Annie

John Huston is listed as director of this elephantine Ray Stark production based on the Broadway musical (which was based, in turn, on Harold Gray’s Little Orphan Annie comic strip), but this is the kind of overproduced monolith in which even better directors can easily lose their way. Set during the Depression, the movie offers an insulting let them eat cake gesture toward the 1982 audience, but the pacing is so ragged and the characters so lifeless that few will be able to stay awake long enough to feel offended. With Aileen Quinn as Annie, Albert Finney as Daddy Warbucks (who at least behaves like a trouper), Carol Burnett, Bernadette Peters, Tim Curry, Ann Reinking, Geoffrey Holder, and Edward Herrmann. PG, 128 min. (JR)

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