Mrs Parker and the Vicious Circle (Alan Rudolph, 1994)
Very hard to understand the raison d'etre of this Robert Altman-produced film. Despite a considerable cast and careful costume design this seems to have a very circumscribed budget. It appears to have been shot on video through a piece of brown glass and there is limited camera movement and constricted sets. Jennifer Jason Leigh adopts a, presumably appropriate, tight-lipped drawl that is difficult to understand, the supporting cast with the exception of Campbell Scott is unremarkable and Matthew Broderick singularly out of place. Whilst the subject matter, Parker and the Algonquin set, is arguably of intrinsic interest, this is little more than a stringing together of incidents and witticisms with virtually no tempo or dramatic tension. BH