instruction:
In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
question:
plot : a group of asbestos cleaners get a job removing the gunk from an old insane asylum .
as each day passes , the crew members begin to discover things about the place and themselves which set other things in motion .
saying anything else about the plot would be a crime .
have fun . . .
critique : " i feel like shooting myself in the head
" are the first words that came out of my mouth after seeing this movie , a good indication as to what kind of film to expect here .
this ai n't your average " happy go lucky " kind of picture .
this is a deliberately slow - paced mystery - horror film drenched in atmosphere , with a very creepy insane asylum ( in which most of the film takes place ) , very few clues up - front and lots to talk about afterwards .
will it bore some people to sleep ?
you bet it will !
is it made for the scream audiences of the day ?
absolutely not !
i guess you can describe this film as a horror movie for the " cerebral crowd " .
a film that patiently unwraps itself frame after frame , giving away very little with each step and each sound , unwinding itself until its final scenes offer up a world of revelations and plenty more to discuss later .
i 've always loved movies that have me talking about them afterwards like the shining and lost highway and this film fits right into that group .
in fact , i guess i can pussyfoot around the actual word all i want but the best way to describe this kind of movie is a " mindfuck " .
if you feel like watching a movie that moves very slowly , gives you a handful of characters with divergent backgrounds , tosses a few very ambiguous and supernatural cookies your way and is extremely disturbing once you put it all together , well ,
then this movie is definitely for you !
it 's the kind of film that you actually have to see twice to fully appreciate ( damn , i missed that whole " peanut butter " thing ! )
and one that will likely creep the shit out of you if watched alone in the dark .
" brrrrrrrrr .
.
.
now what was that sound in the basement ?
honey , can you go check ? " and one thing this film does n't have , unlike its hollywood - ian counterparts like the haunting , is special effects .
in fact , that 's one of the greater things about this movie : it feels real because it looks like it 's actually taped on video with very credible actors in very credible circumstances ( i did some research
and it was , in fact , shot on digital video .
. .
ah - ha ! ) .
another great thing about it is that it 's actually very gory and somewhat violent in theme , and yet we rarely see anything of the sort on the big screen ( it 's mostly implied , kids ! ) .
and as clich ?
d as it might be to say .
. .
it 's usually much scarier when stuff is left to our imagination or implied in movies as such .
other films that this one reminded me of include henry : portrait of a serial killer and the blair witch project , with that same real sense of dread , brooding and terror .
the film does however move awfully slow and if you really do n't get " into " it completely ( you really need to concentrate here ) , you will lose the motion of the story and the pent - up tension might be released .
but overall , this film is yet another great example of the horror genre making a very cool comeback this year with no tight tanktops in sight .
and with david caruso acting like the king hotshot like only he can , how can you go wrong ?
definitely not a film for everyone but
a must - see for anyone looking to throw themselves into the psyche of the disturbed ( count me in ! ) .
stanley kubrick would be proud !
oh yeah . . .
so where 's that gun again . . .
?
where 's joblo coming from ?
the blair witch project ( 4/10 ) - blair witch 2 ( 7/10 ) - the haunting ( 3/10 ) - the house on haunted hill ( 7/10 )
- lost highway ( 10/10 ) - the pledge ( 6/10 ) - the shining ( 9/10 ) - the sixth sense ( 8/10 ) - unbreakable ( 8/10 )
answer:
P


question:
( warning to those who have not seen seven : this review contains some spoiler information . )
seven is a powerful , fully - realized film on the level of the silence of the lambs .
it is a disturbing film that accomplishes its biggest of goals -- it occupies the viewers mind long after the closing credits have rolled .
while this film is not for the squeamish , there is no denying that seven demands attention , for it is a film that transcends its genre in both style and substance .
for starters , classifying seven as a " thriller " would not be an altogether complete classification of this film .
while i was genuinely thrilled throughout , i would rather call seven an " intense drama , " because that is what it delivers -- meaningful scenes with a relentlessness that does not readily let up .
part of director david finchers accomplishment is in style .
he seems to have a knack for knowing exactly how the average person fears something as " simple " as a corpse .
and visually , fincher shows us the remains of murder victims in all - too - realistic and graphic terms ( courtesy of rob bottin 's always - grisly special effects ) .
throw in the appropriate but not - to - be - underestimated effects of lighting and a foreboding score and the result is a technical masterpiece of the murder scene .
these scenes alone are quite impressive ; as fascinating as they are harrowing .
yet , seven is more than just a technical accomplishment .
in addition to style , fincher supplies substance .
seven has compelling characters that it wants us to know and understand , and fincher ties them all together in a completely pessimistic view of society .
detective william somerset ( morgan freeman ) is a man who has nearly given up on the world .
its easy to see why .
the world does n't make sense .
( somerset drives this point home with a rather ghastly story of a robbery victim who was attacked just blocks from the police precinct .
after knocked down and robbed of his wallet , the attacker stabbed the helpless man in both eyes . )
why should somerset believe that by following this murder investigation and " picking up the pieces " he will be able to catch the killer ?
somersets new partner , david mills ( brad pitt ) has not given up on the world , perhaps because he is still young ( and perhaps by having this optimism he 's naive in
this films portrayal of the world ) .
he completely disagrees with somersets abandonment of hope .
however , david 's wife ( gwyneth paltrow ) has so much fear of her urban surroundings , she is n't even sure if she wants to * tell * her husband about her recent pregnancy , let alone carry it until birth and attempt to raise it in this environment .
these three characters are all performed with skill and authenticity
that makes them feel like real people and not the typical hollywood characters a lesser film might have offered .
and in addition to making clear how each of these characters sees the world , fincher gives us support for
* why * they feel the way they do .
but if there 's one character that underlines the message seven is trying to convey , it has to be the killer , john doe ( kevin spacey ) .
seven 's payoff lies in its ability to allow us to see how the killer views the world and what drives him to do what he does .
one important thing to remember about doe is how easy it is to simply dismiss him as a " psycho , " with no motives behind his slayings .
this is exactly the mistake mills makes .
in the extremely intense and superbly performed closing scenes , were allowed to see that doe is , in his mind , merely a product of society .
he 's a killer who kills those who are bringing society down .
in his mind he did n't kill " innocent " people , and , perhaps , they were not completely innocent ( but , then again , who is ? ) .
he s absolutely infuriated that mills believes that the murder victims were innocent .
really , seven does n't just comment on the superficial obviousness of how screwed - up john doe is .
seven makes larger statements about how screwed - up society is , hinting that society 's degradation is simply conducive of creating more john does .
besides the stylistic and larger - issue arguments for seeing this film , i recommend seven because it is , after all , also a very slick and well - made thriller .
it features exciting plot developments , commanding performances , lots of suspense , and a conclusion that is chilling , riveting , and quite unfair .
but then again , its a cruel world .
answer:
P


