"Jerry Maguire" (15) Cameron Crowe's exuberant, sharply scripted romantic comedy features Tom Cruise on top form as a disillusioned sports agent on a journey to redemption. He is helped by his last remaining client (Cuba Gooding Jr in a flamboyant, Oscar-winning performance) and a young accountant (Renee Zellweger) who falls in love with him.
"Grace of My Heart" (15)
Illeana Douglas is very impressive as an aspirant pop singer who moves to New York in the late 1950s and scores a string of hits as a songwriter while suffering several disappointments in love. Oozing affection for the pop songs of the period, Allison Anders's under-rated film suffers from some narrative flaws, but remains engaging and features a superb soundtrack. With Matt Dillon, Eric Stoltz and John Turturro.
"Hollow Reed" (18)
Angela Pope's harrowing and very wellacted drama, scripted by Paula Milne, features Martin Donovan and Joely Richardson as divorced parents. A custody battle erupts when Donovan's character, who has moved into a relationship with a gay man (Ian Hart), learns that his young son is being physically abused by his exwife's new lover.
"Swann" (15)
Based on the novel by Carol Shields, this is both a perceptive character study and a very melodramatic literary drama. Brenda Fricker is on fine form as the middle-aged Ontario woman who sets out to publish and preserve the poetry of the murdered Mary Swann, with Miranda Richardson as the successful author writing a biography of Swann. Directed by Ann Benson Gyles.
"Basquiat" (15)
Painter Julian Schnabel turns filmmaker with an unilluminating picture of another artist - the insecure and selfdestructive Jean-Michel Basquiat who died of a heroin overdose in 1988, at the age of 27. Jeffrey Wright as Basquiat heads a cast that includes Michael Wincott, Benicio Del Toro, Dennis Hopper, Gary Oldman, Christopher Walken, Willem Dafoe, Courtney Love and, as Andy Warhol, David Bowie.
"Michael" (PG)
John Travolta on auto-pilot plays a chain-smoking, beer-bellied sexually active angel pursued by tabloid reporters in this dire would-be romantic comedy uncertainly directed by Nora Ephron. With William Hurt, Andie McDowell and Bob Hoskins.
