Winterbourne

Richard Benjamin directs a labored comic adaptation by Phoef Sutton and Lisa-Maria Radano of Cornell Woolrich’s I Married a Dead Man, about a poor unmarried mother (Ricki Lake) who impersonates a dead heiress and widow. Translating Woolrich’s pulpy obsessiveness and crazy contrivances into the stuff of light comedy is no easy matter, and the movie gets as far as it does mainly with the help of Lake and Shirley MacLaine, who plays Lake’s newly acquired mother-in-law. With Brendan Fraser, Miguel Sandoval, and Loren Dean. (JR) Read more

Kids In The Hall: Brain Candy

TV comics David Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney, and Scott Thompson star in a 1996 TV spin-off, produced by Lorne Michaels, about the creation of a designer drug that makes everybody happy. It was written by Norm Hiscock and all the Kids except Foley, and directed by Kelly Makin. I think it’s supposed to be a comedy. Perhaps because no one in the cast adjusted his performance style to the big screen, I may have thought about laughing three times over the 90-some minutes. (JR) Read more