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

in 1990 , the surprise success an unheralded little movie called ghost instantly rescued the moribund careers of its trio of above - the - title stars , patrick swayze , demi moore , and whoopi goldberg .
eight years later , moore and goldberg 's careers are n't exactly thriving , but they have had their share of screen successes since ; the same ca n't be said of swayze , who has just added yet another turkey to his resume with the aptly named black dog .
forget the mortal kombat movies -- this trucksploitation flick is the closest the movies has come to video games .
good truck driver jack crews ( swayze ) must drive a cargo of illegal firearms from atlanta to new jersey .
along the way , jack and his crew of three run into a number of obstacles -- such as a highway weigh station , evil truckers , and deadly uzi - firing motorcyclists .
every so often , like at the end of a video game " level " or " stage , " the main baddie pops up : red ( meat loaf , fresh from the triumph of spice world ) , who wants to steal the cache of guns .
just in
case you forget his name or have trouble keeping track of who 's driving what , all of red 's vehicles , be it a pickup or a big rig , are painted -- you guessed it --
red .
i could go into more of the plot specifics ( such as jack 's dream of having a nice home with his family , the past trauma that sent him to prison and cost him his trucking license , the fbi / atf crew tracking the cargo ) , but they are of little importance .
all that matters to director kevin hooks and writers william mickelberry and dan vining are the obstacles jack confronts in his drive from point a to point b .
but they fail at even this modest goal , for none of the highway chaos , as credibly staged as it is , is terribly interesting , let alone exciting .
once you 've seen a couple of trucks bang against each other or a big rig explode the first time
, you 've seen it every time .
as dreary as black dog is as an entertainment ,
the saddest part about the film has nothing to do with what shows up onscreen ; it 's that swayze has to reduce himself to such work .
while far from the best of actors , he is certainly not horrible , and he is a charismatic presence .
i do n't know if it 's his judgment or the dearth of quality job offers that leads him to involve himself with bombs such as black dog .
regardless , if he continues on this career track , could a tv series be far behind ?
N

