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Nicolas Cage recovers from the letdown that he suffered from "The Rock" with a strong action hero lead in this 1997 Touchstone release. The genre gets a twist here. Cage's character is actually a criminal but he gradually tries to turn himself into a hero when upon getting paroled and boarding a criminal infested plane back home, the plane is hijacked by a psychopath (John Malkovich). Just like he did in "In The Line Of Fire", Malkovich handles portraying a sinister villain to great effect and Cage can really deliver when the right scripts and roles come along. Genuine action, suspense and thrills abound in this film that ranks as one of Cage's very best.

Hollywood should either stop making live action films where animals are expected to be the stars of the show or just not make them so often. The monotonous genre suffers its biggest farfetchedeness of all with this overly ridiculous 1995 Paramount release. This film tells the tale of a group of jungle explorers who take a dangerous trek to the African jungles to recover a gorilla who can communicate to humans through sign language. Compared to the acting performances here by a cast of mostly unknowns, that might actually be the plausible part. This film trashes just about every animal and jungle film cliche ever written and adds nothing genuinely interesting to the genre.

With "Saturday Night Live" creator Lorne Michaels producing and a huge all star comedy cast including Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, Laraine Newman, Jason Alexander, Chris Farley, Michael Richards, Lisa Jane Persky, Sinbad, Michael McKean, Phil Hartman, David Spade, Dave Thomas, Jan Hooks, Adam Sandler, Julia Sweeney and Drew Carey cast in the shenanigans, "Coneheads" should have been a gut busting laugh riot. While it does have some genuinely funny moments, there are not enough of them to make it a hit. The film is yet another extended format of a popular "Saturday Night Live" sketch. The victims this time are the Coneheads, the alien couple from the planet Remulac who crash their spaceship in New Jersey and wind up living among suburban inhabitants. Aykroyd and Curtin reprise their TV roles as married cone shaped head alien couple Beldar and Prymatt with Michelle Burke making her film debut as their daughter, Connie (Newman, who had portrayed that role on TV appears briefly here as Beldar's sister and Aykroyd's daughter, Danielle also appears in the film portraying Connie as a toddler). The plot (although it matters little when compared to the sight gags) has to do with the alien family being pursued by the INS led by Hartman and Spade who will do whatever it takes to deport them. The popular duo of Farley and Spade make their first appearance in a film amid the same cast here but they have no scenes together. Film is not a total waste but it is often rather dated and pales in comparison to the comic delivery of the TV sketches of the characters. Farley, Spade, Aykroyd and Michaels would later collaborate on the much funnier film, "Tommy Boy."