polsci/sentiment-polarity-dataset-v2.0 huggingface dataset:
if anyone had been able in 1983 to forsee a late-night cable show hosted by gilbert gottfried showcasing some of the worst films of the 80's , they'd agree d . c . cab is the quintessential " usa up all nite " movie . 
it's one of those childish r-rated movies that kids would love but can't see until it's edited for tv . 
it's also one of those pointless , almost plotless movies with hardly any laughs . 
and , strike three , it pairs mr . t with gary busey . 
i heard gilbert say d . c . cab had " an all-star cast , " but i'm still hoping there was some degree of facetiousness in that statement . 
when third-billing goes to a two-minute appearance by famed flashdancer irene cara " as herself , " you can't say a damn thing about all-star casts . 
likewise for token appearances by marsha " roz " warfield , paul rodriguez and " politically incorrect " host bill maher , before he was somebody . 
appearing in d . c . cab pretty much had the opposite effect on everyone else , especially irene " i'm gonna live forever " cara . 
d . c . cab is an ensemble comedy from joel schumacher ( who would go on to direct batman forever ) about a bunch of misfits who drive cabs . 
you get the feeling if the police academy cadets had made a different career choice , this would be the result , except here you have such interesting characters as the " token white guy " ( busey ) who wants to get in tight with the blacks now before they take over the world , the token jive talker named tyrone ( charlie barnett ) who wears his hair in rollers and uses the word " honkey " as much as possible , the tough guy with the mohawk and gold chains ( mr . t -- a real stretch for him ) , the aspiring musician waiting for his big break ( maher ) , the mexican gigolo ( rodriguez ) , the woman who actually wants to drive cabs for a living ( warfield ) and the guy who wants to own a cab company for a living ( adam baldwin ) . 
we've all seen dozens of bad comedies from the 80's . 
some are fun to watch and some are actually funny . 
this one is more or less neither . 
you'd think plenty of comedic sparks would fly from the assemblage of talent ( whatever ) , but d . c . cab more or less falls flat on a continual basis , culminating in the usual contrived hollywood finale as baldwin is kidnapped and the other cabbies have to go to rescue him . 
it's a shame no one was able to rescue this movie from the depths of stale jokes and unoriginality . 
d . c . cab has rightly earned its position on " usa up all nite . "
the best thing about , " lake placid " is that it's only 80 minutes long and when it's over you're glad that you didn't waste more than an hour and a half of your time . 
it's nothing more than a bad rip-off of , " jaws " ( and i think that's being kind . ) 
it was written by david e . kelly ( " ally mcbeal " ) as a horror-comedy but fails at both , miserably . 
i was never scared and i think that i only laughed once . 
the crocodile even fails in comparison to the snake in , " anaconda . " 
the plot begins when a man is eaten in half by the giant crocodile in black lake in maine . 
that brings the local sheriff ( brendan gleeson ) and a fish-and-game warden ( bill pulman ) to investigate . 
also , a paleontologist ( bridget fonda ) from new york is sent to look at a tooth and an eccentric millionaire/crocodile lover ( oliver platt ) flies in because he wants to swim beside the beast . 
soon there is tension between everybody because half the people want to kill the croc and the other half want to save it . 
there's also an eccentric old lady ( betty white ) who lives by the lake and has a few secrets . 
as i mentioned before kelley and director steve minor ( h20 ) don't go for a serious approach towards the material but they also don't have anything sly or satirical or witty to say either . 
the betty white character is completely unfunny and none of the other characters are really that interesting , they're all basically idiots . 
if they had any brains the croc wouldn't have been that much of a challenge to catch and they wouldn't have put themselves in half of the situations that they did . 
but then again , if they were smart there wouldn't be a movie . 
basically , " lake placid " is best undiscovered .
that is , unless you're one of those people who have seen the preview a thousand times on tv or in the theaters . 
i can tell you one thing now : they gave the entire movie away . 
why someone would want to base an entire movie on one premise and then give that crucial detail away in the trailers is beyond me . 
however , if they * hadn't * given it away , the film would've still been suprisingly devoid of suspense given its subject matter . 
obviously , the producers thought they could remake " the deep end of the ocean , " throw in tommy lee jones and a couple of cliches and call it an action drama . 
