polsci/sentiment-polarity-dataset-v2.0 huggingface dataset:
" saving silverman " is a good example of a good comedy gone bad . 
as a love story it is good , however as a comedy it falls flat on it's face . 
i think throughout the short 90 minutes i laughed a total of seven times . . . and 
those were just chuckles at the most ! 
the movie doesn't have the oomph to make it a great movie , and doesn't have the script to make it a funny movie . 
wayne lefessier ( steven zahn ) , j . d . mcnugent ( jack black ) , and darren silverman ( jason biggs ) have grown up all their lives together , they have been best friends forever and vow to stay close till the end . 
while in a bar after doing a show with their band , based on their love of neil diamond , darren meets a young woman named judith ( amanda peet ) whom he instantly falls for . 
wayne and j . d . however think differently and when judith tells darren that he can never see his friends again , it's up to wayne and j . d . to try and begin saving silverman . 
the performances are topnotch and surprisingly , they are what keep the movie afloat . 
jason biggs right off the flop " loser " does an ok job playing silverman , but he is stale and flat at times . 
steve zahn is perfect in the role of wayne lefessier , and even though the movie is about silverman , lefessier is really the main character and the narrator of the movie itself . 
jack black is well jack black , and he does an all right job as j . d . but he isn't as funny as he has been in the past . 
amanda peet plays the ultimate bitch as judith , and neil diamond plays neil diamond ( he's better at singing than acting ) . 
anyway the performances in the film are good , but it's too bad the script isn't . 
speaking of script , hank nelkan's choppy script is not only badly written , but not funny enough even for an episode of sesame street . 
the trailer for the movie , as with most movies gives away everything that happens in the movie , especially the funniest parts . 
somewhere " saving silverman " was meant to be a good movie , and it could have been , but alas in the end it wasn't . 
dennis dugan's direction is all right , he adds a few directorial touches here and there , nothing special being a simple comedy . 
 " saving silverman " is a perfectly bad movie in more ways than one . 
it has a great cast , a good director and a sweet story . . . it's 
just too bad it has a bad script and is all together a bad movie .
one of my brother's favorite movies is h . b . halicki's 1974 cult flick " gone is sixty seconds , " one of the best products of the car-chase genre that provided drive-in fare during the 1970's . 
chase pics had more tire squeals than dialogue , but they had a strong visceral appeal . 
although it boasts a bigger budget and familiar stars , the remake of " gone in sixty seconds " is relatively weak and dull . 
randall " memphis " raines ( nicolas cage ) is a retired car thief who runs a go-cart track . 
he got out of crime so that his younger brother kip ( giovanni ribisi ) would not take up boosting cars . 
however , kip became a thief anyway , and now he's in big trouble . 
kip promised to deliver fifty luxury and sports cars to gangster raymond calitri ( christopher eccleston ) by the end of the week . 
calitri expects memphis to fulfill kip's bargain ; if he doesn't come through , kip dies . 
memphis gathers his old crew ( angelina jolie , robert duvall , will patton , chi mcbride , and vinnie jones ) , and kip brings his boys ( t . j . 
cross , william lee scott , scott caan , and james duval ) . 
as if calitri breathing down their necks wasn't bad enough , the team is pursued by a cop ( delroy lindo ) who's still ticked off that he never busted memphis and by a rival gangster ( rap star master p ) who wants to take over calitri's clients . 
watching " gone , " i discovered that stealing fifty cars is not any more interesting than stealing one . 
maybe that's why the first forty-nine are fairly easy , and the thrills are saved for " eleanor , " a 1967 shelby gto , a model that has always eluded memphis . 
but the big chase doesn't live up to the long wait . 
i had high hopes for " gone " because it is director dominic sena's second film . 
 " kalifornia , " his 1993 debut , was a brilliant study in the relationship between violence and its audience . 
in that movie sena took a simple thriller plot ( a couple gives a serial killer a ride ) and successfully endowed it with deeper significance . 
in " gone " he seems to be aiming for a drama about two brothers who can't communicate with each other , but that goal just doesn't mesh with this plot . 
