instruction:
In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
question:
writing a screenplay for a thriller is hard .
harder than pouring concrete under the texas sun . harder than building a bridge over troubled waters . and incidentally , a whole heck of a lot harder than writing a movie review .
thrillers are all variations on a theme .
you have a smart , resourceful , and powerful bad guy , who has a goal he has to meet .
you have a noble and brave good guy , who has to protect the innocent , kill the bad guy , and not get killed himself in the process .
the trick of thriller writing is doing all of this in an interesting and novel manner .
this simple formula can lead to classic movies like north by northwest , high noon , or silence of the lambs , or big summer blockbusters like men in black , the fugitive , or air force one , or it can lead to utter dreck like masterminds , event horizon , kull the conqueror .
.. . is anyone else getting depressed here ?
point is , it 's not enough to follow the formula .
you 've got to throw in something extra , something good and new and better than the last version .
something to surprise and move all of us people who buy the tickets and the popcorn and the happy meals .
this is a hard thing to do , but it is absolutely necessary in every way .
without that something extra -- whether it 's a great plot or a well - written screenplay , or great special effects or great locations or great casting or great performances or great big hungry dinosaurs -- the movie fails .
that 's why the jackal , with all its starpower , with all its budget , with all its hype , gets a big fat f. bruce willis is the bad guy , the jackal , a legendary killer for hire .
richard gere is the good guy , a former ira assassin with a vendetta against the jackal .
the jackal is trying to kill someone .
gere is trying to stop him .
will gere be able to stop the assassination in time and kill the jackal ?
( i 'll give you three guesses , and the first two do n't count . )
there are no surprises awaiting the audience in the jackal , no moment when you say to yourself , " i wonder what happens next ?
"
the script for the jackal is n't ripped straight from today 's headlines .
it 's ripped off , straight from an episode of millennium .
throughout the movie , we learn what the jackal 's plans are and how he intends to accomplish them .
no surprise .
the fun of a movie like this should come from richard gere figuring out what the jackal 's plan is and developing a clever plan to foil the bad guy .
instead , we get two ( count 'em , two ) scenes where gere is sitting in an fbi conference room somewhere and instantly divines the jackal 's plan just as if he 's frank black ( or more likely , just as if he 's been handed a copy of the script ) .
and we never get more than a superficial clue as to why gere has had this flash of insight .
it 's like gere 's character is psychic , but neither he nor the fbi ( or the screenwriters ) seem to know it .
and just like in millennium , the bad guy has an overwhelming need to go after the people the good guy cares about , whether or not they are important to what he 's trying to do or not .
what 's more , in the last half of the movie , the jackal , supposedly a super - smart professional terrorist who never makes a mistake , comes down with a major case of the stupids .
as for the performances .
.. bruce willis manages to get through the whole movie without a wisecrack , which is a major achievement , but not enough reason to see the movie .
his disguises are good , but not as good or as interesting as val kilmer 's in the saint .
richard gere is made to talk the entire movie in an irish accent , which detracts from his otherwise lifeless and dull performance .
sidney poitier is probably the most disappointing element in a overwhelmingly disappointing movie -- not that his performance is bad or anything , it 's not , but it is sad that hollywood wo n't use this talented actor in any part other than an fbi agent ( shoot to kill , sneakers ) .
writing a good plot and a good screenplay , like i said , is hard , but it can be done .
it was n't done here .
it is our job as consumers to reward good screenplays and to denounce bad and uninteresting ones .
do not go see this movie .
you 'll only encourage the producers to make more just like it .
instead , stay home and rent day of the jackal , or in the line of fire , or a fire safety video , for crying out loud .
anything other than the jackal , which lives up to its name by gnawing the dead bones of other , better movies .
answer:
N


