A friend sent me a very favourable review of the new film, _The
Adventures of Huck Finn_, and I thought you might be interested in the
following extracts.  Although I haven't seen the movie (nor do I intend
to pay to see it, on the basis of what other Forum subscribers have
said), I can't help but smile at the following:

     Disney knows that it's sometimes better to be "The Magic Kingdom"
     than it is "The House of Ideas."  Because, if you really know what
     you're doing, an abundance of the former can always compensate for
     a lack of the latter. . . .

     . . .while I can't say that this is the best _Huck_ yet, it is, at
     the very least, an exceptionally good _Huck_, as true to the book
     as any previous incarnation, and more politically correct than ever
     before.
          It also has the best casting since the Mickey Rooney version
     of 1939. . . .

     . . .the depiction of slavery in the 1800s--and how it was
     tolerated and even rationalized by the liberal white South (Huck
     included)--is neither too intense nor too ambiguous for family-
     oriented light entertainment (parents should be aware, though, that
     there is some violence, and partway through the film a child is
     killed).

          Rob Salem, "Huck will run away with your heart," Toronto
          _Star_ 2 April 1993, p. C8.


Taylor Roberts
University of British Columbia