Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, October 2, 1993 TAG: 9310020078
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: B7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CARRIE RICKEY KNIGHT-RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Mile-high skyscrapers glitter against the skyline. Given the heights that the penthouse denizens live in, there's bound to be enough altitude (not to mention "attitude") sickness to go around.
Happily for this genial but lackluster comedy, Michael J. Fox - in the role of concierge Doug Ireland - is there to greet us on the ground floor of The Bradbury, the four-star hostelry he runs with equal parts graciousness and greed. Dougie anticipates his guests' every whim - for a price.
Box seats for the Yankees? No problem. But you better give him a tip that "hurts."
Dougie needs these 100-buck gratuities to bankroll his own dream hotel. And to leverage this, he discreetly supplies hotel rooms to a self-satisfied (read: Trumpy) married real-estate mogul, Christian Hanover (Anthony Higgins). This would be fine except that Hanover's trysting with Andy Hart (Gabrielle Anwar), a pretty shopgirl whom Dougie is trying to date.
Should Dougie sacrifice his ambition, act less like a pimp and more like a mensch, in the hopes of saving Andy from this jerk?
If this sounds reminiscent of "The Apartment," you're thinking along the same lines as screenwriters Mark Rosenthal and Larry Konner. Alas, they are no Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond (who wrote "The Apartment"). And though perennially charming, Michael J. Fox is no Jack Lemmon.
About Gabrielle Anwar, so fetching as Al Pacino's tango partner in "Scent of a Woman," so charming as the diving-horse girl in "Even Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken" - isn't she just too wholesome and underfed to play a real-estate bimbo?
\ For Love or Money: A Universal Pictures release showing at Tanglewood Mall. Rated PG for mild profanity. 1 hour and 36 minutes.
by CNB