TASK DEFINITION: In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
PROBLEM: cradle will rock is the latest effort from director / actor tim robbins .
while he may have had an oscar worthy film back in 1995 ( dead man walking ) ,
he gets a little overconfident and sloppy here .
the story is confusing , and filled with many subplots , so i 'll try my best and explain it as simply as possible .
the film is based on a " mostly " true story about a federal theater in the 1930s , that produced a play ( the cradle will rock ) that apparently was offensive to some , so the government shuts it down .
it 's during the time of the depression , and all this theater wants to do is entertain and cheer up those who do not have jobs , or are poor .
between this conflict lies what seems like 10 subplots , about those who work in theater , or those associated .
also along the way are some other messages mashed together to create an even more overwhelming experience .
tim robbin 's just keeps piling on political views , and characters , that we just give up on the film , or in some cases walk out .
for robbin 's it may be a nice achievement , but to me it seemed more like a friendly get together with slightly more sophisticated dialogue , and fancy outfits .
i thought the main reason for seeing the film would be for the outstanding cast ,
unfortunately are all uninteresting , except for a few .
let me recap what each important character does , so please bear with me
( it 's the least you can do , especially if you were considering seeing this ) .
i 'll begin with those involved with the play .
there 's orson welles ( angus macfadyen ) who of course is the director of the play , the producer john houseman ( cary elwes ) , marc blitzstein ( hank azaria ) the writer of the play , emily watson , a woman who gets her break by playing the main part in cradle will rock .
outside the play there 's the : ventriloquist ( bill murray ) who wants a relationship with a federal theater clerk ( joan cusack ) , another subplot involving a painter diego rivera ( ruben blades ) who 's unhappy that his painting is too be destroyed by nelson rockefeller because he feels it to be an outrage ( john cusack ) .
there 's a few other actresses and actors who have their own stories ( susan sarandon , philip baker hall too name a few ) but those that i mentioned , were the most significant to the story .
anyway , most of these talented hollywood stars were completely wasted , except for emily watson , who does another great job , and one of my personal favorite actors john cusack , who always delivers through thick and thin .
now although most of the film was weak to say the least , there were some nice moments and some involving subjects , but all this is overblown
.
sure the free speech segment was a nice feature , but not when it becomes repetitive .
the whole film is like this , and it 's basically nothing but a headache
.
on the brighter side , tim robbin 's direction was masterful .
his camera direction seemed reminiscent to the works of paul thomas anderson 's latest magnolia , only smoother in my opinion , but even that ca n't make a movie that much better .
although it has it 's moments ( not many of them , but they 're there ) , cradle will rock stays true to it 's title , because the cradle rocked too far and tipped over .

SOLUTION: N

PROBLEM: it 's probably inevitable that the popular virtual reality genre ( " the matrix , " " existenz " ) would collide with the even more popular serial - killer genre ( " kiss the girls , " " se7en " ) .
the result should have been more interesting than " the cell .
"
as the movie opens , therapist catharine deane ( jennifer lopez ) treats a catatonic boy ( colton james ) by entering his mind through some sort of virtual reality technique that 's never fully explained .
after months of therapy sessions in a surreal desert , catharine has no success to report .
meanwhile , killer carl stargher ( vincent d'onofrio ) has claimed another victim .
his particular hobby is to kidnap young women , keep them in a glass cell overnight , and drown them .
he takes the corpse and soaks it in bleach , then suspends himself over the body and jerks off while watching a video tape of the drowning .
although carl 's been doing this for awhile , he 's recently become sloppy , and fbi agent peter novak ( vince vaughn ) is closing in fast .
not fast enough , though , to keep carl from sticking another woman ( tara subkoff ) in the cell or to catch him before he suffers a schizophrenic attack that leaves him in a coma .
from the videos in carl 's house , peter can see that the drowning cell is automated and will fill with water forty hours after the abduction .
to save the kidnapped girl , peter has to find the cell before the end of the day , and comatose carl 's not talking .
so off they go to catharine in the hope that she can go inside carl 's mind and find out where the cell is in time .
the focus of " the cell " in on the ornate interior of carl 's mind , but the universe director tarsem singh creates seems more an exercise in computer - generated spectacle than an exploration of the psychotic personality .
for the most part , it 's style without substance .
in his own mind , carl is a decadent emperor in flowing robes , ming the merciless , as well as a frightened boy ( jake thomas ) abused by his father .
all in all , the mind of a psycho killer turns out to be a strangely dull place , and i kept wishing i could fast - forward to the next development .
singh is best known for directing music videos , particularly rem 's " losing my religion , " and " the cell " seems very much like a really long , really slow mtv video with the sound deleted .
singer lopez seems to think she 's in a video as well ; she devotes more time to posing in elaborate costumes than she does to acting .
the premise had great promise .
the computer - generated world within carl 's mind could have been a bizarre , surreal universe governed by insanity and symbolism rather than logic .
the first room catharine enters in carl 's head shows this promise .
she finds a horse standing in center of the room ; suddenly , sheets of sharp - edged glass fall into the horse , dividing it into segments .
the panes of glass separate , pulling apart the pieces of the still - living horse .
this scene is twisted , disturbing , and thought - provoking , because the psychological importance of the horse and its fate is left to the viewer to ponder .
another element that should have been developed is the effect on catharine of merging with the mind of a psychopath .
their minds begin to bleed together at one point in the movie , and this should have provided an opportunity to discover the dark corners of catharine 's own psyche .
like sidney lumet 's " the offence " or michael mann 's " manhunter , " " the cell " could have explored how the madness of the killer brings out a repressed darkness in the investigator .
however , catharine 's character is hardly developed at all , and lopez has no depth to offer the role .
bottom line : do n't get trapped in this one .

