TASK DEFINITION: In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
PROBLEM: " varsity blues " is the best film of 1999 thus far .
unfortunately , it is also the first film i have seen from 1999 .
it is another one of those small - town sports movies that involves a flawed , but good - heartedfrom 1999 .
it is another one of those small - town sports movies that involves a flawed , but good - hearted protagonist ; a rough and meanspirited coach ; and the " big game .
"
by the end , will the underdog overcome great odds and triumph ?
will everyone in the town turn against the coach ?
will the team win the climactic game ?
do cats bathe themselves regularly ?
the so - called " hero " in question is john moxin ( james van der beek ) , a senior at west canaan high school who plays for the varsity football team , but is really just hoping to get a scholarship at brown university so that he can get out of the dead - end town .
at least he 's got the right idea , since west canaan , texas is portrayed in the film as , frankly , pathetic , with the whole town treating the weekly football games as the second coming .
heck , in one scene , the front page of the town 's newspaper is proclaiming about the west canaan badgers ' big win the night before .
when the team 's star quarterback is severely injured , tearing the ligaments in his leg , john finds himself taking over as the team 's leader , but his few minutes of glory do not last long , as he begins to have problems with his girlfriend ( amy smart ) when she discovers he spent an evening with another girl ( ali larter ) . and after staying out all night with his drinking buddies at a strip joint ( all of the teenagers in the film are portrayed as raging alcoholics ) , the team loses their second - to - last game , putting john at feuds with the coach ( jon voight who , like gary oldman , is overstaying his welcome in the typecasted role as the " bad guy " ) .
worse yet , the coach is threatening to ruin john 's scholarship chances if the badgers do n't win their final game .
the plotting of " varsity blues " is as old as the hills , and contains every cliche in the book .
admittedly , i was never exactly bored while i was watching it , but i hasten to add that i was rarely ever entertained
.
throughout , all i could really think of is how virtually the same exact story had been filmed with a great deal more thoughtfulness and maturity in 1983 's " all the right moves .
" one of the biggest problems
i had with the film is how little of interest any of the characters actually were , least of all certainly not john , who , played by van der beek ( of tv 's " dawson 's creek " ) , is pretty much a bore without any engaging qualities .
while i probably should n't blame this on van der beek , since the inauspicious and
" by - the - numbers " screenplay by w .
peter iliff is n't of any help , he is still certainly not in the league of tom cruise in " all the right moves .
"
the story revolving around john , meanwhile , is extemely thin throughout , particularly for its 104-minute running time , and it alternates between uninspired comic relief ( as in when the students see their sex education teacher working as a stripper at the club ) and heavy - handed melodrama .
the romance between john and his girlfriend had the potential to be an adequate subplot , but we also learned very little about her , which is unfortunate since amy smart , whom i do n't think i 've seen before in past films , is probably the only character written with any sort of intelligence .
smart does not allow her character to become the " passive girlfriend , " instead coming off as a young woman with her own ideas and opinions .
it 's too bad the camera did n't linger on her long enough
so we could hear some of those thoughts .
the adult characters probably fare the worse of any , since they all must play residents of a dim - witted town that cares about nothing but football .
john 's relationship with his parents can also be telegraphed far in advance .
his father is set on him becoming a football player at a university , but john does n't want any part of that .
his mother stands beside her " big , strong husband " and is a passive female .
finally , jon voight plays the stock bully coach character and he does nothing to make the thankless role any more than one - dimensional .
saving " varsity blues " from being a total washout are a few amusing sequences , including one set in the sex education class , which did get a laugh out of me .
the scenes of playing football were well - shot and thankfully did n't overstay their welcome , as many sports films fall victim to .
but leaving the theater , the question i had in my mind was why did this film need to be made ?
i seem to be asking this question quite a lot lately , since the same old stories seem to be cranking out of hollywood .
do we really need another high - school sports film ?
no , we do n't , and certainly not one of this low - caliber , which felt like a cut - and - paste job of spare parts from much better , but similar , films .
" varsity blues , " no doubt is the first one , however , to include an earnest scene in which one of the characters is only wearing whipped cream on their private parts .

