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: with the opening scene of a young couple in a van pulling up , loading their guns , kissing each other and uttering what sounds like " rock and roll !
"
( actually , it 's " lock and load " ) , you ca n't help thinking tarantino .
and of course with its storyline of a crazy girl and boy in love who turn to violent bank robbery , the film unapologetically takes its place alongside all those other films from bonnie & clyde to natural born killers .
but if most of those movies have their roots in pulp fiction , exploring a modern myth of the doomed rebels on the run , normal life takes a much more psychologically realistic look at the phenomenon .
" inspired by true events " -- we 've heard that one before , and yet in no other tale of violent couples has it seemed so solidly demonstrated . . .
or so strangely poignant .
for this is a story of real people whose lives take on a steadily unreal quality , who in their search for a normal life find themselves increasingly unhinged .
beginning with their final arrest , the film goes back to trace the relationship between chris ( luke perry ) , a policeman , and pam ( ashley judd ) , a factory worker .
they fall in love and marry , but pam 's increasingly erratic behaviour ( going on spending sprees , slashing herself with a knife after an argument ) begin to trouble the solid and stable chris .
when chris gets sacked , they find themselves heavily in debt and near breaking up .
then , chris begins to rob banks . . .
luke perry accomplishes the not - inconsiderable feat of making us nearly forget that he was ever in beverly hills 90210 or buffy the vampire slayer .
moustached , with a tough paternal look and yet a voice and eyes that suggest sadness verging on exasperation , he is perfectly cast as the long - suffering husband .
( it 's another of john mcnaughton 's coups of casting - against - type , after transforming robert de niro into nerd and bill murray into gangster in mad dog and glory ) .
but it is the character of pam who commands centrestage , and ashley judd rises to the challenge with great alternating currents of ferocity and tenderness , making pam into a fascinating yet often infuriating person .
if the performance falls short of greatness , however , it is perhaps because the role of the mad woman has been done so often before it is virtually a staple of cinema , whether it 's in betty blue , tom & viv or georgia .
as in those movies , there 's the danger that the performance seems mannered , a collection of screwy tics and tantrums designed for the oscar presentation piece .
judd does n't entirely avoid this pitfall , but pam 's ' craziness ' is best and most movingly presented in counterpoint to the more ' normal ' chris .
when pam reacts to her father - in - law 's death by showing up at the funeral in rollerblades and blaring headphones , chris ' face is the picture of pained restraint .
of course , it 's the question of what is ' normal ' that is asked in normal life .
mcnaughton constantly offers up the ironies of the aspirations for the average domestic life and its kinship with insanity .
it is the rational chris that loves guns ( " shooting is about precision , control " ) and the ' crazy ' pam that loves astronomy and yearns for a dog ( who is then called chaos -- " chaos and you and me . . .
we 're a real family " , she notes wryly ) .
it is chris ' methodical mind and his knowledge of police procedure that allows him to be such a successful bank robber ( his well - planned disguise as a bearded , roaring man of terror is another piece of method in madness ) .
in the carpark where he sets out for his first robbery , a huge sign on a shopping mall stands out in the background : " buy - more " -- the perfectly respectable consumption - crazy american dream that has driven pam to her extravagant purchases , and both of them into desperate situations .
it 's not a perfect film .
some of the dialogue is a touch too banal ( perhaps intentionally ? ) .
the use of the punk hardcore soundtrack in pam 's crazed scenes comes rather too close to making emotional disturbance seem glamourous and sexy an image which only detracts from the rest of the film .
indeed , as in mcnaughton 's seminal film henry : portrait of a serial killer , it is the avoidance of glamour or sensationalism , the denial of some of the standard thrills of the outlaw film genre
, that gives this determinedly unflashy , moving film its great strengths .
mcnaughton has filmed this story with a quiet , coolly ' realistic ' method that works far better than any nbk theatrics at unsettling the viewer .
the suburbs , with their miles of white - fenced houses and identikit malls , take on a sense of claustrophobic blankness .
in its very different way , this makes for as haunting a backdrop as the wide open spaces in terence malick 's badlands .
while pam shares the yearnings of malick 's heroes to escape from ordinary life , chris takes up crime precisely so that they can lead a ' normal life ' - their little house on the suburbs is financed by his violent robberies .
but these are dreams defined by , constrained by , and even doomed by , the limitations of the ' normal ' , conventional world .
pam 's final scene takes place at the edge of the suburbs , where wild bushes grow -- symbolically the frontier , the outer limits of her society , but also quite literally the end of the road , where there is nowhere left to go but to the final tragic denouement .
the flying inkpot 's rating system :
* wait for the video .