 " double jeopardy " offers solid acting from ashley judd and tommy lee jones , who got first billing even though he didn't see to be on screen half as much as judd did . 
it also offers some genuinely funny , clever , or full-of-tension moments ( my favorite : judd waking up in the coffin ) , but none of that can salvage the film from its insanely predictable plot . 
half the time i'm wondering whether i'm watching one of those overhyped tv miniseries , which always turn out to be less exciting than advertised . 
judging by the beginning , end , and a huge chunk of the middle , i might have been watching a special hallmark presentation too . 
the movie's stretching for an almost two hour long film with only 30 minutes worth of material . 
implausible material , no less . 
loose interpretation of one of the amendments aside , too many times in the movie i thought , " that is * not * possible * . " 
that kind of stuff is excusable in popcorn movies , but not one like " double jeopardy " that tries to pass itself off as serious drama . 
everything seems dragged out , overplayed . 
when they should've kept us in the dark , they let the cat out of the bag too early .
director andrew davis reworks his fugitive formula and the results are about as exciting as his last film-- the dreadful comedy steal big , steal little-- was funny . 
keanu " i'd rather play music than play another action hero " reeves is the grad student on the run , who , along with his superfluous sidekick ( rachel weisz ) , has been framed for a sabotaged science experiment that vaporized eight chicago city blocks . 
 ( the mushroom-cloud explosion is a knock-out and easily the best part of the movie . 
or , as one audience member succinctly summed it up : " whoa . " ) 
false information implicates their involvement and boy and girl are soon on the run , fleeing over open drawbridges , across icy lakes , and through the corridors of power at a top-secret , underground energy facility . 
aiding and abetting is the team's shady mentor , played in an excellent-but-so- what performance by morgan freeman . 
 ( brit brian cox is also about , as the behind-the-scenes bad guy . 
he has some fun fiddling with a southern accent . ) 
unfunny , overscored , and without a single shred of suspense , chain reaction is * the * summer movie to walk out on . 
if you make it to the end , a mess of cross-cutting involving another imminent explosion , you'll hear somebody say " i guess it's time to go . " 
heed that warning .
brian de palma's snake eyes stars nicolas cage's evil twin , who confusingly uses the same stage name as his talented brother . 
like a foreign tourist who screams his lines in english to ensure that he will be understood , cage yells with the ferocity of a man with a bad case of caffeine overload . 
de palma , whose last great film , the untouchables , was crafted over a decade ago seems to have lost his magic . 
in snake eyes , he manages to elicit some of the worst performances possible out of a skilled cast . 
only gary sinise rises slightly above the hackneyed material . 
the rest of the actors become caricatures in this by-the-numbers thriller . 
ryuichi sakamoto's atmospheric and melodramatic music dominates almost every scene . 
heavy on the long violin notes , its rhythm is punctuated by thunder . 
 ( the script by de palma and lost world's david koepp sets the action during a hurricane in an attempt to pump up the adrenaline level and the noise . 
only the latter is achieved . ) 
cage plays rick santoro , a corrupt atlantic city cop who shakes down criminals to get betting money . 
the movie takes place over a single evening when a world championship fight is being held . 
with a flashy , bad wardrobe and a gold cell phone , rick is an obnoxious cop who doesn't know when to shut up . 
spouting cliched and ridiculous dialog , he screams such lines as , " i was made for the sewer , baby ! " 
actually the line is more apropos for the movie as a whole . 
sinise plays kevin dunne , a naval officer who is in charge of the security for the secretary of the navy , who has come to watch the fight . 
but most people in the film are not who they seem to be , and the thin script makes all of them easy to guess . 
