TASK DEFINITION: In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
PROBLEM: absolute power , the new film produced and directed by clint eastwood , attempts to be a thriller set in the world of hypocritical presidents and their murderous political staff .
it is about as thrilling as a lecture on the mating habits of the south american grasshopper .
one can only wonder how an utterly absurd script like the one written by william goldman could have ever interested eastwood .
not only is the plot unbelievable and contrived , but even the writing itself lacks any consistency or intelligence .
continually underestimating the audience , the film gives us information we already know or do nt even need .
details essential to the story are so improbably convenient they are annoying
( like why would two unprepared secret service men carry two night - vision goggles in their car ? ) .
oddly enough , the initial setup for absolute power offers interesting possibilities .
a masterful jewel - thief ( played by clint eastwood ) witnesses the murder of the wife of a powerful millionaire ( played by e. g. marshall ) .
while robbing one of marshalls mansions , he is forced to hide in the bedrooms vault .
there , through a two - way mirror , he sees the wife and another man engage in passionate foreplay .
their game of love quickly turns into a violent struggle as the man starts beating the woman . in self defense , the woman grabs a letter - opener and stabs the man in the elbow .
she raises her arm to stab again when she is fatally shot by two secret service men .
the man ?
he is the president of the united states of america .
where does the film go wrong ?
it can not be the acting .
clint eastwood , ed harris and gene hackman as the president give type - cast , but decent performances .
the cinematography is sufficient ; wild and erratic during action sequences , dark and mysterious during psychologically suspenseful scenes , and calm and warm during dramatic dialogue .
even the music is not as bombastic as it usually tends to be in the thriller / suspense genre .
the fault clearly lies in the screenplay , and the screenplay alone .
while setting up a story about misuse of power , about the true possessors of that power , and about intrigue and double - crossing , it does not resolve it .
not one buildup of suspense is resolved by an exciting climax . rather , the tense situations are left dangling at the end , giving the viewer an uneasy sense of incompleteness .
an example of this is a very promising and tense buildup of a scene : in an attempt to arrest clint eastwood , the police have set up a trap at a small restaurant .
police officers are everywhere , incognito of course .
at the same time , not one but two hit men are preparing to kill clint eastwood when he arrives .
all three parties are unaware of each others presence .
this scene is tremendously exciting and the audience is wondering how clint eastwood , who might suspect this is a trap , will get himself out of this difficult position .
he will probably have a brilliant plan , involving ingenious preparations .
however , when he arrives at the trap , both hit men miss ( how convenient )
and in the confusion eastwood simply walks away .
the buildup of this scene took about ten minutes .
ten minutes of close ups of the hit men loading their weapons intercut with the police preparing for the trap .
the scene was resolved in less than 20 seconds .
.. parallel to the story line of catching the real killer is a cliche emotional tale about the estranged relationship between father eastwood and his daughter .
the daughter blames her father for never being there for her , because he was either in jail or robbing a house somewhere .
of course their relationship takes a turn for the better during the adventure and they end up a happy family .
again , it is commendable that absolute power tries to deviate from the mainstream suspense film by giving room for a dramatic subplot . however , trying is simply not enough !
the second story line should be subtle , original and preferably unpredictable .
.. everything this film is not .
how could a screenplay like absolute power ever get the funding to be produced ?
how could eastwood , who has successfully produced and directed many outstanding films such as the brilliant unforgiven , ever believe in a project like this one ?
i am sad to say that my respect for the actor / director / producer has diminished substantially due to this film .
director quentin tarantino once said : " i can make a good movie out of any bad script .
" director clint eastwood obviously can not .