my filmcritic . com colleague norm schrager nailed session 9 , brad anderson 's throwback to spooky horror films from the 70 's .
it worked as an eerie homage without being self - referential or smugly postmodern .
genre aficionados will acknowledge the similarities in tone to stanley kubrick 's the shining and george romero 's dawn of the dead without being taken out of the engrossing narrative ( i .
e . , a psychologically addled waste management team clears out an abandoned lunatic asylum ; unspeakable dread ensues ) .
in a double - whammy for 2001 , anderson shoots and ( mostly ) scores again with his eclectic riff on time - travel episodes from the twilight zone , appropriately titled happy accidents .
much like session 9 , the cards are played very close to the vest here .
is boyish , eccentric " sam deed from dubuque , iowa " a futuristic voyager from the year 2470 or just your run - of - the - mill psychologically disturbed nutcase let loose on the present - day streets of nyc ?
as played by wonderful character actor vincent d'onofrio ( full metal jacket ) , it 's up in the air whether or not we should accept his detailed monologues about life after the polar ice caps have melted .
the question proves to be moot , at least for a time .
even if the whole thing proves to be a creative delusion , one agrees with the character judgment passed down on him by his new girlfriend , ruby ( marisa tomei ) : " he 's a freak , but he sure tells a good story !
"
neurotic ruby thinks she may have found true love after a series of nightmarish dating disasters ( the junkie , the fetishist , the artist , the frenchman , etc . ) , but is n't quite sure how to handle " sam deed " when he starts explaining the barcode on his arm , his elaborately constructed fake identity , his pathological fear of dogs , his ability to speak five different languages , and his mission to change a crucial moment in time that may have ramifications on time 's alternate realities .
( do n't ask . )
it 's all a bit much to take in .
ruby 's close friend gretchen ( cuz ya ca n't have a love story without the token friend , though nadia dajani invests the thankless role with warmth )
chalks it up as a sexy role - playing game , but her cautious therapist ( holland taylor ) warns her that co - dependency is rearing its ugly head again
and she 's in over her head with yet another doomed relationship .
who ya gon na believe ?
despite her winning an academy award , marisa tomei has always struck me as an annoying and unwelcome screen presence , one that undermines the pleasure of watching happy accidents .
her brassy new yawk attitude never really meshes with her desperate desire to appear " cute " to her adoring fans . being loud and flashing a ( disingenuous ) smile does not necessarily equal " substantial and sexy .
"
it takes more than a crack team of hair and wardrobe people to imbue her with personality .
then there 's that damned voice , which strains to be oh - so - adorable .
look , this stuff is purely subjective .
some people feel this way about richard gere , others can not bear to watch robin williams ' hyperactive schtick .
for my money , it 's m .
tomei with a bullet .
happy accidents is a romantic comedy filtered through twelve monkeys ( or , more appropriately , chris marker 's la jetee , especially with those still framed " memory " photographs anderson employs as a stylistic device throughout ) .
modern manhattan is filmed with an otherworldly , vaguely alien eye with a color scheme oddly reminiscent of logan 's run .
as the stranger in a strange land , d'onofrio walks slightly out - of - step , wonderfully affable but often inscrutable with his wayward expressions and bemused detachment .
this is science fiction told mainly via the power of suggestion ( though it often falls into the sci - fi trap of having entirely too much forced exposition -- we want deeds , not words ! )
at least twenty minutes too long , happy accidents eventually gets around to a race - against - time scenario that puts " sam deed " to the ultimate test .
no movie can live in ambiguity forever , but anderson seems terminally unable to provide satisfactory conclusions to his otherwise well structured recent narratives .
( let 's pretend the loathsome and predictable next stop wonderland never happened , shall we ? )
there are also some slow , repetitive stretches as ruby and sam go over the same arguments again and again over whether or not he 's crazy .
the premise is strong enough to sustain interest , but it 's enough to throw a nod in the general direction of rod serling for wrapping up his ideas in half - hour time slots , commercials included .
P

not since 1996 's shine , which starred geoffrey rush as pianist david helfgott , has a movie so defiantly laid bare the lives of world - class musicians .
in fact , if one were to watch these films together , it would almost certainly stand as a convincing argument that a life of music naturally leads to all varieties of social ills .
yet hilary and jackie , the sophomore effort from director anand tucker , has something more to say -- it softly but strongly explores the complex relationships of sibling rivalry and love in a very compelling tale .
emily watson and rachel griffiths are the leads in this tale , playing the sisters du pr ? .
both musicians from childhood , hilary ( griffiths ) is renowned flutist while jacqueline ( watson ) is easily as skilled on the cello .
the two comepete for and win many honors as children and as young women , both together and seperate .
their careers as musicians surpass and then bow to one another 's , and although their lives take very different paths -- hilary settles down to marriage and a family while rachel skips across the globe on a world concert tour -- they are bound together by their deep family love .
the performances of watson and griffiths are excellent in style and substance .
they contrast each other wonderfully , and
while watson 's portrayal of jackie du pr ? is at times eccentric and perhaps unsympathetic , both characters are charged with emotion .
the frank cottrell boyce script , which is based on the book by hilary and piers
du pr ?
, brings a great deal of depth to these characters as well .
the script is also to be commended for its well - polished dual nature .
cottrell boyce adopts a style which one might expect to see in a mystery thriller ( which was in fact the case with david koepp and robert towne 's script for mission : impossible ) and skillfully molds it to the story of two rising musicians on different courses to fame .
the latter parts of his script are controversial to say the least , and the rather depressing ending takes the wind out of an envigorating story .
some will leave this movie feeling disenfranchised .
nevertheless , hilary and jackie is a movie that reaches an upper echelon of contemporary cinema through solid fundamentals and is a decent watch all around .

P