Leonardo Masterpiece

Mix James Dean's brooding wim the impish oppeal of Mickey Rooney and you've got 20-yearold LEONARDO DlCAPRIO, a sprightly creature who rivets with giddy intensity. DiCaprio exploded with a banner '93, thanks to This Boy's Life, in which he was the reluctant foil for Robert De Niro's sadism, and What's Eating Gilbert Grape?, which had him as a mentally challenged but emotionally pure free spirit who was an indication of Gump to come. Now that he's reaped kudos and citations, Leo's dance card is full with some more soul-searchers: he plays the young Jim Carroll in The Basketball Diaries ( I m impressed with what I've seen," says DiCaprio. "I can't stand movies about reality that don't deal with that reality"), he's Gene Hackman's son, Kid, in The Quick and the Dead; and he's appearing as the poet Rimbaud opposite David Thewlis s Verlaine in Total Eclipse ("Rimbaud wanted to experience, do, and feel everything"). His standards should remain high. I could die tomorrow, so I don t want to be working on The Goblins: Part 3."

MICHAEL MUSTO

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