TASK DEFINITION: In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
PROBLEM: plot : a group of asbestos cleaners get a job removing the gunk from an old insane asylum .
as each day passes , the crew members begin to discover things about the place and themselves which set other things in motion .
saying anything else about the plot would be a crime .
have fun . . .
critique : " i feel like shooting myself in the head
" are the first words that came out of my mouth after seeing this movie , a good indication as to what kind of film to expect here .
this ai n't your average " happy go lucky " kind of picture .
this is a deliberately slow - paced mystery - horror film drenched in atmosphere , with a very creepy insane asylum ( in which most of the film takes place ) , very few clues up - front and lots to talk about afterwards .
will it bore some people to sleep ?
you bet it will !
is it made for the scream audiences of the day ?
absolutely not !
i guess you can describe this film as a horror movie for the " cerebral crowd " .
a film that patiently unwraps itself frame after frame , giving away very little with each step and each sound , unwinding itself until its final scenes offer up a world of revelations and plenty more to discuss later .
i 've always loved movies that have me talking about them afterwards like the shining and lost highway and this film fits right into that group .
in fact , i guess i can pussyfoot around the actual word all i want but the best way to describe this kind of movie is a " mindfuck " .
if you feel like watching a movie that moves very slowly , gives you a handful of characters with divergent backgrounds , tosses a few very ambiguous and supernatural cookies your way and is extremely disturbing once you put it all together , well ,
then this movie is definitely for you !
it 's the kind of film that you actually have to see twice to fully appreciate ( damn , i missed that whole " peanut butter " thing ! )
and one that will likely creep the shit out of you if watched alone in the dark .
" brrrrrrrrr .
.
.
now what was that sound in the basement ?
honey , can you go check ? " and one thing this film does n't have , unlike its hollywood - ian counterparts like the haunting , is special effects .
in fact , that 's one of the greater things about this movie : it feels real because it looks like it 's actually taped on video with very credible actors in very credible circumstances ( i did some research
and it was , in fact , shot on digital video .
. .
ah - ha ! ) .
another great thing about it is that it 's actually very gory and somewhat violent in theme , and yet we rarely see anything of the sort on the big screen ( it 's mostly implied , kids ! ) .
and as clich ?
d as it might be to say .
. .
it 's usually much scarier when stuff is left to our imagination or implied in movies as such .
other films that this one reminded me of include henry : portrait of a serial killer and the blair witch project , with that same real sense of dread , brooding and terror .
the film does however move awfully slow and if you really do n't get " into " it completely ( you really need to concentrate here ) , you will lose the motion of the story and the pent - up tension might be released .
but overall , this film is yet another great example of the horror genre making a very cool comeback this year with no tight tanktops in sight .
and with david caruso acting like the king hotshot like only he can , how can you go wrong ?
definitely not a film for everyone but
a must - see for anyone looking to throw themselves into the psyche of the disturbed ( count me in ! ) .
stanley kubrick would be proud !
oh yeah . . .
so where 's that gun again . . .
?
where 's joblo coming from ?
the blair witch project ( 4/10 ) - blair witch 2 ( 7/10 ) - the haunting ( 3/10 ) - the house on haunted hill ( 7/10 )
- lost highway ( 10/10 ) - the pledge ( 6/10 ) - the shining ( 9/10 ) - the sixth sense ( 8/10 ) - unbreakable ( 8/10 )

