River Phoenix, Jodie Foster, Robert Downey Jr. Among the 1991 Treasures Unearthed in Movieline's Vault

The weekly roll-out of vintage Movieline continues today with a look at 1991 -- that year when fashion began its incremental climb to respectability (on second thought, maybe not), Robert Downey Jr. was on his first term of fame, and taking down Pretty Woman felt like a political act. Oh, and River Phoenix paid us a visit as well. It was a good year! Read on for a few more highlights.

· Still hot off the cult success of Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, Todd Haynes gets his close-up just in advance of his even more controversial breakthrough Poison. Best exchange: ML: "What would you say if you met Richard Carpenter at a party?" TH: "F*ck him. He's a jerk." Biggest underestimation: "Haynes says he wants to make films that a lot of people will see. But unless Poison generates the same kind of heat that, say, sex, lies, and videotape did, Haynes will stay a directorial curiosity with a cult following." Ha.

· The Young Hollywood issue handicaps the career futures of David Fincher, Nicole Kidman, Julia Roberts, Steven Soderbergh, Jennifer Connelly, Keanu Reeves, Shane Black, Bryan Lourd and numerous others. Count the Oscar winners.

· Jodie Foster discusses Silence of the Lambs, Little Man Tate, avoiding the Brat Pack, the appeal of Baudelaire... pretty much everything but gun control. Because that's where she just has to draw a line.

· Photographic proof (at right) of the extraordinary power summit between Harrison Ford and Steven Seagal.

· A fascinating conversation with the producers of New Jack City and House Party 2 (!) about the politics and peril of mainstreaming African-American cinema in the '90s.

· Florence Henderson's priceless reminiscence of working with Bobcat Goldthwait in Shakes the Clown: "He drank all of this soda pop so he'd be able to burp on cue, and as he's walking across the floor, it came out the wrong end. This loud noise. At first I thought, 'I don't think that's what I think it was,' and then I realized it was what I thought it was. So we tried doing the scene again, and he did the same thing. Twice. If you wanted to do that, you couldn't."

For an added bonus, find PDF's of these and most other articles from the year. Considering the paucity of actual current news, it might not be the worst thing to live a little in the past. Enjoy!