Robert Thom

There's something to be said for a movie that knows exactly what it is and then whacks that knowledge home like a rusty pipe in the face. Case in point: ''Death Race,'' a delectable bit of B-movie savagery that actually does feature pipe melees, among much other kicky (and punchy and impaled-by-a-metal-spikey) ultraviolence. The premise, updated

Janice Rule, an actress in film and onstage who became a psychoanalyst late in her career, died on Friday at her home in Manhattan. She was 72. Born in Norwood, Ohio, Ms. Rule studied ballet and began dancing in Chicago nightclubs in her teens. She soon attracted attention in Hollywood and made her film debut in 1951 in ''Goodbye, My Fancy,'' with