 " gone " either takes itself too seriously or not seriously enough . 
it's not light enough to be fun , or mean enough to be intense . 
this chaser has more dialogue than tire squeals but is none the better for it . 
the lack of action is a waste of the premise , which should have challenged the filmmakers to create the most spectacular car chases ever . 
the weak script is a waste of a talented cast . 
in a " newsweek " interview last year , sean penn blasted his old pal nic cage for making bad movies . 
much as i like cage , for every good picture he does ( " leaving las vegas , " " bringing out the dead " ) , there are two major stinkers ( " snake eyes , " " con air , " " 8mm , " " city of angels " ) . 
that ratio is probably better than what a lot of his peers can boast , but cage has real talent . 
it's a shame to waste it in glitzy , superficial tripe like " gone in 60 seconds . "
steve martin is one of the funniest men alive . 
if you can take that as a true statement , then your disappointment at this film will equal mine . 
martin can be hilarious , creating some of the best laugh-out-loud experiences that have ever taken place in movie theaters . 
you won't find any of them here . 
the old television series that this is based on has its moments of humor and wit . 
bilko ( and the name isn't an accident ) is the head of an army motor pool group , but his passion is his schemes . 
every episode involves the sergeant and his men in one or another hair-brained plan to get rich quick while outwitting the officers of the base . 
 " mchale's navy " 's granddaddy . 
that's the idea behind this movie too , but the difference is that , as far-fetched and usually goofy as the television series was , it was funny . 
there is not one laugh in the film . 
the re-make retains the goofiness , but not the entertainment . 
everything is just too clean . 
it was obviously made on a hollywood back lot and looks every bit like it . 
it all looks brand new , even the old beat-up stuff . 
martin is remarkably small in what should have been a bigger than life role . 
in the original , phil silvers played the huckster with a heart of gold and more than a touch of sleaziness . 
martin's bilko is a pale imitation . 
the only semi-bright spot is phil hartman as bilko's arch-enemy . 
it's not saying much , considering martin's lackluster character , but hartman leaves him in the dust .
who knew that in 16 years eddie murphy , who made such a brash , raucous big-screen splash in _48_hrs . _ , 
would become . . . 
cuddly . 
the disconcerting trend begun in this summer's cutesy , largely laugh-free _doctor_dolittle_ continues with this earnest-to-a-fault dramedy . 
although he is top-billed , here murphy is merely support for jeff goldblum , who plays ricky hayman , the programming director at a home shopping network . 
sales are way down , and ricky's job hangs by a thread until he meets g ( murphy ) , a mysterious spiritual guru whom a desperate ricky puts on the air . 
while sales skyrocket and g becomes an overnight sensation , the reinvigorated ricky's greed grows , endangering his budding romance with a goodhearted media research consultant ( kelly preston ) . 
writer tom schulman has some promising ideas , satirizing home shopping and infomercials and the nature of instant celebrity . 
but these ideas would have more bite if stephen herek had invested any energy into the direction of the film . 
the sluggishly paced _holy_man_ is not only slow and overlong ( 113 minutes ) , but an unfunny bore , and murphy can do little to juice up the proceedings ; cleansed of both the attitude _and_ comic sensibility that made him a star ( g is , for the most part , a straight man ) , he is a curiously lifeless presence . 
goldblum is actually quite good , but it's hard for the audience to sustain much interest in his character and spiritual journey when the director doesn't seem to be much interested , either .
" pokemon 3 : the movie " has a lot of bad things in it . 
first of all it's a plot heavy mess that has bad voice talents , badly written script and fantastic animation . 
the first film came out the end of 1999 and was a huge hit grossing almost $90 million domestically . 
a sequel soon followed and even made $45 million . 
warner has released their third movie based on the immensely popular video game and tv series and its a waste of time and celluloid . 
this time ash ketchum and his friends are on their way to the johto battles ( which my little brother told me the new spinoff is " pokemon : the johto journeys " so go figure ) anyway he comes in contact with a young girl who's father has disappeared after trying to discover the unown . 
they are small pokemon with a powerful punch and have great psychic abilities . 
the unown bring together their psychic abilities and create entei a powerful legendary pokemon who barriers young molly's house and creates every wish she wants . 
now it's up to ash and his friends to stop this pokemon entei and show him to be a good pokemon rather than a bad one . 
too bad really that this is a bad movie , surprisingly the first movie was entertaining and somewhat absorbing , the second was a piece of trash and this one is almost in between . 
it has some good qualities ( animation , message in the end ) but the flaws seem to overpower the goods . 
i'm still not sure what the big thing is about pokemon , they are ugly little animals who speak their own name for their language ( besides meowth , my personal favorite ) and you don't understand what they are saying . 
my little brother just thought the movie was amazing , and i kept leaning over and asking him happened , or what pokemon that was . 
his response was a big lecture of how this is that , and that is this . . . he 
sure did put me in my place . 
with the second and third movie being bad , i have a feeling pokemon 4 : the movie might be a total bust as well . 