the plot , which is told in endless flashbacks , concerns the assassination of the secretary through a scheme set up by some malevolent businessmen ? that adjective is , of course , redundant in hollywood thrillers . 
the flashbacks become repetitious with the same scene shown again and again , sometimes from a different perspective and sometimes not . 
although a brian de palma film requires a certain amount of gratuitous violence , this one is remarkably tame for the man who became famous when he made carrie . 
the movie's outline has some promise , but the movie itself is leaden . 
the film takes itself all too seriously . 
at best , it is a 1940s-style b movie . 
a little humor would have helped the script some , but a complete rewrite would have been better . 
and , although i hate to say it , a different director would have been the biggest improvement . 
snake eyes runs 1 : 39 . 
it is rated r for violence and would be acceptable for teenagers .
" idle hands " is distasteful , crass and derivative . 
if an original thought found its way into this horror-comedy it would die of loneliness . 
plus , you have to question the judgment and sensitivity of studio executives who would green light the release of a movie dealing with the slaughter of innocent teen-agers the week after the tragedy in littleton , colo . 
the movie is insulting to horror film fans and teen-agers . 
the plot , what little there is , deals with anton ( devon sawa ) , a high-school slacker who's hand goes on a murderous rampage after becoming possessed . 
along the way the hand kills anton's parents and his two best friends . 
the friends , also slackers , are so lazy that they return from the dead because the walk into the light was too far for them . 
that is the level of this's atrocity's humor . 
the movie treats death as a joke . 
 " idle hands " is gruesome and morbid . 
the performances are stereotypical and cartoonish . 
i realize this is supposed to pass for comedy , but recent events have surpassed what is on the screen . 
it is not the fault of the filmmakers that real life has overtaken reel life . 
and i can only presume that the writers of " idle hands , " terri hughes and ron milbauer , were trying to make some statement about today's young people and their values in a satiric vein . 
however , it's hard to laugh at death these days , especially ones involving young people . 
with the real horrors of the world put before us on television , a stale pastry such as " idle hands " should be held from release for a few weeks or months to give us time to catch our collective breaths . 
 " idle hands " is bad , no matter the circumstances in the world outside . 
but the context of recent events only heightens its shortcomings . 
the time is not right for this type of movie . 
and as far as " idle hands " goes , the time may never be right . 
this is a movie that shoud be consigned to the trash bin of cinema .
starring kiefer sutherland ; reese witherspoon & bokeem woodbine i used to think that the conversation was the worse film i had ever seen . 
freeway is giving me second thoughts . 
freeway is a modern retelling of little red riding hood . 
only in the nineties , little red riding hood is a foul-mouthed juvenile delinquent played by reese witherspoon , and the big bad wolf is a serial killer ( keifer sutherland ) . 
to top that pathetic premise off -- reese goes to visit granny and you'll never guess who's waiting under the cover's in granny's bed . 
keifer sutherland is one of hollywoods most talented , yet underrated actors , and reese witherspoon is exceptionally talented and will most likely become a major star . 
so what are they doing in this movie ? 
after seeing the end result , undoubtedly they are both asking themselves the same question . 
you might be asking yourself why this is such a short review . 
the answer is quite simple -- i dont want to waste any more of my time writing or thinking about this movie than absolutely necessary . 
i wasted enough of my time just sitting through it . 
note to keifer : you wonder why you aren't a bigger star in hollywood ? 
because you keep making movies like this . 
note to reese : you were great in fear , what happened this time ? 
note to both : don't worry about it too much , no one saw this movie anyway . 
bottom line -- i'm still shaking my head . 
don't waste your time on this turkey . 
if you want to see a great keifer sutherland movie , go rent flatliners or young guns . 
reese witherspoon's abundant acting talents are used to their full potential in fear , a great thriller . 
do yourself a favor and rent one of these movies -- but stay as far away from freeway as you possibly can .
a suave , cool , collected , rich , uptight bad guy = cliche . 
