In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.

nicolas cage comes up with an ingenious survival mechanism for his role in the wink - and - a - concussive - nudge bombast - o - rama con air .
the opening credits sequence introduces us to cage as cameron poe , a gulf war veteran convicted of manslaughter and serving eight years in prison after an ill - fated bar - room brawl .
the prison scenes are accompanied by voice - overs in which poe , in a languid southern drawl , describes prison life to his wife back home and offers simple homilies for the daughter he has never met .
if the scene gives you a tickle of familiarity , it probably should .
cage appears to realize that con air is going to be utterly dim - witted and ridiculous , and that he 's going to have to do something to keep himself entertained .
and thus he slips into a familiar , surreal role as his own commentary on the proceedings -- cage plays cameron poe as a buffed - up version of raising arizona 's h .
i .
mcdonnough .
cage should have known what he was getting himself into .
he got a paycheck from jerry bruckheimer last year for the rock , and if there 's one thing you can count on from a bruckheimer production ( even without his late partner don simpson ) , it 's that you can count on seeing everything you saw in the _ last _ bruckheimer production .
the critical difference between the rock and con air is cage 's performance .
in the rock , cage appeared to be having the time of his life jumping into the action fray for the first time .
that sense of discovery has been replaced by a wry self - awareness .
while the plot of con air finds poe a parolee on board a hijacked prison transport plane whose goal is just to get home , cage 's goal is different but just as simple : to get out of the film with some measure of dignity intact .
audiences , too , should know what they 're getting themselves into with a bruckheimer production .
in fact , the marketing people are counting on it .
no one who loathed the rock for its swear - grunt - blast repetitiveness will be converted by con air ; no one who loved the rock for exactly the same reasons will be dissuaded .
director simon west ( yet another tv commercial auteur plucked by bruckheimer from the advertising equivalent of the schwab 's soda fountain )
delivers exactly the kind of adrenaline / testosterone cocktail which could launch an endocrinology lecture
( it 's perversely appropriate that one sympathetic con spends most of the flight nearing a diabetic coma ; like insulin , con air does the work of a gland ) .
what he does n't deliver is a moment of suspense .
a bruckheimer film has no use for hitchcock 's notion that showing you the bomb under the desk creates a more interesting scene than just blowing up the desk ; a really , _ really _ big desk and a really , _ really _ big bomb will serve the purpose nicely .
if either west or bruckheimer were interested in genuine tension , they might have done something with con air 's creepiest set - up .
at a desert stop for the plane - load of convicts , serial killer garland greene ( steve buscemi )
wanders of into a trailer park where he meets a little girl having a tea party in a drained swimming pool .
their tete - a - tete is eerie and menacing , providing a welcome shift in tone and giving buscemi a chance to stand out in a cast with too many villains ( danny trejo , ving rhames and a characteristically reptilian john malkovich among them ) .
in fact , con air usually opts for too much of something when the tiniest measure of restraint would have been an improvement -- too many characters , too much editing , too many dopey punch lines , too much of the cheap , ugly appeals to machismo which characterize too many bruckheimer efforts .
it is that kind of exhausting excess to which cage is responding with his detached performance .
while malkovich goes for the outrageous and john cusack ( as a u . s . marshal )
goes for
earnest , cage looks like he just wants to go to sleep .
his recycled raising arizona performance is a means of escape , his chase after a stuffed bunny a continuation of his pursuit of that big box of huggies .
it does n't bode well for cage 's appearance in face / off later this month ; perhaps he already realizes that all he can do in action films is more of the same over and over .
there 's a word for people like you , nicolas .
that word is called recidivist . . .
repeat offender .
N

jean - luc picard ( patrick stewart ) and the rest of the crew of the u .
s .
s .
enterprise are back for their third outing in the ninth film based on the 1960 's series , star trek .
gone are kirk , spock and mccoy and in their wake in the very able and very talented cast from star trek : the next generation .
as usual , a crisis is brewing and it is up to the crew of the enterprise to make the galaxy safe again .
this time out the united federation of planets and an alien race led by f .
murray abraham are trying to move some colonists off a planet against the colonist 's will .
it turns out that this planet is the fountain of youth and the federation and their alien buddies feel that is should be used for the good of everyone and not just a few hundred colonists .
of course picard feels that this sort of treachery is wrong , so he disobeys direct orders and vows to help protect the colonists .
insurrection is a lighter movie than the last two star trek films .
the film focuses on the lofty question of whether the rights of society as a whole outweighs the rights of a small group .
in this respect it gets back to the roots of star trek by disguising social commentary as science fiction .
it does n't do a bad job , other than it tries to inject too much humor into the story line .
many of the jokes are your typical inside star trek - fan - only jokes , while many of the others just fall flat .
the other criticism that i had with the story was that it ignores common sense .
there are only a few hundred people on this whole planet , why do they have to be moved ?
the explanation is that the planet has to be bombarded with deadly radiation so that this fountain of youth effect will be strong enough to help heal f .
murray abraham 's aliens who number only a couple of dozen .
so the basic story line is bad enough in that we have a few hundred being booted out for a few billion , at least that 's plausible .
but in reality we have a few hundred being moved for the benefits of a few dozen , which makes no sense whatsoever .
the other little hiccup in logic is the inclusion of worf ( michael dorn ) , the trusty klingon .
worf was on star trek : the next generation , so they want to include him in the films .
no problem so far .
worf is now a character of star trek : deep space nine , so the writers have to find a way to have him show up .
in the last star trek movie , first contact , the included worf in a credible fashion , in this one , the writers are so lazy that the completely gloss over why he is even in the movie .
what little explanation they do give is so small that you would have missed it if you were n't hanging on every word on the screen .
my minor problems with the movie aside , star trek : insurrection does have an overwhelming number of good points as compared to its bad ones .
while many of the jokes do miss the mark , many are pretty good , even for non - trekkies .
the special effects are among the best for the star trek series .
the action is plentiful and well done .
this is a very good - looking movie .
it should come as no surprise to anyone who ever watched star trek : the next generation that the acting is first rate .
it is very obvious that these actors have been working together for over a decade .
they interact with each other with a skill that few other ensemble casts can muster .
most star trek fans probably will not be disappointed with this latest film in the series .
if you 've always hated star trek , there is nothing here that is going to change your mind .
star trek : insurrection is not the best film in the series , but it is good enough to dispel the long standing tradition of the odd numbered films in the series being far inferior to the even numbered ones .
P