 " pokemon 3 : the movie " has some redeeming qualities for the kids , and the pokemon fans will dig every minute of this film . 
for those parents and/or brothers and sisters who have to sit through this . . . bring a pillow .
in the first death wish movie , mild-mannered new york architect paul kersey , played by charles bronson , was avenging the death of his wife . 
in the second , he was avenging his daughter . 
in the third , he instigated small war in order to avenge the old friend . 
fourth movie , on the other hand , begins with kersey doubting the point of his violent crusades and living the quiet life with his girlfriend karen , played by kay lenz . 
however , since this is death wish movie , we know that sooner or later something bad is going to happen to the people kersey cares for . 
this time karen's teenage daughter dies of a crack overdose and kersey is forced to return to his old vigilante ways . 
kersey's new targets , unlike the previous movies , aren't the ordinary street punks but rich , heavily armed and well-connected drug dealers . 
even such unstoppable killing machine like kersey needs some support , and it comes from the publisher nathan white ( john p . ryan ) , determined to avenge the drug-related death of his own daughter . 
white's plan is to make kersey kill major players in two rival drug dealing organisations and thus instigate the war between them . 
the plan begins to take shape , but kersey's actions bring attention of two police detectives - reiner ( george dickerson ) and nozaki ( soon teck-oh ) . 
fourth ( and , unfortunately , not the final ) installment in the death wish series , will probably remembered as the typical movie of cannon group , production company responsible for some of the worst cinematic trash of the last decade . 
however , although some critics might argue , death wish 4 : the crackdown represents slight improvement over the death wish 3 . paul kersey , one of the most intriguing ( and potentially controversial ) characters of the 1970s , is still being dumbed down by mediocre script , and charles bronson really doesn't feel the need to put much effort in his acting . 
however , the hand of a veteran director j . lee thompson seems more capable of michael winner's and the action scenes seem slightly less surreal , although they still look cheap and repetitive and downright boring . 
there are some attempts for the movie to have a plot between the numerous scenes of violence , and one of such attempts is a potentially interesting plot twist at the end . 
the script even tries to fake some social conscience ( through criminally underused kay lenz's character ) and predates the war on drugs campaign that would inspire many hollywood products in next few years . 
there are even some half-hearted attempts of humour - both intentional and unintentional , like in a scene where kersey assassinates mob figures by a wine bottle - but the quality of this movie is still far away from bronson's 1970s classics . 
 ( special note to x-philes : mith pilleggi , the actor who plays ad skinner in the x- files , could be seen in a small role of cannery lab foreman ) .
attention moviegoers : you are about to enter a meaning-free zone . 
should the sound system malfunction during your viewing of 200 cigarettes , do not panic . 
the film will work just as well as a silent movie . 
chronicling the meaningless lives of vain , yuppie types , the movie covers the same ground as the wilt stillman films ( last days of disco , barcelona and metropolitan ) but without any of his acerbic wit and the inviting style of his writing . 
first-time writer shana larsen makes the mistake of creating a couple of dozen characters and not giving any of them any depth . 
there isn't one of these characters worth caring about . 
the movie features such a cornucopia of hot young stars that it looks like a celluloid version of " people magazine . " 
among others , the movie features : ben affleck , casey affleck , david chappelle , janeane garofalo , gaby hoffmann , catherine kellner , courtney love , jay mohr , martha plimpton , christina ricci and paul rudd . 
and unlike people magazine , the people speak , not that they have anything interesting to say . 
it's new year's eve in 1981 , and monica ( martha plimpton ) is preparing her big party . 
structured as a series of relatively unrelated stories about her guests on the way to the party , director risa bramon garcia flits back and forth among her stars . 
monica's apartment is in " noho , " an area that one of the guests describes as " so cool , all of the poor people live there . " 
typical of the shallow couples in the movie are kevin ( paul rudd ) and his friend and would-be sexual partner lucy ( courtney love ) . 
they argue about whether lucy is a slut or not since she sleeps with everyone , except him , of course . 
she dares him to go immediately to a bathroom stall and have sex with her , which turns out to be neither erotic , funny or successful -- rather like the rest of the story . 
the movie gets its title from the carton of cigarettes that lucy gives kevin for his new year's eve birthday . 
 " cigarettes are a shield against emotional interaction with other people , " kevin later tells lucy in a snippet of dialog that sounds profound only outside the context of the movie . 
another character , played by jay mohr , has a problem with his sexual triumphs . 
every woman he beds falls deeply in love with him by the next morning . 
when his latest conquest tells him of her affection for him , his response is " i like a lot of people . " 
as the movie finally draws to a close , the characters awaken from their post-party game of musical beds . 
some have passed out early from alcohol abuse and remember little , while others actually have some clue as to what happened . 
the movie itself is so forgettable that by the time you reach your car in the parking lot , all trace of the film will have vanished from your mind , which is probably the best thing that can be said about the movie . 
