With Honors

The only copy of Monty's Harvard senior thesis falls down a vent into the boiler room, where a homeless man named Simon finds it. Simon sets terms: one night's shelter and one meal per page. Alek Keshishian builds it as a lesson story of an obvious shape, but Simon's illness from asbestos and the real reasons he has nobody carry the emotional weight. Joe Pesci plays Simon without once reaching for a comic reflex; Brendan Fraser is Monty. What is most remembered now is Simon's speech about the constitution. The score and the closing song sung by Madonna are remembered separately from the film. Who it is for: viewers who like the emotional American dramas of the nineties. Who it is not for: anyone looking for an unpredictable story.