Holiday Prompts Early Releases

The holiday weekend brought about midweek releases from distributorsanxious to capitalize on moviegoers' extra days off. Here aresummaries of the movies reviewed Wednesday by Chicago Sun-Times filmcritic Roger Ebert.

"Faithful" (rated R, 91 minutes) stars Ryan O'Neal as a cheatinghusband who hires a hit man (Chazz Palminteri) to kill his wife(Cher). The material began as a play, and although director PaulMazursky has opened it up somewhat, it basically comes down to a lotof dialogue between Cher and Palminteri, Cher and O'Neal, and allthree of them. There's never the sense that anyone's life is reallyat risk. The performances have wit, but the movie is about dialogueand acting, not murder. Ebert's rating: (STAR)(STAR) 1/2

"Primal Fear" (rated R, 131 minutes) stars Richard Gere in one ofhis best performances as a flamboyant Chicago defense attorney whotakes on the case of a teenager accused of murdering an archbishop.As crime procedurals go, this is a good one, but the performances andthe smart dialogue are better than the plot. Laura Linney, JohnMahoney, Frances McDormand and Alfre Woodard do strong supportingwork, and Edward Norton as the "Butcher Boy of St. Mike's" creates acomplex, convincing character. Gere's work here is among his best.Ebert's rating: (STAR)(STAR)(STAR) 1/2"A Thin Line Between Love and Hate" (rated R, 108 minutes) starsMartin Lawrence as a ladies' man who lusts for a rich executiveplayed by Lynn Whitfield. As soon as he wins her heart, he straysinto the arms of another woman (Regina King). He's shameless, thekind of man who keeps the "Waiting to Exhale" generation waiting.But the first woman doesn't take his departure easily, which bringsabout a "Fatal Attraction" scenario. Good performances and aninteresting premise, but the film wanders off course too much to makethe story compelling. Ebert's rating: (STAR)(STAR) 1/2