200 cigarettes runs 1 : 40 . 
it is rated r for profanity , sex and one dope smoking scene and would be acceptable for older teenagers .
i have nothing against unabashedly romantic films . 
when done right , with at least slightly evident restraint , they can be engaging , sweeping , appealing . 
but it's a hell of a shame when someone botches it as badly as nora ephron botched sleepless in seattle , a hollow , boring romance that should appeal only to the most gullible of viewers ; the ones willing to buy into ephron's whiny views of life and romance . 
tom hanks and meg ryan , two of hollywood's most likeable stars play sam baldwin and annie reed , repectively . 
baldwin's wife recently died and he moved to seattle with his son , jonah , seeking to get away from the familiar surroundings which remind him of his late spouse . 
jonah senses tension and calls a talk radio show to tell the world about their problems . 
sam seems ready to strangle his son for calling the show , but when he gets on the phone he begins pouring his heart out . 
ephron has him do this so that annie reed ( meg ryan ) can hear it . 
annie is a happy woman . 
she is engaged to walter , an allergy-prone working man and seems to be perfectly content . 
but after hearing sam the widower on the radio show , she becomes convinced that he is her destiny and is willing to risk her engagement for it . 
five years after this movie hit theaters , hanks , ryan and ephron would team up again in the far better , although still sub-par romantic comedy you've got mail , which is about people who hate each other in real life falling in love on the internet . 
at least that movie had a sense of spontaneity . 
here it seems that the first one hundred minutes exist solely to set up for the last five . 
the fact that sam and annie will finally meet is so excruciatingly obvious that everything else is perfunctory . 
sleepless in seattle is full of wonderful performers ; from its two leads to supporting stars like bill pullman and rosie o'donnell . 
but none of them can save the film from being a bore . 
its characters are dull and empty , its script isn't funny or particularly charming . 
the script has a fundamental problem : annie gives up , for little reason , her life with walter to pursue " sleepless in seattle , " whom she has never even seen . 
it's the kind of life decision that real people don't make , and its a major , unforgivable plausibility sacrifice . 
in essence , this movie's purpose is to head towards a goal that shouldn't even exist . 
it's a ten minute short film with ninety-five minutes of filler . 
if you were to show me sleepless in seattle and i didn't have to review it , you could just call me " asleep in philadelphia . " 
 ? 1999 eugene novikov&#137 ;
if you've seen the trailers or commercials , it's rather difficult to really figure out what this movie has in store . 
well , it's hard to tell after watching the movie as well . 
bruce willis is a resident of the future , and it is a rather bleak future . 
the world's population had disintigrated into a mere 200 , 000 and is no longer ruled by humans but animals . 
the reason ? 
in 1995 , an organization called the army of the 12 monkeys contaminated the world with a pure virus , thus wiping out practically the world's population in a mere month . 
bruce willis' character is one of the surviving few , but is enslaved by scientists , as are most of last living humans . 
they barter his freedom by sending him on an assignment and having him do the ultimate task : go into the past , find the leader of the army of the 12 monkeys , and kill him . 
well , this explanation didn't come easy . 
although the movie is very thought provoking of us as a people , our future and the evilo in the world , as a story it is very confusing . 
and dragging . 
i know a movie isn''t keeping my interest when i fidget in my seat or feel the need to look at my watch only to find that it's only been an hour passed . 
terry gilliam has a certain style that i realize many appreciate , and i haven't watched his previous work brazil , but this movie felt like it took too long to tell and yet when one realizes the end is near because it is very easy to figure out , you wish it were more complex , and not to mention that the movie is depressing is the only reason why it did invoke emotion from me .
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 aren't exactly thriving , but they have had their share of screen successes since ; the same can'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 don'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 ?
these days , we are witnessing the deluge of films based on old , cult tv shows . 
most of the times , the fans of these shows shudder thinking what could hollywood hacks of the present do with the memories of their past . 
but , some five or six years ago , there weren't that many movies and the trend didn't look that depressing . 
so , the people who , like the author of this review , grew up watching flintstones , popular 1960s animated series about " modern stone age " family , weren't particularly worried when the word came about live action remake . 
after all , the producer behind the project was steven spielberg and , if anything else , at least the special effects would be good . 
the plot revolves about flintstones , family set in fictious stone age " town " of bedrock , whose members enjoy the lifestyle of 1950s middle class america . 
fred flinstone ( john goodman ) works in the quarry , and one day he helps his best friend and neighbour barney rubble ( rick moranis ) and his wife betty ( rosie o'donnell ) to adopt a baby . 
to return the favour , barney switches his results of aptitude test with fred , and , based on that , fred gets well-paid job in management . 
but , of course , this is just a sham - corrupt official cliff vandercave ( kyle maclachlan ) and his sultry secretary sharon stone ( halle berry ) need a scapegoat for their embezzlement scheme . 
