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

Q: 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 .

A: P
****
Q: the most interesting part of
"
ca n't hardly wait " just happens to be not only the most human , but
for many of us , the one part that many of us can easily relate to .
that is the character of denise ( lauren ambrose ) , the film 's sole sarcastic member who mocks everything that goes on in the film , and at one point sits down on a couch and looks totally bored .
the film wisely holds over this moment , nicely showing her alienation in the midst of a large high school party .
.. almost too nicely .
for some members of the audience ( read : me ) , this is basically a mirror of what 's going on with them watching this film .
we sit there wondering why we 've even bothered to see a film about a long high school party we probably never felt the desire to go to in the first place .
i would actually highly recommend this film if it satirized all of this .
after all , this film is filled with a bunch of pathetic stereotypes much of which i went to high school with .
everyone 's here :
the jock , the homecoming queen , the nerd ( and his dominions of trekkies and x - philes ) , the alienated wannabe writer , the school spirit girl , the pothead ( s ) , the wigger , etc , etc , etc , and weirdly enough this film shows them as superficial , lame , and basically as a bunch of losers . except for denise , who rolls her eyes at everything , and easily becomes the most likable character even before she speaks ( her yearbook entry , something which is done for each main character , quotes oscar wilde - definite pointers there ) .
unfortunately , the writers and directors take several major misteps on the way to making this into an admirable and even likable film .
the film , as i said , portrays most of its characters as superficial and just totally ignorant to everything .
however , instead of sticking with this , perhaps even going a bit further with it , they let this lie , and actually make these characters into our heroes .
we follow several of them , all a bunch of moronic stereotypes with only a shread of humanity and realism , and tries to tell boring and overly melodramatic tales about them as if we actually cared and/or identified with them .
and if we did , we certainly do n't want to revisit that state of being .
here 's a quick low - down : it 's graduation , and we follow a bunch of seniors on the last night , otherwise known as the " american grafitti " or , to a lesser extent , the " dazed and confused " cliche .
the formal just followed them as they drove aimlessly ; the latter did a little bit of that and featured a big outdoor keg party .
"
ca n't hardly wait " just opts for a big indoor keg party , and a little bit of aimless driving , albeit of the i'm - whining - because - i - can't - get - a - girl - i - want brand .
we follow many people around , but mostly we trail preston ( ethan embry , of " that thing you do ! " ) , the alienated writer , who 's been pining over the homcoming queen , amanda ( the totally overrated jennifer love hewitt ) , for the entirety of high school because he thinks they shared a moment their freshman year over a freaking pop tart .
now that she 's broken up with her football player boyfriend , mike ( peter facinelli ) , he decides to go to the party with a note he 's written declaring his " love " for her in the hopes he 'll build up the guts to give it to her .
.. even though he 's leaving for a multi - week intensive writing program hosted by none other than kurt vonnegut
( okay :
the ingenius vonnegut or some icky noxema spokesperson ? ) .
since that plot is incredibly lame and a track record of what goes on with it would n't be able to carry a commercial let alone a feature film , and because it 's a party , there are some more main characters , such as : william ( charlie korsmo , finally surfacing after " dick tracy " ) , the nerd ( and his dominions ) who has come up with a ridiculous plan to publically sabotage mike , who 's humiliated him for years , but gets too caught up in drinking to do it ; kenny ( seth green ) , the wigger , who has decided that this party will be where he will finally get laid ( uh huh ) ; and denise , the only exceptional character , who unfortunately gets stuck in a bathroom ( do n't ask ) with kenny where the two characters let down their characters and are allowed to follow the laws of plot cliches from point a to point b with nary a bit of characterization involved after awhile . ugh .
the main comparison this film is getting to another film is actually not " american grafitti " or " dazed and confused , " two films that embraced and ultimately made humans out of many of its high schoolers ( not to mention were extremely entertaining ) , but to john hughes films of the 80s , most notably " sixteen candles .
"
the big difference in the two is that that film managed to not only embrace but even satirize its main characters , and did so equally and in an entertaining fashion .
this film forgets to satirize its characters , and ultimately tells a story about a bunch of uninteresting stereotypes .
..
and then says that it 's all okay .
we ca n't take this film seriously , nor can we take this as fun , so really what good is it ?
but i will tell you some things i did
like
: i liked the direction , except for a couple too - over - the - top features , like way - too - glossy jump cuts
( it 's like an oxymoron ) and other obscurities .
generally , though , elfont and kaplan do have graceful camera movement , and even manage to capture
an altman - esque feel to their film from time to time ( a thing with a note , though , is too hokey to really be admirable ) .
i actually did like seth green , for once in about a decade ( when he played a very young woody allen in " radio days " ) - his desintegration of his wigger character was almost believable .
.. almost .
and , of course , lauren ambrose is wonderful as denise , the one character we could have used some more of , even though it would have changed the entirety of the film .
however , the character of denise really does n't work with the film , when really thought about .
she 's far too witty and realized ( at least for the first half ) to belong in this film , and whenever she appears , she automatically gives everything a delightfully satirical tone .
she 's not just the cynic or the intellectual ; she 's just a very interesting character who provides entertainment even if it further damages other already damaged characters .
she may ruin the film more , but at least when she 's on screen we can sit up and think to ourselves " well , at least we 'll be entertained .
"
a couple other things that just do n't work : mike 's character , who suffers an epiphany throughout the film but in the end acts as though he has forgotten everything : too much the sacrificial lamb for the film in general ;
the aimless , bitchy driving by preston to try and get over his inability to shack up with amanda - give me a break ; and
perhaps the one thing that just does n't work at all : jenna eflman 's uncredited cameo as an angel - just did n't work , but nice try .
basically the worst thing about this film , the real reason i 'm giving this such a low rating , is because it refuses to give us any fully realized characters and then insists we follow around complete stereotypes from other movies doing things that are inane and unlike anything we 'd do .
we do n't feel for these characters because for most of us , we are n't stereotypes going through the motions to worn subplots .
the acid test for high school movies is : does it at all capture the feel of what it 's portraying ?
the answer for this film is no .
nice try , though .

