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

[Q]: by the time dennis quaid , the ostensible star of switchback , makes his first appearance at about the 22-minute mark , you may find yourself wondering why he bothered .
after all , writer / director jeb stuart has already set up a fairly promising pair of parallel story lines .
the first finds amarillo , texas sheriff buck olmstead ( r . lee ermey ) facing a hotly - contested election battle just as a brutal double homicide is discovered at a motel in his jurisdiction .
as olmstead begins his investigation , we also meet the two men who come to be our prime suspects .
lane dixon ( jared leto ) is an enigmatic young hitchhiker ; bob goodall ( danny glover ) is the jovial motorist who offers lane a ride from texas to his utah destination .
all the necessary conflicts seem to be in place -- the internal struggle of olmstead over the clash between good politics and good police work , and the external struggle as one of the two travelers eventually becomes villain to the other 's protagonist .
but then quaid shows up as grimly determined fbi agent frank lacrosse .
lacrosse is certain that the amarillo murders are the work of a serial killer he has been tracking for nearly two years .
he 's not supposed to be tracking him any more -- according to the bureau , they 've got their man -- but lacrosse has a very important reason for believing otherwise .
two months earlier , lacrosse 's own son was kidnapped by the killer , and the boy has yet to turn up anywhere .
lacrosse knows his killer 's work , and he knows that the man is still out there somewhere trying to continue their game .
it would n't be fair to reduce everything that 's wrong with switchback to quaid 's presence , but it 's a pretty good place to start .
there 's a reason lacrosse feels like an intruder in the narrative instead of its vital center :
as a dramatic actor , dennis quaid possesses exactly one facial expression and one vocal intonation .
we can tell lacrosse is determined because his face is a perpetual tight - jawed , sourpuss pucker ; we can tell he 's grim because every word comes out in an eastwood - esque rasp .
a more flexible performer might have given weight to the character , pulling the audience into his haunted intensity , making switchback _ his _ film .
quaid
merely looks annoyed and slightly constipated .
it 's tough to become emotionally invested in a character 's turmoil when it looks like all he really needs is a big bowl of bran flakes .
even without quaid , it does n't appear that switchback would have stayed on course .
the early scenes between leto and glover have a lively energy , building our curiosity over which man -- the taciturn kid or his gregarious benefactor -- is the real threat .
unfortunately , stuart tips his hand far too early in the game , both through the pitch of the individual performances and the facts he chooses to reveal .
once the mystery of the killer 's identity is dispatched , the interaction between leto and glover becomes stale and predictable
.
in fact , " stale and predictable " describes the direction that switchback takes in general , falling back on far - too - common hollywood devices like cats jumping out of nowhere , a climactic fistfight on board a freight train , and edgy law enforcement agents .
it 's too bad stuart was n't willing to spend more time with sheriff olmstead , far and away the most interesting and appealing character in the film .
played with atypical restraint by r .
lee ermey
, he 's a wonderful , unconventional hero who seems genuinely comfortable accepting the consequences of acting on his convictions .
a film focusing on the olmstead would have signaled a film - maker willing to take a few risks with his casting and story - telling .
instead , stuart places his trust in a " name " star who ca n't carry the material .
maybe next time he 'll throw away that one crucial page in the script , the one where the grimly determined fbi agent wanders onto the scene to muck up a perfectly good story .
[A]: N


[Q]: "
i would appreciate it if you did n't do that again .
" starring jet li , bridget fonda , tch ?
ky karyo
, burt kwouk .
directed by chris nahon .
rated r .
it 's no secret that martial arts film often use their plot simply to get from one action sequence to another .
when the fight scenes are enough to justify paying admission , there is no problem with this , as in most jackie chan projects and a lot of the hong kong actioners .
when they are n't , well , we 're in bad shape .
kiss of the dragon , jet li 's second consecutive american misfire , plays like one big miscalculation , and fails even as the most rudimentary entertainment .
now before i start getting e - mails angrily touting the genius of jet li , let me explain myself .
li is as spectacular as ever here , and i do n't think anyone would ever dare call his martial - arts - star skills into question .
the problem is n't with him , it 's with the movie 's tone .
the much touted fight - scenes here are filmed with such unflinching , unrelenting brutality that they are unpleasant to watch .
they 're joyless , perfuctory ; li 's rogue chinese detective is more of a killing machine than a hero , a terminator with a black belt instead of a metal skeleton .
but even the terminator in judgement day had a sympathetic side .
the plot is n't relevant , but if you 're curious ,
it 's some nonsense about a chinese law enforcement officer ( li ) sent to paris to investigate a possible drug ring and encounter a corrupt chief of police ( tcheky karyo ) , who kills people and does sinister things with no motivation whatsoever .
oh yeah ,
and li 's character is also an acupuncture expert who is able to ease pain and/or kill at the touch of a needle .
" kiss of the dragon " is the name of an acupuncture maneuver , in which you stick a needle in a precise location on the back of the victim 's neck , somehow redirecting all of the body 's bloodflow to the brain and killing the poor sap more or less immediately .
there 's a vague attempt to humanize li by having him fall in love with a downtrodden prostitute , whose daughter is being held hostage , for some reason , by the villain .
this is one of the worst love stories i have ever seen on screen , even worse than the one in pearl harbor .
there 's no conviction whatsoever as the movie barely pays lip service to it ; it 's only here because someone apparently thought there should be some kind of boy - meets - girl subplot .
kiss of the dragon was written by luc besson , whose screenplay the messenger : the story of joan of arc , for all of that film 's flaws , was at least thoughtful .
i do n't know why the guy got himself involved in this train wreck
,
but perhaps he wanted to so something more mainstream after the neverending weirdness of the fifth element and the aforementioned stylized biopic .
i suppose you could call this mainstream , but i 'll choose the bizarre any time of the day .
if action scenes in a movie are going to be brutal instead of dazzling , you need a story to justify watching them .
the filmmakers behind kiss of the dragon should have rethought their strategy .
no one will walk out of this misbegotten project smiling , but i hear rush hour 2 is coming in just a few weeks .
[A]: N


[Q]: in one of my many videos i have attained from the local library , casablanca was my third classic in some weeks .
the others being citizen kane and vertigo ( yes , i am trying to see as many of afi 's greatest movies ever made as i can ) .
but , casablanca stood out from the rest for me : it was actually watchable .
what most hail as the greatest american film ever , casablanca is n't so much a love story as a political frenzy with a love triangle thrown in .
it seems that star humphry bogart spend about 85 percent of the movie with various leaders of the nation instead of with ingred bergman .
that annoyed me , as did the ending .
why did n't the plan turn around ? ! ?
surprisingly , i enjoyed the film .
i liked bogart 's character and his acting
( not over the top as most actors in his era ) .
i once read about if you had a choice to be in a movie , which one would it be , and a women said casablanca .
at first i was thinking to myself " why ?
" then , as i watched the film again , i understood why .
the movie is very well done and the script top - notch , although i doubt i understood more than half of the political mumbo jumbo .
casablanca is , in my mind , no classic ( like solaris ) , but it is a good film and stylishly shot
.
hey , hollywood , how about this : a remake with harrison ford and anne heche ?
now that would be a classic .
[A]:
P