in the meantime , fred's wife wilma ( elizabeth perkins ) must face her mother ( elizabeth taylor ) who can't stand fred . 
on the superficial level , the flintstones did the excellent job in bringing the animated series to life . 
computer effects are flawless , and the costumes , settings and other details are authentic for all the fans of the show . 
unfortunately , problems with this film start with inadequate casting - rick moranis is too thin for the role of barney , while the cartoon betty used to be much skinnier than rosie o'donnell . 
but the greatest problem of all is plot , or to be precise , the lack of plot . 
some thirty six screenwriters made sure that the plot of the film is lame , original characters one-dimensional , and many elements of the story , like embezzlement and inter-office politics , totally incomprehensible for the little children , the main targeted audience of this film . 
result is almost unwatchable mess , occasionally saved mostly by excellent acting ( elizabeth perkins was right on mark as wilma ) and one of the classic example of mortal hollywood disease known as " high concept " . 
after great hype , movie quickly sank into oblivion and the fans of the show returned to the animated version . 
all in all , film isn't that bad , but only the hard core fans and nostalgics can find more than guilty pleasure in it .
i think of i know what you did last summer as the movie that scream and scream 2 could have been . 
mind you , though , i mean this in the worst possible way . 
i know what you did last summer is a typical slasher flic without the smarts of the scream's . 
as a result , it's even worse than some of your better campy horror pictures ( see nightmare on elm street ) because it thinks it's about thirty times smarter than it is . 
based on a teen book of the same name and , disappointingly , adapted by scream scribe kevin williamson , i know what you did last summer begins with appropriately angsty modern rock music combined with some startling cinematography of a cliff along the ocean and an angsty sort sitting at the top . 
the appropriate mood being set ( this is angst-horror for the 90's ) , we cut over to the july 4th parade in a small north carolina town . 
from there , we see the blond , female protagonist , helen shivers ( woodenly played by sarah michelle geller ) , getting crowned croaker queen as the blond male " hero , " barry cox ( woodenly played by ryan phillipe ) , and matched brunette pair of protagonists , julie james and ray bronson ( woodenly played by party of five's jennifer love hewitt and freddie prinze jr . , respectively ) cheer her on . 
after getting drunk at a party , going to a beach to wittily discuss urban legend and indulge in some foreshadowing , and having some meaningful sex ( if you believe what the characters say ) , the four run down some guy crossing the windy cliff road at night . 
his face is mangled so they can't tell who it is , and they come to the decision to dump him in the ocean so as to not ruin any of their future chances for success in the world . 
cut to one year later . 
the lives of our protagonists have gone from annoying to bad . 
main brunette female , the bright one of the bunch , has been plagued with guilt and almost failed out of college . 
blond female has forfeited her dreams of starring on guiding light , and now works at the family store in town . 
brunette male is a fisherman , living off the land . 
blond male has become a complete jerk and quarterback on some college football team . 
then , predictably , their past comes back to haunt them . 
it all begins with an irrational murder , followed by some taunting of protagonists by the mysterious killer , bad acting by a good actress ( anne heche ) , an improbable plot , bad acting by the main bad actors , some more killing , concluding in a climactic scene , mostly climactic in the relief at the end of the movie . 
all the while , the actors and actresses spout off bad lines , and main brunette male does his best keanu reeves imitation . 
not that the movie was without pleasure . 
count the illogical plot twists and bad lines for some fun . 
mostly , though , note the costumes of main females and how trendily unattractive they make the otherwise eye-catching pair look .
one of the 90s' most unwelcome thriller trends returns from the grave : it's the " ___ from hell " movie ! 
starting in the early nineties , we were subjected to nearly every conceivable combination of relationships-from-hell ! 
there were boyfriends from hell , friendly neighborhood cops from hell , nannies from hell , and even secretaries from hell . 
but hush has found an old standby that somehow was forgotten in the rush : the mother-in-law from hell ! ! ! ! ! 
the mother-in-law in question is martha , played by jessica lange . 
she has been single-handedly running the family horse farm , kilronan . 
her son , jackson ( johnathon schaech ) and his girlfriend , helen ( gwyneth paltrow ) , live in new york , and have no intention to move back down south to the rural kilronan . 
but those intentions are about to change . 
you see , martha lives by manipulation . 
she has used it in years past to breed many championship horses . 
now , she believes she can use it to breed herself a grandson . 
though at first , helen finds martha charming , soon she is caught in the domineering martha's web of deception . 
it's hard to understand why nobody ever wises up to martha' schemes . 
as written , most of the characters in the film must be very slow witted . 
but then , the film even treats the audience like idiots . 