A: N
****
Q: there are movies that pose a question in its first five minutes and spend the rest of the time trying to answer it .
then there are movies that spend the whole time posing questions and try to answer it all in the last five minutes .
writer - director john herzfeld 's two days in the valley falls into the latter category .
weaving together a grabbag of seemingly unrelated characters
, herzfeld 's tries very hard to keep the audience guessing with a altmanesque series of parallel stories .
hitmen lee ( james spader ) and his partner dosmo ( danny aiello ) pop a guy in bed while leaving his drugged wife becky fox ( teri hatcher ) lying next to him showing the audience where on her behind
she got nicely pricked .
an understandeably shocked becky runs out of the house the next morning before hailing down a couple of vice cops , ( jeff daniels ) and wes ( eric stoltz ) .
a murder is not vice territory , flirting with asian prostitues is , but wes would rather play inquisitive detective .
meanwhile , washed - up director , teddy ( paul mazursky ) is about to end his life .
but before he can do that , he must find a good home for his dog .
enter nurse audrey ( marsha mason ) , who takes the dog and teddy for a ride .
stuffy art dealer , allan hopper ( greg cruttwell ) has kidney stones .
while struggling about his fancy house , he switches between moaning in self - pity and dropping condescending hints about his loyal secretary 's ( glenne headly ) plain appearance .
do n't be surprised if you find yourself asking more than once just what the hell is going on .
you might like that feeling of cluelessness .
herzfeld does answer all the questions in the course of time and pieces it all rather neatly in the last five minutes .
the jigsaw puzzle assembled is n't stunning by any means though .
the characters lack the stature or moral complexity of altman 's real - life heroes in short cuts , even though they are interesting and funny .
funny , that is if you are n't comparing them to the likes of tarantino 's pulp chcaracters .
the tie - up is tidy but nowhere near the squeaky clean resolution of ( director 's name ?
guy who also did last seduction ) red rock west .
two days is n't a bad movie but there is n't much else to it than the screenplay novelty of the linkage of seemingly unrelated characters .
it 'll keep you guessing alright
but you wo n't remember the answers five minutes after the credits .
the flying inkpot rating system :
* wait for the tv2 broadcast .
*
* a little creaky , but still better than staying at home with gotcha !
*
* * pretty good , bring a friend .
*
*
* * amazing , potent stuff .
*
*
*
* * perfection . see it twice .

A:
N
****