For Love Or Money

If Billy Wilder had been hired to rewrite Mark Rosenthal and Lawrence Konner’s script and take over the direction, this might have had a chance of succeeding; unfortunately, the directing job went to The Addams Family’s Barry Sonnenfeld, who’s OK at paying homage to his own work and filling in the background of some shots with arch sight gags, but lacks the light touch needed for the rest. Michael J. Fox stars as the good-hearted concierge of a luxury hotel in Manhattan who dreams of opening his own establishment; a bad-hearted English tycoon (Anthony Higgins) agrees to stake Fox if he can entertain his adulterous mistress (Gabrielle Anwar). Fox is smitten, and winds up having to choose between …you can fill in the blanks. Overproduced, overdirected, and overfamiliar, this is one of those conspicuous-consumption spreads that is trying to tell us that true love is all that really matters. Come again? With Michael Tucker, Bob Balaban, and Isaac Misrahi. (JR)

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