it tries to get away with things ( like leaving a critical piece of evidence in a rather unlikely place ) without even batting an eye . 
then again an audience which accepts characters as shallow as these isn't one that's likely to question details . 
jessica lange's martha is the only semi-developed character in the film , and she applies her talents to redeem it as much as she can . 
a character that could have been simply awful is merely groan-worthy . 
gwyneth paltrow doesn't have much to build upon , as helen's only character trait seems to be " daughter-in-law " . 
still , she fares better than johnathon schaech , whose character is so nonexistent , he's inexplicably missing for much of the film . 
still , there have been much worse " ____ from hell " films . 
even with its paper-thin characters and ludicrous setups , hush manages to create a few thrills in a color-by-numbers fashion . 
you know what's coming , but occasionally the film will deliver a shock or two . 
the old formulas are around for a reason , but that doesn't mean they taste fresh .
mugshot ( director/writer/cinematographer/editor : matt mahurin ; cast : belinda becker ( stella ) , michael williams ( rumor ) , robert knepper ( joe/chris ) , robert walker ( random ) , willie lassic ( young brother of rumor ) , maxine joiner ( rumor's mother ) ; runtime : 87 ; mortal films ; 1995 ) 
reviewed by dennis schwartz 
a bleak indie film about a stolen identity . 
there's not much more to this visually stylish film than what meets the eye , as it relies on shock to tell its story of a prolonged vicious mugging . 
it falls into the category of being a pretentious art-house film , leaving a bitter taste in one's mouth as it stereotypes its characters and unintentionally further inflames the racial issues . 
it tries to make a heavy-handed point about disenfranchised black youths trapped by their environment , with their only way out being crime . 
but the story is so filled with violence and its nyc setting looks like hell , that it's hard to enjoy this film and to follow what the logic in the story is supposed to mean . 
the relationship between the black mugger and his white victim is a cloudy one , which the film never determines what it wants to say about it . 
matt mahurin is virtual one-man crew in putting this film together ( director/writer /cinematographer/editor ) , who is a still photographer in his day job . 
the film works best as a visually challenging piece , as each shot looks like a photograph carefully telling the story unfolding . 
a white photographer ( robert knepper ) is mugged by a black gang while he's on a freelance assignment to take a photo shoot of harlem at night . 
he becomes a victim of amnesia and his head is bloodied as he's left in a deserted harlem building , as the gang leaves him for dead ; but , one of the muggers , rumor ( michael williams ) , comes back and pretends to help him . 
he's a would-be photographer , who keeps a scrapbook entitled mugshots in the project apartment he shares with his mother and younger brother . 
keeping his victim in the dark about who he is by calling him joe and not telling him what's happening , he becomes the photographer for a few days . 
he enters the photographer's stylish greenwich village apartment and steals his expensive camera , and decides to hold the mugging vic for ransom when he finds out he has a black girlfriend , stella ( belinda becker ) . 
she's the only one in the film who could act . 
the film is stuck with a clumsy dialogue and an overuse of symbolism , as it ends with nothing more to tell after the shock and the violent situation it created except to beat it into the ground . 
it could only be commended for how appealing the film looks , as if it's a scrapbook of still photos put together to celebrate a mugging .
preposterous religious action film ( produced by the trinity broadcasting network ) about a code hidden within the text of the bible that when deciphered will lead to the end of the world ( nice of those bible authors to put a doomsday code into the most read book ever eh ? ) . 
michael york plays a millionaire diplomat who breaks the code and sets out to become god on earth and fulfill the doomsday prophecies , while casper van dien ( terribly miscast and giving an awful performance as a result ) plays the atheist motivational speaker who must stop him . 
michael ironside ( great as always , despite the silly film surrounding him ) plays a fallen priest and right hand man to michael york's character . 
here's some subtle character development you may have missed pertaining to ironside's character . 
now despite the fact that we see him murder a man in the opening scene , the filmmakers aren't quite sure if their audience will understand that he is evil . 
how do they fix that ? 
make specific efforts to show that his character is the only one in the film who smokes ! 
there are lots of ominous shots of michael ironside smoking . . . 
oooooo scary . 
but even that wasn't enough for the filmmakers apparently , as they later have to infer that ironside's character is gay ! 
it comes out of nowhere and just makes no sense . 
my main problem with this film is that , despite the silly story ( which could have been pulled off . . . 
anything can be made believable if executed correctly ) , the events of the film aren't shown with any sense of urgency or importance . 
for example , at one point york's character is declared chancellor of the world or something , and we see one brief , cheesy news report about it . 
the movie keeps telling us that the apocalypse is coming , but it never seems that way . 
there's no " world reaction " to anything . 