SOLUTION: N

PROBLEM: titanic is so close to being the perfect movie
it 's upsetting that it is n't .
the film , which cost $ 200 million+ to make and could of put 20th century fox into a lot of finicial trouble if it ' sunk ' ( pun intended ) is a labour of love for cameron , who wrote and directed the film .
we all know that big budget dosen't mean great film ( see waterworld ( 1995 ) ) but titanic is far superior to kevin costners waterlogged epic .
but sadly , titanic just misses the mark of masterpiece ( although it is one of cameron 's best films )
the film starts with present day explorers searching the runied titanic .
they find a safe , and inside a picture of a woman .
the woman in the picture ( an old winslet ) tells the explorers that the picture is of her .
the explorers invite her over , and she then tells her story of titanic .
in the flashback , dicaprio plays poor boy jack dawson , who , after winning a poker game , wins two tickets to board the grand ship titanic , leaving liverpool to go to america .
also boarding the ship is rich woman rose dewitt bukater ( winslet ) who is being forced into a marriage with a man she dosen't love at all , cal hockley ( zane ) so her family can remain rich .
she nearly commits suicide on the ship , but jack comes to the rescue , saves rose , they fall in love , and cal gets jealous and eventually tries to kill them .
oh yeah , and the ship sinks .
and that is the main problem with the film , and which stops it from being a work of genius .
the story and script ( both by cameron ) are both weak .
the story is full of cliched characters , ( the creepy man who the nice girl has to marry , the poor boy with heart , the stuck - up mother ) and poor dialogue ( the script consists of lots of in - jokes of how the boat wo n't sink , and most of the dialogue is pretty basic )
it 's a shame really , as the audience does have to sit through 3 hours of this film .
without good dialogue , a film could become a very long , very boring film ( like camerons own terminator 2 , 1992 ) but , luckily ,
there are some redeeming features that make the story and dialogue problems just disappear .
firstly , there 's cameron 's direction .
there are some great sweeping shots of the titanic , and some clever fades between the flashback titanic and the ruined titanic .
but the scenes cameron directs especially well are the disaster scenes at the end .
there is a lot of mayhem and panic ,
all done very well by cameron .
it 's a scary sight , watching bodies fall from great heights into the watery depths below .
thanks to cameron 's direction , then , the audiences attention is held for the full 3 hours 15 minutes .
to support the directing are the excellent cast , working very well with their underwritten characters .
dicaprio is good , although he only looks 16 - 17 years old .
his performance of a over excitiable , yet also well mannered boy is excellent , and he also has some funny lines .
winslet is great also , and her transistion from a well mannered rich girl to a rebelous young adult is pretty smooth .
zane is deliciously evil as cal , saying every line with a sneer and a flicker of the eye lash .
the audience really does come to hate him .
he may be playing the same character he plays in every film he 's in ( like dead calm , 1988 ) but
he does it really , really well .
also worthy of note is kathy bates ( edward scissorhands , 1990 ) as a loud mouthed american .
finally , the icing on the ' great things ' cake are the special effects .
cameron is a whiz with effects
( just watch aliens ( 1988 ) , terminator 2 and true lies , 1994 ) and they are used very well throughout .
the sweeps of the ships are awesome , although digital domain , who did the effects , can not animate human movement too well .
the humans seem to move to ' smoothly ' , there 's just something odd about them .
you can tell that they have been animated on a computer .
of course , the ship sinking scenes are awesome , with bodies flying all over the place , and the scene where the ship splits in half has to be seen to be believed .
titanic is one of the only films where effects have reinforced the film .
titanic , then , is a wonder of directing , acting and cgi , but not writing and story .
again , like most of camerons films , the editing is loose ( cameron edits himself ) , and the film could of come in under three hours with a few more cuts .
titanic , then , although not the godfather of movies it could of been , is a wonderful attempt at creating a work of genius .
enjoyable , scary , and even sad , titanic is a film cinema was invented for , filling the screen with incredible images , and assaulting the ears with awesome sound . a superb film , but sadly not perfect .
overall rating= (

SOLUTION:
P