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

Q: for those of us who were n't yet born when the 1960 's rock ' n ' rolled around , monterey pop affords an affectionate glimpse of the music that influenced our parents to be hippies .
from otis redding to jimi hendrix , janis joplin to the mamas and the papas , and jefferson airplane to the who , this documentary is jam - packed with contagious energy .
but i give fair warning that i will reveal the ending , which does not do the rest of the film the justice it deserves .
shot in 1969 at an outdoor concert that precluded woodstock , the film defies the stereotype of the general population at the time .
sure , some have painted their faces and smoke joints , but d .
a .
pennebaker ( the war room , moon over broadway ) surprisingly chooses to show a broad spectrum of the audience .
no matter who is watching , it all comes back to the talented musicians that stir your soul .
the excitement starts before the music even begins .
a young girl is cleaning thousands of seats and when asked why by an interviewer , she replies that she feels lucky to do so .
there are moments of organized craziness as john phillips , leader of the mamas and the papas and one of the concert organizers , tries to get in touch with dionne warwick .
and when one band is tuning up , a member remarks , " finally , a decent sound system !
"
you can tell just by watching these first few moments that this show is n't about vanity , it 's about playing the music you love to those who have an appreciation for it , a two - way street .
this interaction between audience and performer continues throughout the film and becomes infectious to the audience .
it 's impossible to tear your eyes away from janis joplin as she belts out her ballad about love being a ball and chain .
and while the lyrics to " wild thing " may not be all that complicated , watching jimi hendrix mime having sex with his guitar is as captivating as otis redding singing about love .
even if you do n't recognize every band you see on stage , you can imagine being as enthralled by their work as the public sitting in those seats .
the only drawback to the film is the ending , which unfortunately i must reveal .
all the other bands , big names then and still today , got approximately 7 to 10 minutes of screen time .
in contrast , the last band on camera , a wholly forgettable one , gets an entire 18 minutes of screen time .
for a film that 's only 78 minutes long , that 's too large of a chunk , especially when previous acts are much more stimulating .
all in all , monterey pop is
a precious , rare look at a time period that still holds sway over us .
the variety of music , as well as the beautifully shot performances , are easy to become immersed in .
if there was ever any question as to why most of these bands were so popular , this is quickly dispelled .
it 's almost depressing to think that music this moving does n't get made much anymore .
instead we 're stuck with * nsync , the backstreet boys , and jennifer lopez , all of whom should have stuck with modeling .

A: P
****
Q: how could a g - rated disney film based on meg cabot 's novel " the princess diaries " be anything but cute , harmless fun ?
easy .
take all the cute , harmless fun out of it .
and while you 're at it make it borrr - ring .
that 's what director garry marshall , screenwriter gina wendkos and , not to be outdone , producer whitney houston have done with the g - rated disney film " the princess diaries .
"
you could n't tell it from the audience though , a braintree , mass .
of growing , glowing pre - pubescent girls ( and the odd parental , popcorn perched about their persons ) , who positively cheered when the end credits rolled ( ah the film had struck a lovely nerve with them but not with fuddy - duddy old me ) .
well , i might have cheered that the utter tripe was now well and truly over , but that would have been too obvious .
too obvious is the least of the problems with marshall 's film ( garry made a couple of other " princess " movies-- " pretty woman " and " runaway bride
" --but this one 's way without julia roberts
so maybe
*
that 's * its problem ) .
in addition to being predictable as molasses , " the princess diaries " has hardly got a laugh in it
( it 's a comedy ) , could bore the pants off an abyssinian for long , long stretches , and is so sloppily edited the principals refer to scenes we have n't even seen yet ( and probably never will except , perhaps , in the dvd edition ) .
marshall should take virtually all of the blame here , since he 's been at this for some time and should know when a scene or two is n't working . . .
and hardly
* any * of " the princess diaries " works ( " works , " alas , implies cleverness and there 's none of that here either ) .
newcomer anne hathaway stars as mia thermopolis , a bright but socially invisible san franciscan teen who learns that her single mom ( a wacky artist played by the likable caroline goodall ) had a bit of a fling with some royal member of some miniscule european country nobody ever heard of ( the filmmakers go out of their way
* not * to call it serbia , which is pretty much what all miniscule
european countries are called in the movies mark my words ) and now she , mia , is next in line to rule " genovia " ( hence the headphones / tiara combo in the print ads ) .
julie andrews , with the luminous factor cranked to 11 , plays mia 's grandmother ( aka queen clarisse renaldi ) , who shows up out of the royal blue and lends mia much advice and direction in the eating , talking , and looking like a princess department ( although mia 's big makeover simply transforms her from ugly duckling to ugly swan ) .
does queen julie lose her dignity for the sake of a good laugh ?
not really .
consuming a corn dog is about the worst that it gets .
also on stereotypical hand are a brainless jock , an evil cheerleader , a dorky - looking best friend ( " welcome to the dollhouse " 's heather matarazzo ) , a sensitive auto mechanic / musician , and marshall mainstay hector elizondo as joe the driver , imparting wit and wisdom from the front seat of mia 's chauffeur - driven limousine at every intersection .
a non - animated g - rated movie is a rarity these days but the rating here reflects the fact that all the guts , all the good stuff , has been exorcised from the finished product .
lame , labored , and lamentable
, " the princess diaries " is recommended for eight - and - a - half year olds of the feminine persuasion * only * ; all others would do well to avoid it
( like potholes , the plague , and " the perfect storm " ) .