SOLUTION: N

PROBLEM: pitch black is a sheep in wolf 's clothing .
it is full of darkness , danger and violence and if you buy into the marketing hype , an unsettling and scary film going experience .
do n't be fooled .
pitch black is a morality play masquerading as a scare - fest .
it starts off with blistering intensity .
a cargo spaceship crash lands on a planet apparently leeched of life by the scorching heat of three suns .
among the survivors is fry ( mitchell ) , the ship 's pilot , who spends the film wrestling with the fact that she tried to jettison the other passengers in her effort to land the craft safely .
there is imam ( david ) , an islamic leader whose faith in his god is tested repeatedly throughout the film .
there is a law enforcement officer in the form of johns ( hauser ) , who attacks every situation with square jawed authoritarian zeal .
and there is riddick ( diesel ) , a menacing , muscle - bound convicted murderer who 's being brought back to justice by johns .
the group quickly sizes up the situation and each other .
confident in their assessment of matters , a plan is set in motion to escape their hellish environment .
those plans are shredded by the appearance of one of the planet 's wildlife , a predatory , sometimes winged , species that enjoys the taste of blood and flesh .
fortunately , the creatures are light sensitive and are forced to live in networks of catacombs under the planet 's surface .
unfortunately , the group has managed to land on the planet moments before an eclipse is about to occur , taking away their one protection from the monsters .
the group 's savior comes in the form of johns , whose decisive leadership looks to deliver them from purgatory .
or does it ?
pitch black deviates from the standard sci - fi fare by avoiding some of the stock " escape the boogieman " conflicts the genre typically serves up .
just as the planet gave a false facade of lifelessness , first appearances given by the survivors proves to be just as false .
the excitement of the film comes not from the danger posed by the creatures , but rather from watching the shifting allegiances and emotional growth of the characters as the planet serves as a deus ex machina of sorts to catalyze emotional growth .
a recurrent theme runs throughout the movie of faith , whether it be religious or in a person , and how that powers their motivations .
i found it telling that an accidental death occurs early on due to the misperception of a self professed atheist .
conversely , imam constantly contributes any good fortune to allah .
one by one , his perceived heaven sent blessings are taken away and crushed .
imam is forced to reassess his faith .
another character expresses belief in god , along with a life long hate .
yet another character makes a decision that echoes the sentiments of christ about selflessness and has lasting repercussions for several of group .
it is a fascinating character study hiding under the guise of a scare flick .
special mention should be made of vin diesel , who intriguingly conveys feral menace combined with a truly mesmerizing presence .
his character could have easily slipped into a parody of the baddass killing machine , but twohy and diesel add surprising depth to riddick .
they can be excused for the two or three shwarzenegger - like catch phrases that growl their way out of diesel 's mouth .
the movie has its flaws that can be nitpicked .
the creatures do look derivative of the ones in alien .
the dialogue is n't the freshest at times , reminiscent of a bad comic book .
yes , the appearance of riddick 's vision skills are more than a little timely considering the situation .
these trappings are on the periphery of the story twohy is really trying to tell .
twohy may have lured you in under the pretense of scaring you with film fabricated boogieman , but he shows the real boogieman to be the prejudices and beliefs we use to direct decisions in our lives .

SOLUTION: P

PROBLEM: is n't it the ultimate sign of a movie 's cinematic ineptitude when you ca n't think of much to say about it other than
" it sucks " ?
one of the first official year 2000 releases , supernova is such a movie .
i ca n't seem to get past one - word adjectives with this one , although
" boring , " " stupid " and " absurd " does n't amount to much of a review .
a shame .
i would have been able to save myself the chore of desperately trying to elaborate .
but c'est la vie .
here goes nothing .
i 'll keep it short .
i suppose the first bad omen for supernova came when director walter hill ( 48 hours ) removed his name from the movie , requesting that it be replaced with the pseudonym thomas lee .
the film 's fate was sealed in many minds when struggling studio mgm declined to screen it for the press , an event usually signifying a studio 's lack of confidence in a particular movie .
hill 's and mgm 's actions were prudent .
when the captain of medical space vessel nightingale dies in a tragic hyperjump accident , a reformed drug addict who is also the first officer , for some reason ( james spader ) is forced to take command .
the ship picks up a distress call from a nearby planet and , on arrival , picks up one survivor from an apparent accident in an abandoned mining colony .
one of the crew members ( angela bassett ) knows this passenger , who is played by peter facinelli , and has some bad feelings about it -- and we all know what that means .
this intergalactic hitchhiker is carrying some mysterious cargo -- a jellylike substance the purpose of which is unknown , though it seems to bring some form of pleasure to whoever touches it .
another one of the crew members experiences this first hand ; after spending a few minutes partially inside this glob of goo , he does some impressive handstand pushups .
evidently , touching this enigmatic egg - shaped thingie makes you younger and stronger .
how ?
why ?
the movie never bothers to explain .
soon enough though , spader and bassett are running around the ship like mad , being chased by the all - of - a - sudden - superhuman facinelli .
to be honest , i do n't even remember exactly why .
i just remember that i did n't care .
supernova 's plot suggested some more or less interesting ideas , such as the ball of goo being an intergalactic time bomb , but they are all dropped before they have a chance to develop into anything truly intriguing .
in fact , everything is dropped just so the actors can have some fun running around what looks like an elaborate set .
well , the effects are good , though there 's hardly a studio movie with bad special effects these days
so i 'm not sure whether that 's so remarkable an accomplishment .
the performances are hardly worth talking about .
i 'm not even sure i can call what 's here " performances , " though angela bassett sure is good at giving people the finger .
james spader is not a bad actor , but he proves to be one of the blandest action stars i 've seen in a while , mostly because he is n't given a character with a personality .
the action scenes are just as bland , since they 're pretty much just rehashes of action elements that were n't particularly entertaining the first time around . and since the action scenes are everything to this movie ,
it 's pretty much dead in the water .
and for the life of me , i ca n't figure out why it 's called supernova .

SOLUTION:
N