SOLUTION: P

PROBLEM: ingredients : starving artist lusting after a beautiful woman from his childhood synopsis : great expectations ( 1998 ) is a modernized version of a charles dickens novel .
in the original charles dickens classic
an orphan boy named pip learns about life through his friendship with an escaped convict , his relationship with a bitter old lady named miss havisham , and his hopeless lifetime infatuation with havisham 's snobbish adopted daughter , estella .
the gist of the story is that an anonymous benefactor sends pip to london for pip to become an upper class " gentleman .
"
pip leaves for london with " great expectations " to be groomed into a gentleman so that he can one day be classy enough to marry estella .
but life has a way of complicating things .
pip becomes an arrogant s .
o .
b .
until he learns just who his secret benefactor is .
in this new 1998 version of great expectations a poor florida lad named finn ( ethan hawke ) with a talent for drawing has an early memory of helping an escaped convict ( robert de niro ) .
but soon the focus of finn 's life becomes romance , as he develops a lifelong infatuation with estella ( gwyneth paltrow ) , an upper crust girl with some psychological and emotional issues due to being raised in a dysfunctional environment .
estella was raised in wealth by ms .
dinsmoor ( anne bancroft ) , an eccentric , aged and embittered , man - hating single aunt whose groom left her abandoned at the altar on the day of her marriage .
this causes estella to ' fear the daylight ' of relationships , but finn thinks it 's just a case of snobbery .
when finn becomes a young man , an anonymous benefactor sets finn up in new york with the connections and publicity to be groomed into a famous artist .
finn leaves florida with " great expectations " to be a successful artist so that some day he might become classy enough to marry the snobbish estella .
what will happen to all of finn 's " great expectations ?
" opinion : if you 're looking for a romance with a happy ending ,
look no further
; you 've found one here .
ethan hawke is romantic lead .
( he romanced winona ryder in reality bites .
he romanced julie delpy in before sunrise .
he romanced uma thurman in gattaca .
now in great expectations he gets to chase gwyneth paltrow , a rail - thin blonde . )
hawke plays a lovestruck , earnest and unchanged finn throughout the film .
meanwhile paltrow portrays estella as alternating between infuriating tease and ice princess ; estella 's whole purpose is to get men to fall in love and then hurt them rather than become intimate .
anne bancroft goes a little overboard as the deranged and pessimistic ms .
dinsmoor , while robert de niro carries off the convict part suitably .
the difference between the classic dickens novel and this 1998 adaptation is that the dickens novel is ripe with deep and timeless themes about class struggle and love , whereas great expectations ( 1998 ) is more artsy , less complicated story about a 1990s artist dealing with a lifetime tease .

SOLUTION: P

PROBLEM: one of the most popular subplots in the entire science fiction genre is time travel .
that concept , although many purists doubt its scientific credentials , spawned many interesting novels , comic books and films in the last century .
however , the big grand - daddy of time travels , h .
g .
wells ' novel the time machine , was n't written with the intention to speculate about that concept or its consequences .
the author , h .
g .
wells merely used it as a convenient way to express his socialist views and condemn the great social gap between the rich , idle capitalist class and impoverished labour .
whatever intentions wells had , the future generations of readers were less impressed by his political messages .
instead they were fascinated by the idea that the strange new worlds could be explored without traveling trough space .
the novel became one of great classics of science fiction genre and it natural for filmmakers to use it as inspiration .
first of them was george pal , who in 1960 directed film which would , through the years , become genre classic of its own .
the plot revolves about george ( rod taylor ) , victorian scientist who discovered the way to travel through the fourth dimension - time .
at the eve of the new 20th century , george gathers his friends in order to present them his invention - machine that would enable him to travel through time .
they are skeptical , but that does n't prevent george from carrying out his plan and traveling into the future .
at first , he travels slowly , seeing london as it changes through the years and three world wars .
finally , after witnessing world war three , he travels far into the future , hoping that he would cease to witness wars and senseless destructions .
when he finally reaches year 802 , 701 ad , at first glance , new world looks like utopia - humanity consists of young , beautiful , but idle eloi , people who are fed , clothed and taken care of by unseen machines .
but , weena ( yvette mimieux ) , eloi woman , tells george about another side of the coin - in the night , her people is preyed upon by morlocs , humanoid creatures from the underworld .
the time machine became the cinematic classic for the very same reason the novel became the classic in science fiction literature - the fantastic concept was a brilliant way for the authors to talk about burning issues and fears of their respective times . for h .
g .
wells
it was frightening threat of class struggle ; for george pal and his screenwriter david duncan , who produced the film in the worst days of the cold war , it was the constant and more imminent threat of nuclear holocaust , underlined with the negative references to war throughout the movie .
even the modern audience , which would be tempted to discard the film as old - fashioned , could find some values in its universal messages , fit for each era .
compared with the genre films of today , the time machine is even better , and could serve as a good example how to make intelligent , thought - provoking films .
of course , since this is hollywood product after all , the time machine delivers such concepts in the form of classic adventure , sometimes sacrificing plausibility for the sake of attractiveness .
for example , it is hard to imagine that someone would be able to understand perfect english million years in future ; same is with morlocs degenerating into mutant monsters , while eloi remain undistinguished from the people of today .
some of the final scenes , that turn victorian scientist into an action superhero , are also rather unconvincing .
but , on the other hand , the film is very well directed , cleverly paced and the special effects , although definitely old - fashioned , are more than adequate for this kind of picture .
the acting is good , with rod taylor in one of his most remembered roles , while in the same time alan young brings rather memorable performance as george 's trusted friend filby .
yvette mimieux , who plays weena , on the other hand , would be remembered more by her looks than by the complexity of her role .
however , despite all those flaws , the time machine is a very good piece of cinema , something that connoisseurs of quality science - fiction films sorely miss these days .

SOLUTION:
P