the omega code is available on dvd from goodtimes home video . 
it contains the film in the original theatrical aspect ratio of 1 . 85 : 1 , and includes the original theatrical trailer , a documentary on the making of the film , production notes , and cast and crew information . 
the documentary runs about 25 minutes and is actually surprisingly good ( it looks as though it was made for broadcast on tbn ) , and it does a comprehensive job of interviewing practically everyone in the cast and crew ( with the exception of michael ironside , unfortunately ) . 
the best thing about it is that whenever crew members are interviewed , they do an excellent job of explaining their profession and exactly what it is they do on a movie set . 
most documentaries tend to overlook this . 
doomsday expert hal lindsey is even interviewed ( you'll remember his documentary from the 1970's called the late great planet earth , where lindsey speculated that jimmy carter might actually be the antichrist ) . 
however , at the very beginning of the documentary the producers of the film managed to get on my bad side . 
when interviewed they actually have the nerve to say " ever see raiders of the lost ark ? 
well , our film is like that ! " 
no it isn't . 
not by a long shot . 
[pg-13]
synopsis : two con artists find the perfect patsy in harry ( woody harrelson ) - - an inept former journalist who trips and bumps his head into a post , tries to slap a girl and gets poked in the eye , has ill-timed fits of coughing , and fails at everything he does . 
the story is told from harry's point of view . 
harry always carries around a shot of whiskey although he swears he doesn't drink . 
one day harry is approached by the con girl rhea ( elisabeth shue ) , who is similar to harry in that she carries around a cigarette but swears she doesn't smoke . 
seduced , harry agrees to participate in a money-making scheme involving faking the kidnapping of odette ( chloe sevigny ) , the teenage daughter of a rich man . 
turns out , it's all part of a needless , very puzzling , extremely elaborate and convoluted scheme ( it involves hiring special impersonators ) by two cons in order to fool harry , a hero who barely has the intellectual capacity of a wooden post . 
when the 'kidnapped' odette is found dead , the clues point to harry as the kidnapper/murderer , and the police are hot on harry's trail . 
harry suddenly realizes he has been framed while others have taken the ransom money . 
can he get out of this mess ? 
opinion : palmetto is a long , uninteresting film with all the wrong feel . 
hero harry is an inept bungler who trips up often and consistently overestimates his own intelligence . 
this farcical kind of character works best in an entertaining naked gun action comedy or dragnet spoof . 
but palmetto is played like a dark , serious , detective noir drama , and watching harry's bumbling confidence amounts to an irritating distraction . 
there's a lapse in concentration in the middle of the movie as the camera goes wild on breasts , buttocks , short skirts , colored painted nails , and women's legs . 
even when the focus is supposedly on harry and his dilema , you can always notice the side of elizabeth shue's breast forming a prominent foreground . 
towards the end , palmetto re-focuses on plot for the grand finale - - a confusing explanation involving impersonators , with woody harrelson handcuffed and suspended over a tub of acid as he hears the criminals' confession . 
if you can imagine 'shemp' from the three stooges playing the detective hero of an hbo 'lingerie suspense' thriller , that's how out of synch this movie feels .
starring arnold schwarzenegger ; danny devito ; emma thompson & frank langella the only thing that you can say about junior is that it is a disappointment , and a big one at that . 
junior brings together arnold schwarzenegger and danny devito with director ivan reitman . 
these are the same men that brought us the very funny twins . 
so foolish me , i was hoping for something that would at least come close to the level of quality of twins . 
so much for hopes . 
schwarzenegger and devito play two scientists ( doctors hesse and arbogast ) who are working on a new drug that will reduce the possibility of miscarriage in pregnancy . 
unfortunately , due to circumstances beyond their control , they are denied permission to test this new drug on humans , and subsequently lose their funding . 
still believing that their drug will work , they decide to test it anyway , on hesse . 
so , dr . hesse ( schwarzenegger ) artificially inseminates himself and begins taking the drug . 
their theory is that if the drug can prevent a man from miscarrying , surely it will work on a woman . 
does the thought of arnold schwarzenegger pregnant sound funny or humorous to you ? 
well , it must have to the producers of junior . 
admittedly , schwarzenegger has the comedic talent to pull it off . 
perhaps if it had been done differently it might have actually been funny . 
but it wasn't , schwarzenegger pregnant is goofy at best . 
the sight of schwarzenegger running around going through the hormone imbalances that come with pregnancy , and the accompanying emotional swings , is not funny . 
schwarzenegger comes very close to embarrassing himself with these antics . 
i kept thinking to myself , with the time arnold wasted making this turkey he could have been making an action picture . 
better yet , with schwarzenegger , devito and reitman all in the same place at the same time , why didn't they make a sequel to twins ? 
anything would have been better than this mess . 
danny devito is wasted in this movie . 
his part could have been played by any joker they pulled in off the street . 