A: N
****
Q: jacques tati 's 1953 classic " les
vacances
de m . hulot " ( also known as " mr .
hulot 's vacation , " in english ) ought to be the textbook on how to do non ?
dialogue comedy in film .
the characters hardly ever speak to each other directly , and the film operates on the paper ?
thin premise that monsieur hulot , played by tati himself , is awkward and clumsy and generally manages to annoy the other guests at the beach resort hotel where he is taking a week 's vacation .
yet the film had me beside myself laughing more consistently than any in recent memory .
part of the reason the film works so well is the clever setup for the various gags .
slapstick has often been regarded as an unsophisticated and even crude form of comedy , but i think part of the reason for this is that it often seems forced : you can only see movie characters start running after something and then crash face - first into a pole so many times before you start to wonder what all these poles are doing there in the first place or why these people do n't watch where they 're going .
in " les vacances de m . hulot , " the gags build upon each other and often start out relatively low - key .
in one sequence , for example , hulot is painting the side of his small row boat on the beach when , while his back is turned , the paint can gets caught up in the oncoming waves , washes away , then comes back up on the other side of the boat .
while crossing over to get the can , hulot steps in the boat and unknowingly cracks it .
when he actually takes the boat out into the water , it breaks in half , but the two halves flip up against each other , trapping him inside as the bystanders mistake it for a shark fin and panic on the beach ensues .
tati does n't waste a single opportunity for humor ;
scenes that might have yielded one joke in most comedies are good for at least four or five in this film .
it has been said that comedy relies on frustrating the audience 's expectations , and " les vacances de m . hulot " succeeds brilliantly in that area as well .
tati accomplishes this largely through a sort of deadpan understatement .
when hulot goes into a separate room during dinner and starts playing a record at defeaningly loud volume , no fights or shouting matches ensue ; instead , the waiter calmly walks in and shuts off the power in the room , disconnecting the record player and leaving a puzzled hulot sitting in the dark .
tati also uses running gags to this effect , allowing them to keep running far longer than most comedy directors would ; more often than not , we can see them coming and think , " oh , he 's not going to do that again , " but , lo and behold , he does .
for example , there is a recurring joke in which hulot 's noisy , sputtering car engine wakes everyone in the middle of the night as an exterior shot reveals the hotel 's lights coming on one by one .
then this image turns up again in the finale , which i will not give away other than to say that involves a lot more noise in the middle of the night than a car engine could ever produce .
the ending is one of two elements that really make this a four - star film as opposed to merely an above - average , clever comedy . as much as i was laughing during this film , i was thinking to myself occasionally that tati had to top himself at the end to really make this work as a complete viewing experience ; suffice it to say that he did .
the other important aspect is that the film never seems disdainful of its characters .
it easily could have turned the tables on hulot and had the other guests exact some kind of revenge on him ; alternatively , it could have portrayed the others as humorless curmudgeons .
instead , tati seems to regard his characters with cheerful amusement more than anything else and invites the audience to like them , however strange or irritating they might seem .
" les vacances de m .
hulot " is not subtitled , but the dialogue is sparse and for the most part not terribly essential to the flow of events .
anyone with a taste for this kind of absurd humor ought to make this film their next rental from the video store .
note : " les vacances
de m . hulot " was not rated by the mpaa .
it would at most receive a pg rating .

A:
P
****