earth is a harsh , unconsoling drama about the time when india gained independence from britain and the ensuing turmoil that engulfed the subcontinent .
people who supposedly loved the same land and the same god found themselves in bitter conflict , as the country divided into factions fighting in the streets : indian and pakistani ; muslim , hindu , sikh , parsee .
the story takes place in lahore , which was indian before partition , and pakistani afterward , regardless of what its citizens might call themselves .
the action is seen through the eyes of lenny ( maaia sethna ) , a young parsee girl , but it is really about her nanny , shanta .
shanta has a small circle of male admirers .
two of the men are suitors : hasan ( rahul khanna ) , a hindu , and dil navaz ( aamir khan ) , a muslim .
the others -- sikh , hindu , muslim -- are older ; some are married ; but all appreciate shanta , who is played by the stirringly beautiful nandita das .
( she also starred in deepa mehta 's previous film , fire , the first part of a thematic trilogy which will conclude with water . ) in an early scene , the men are sitting in a park talking with shanta and lenny ; political tension in the country is growing as the day of independence nears .
one of the men remarks , jokingly , that their little group is probably one of the last places in the city where the different religions can still get along .
he is wrong : the men make barbed little comments to each other , spoken like jokes , but with an undercurrent of fanaticism .
the tenor of these exchanges grows darker and more bitter as the movie progresses .
it is easy to perceive , in these squabbles , the trajectory which ends in mass violence and slaughter .
the group around shanta represents , in a sense , a united india , and shanta herself the ideal motherland -- one which all love , which inspires hindu , muslim , and sikh to live peacably together .
but the circle around shanta is sundered , as is the state .
a sikh is persecuted , hides , then flees .
another man is murdered .
the group of friends will not meet again .
the movie is rife with images of breakage and destruction : a plate shattered on the floor , a stuffed toy torn apart by an upset child , and , most brutally , when the tension escalates into violence , a man is held down , tied between two cars , and ripped in half by the opposing movement of the vehicles .
it is a visceral and effective metaphor for a country which is being destroyed just as painfully .
the crux of earth 's plot is the transformation undergone by dil navaz .
his sisters are killed in brutal fashion , by hindus , because they are muslim .
dil navaz seeks solace from shanta , and asks in desperation that she marry him .
but she loves hasan , and tenderly refuses dil navaz 's offer .
the combination of familial anguish and romantic rejection twists inside him , and it is easy to see how he is seduced by the growing mob mentality : the muslim cause gives him a motive to vent his anger and hate .
despite the things he later does , it is to the credit of earth that it does not simply denounce dil navaz and those like him , but shows how circumstances can make decent enough men do monstrous things .
the conclusion -- the consequence of dil navaz 's transformation -- is rather abrupt .
the story earth tells does not end .
it just stops .
it is an appropriate finish : giving us closure would have imparted , at least on an aesthetic level , a sense of resolution , of satisfaction .
but there was no resolution for india and pakistan
-- they have been at war , on a small or large scale , for decades .
since the personal dramas in earth mirror the political struggles of a nation , it is only right that those dramas should have no terminus .
there is no healing to be had , no closure , on any level ( despite the needless , tacked - on ending , with voice - over narration from lenny as an adult , framing the story ) .
earth is , in some ways , an unexceptional movie .
it does not reinvent the wheel , following instead the standard pattern of historical dramas .
but deepa mehta 's directon is assured , and the issues she addresses run deep .
earth does for india what movies like zhang yimou 's to live and tian zhuangzhuang 's the blue kite did for china : they show us the agonies endured by unremarkable people who had the bad luck to be caught up and smashed in the crucible of history .
such films strike me as inherently valuable , even when flawed .
they may be biased or inaccurate , but they bear the weight of human hardship , and this confers on them a nobility and gravity which other , more inventive films , often lack .
it is notable that all three movies were banned in their native countries : the events shown may have happened decades ago , but they still touch a nerve .
the issues tackled in earth have a particular urgency in light of the nuclear test bombings that took place last year .
in the near future , india and pakistan may launch nuclear missiles at each other .
at the time of the tests i had some understanding of the reasons why this might happen ; after seeing earth , i have a much , much better understanding .

P