 ( after seeing the movie , if i was devito , i probably would have wished they had pulled someone in off the street . ) 
emma thompson is wasted here as well . 
while thompson is best known for her jane austin adaptations , she is also a fine comedian . 
too bad she didn't get to use any of that talent here . 
am i being too hard on this film ? 
i don't think so . 
schwarzenegger and devito are two of my favorite actors in film today , and ivan reitman is one of the more talented directors in hollywood . 
with a supporting cast of emma thompson and frank langella , the filmmakers really have to be trying hard to make a bad film . 
they certainly managed here . 
maybe it was well intentioned , but unfortunately this is a movie that never should have been made . 
if you are tempted to see this film , do yourself a favor and go rent twins , a film that truly takes advantage of arnold schwarzenegger and danny devito's comedic talents .
the rapid-fire formula that worked so well in airplane ! , the " police squad ! " 
television series , top secret ! , three naked gun films , and two hot shots ! 
movies has finally reached a desperate dead-end with spy hard . 
even ezio gregio's the silence of the hams is arguably funnier than this over-extended spy- and action-movie spoof . 
leslie nielsen stars as secret agent wd-40 , who returns from retirement to battle his old nemesis , general rancor ( a cackling andy griffith ) . 
the jokes fly in every direction and with hardly a hint of restraint , timing , or tact . 
most the movie is comprised of recycled airplane and naked gun gags , recreated movie sequences , and soggy star cameos . 
yeah , maybe we * do * need ray charles driving an l . a . bus bound for a speed bump , but did mr . t , hulk hogan , and dr . joyce brothers also have to appear in the same movie ? 
leslie nielsen plays it straight with his usual dopey flair . 
there is something oddly inspiring about the sight of nielsen wearing a nun's habit , even the resulting sister act spoof is silly . 
as are the bits directly lifted from home alone , pulp fiction , true lies , etc . etc . ( adolescent males might enjoy this mess , tho . 
the butt shots , breast peeks , penis pokes , flatulence gags , and related innuendo are right up beavis and butthead's alley . ) 
beyond the hilarious title sequence with " weird " al yankovich performing the theme song , spy hard is barely the stock that it's printed on . 
my recommendation : duck in while you're waiting for another movie to start . 
stay long enough to see the camera dart inside of weird al's nostril and then leave . 
you won't miss a thing .
the premise of this movie is , well , pretty far-fetched . 
tom berenger plays shale , a mercenary who is temporarily out of work ( those fools at the cia have denied his existence just because he and his buddies botched a job in cuba ) . 
fortunately , his girl friend ( diane venora ) , a teacher at christopher columbus high school in miami , gets her knee cap broken by a disgruntled student , creating a job opening for shale as a substitute teacher . 
not telling his girl friend , who might object on pedagogical grounds , he creates a number of fake higher degrees for himself ( from yale , harvard , princeton , et al ) and begins his tenure as a high school teacher . 
the students ( junkies , drug dealers , gang members , sleazy sluts , ice-pick wielders . . . you 
get the picture ) don't really take to him right away , so he hits one in the face with a can and breaks a few fingers . 
this gets their attention to a certain extent , so he tells them the story of the vietnam war : " see , some homeboys from the north tried to muscle in on the turf of the homeboys from the south . " 
oh yeah , now they can dig it ; the problem is just that nobody ever explained it properly before . 
but wait ! 
there are drugs being dealt in the school itself ! 
and behind the whole scheme , in cahoots with the head gang , the kod ( no , not " cod " , but " knights of destruction " . . . really ! ) , is none other than . . . the 
upright , ex-cop principal , played by the forgotten ghostbuster , ernie hudson ! 
so shale does what any good teacher would do . 
he gets his buddies together , they gather together a bunch of bazookas and other major weapons , explosives , and cool stuff like that , and they have a big showdown against the drug dealers and kod at the high school . 
ok , so the premise is not just far-fetched , it's downright dumb . 
if this were a hong kong action comedy , we might just accept it , but it takes itself far too seriously to be truly fun . 
oh , it has its moments ; how one can truly hate a movie in which huge ( really huge ) amounts of cocaine are delivered in school busses ? 
and to be fair , it is almost never really boring , as the action is interrupted by only short sequences of actual story . 
but over all , this is pretty much a made-for-tv movie with more ( and bigger ) explosions and more foul language . 
in fact , it reminded me of " miami vice " without the production values , babes in skimpy bikinis , and pastels . 
if you can sneak into the theater without paying , go for it . 
otherwise , wait for video . 
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 .