Task: Sentiment Analysis
Input (English): in these days of overlong movies ( meet joe black , the thin red line , the mask of zorro ) it is a shame that films like waking ned devine ca n't be longer than a paltry 90 minutes .
this is just a cute movie , even through its mildly risque subject matter .
old friends jackie ( bannen ) and michael ( kelley ) try to find the lottery winner ( they deduce must live in their dinky town of about 60 ) so that they might kiss up to him and share the winnings .
through process of elimination , they find that it must be lovable old ned devine , who they find sitting in front of his tv , clutching the winning lottery ticket in his cold dead hand .
what results is thuroughly amusing , as jackie tries to convince his wife that not claiming it would be wrong , and that they could really benefit .
after all , old ned wo n't miss it . rather than divulge the later twists and turns , i 'll stop here merely pointing out that jackie and michael get into all sorts of trouble in their little sleepy irish villiage .
bannen and kelly are a perfect pair .
one slightly stout , the other as thin as a rail .
both getting on in years , they make such a cute pair of old codgers .
waking ned devine may even be seen as a " full monty " for the geriatric set , especially since kelly gets buff - o for one amusing scene .
waking ned devine is by no means perfect , but it is so sincere and touching that it looks so much better than most films .
the performances by everyone in the town are great , particularly the two leads .
there is one twist at the end which i find unnecessary , but it hardly ruins the picture .
writer / director kirk jones should be held up as an example to all those hollywood screenwriters .
scripts as creative and endearing
as this should be the norm , not the exception .
perhaps it makes us appreciate this wonderful film even more .
had i held off on my year 's best / worst list for another day , waking ned devine ( officially released in late november of 98 )
surely would have graced the short group of the year 's finest films .
it is light , but thought provoking and sweet .
i ca n't think of anyone who should n't see ( or would n't enjoy ) this film .
Output (English): P