Innerspace (1987)

Using a twist on the ingenious premise of "Fantastic Voyage" -- miniaturized travel within a human body -- and a pair of very different but equally irresistible leading men, Innerspace is densely inventive and consistently hilarious. [1 July 1987, p.C1]

It doesn't have the dark edge of Joe Dante's other works, but brilliant performances by Martin Short and Meg Ryan make it a joy from start to finish.

The plot is standard fantasy-adventure pulp, though director Joe Dante (Gremlins, Explorers) has so many screwball things going on in it that the comedy all but overwhelms the formulaic line of action.

I would have loved to eavesdrop on the script conferences for "Innerspace." Here is an absurd, unwieldy, overplotted movie that nevertheless is entertaining - and some of the fun comes from the way the plot keeps laying it on.

Quaid is engagingly reckless and gung-ho as the pioneer into a new dimension, although he is physically constrained in his little capsule for most of the running time. Short has infinitely more possibilities and makes the most of them, coming into his own as a screen personality as a mild-mannered little guy who rises to an extraordinary situation.