SOLUTION: N

PROBLEM: and now the high - flying hong kong style of filmmaking has made its way down to the classics , and it is n't pretty .
this time out the nod to asia goes by way of france in the excruciating bland and lukewarm production of the musketeer , a version of dumas 's the three musketeers .
by bringing in popular asian actor / stunt coordinator xing xing xiong -- whose only prior american attempts at stunt choreography have been the laughable van damme vehicle double team and the dennis rodman cinematic joke simon sez -- our musketeers are thrown into the air to do their fighting .
the end result is a tepid and dull action / adventure rip - off that stinks of indiana jones and bad asian kung fu .
the story is so simple my grandmother could have adapted the screenplay .
d'artagnan ( justin chambers ) is the vengeful son of a slain musketeer .
he travels to paris to join the royal musketeers and find the man that killed his parents .
in paris , he meets the cunning cardinal richelieu ( stephen rea ) , who is trying to overthrow the king , and richelieu 's man - in - black associate febre ( tim roth ) , the killer of his folks .
he finds the musketeers in paris disbanded and drunk , so he rounds up aramis ( nick moran ) , athos ( jan gregor kremp ) and porthos ( steven spiers ) to free the musketeer 's wrongfully imprisoned leader treville from the king 's prison .
d'artagnan and his new frisky love interest / chambermaid francesca ( mena suvari ) play footsy and coo at each other as the cardinal hunts down the musketeers until finally the queen ( catherine deneuve ) ends up being captured by the menancing febre , forcing the musketeers to regroup , with d'artagnan leading the charge , and save the day .
director peter hyams ( end of days ) obviously wanted to blend eastern and western filmmaking styles , but here it 's a disaster .
one problem is that , in reality , most eastern films have taken their lead from western ones .
jet li 's high risk is a rip - off of die hard -- not the other way around .
ironically , there is awfully little swordplay or action in the film at all -- maybe ten minutes of swashbuckling spread over five scenes .
most asian action films carry the bulk of their production with 20- to 30-minute action sequences , because they know the scenes have to carry the picture .
the musketeer instead weighs itself down with a predictable and monotonous screenplay by gene quintano ( sudden death ) , horrible acting
by stephen rea and tim roth , and the prosaic attempt of justin chambers ( the wedding planner ) to deliver his mousy self as a leader .
chambers ' d'artangnan is n't a musketeer -- he 's a mouseketeer ! and hyam 's use of candles and torches to light the grime and filth of 17th century paris are well - noted , but that 's the only standout in
an overall flat production .

SOLUTION: N

PROBLEM: " stuart little " is one of the best family films to come out this year .
it 's a cute , funny and very good - natured film that has nothing for parents to squirm over except a few mild cusswords .
though i read the book a long time ago and i really do not remember what it was about , i do know that this film does not disappoint .
finally a movie gets released that is as good as the trailer makes it to be , with a few surprising twists ,
some very funny moments , and a few sentimental moments all mixed in to one great little movie .
stuart little is a mouse .
he has finally gotten a new home after being put up for adoption , he now lives with the littles .
a nice little ( no pun intended ) family that lives in their apartment next to central park in new york city .
they have a little boy george ( played by the adorable jonathan
lipnicki ) and now they have a new son .
at first stuart takes a while
but he finally adjusts to being part of the family and even getting along with the pet cat .
george does n't take too well to having a mouse for a brother at first , but
once the two play together they instantly bond .
stuart however is missing something , and he wants to know who his real parents are .
the littles try and find his parents and one day they show up on the doorstep wanting stuart back .
hesitating the littles know what 's best for stuart
and so does snowball the pet cat
, he and his friends try to get stuart but in the end we find out the truth about stuart 's past ending up to a sentimental and very heart - warming ending .
one thing i noticed about the film instantly was the fantastic special effects .
just like in " star wars :
episode 1 - -the phantom menace " stuart little and his family are all computer generated and they look fantastically real .
from the detail of their fur , to the detail of the way the walk ; the special effects team put a lot of time and effort on this $ 90 million dollar film and it shows .
another movie that this has in common with is " babe " with it 's talking animals and people understanding them .
it has a family friendly atmosphere and is never really scary or suspenseful enough to even scare the youngest of kids .
michael
j .
fox does the voice of stuart himself and just like in the " homeward bound " movies
does a fantastic job and brings more out of stuart than anyone else could .
he to me
fits the character perfectly and ends up making stuart even more lovable .
another gem of the film is nathan lane as snowball .
when he was timon in 1994 's " the lion king
" i would have sworn he was a comedian , and now in " stuart little " he brings the most out of snowball and makes him one of those characters we love to dislike .
for the human actors geena davis who never gives a bad performance does not disappoint here as well .
she fits nicely in her character and there is a good chemistry between her and hugh laurie who plays mr .
little .
both make us believe they are happily in love and married and jonathan lipnicki as their song is even more adorable than he was in 1996 's " jerry maguire " .
even though stuart little is completely cgi ,
the human characters and stuart have a nice chemistry together and even makes us believe they really do care for each other .
" stuart little " is ideal family entertainment for this holiday season and will not disappoint youngsters or adults for that matter .
we get entertainment , laughs , cries and more fun at the movies this season than probably any other movie .
its nice to see a pg rated movie out at christmas that everyone can see .
even though it has a $ 90 million dollar budget i 'm sure it will make over that or just below it respectively .
for all you parents out there trying to find a good family movie , i have yet to see bicentennial man as i write this
but as far as i know " stuart little " and " toy story 2 "
are by far the best family films this year .
a winner . ?

SOLUTION:
P