*
* a little creaky , but still better than staying at home with gotcha !
*
* * pretty good , bring a friend .
*
*
* * amazing , potent stuff .
*
*
*
* * perfection . see it twice .

SOLUTION: P

PROBLEM: the verdict : spine - chilling drama from horror maestro stephen king , featuring an outstanding , oscar - winning performance from kathy bates .
geez , french and saunders had a field day when they set to work on parodying this !
sorry , non - british readers may not be familiar with french and saunders - my apologies .
the pair are british comediennes ( jennifer saunders later went on to become edina monsoon in " absolutely fabulous " ) , who did a series of film spoofs a few years back , including alien , the exorcist and misery .
needless to say , amidst her chucklesome impersonation of kathy bates ( the resemblance was quite uncanny ! ) , dawn french got pretty nasty with her sledgehammer when in reach of jennifer saunder 's legs ! but despite the lingering memory of their sketch , and although i 've now seen the film a couple of times now , that " hobbling " scene was no less disturbing !
i 'm still left screaming at the telly in revulsion !
that may be the most memorable scene , but it 's certainly not the only worth watching .
stephen king , whose film and tv adaptations tend to vary in quality , strikes gold with this simple yet strikingly compelling tale .
it 's a nicely crafted psychological horror , which effortlessly succeeds in drawing you into the plight of writer phil sheldon ( james caan ) .
rescued from a car accident by annie wilkes ( bates ) , who introduces herself as the writer 's " number one fan " , he soon becomes her prisoner .
both the script and kathy bates ' beautifully masterful performance
( for which she won an oscar ) work arm - in - arm as we quickly begin to realise that beyond her bubbly exterior the woman is basically as nutty as a fruit - cake ( or is that fruity as a nut - cake ? ) .
bates relishes her demanding role , and her performance is nothing short of a masterpiece .
at times she seems like an innocent victim of her own obsessive behaviour , at times she 's a rather tragic character , and more often than not she 's just damned scary !
this is basically a very simple tale , but it achieves a large degree of eloquence in its simplicity .
it 's an involving , engrossing experience - and considering it 's basically a two - hander , mainly set in one locale
, it 's a remarkable piece of cinema .
there are no jazzy special effects or cheesy action sequences - this one relies solely upon rob reiner 's stylish directing and the wonderful performances of bates and caan .
oh , i have n't really mentioned caan yet - he does a good job as the writer who 's a prisoner of his own success
( annie is obsessed with him and his books ) .
but , as you no doubt gathered from the above - bates is well and truly the star of the show .
along with the pig , of course !
anyway , the tension is built - up with masterful aplomb , and some scenes are almost agonisingly tense .
there 's the dinner scene where seldon goes to nerve - shattering lengths to poison her wine .
he succeeds , but . . .
she knocks the glass over !
i bet you threw a pillow at the screen as well !
in the immortal words of homer
j .
simpson - " d'oh ! !
"
other nerve - wracking scenes include the bit where annie has gone off to town and sheldon starts snooping around the house .
we cut to annie in her car -
she 's on her way home .
. .
he realises this and tries to get back to his room . . .
cut to the car again , she 's getting near . . .
will he make it ?
ok , so these sequences are n't exactly original , nor perhaps unpredictable - but they work !
boy , do they work !
if a film has you on the edge of your couch , biting your nails and shouting at the screen in suspense , then it 's doing something right !
of course , the most nauseating sequence is the aforementioned " hobbling " !
annie realises her captive has been out of his room , and she 's going to stop him once
and for all .
cue a block of wood placed strategically between his ankles and a huge sledgehammer , and . . .
i feel ill just thinking about it !
nasty .
it all builds up nicely to the final scene where sheldon finally gets the upper hand , and once and for all tries to kill the crazy psycho !
and then we 're given one of the most ridiculously over - the - top fight scenes i 've ever seen .
she gets hit over the head with a typewriter , set on fire , head smashed against the wall - and she just wo n't die !
sheldon is n't in terribly good shape either .
if it were n't so gorey it would almost be laughable .
but it 's a terrifically effective film , and therefore the daft climax is easily overlooked .
misery is a tight , tense , intense and chillingly entertaining thriller .
the directing is first - rate , and the performances - bates in particular - contribute to making this a suitably nightmarish little gem .
wonderful stuff .
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SOLUTION:
P