question:
in my opinion , a movie reviewer 's most important task is to offer an explanation for his opinion .
but with soul survivors , i 'm so full of critical rage that this review is liable to turn into a venomous , uncontrollable rant , obligations damned .
however , protocol forces me to do otherwise .
soul survivors tells the story of four college - bound friends : cassandra ( melissa sagemiller ) is sweet and innocent .
party girl annabel ( eliza dushku of bring it on ) is dating world - weary harvard student matt ( wes bentley ) .
matt still has feelings for cassie , who is now dating sean ( casey affleck ) .
driving back from a creepy , gothic party , the quartet gets into a horrific car crash .
sean dies , leaving cassie crestfallen and guilty , made worse because sean saw matt kiss cassie just minutes after sean revealed his love for her . as cassie mopes through her classes , she sees the ghost of sean all over the place , urging her to follow him .
along with being plagued by other ghastly visions , cassie is also followed by thugs from that strange party .
annabel and matt try calming her down , but no one shares cass 's visions .
she has to figure out this purgatory all by herself .
rarely have i seen a director
so thoroughly mishandle material .
in his directorial debut , steve carpenter does nothing to provoke the audience into feeling any emotion .
when the movie 's camerawork is n't pedestrian , it 's clich ?
d .
carpenter 's need for close - ups , his camera following sagemiller from behind , drain the movie of any anticipation .
we already know what to look for , so why should we be surprised ? and the sense of scary atmosphere , which was recently done so well in the others , is nowhere to be found here .
carpenter 's script relies on random twists and turns with a minimum of logic and loads of laziness .
this is a movie where the ending features one character providing an explanation about the plot to another character , which is one of the lamest screenwriting devices around .
the second lamest device , of course , is the , " oh , it was all a dream " resolution . and guess what ?
this movie has both ! not that the main body of the film , which has sagemiller constantly running in fear or having a nervous breakdown , is anything worthwhile .
since there 's no captivating dialogue , no character chemistry exists anywhere .
that 's a huge problem , since the four main characters are supposed to be couples .
carpenter ca n't even get the smutty scenes right , which are becoming more prevalent in pg-13 movies like bring it on and get over it .
[ the film was recently re - cut from an r rating to get more kids in the seats .
-ed . ]
when sagemiller and dushku dance together at a club , he rarely shows them in a full shot and he never keeps the camera on them for longer than a second before relating to some michael bay - style quick cuts .
and when sagemiller and dushku take a shower together after getting covered in paint , they 're fully clothed . regardless ,
any sexiness in that scene is undercut by its stupidity .
why would n't they wash the clothes in the sink or in the washing machine ?
why would they shower in their clothes ?
what if they were n't covered in latex paint ?
the cast , which will see better material in the future , would be wise to leave this one off their resumes .
i felt sorry for affleck , who i 've liked in other movies , and bentley , who was great in american beauty .
dushku , who possesses an alluring femme fetale quality , has got to stop taking roles belonging to rose mcgowan .
as for sagemiller ( star of the aforementioned get over it ) , i want to see her in a movie where she plays a person , and not an object for gawking .
and i 'm not even getting into luke wilson 's role as a priest .
at least he 's friends with wes anderson .
bottom line : soul survivors is so awful i feel compelled to knock on doors and warn people about it .
answer:
N


question:
"
it was not scary .
" these are the first words that came to mind after it was over .
when a movie is called _ vampires _ , " not scary " are n't words that should be associated with it .
but that was n't my only gripe .
john carpenter is a name associated with cutting - edge cinema , as in the intense scares of _ halloween _ ,
_ the thing _
and _ the prince of darkness _ , or the offbeat action of _
they live _ and _ escape from new york_. unfortunately , the only thing that is cutting edge about _ vampires
_ is the level of boredom the movie is able to reach .
with an anemic plot and not - quite - kosher special effects , _ john carpenter 's vampires _ has barely enough substance to slake the thirst of even the least discerning genre fan .
the film is at first concerned with a group of roaming vampire slayers , led by james woods , of all people .
like some sort of holy a - team ( they even have their own souped - up van ) , the bunch invade and wipe out a nest of vampires in a new mexico shack .
their method is amusingly innovative : the blood - suckers are reeled out with harpoons so they can flare up in the sun like matchsticks . to commemorate their victory , the loutish band decorates a motel room with hookers and parties the night away .
their celebration is short - lived , however , as a master vampire named valek ambushes and single - handedly destroys most of the team .
woods ' jack crow and buddy montoya ( daniel baldwin ) escape with their lives , along with a woman named katrina ( sheryl lee ) .
although the woman has been bitten , montoya and crow decide to keep katrina for her psychic link to the master vampire .
the rest of the movie is concerned with the boys ' hunt for valek ( thomas ian griffith ) , a freaky marilyn manson - type who 's on a mission that dates back 600 years .
along the way they pick up a priest named guiteau ( tim guinee ) , a character who serves pretty much the same purpose as the jittery cpl .
upham in _ saving private ryan_. some stuff happens in the middle of the movie ,
but i ca n't remember most of it , because i often found a twitching hair in the corner of the frame more interesting than what was happening on screen .
_ vampires
_ finally starts to pick up about 90 minutes into the mix , as crow , guiteau , and montoya assault an abandoned prison - turned vampire nest .
only then does the film begin to even resemble a carpenter flick .
but it 's too little too late .
we get the inevitable final confrontation , but it seems tacked on and rather anti - climactic
( come on , we 're dealing with _ the _ master vampire here ! )
interestingly , last summer 's vampire actioner _ blade _ was derived from a comic book , and _ vampires _ from a novel ,
yet the latter seems more steeped in campy cheesiness than the former , a more deliberate superhero flick .
woods ' jack
crow spouts glib off - the - cuff one - liners and strolls away from exploding buildings with that oh - so - cool stride . and his motive for killing vampires ?
take a wild guess .
( hint : a _
_
_ _ _
_ killed his _
_
_
_ _ when he was just a _
_
_ _ _ . )
at least _
blade _ had decent action and slick stylishness .
_ vampires _ lacks even cheap thrills to mask its gossamer - thin plot . to make up for this , the movie resorts to other " shocks , " such as its generally condescending attitude towards women
( crow slaps them around for the fun of it ) and an overplayed contempt for religion
( crow teases guiteau incessantly about whether his vow of celibacy has made him prone to " getting woodies . " )
it can be argued that maybe i wanted too much from this movie .
if not scary and gory , i wanted tense , relentless , and exhausting .
_ john carpenter 's vampires
_ is none of these .
i can only recommended it for the hardcore carpenter fan .
for the rest of you looking for a good scare
, beware :
_ vampires
_ is a film with no teeth .
answer:

N