Film

Critic Stuart Klawans reviews Bruce Robinson's new comedy, about an unhinged advertising executive who gradually develops a giant pimple with a mind of its own.

Critic Ken Tucker says the new video Bugs & Daffy: The Wartime Cartoons is a delightful reminder of the wry ways Americans dealt with their emotions during World War II.

The Italian film director died last week at the age of 67. Film critic Stephen Schiff says that Leone's movies had a unique symbolism and vision of the American West that only an outsider could have imagined.

Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz says that some composers elevate film scores, including Bernard Hermann, who wrote the music for several Alfred Hitchcock movies. A new collection of those compositions is now out on CD.

Critic-at-large Laurie Stone recently attended the Lincoln Center's celebration of Hollywood star Bette Davis, who is now 81. The gala included a series of film clips which, according to Stone, highlighted the power, confidence, and humanity of Davis's performances.

Hurt stars in the new film Scandal, about the Profumo sex scandal of the 1960s. He also portrayed Joseph Merrick in David Lynch's The Elephant Man. He joins Fresh Air to discuss how he fully inhabits his characters, and how his early life led him to acting.

Film critic Stephen Schiff says the new film, based on W.P. Kinsella's baseball-themed novel Shoeless Joe, is designed to make men cry, while still preserving their masculinity. It's skillfully made and acted, but Schiff thinks Field of Dreams is sappy and, ultimately, pointless.

Part 2 of the Fresh Air interview with Bob Balaban. He talks about the kinds of roles he played early in his career, and his show business lineage: his grandfather was a movie producer; his father helped operate a movie theater chain; and one of his uncles was president of Paramount.

Part one of the Fresh Air interview with Bob Balaban. He made his directorial debut with Parents, about a suburban family's dark secret. As an actor, he starred in Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Absence of Malice.

Part 2 of the Fresh Air interview. Crowe talks about how, at 22, he posed as a high school student to research his movie Fast Times at Ridgemont High. He says youth culture had already changed drastically in the four years since he had graduated, especially with rise of Reagan youth.