question:
the rich legacy of cinema has left us with certain indelible images .
the tinkling christmas tree bell in
" it 's a wonderful life .
"
bogie 's speech at the airport in " casablanca .
" little elliott 's flying bicycle , silhouetted by the moon in " e . t .
" and now , " starship troopers " director paul verhoeven adds one more image that will live in our memories forever : doogie houser doing a vulcan mind meld with a giant slug .
" starship troopers , " loosely based on the robert heinlein novel , is the story of an interstellar war between humans and giant insects .
in the hands of verhoeven , the mammoth sci - fi battle flick is one of the most astonishingly bad films ever made , a monument to inept filmmaking on a colossal scale . to put it simply , it 's a bug bomb .
in " robocop " and " total recall , " verhoeven displayed a gift for creating an entertaining mix of violence , special effects and social satire , and " starship troopers " starts off in similar fashion , with a tongue - in - cheek futuristic military recruitment ad that shows promise .
things go downhill fast , though , as we meet our heroes , a group of buenos aires teens preparing to graduate from high school .
inexplicably , johnny rico , carmen ibenez , dizzy flores and xander barcalow are played by square - jawed anglo kids who look like they just stepped out of a mountain dew commercial .
it 's a veritable " alpha centuri 90210 " as we watch the love - smitten teens squabble in the name of love .
michael ironside plays their teacher , who waves around a cheesy fake severed arm while lecturing about civic responsibilities .
eventually , the kids join the military , with dreams of glory in their addled little minds .
one of their classmates , carl jenkins ( " doogie houser 's " neil patrick harris , ) snags a job in military intelligence because of his strong psychic abilities .
he displays his gift by psychically ordering a pet ferret to crawl up his mother 's leg .
a long , dull boot camp sequence follows , enlivened only by an extended coed shower scene where the recruits swap snappy banter as the " showgirls " director 's camera roams over their buff bodies .
finally , a full hour into the film , the war finally starts and we meet the enemy .
the bugs hail from klendathu and colonize planets by hurling their spores into space .
they attack starships by spinning around and firing deadly plasma blasts from their rears .
yes , incredible as it seems , the bugs actually kill with cosmic farts .
a phenomenally large amount of money was spent creating the computer animated insects and the results are mixed at best .
sweeping distant shots depicting hordes of giant bugs racing to attack are both impressive and scary , but the close - ups are a different matter .
the insects have an odd , artificial look , like origami creations with a mottled plastic coating .
the attack scenes are intensely violent , as one would expect from verhoeven , but the overall look is too phony to generate any real tension .
while the action is frantic , the military strategy , wildly illogical even by hollywood standards ,
grows tiresome quickly .
verhoeven tries to spice things up by throwing in more satiric news coverage , but the faux - jingoistic scenes of children " doing their part for the war effort " by squishing roaches on a sidewalk are n't enough to make up for the long stretches of sheer dreck .
one can only guess what paul verhoeven was trying to do here .
his customary one part satire , two parts ultra - violence formula is way out of whack , and most of the film just flounders
.
in " showgirls " fashion , some scenes are almost bad enough to be good .
an intergalactic kegger party , with jake busey playing " dixie " on a green plexiglas fiddle , has a certain bizarre appeal .
a sex scene between two of the teens achieves a smarmy charm , enhanced a few minutes later when the female receives a fatal jab from a bug , but tells her hero that she does n't mind dying .
"
it 's okay ,
" she gasps , " i got to have you !
" and then , of course , there 's doogie 's mind meld with a bug .
it 's possible that verhoeven was attempting to create an homage to the era of the original novel .
heinlein 's pre- " stranger in a strange land " books were aimed at adolescent males , and " starship troopers " has the antiseptic retro - future look of late 50s / early 60s sci - fi .
the one cityscape shown is a jetsons - like gleaming metropolis , with flying cars whizzing past an obvious matte painting .
the hairstyles are retro too , straight from the frankie avalon , annette funicello school of fashion .
ultimately , verhoeven 's motives are irrelevant .
he has produce a gargantuan film that fails as an action film or as a social satire .
it even fails to be an entertaining bad movie . avoid " starship troopers " at all costs .
answer:

N