Grand Canyon

The things that can happen in LA! If you're an immigration lawyer, like Kline, you can break down in a poor black area and get saved from the homeboys by a black road-rescue driver (Glover). Or if you're the wife (McDonnell) of that lawyer, and he's had a fling with his secretary and your teenage son is turning to thoughts of love, you can go gooey-eyed over a baby you find abandoned in the bushes. Or if, like Glover, you've got a deaf daughter, and a poor but hard-workin' sister with a son who's tempted by the neighbourhood gangs, you can befriend the rich lawyer and wax philosophical about one of your country's loveliest natural landmarks. Or if you produce slasher movies, like Martin, and then get shot, you can reconsider your whole life and career. Then again, like Kasdan, you could make an ambitious, entertaining and seriously indulgent film about the modern malaise afflicting your home town. If this disaster-packed parable often smacks of melodramatic contrivance, it does at least benefit from solid performances and direction, and a leavening line in sardonic humour.