a clumsy criminal oaf to add to the laughs = cliche . 
a bad guy who owns a wild animal = cliche . 
a crooked , chauvinistic law enforcer type = cliche . 
at an intense moment , our main character tries to get away , but the car has trouble starting = cliche . 
complaining about cliches = cliche . 
ok , ok . 
so we always hear about cliches . 
but if there was ever to be a prime example , the real mccoy is it ! 
not one uttered word , not one frame of film , not one character in this whole movie isn't a cut and paste example of everything we've ever seen . 
they might as well use this as a training film : " how to make a bank robbery film in the 90's " . 
karen mccoy ( kim basinger ) is a bank robber who just got out on parole after a six-year stay at the state prison . 
she wants to make things right and go straight , especially with the fact that she has a six-year old son out there who doesn't even know she's alive . 
aware of mccoy's bank robbing expertise , sniveling bad guy jack schmidt ( terence stamp ) uses the same six-year old to coerce mccoy into returning to her past . 
he wants mccoy to pull off an elaborate heist of 18+ million dollars at the same bank she got caught trying to rob six years earlier , which , by the way , is somehow due to schmidt . 
and if she refuses ? 
who knows what he'll do to the kid . 
 ( cue sinister laughter ) 
this movie is so pathetically pitiful that it's hard to know where to begin . 
the aforementioned cliches are brutally abundant . 
i can't stress enough how every single element , whether it be a character , the dialogue , a plot " twist " , etc . , is so damn generic that you'll wonder if * anyone * is working behind the scenes , let alone in front of the camera . 
basinger is absolutely vacant . 
and where do they get off trying to make us emotionally attached to her ? 
here's someone that spent their time robbing banks , and now as she heads onto the street , we're supposed to feel sorry for her . 
as she confronts her son , who doesn't even know who she is , are we supposed to break into tears ? ? 
especially when neither basinger nor zach english , who plays the kid , has any depth or emotional-radiance whatsoever . 
i suppose i should mention val kilmer . 
yeah , that's right - he's in it ! 
quite sadly too , seeing as how i can discuss everything about the movie and never mention his name . 
and he got second billing ! 
to be fair , i will admit that kilmer had potential in his role as the bumbling criminal wannabe j . t . 
barker . 
unfortunately the script doesn't allow much room for improvement , and when his character is used like bookends ( he never shows up in the middle of the film ! ) , 
we have no time to appreciate what he might have brought to this project . 
the real mccoy just can't keep it's head above water , and soon , * very * soon , sinks into a cliched mess of movie . 
the actors are like dummies being moved about by an unenthusiastic puppeteer , and the dialogue , particularly schmidt's trite dialogue , falls like the niagra . 
this is definitely one to avoid , folks . 
the real mccoy is anything but !
1990s would remembered as the era of binary movie events in hollywood - two movies dealing with the same subject , or , to be precise , same " high concept " . 
in summer 1994 , that " high concept " was " mad bomber action thriller " . 
in few weeks , " thrillride of the summer " actionfest speed was followed by rather action thriller blown away , so disappointing that most of the people these days associate the title with the 1992 thriller in which nicole eggert did few nude scenes . 
the movie begins in the prison in northern ireland , where gaerity ( tommy lee jones ) , ira terrorist with the great talent to make lethal explosive devices from almost any material , escapes from prison . 
he comes to boston , where he accidentally notices jimmy dove ( jeff bridges ) , dedicated bomb disposal expert within boston police . 
few people except gaerity know the dove's violent past , when he used to be ira terrorist before becoming sick with violence , betraying gaerity and emigrating to america where he changed the name and started using his experience for good purpose . 
gaerity holds dove personally responsible for his captivity and begins the campaign of bombing terror , directed specifically at dove's colleagues , friends and relatives . 
dove , who is just going to retire and start family , now must confront the mad bomber . 
while speed doesn't even try to bother with plot and characters , using them only as an excuse for long and spectacular action scenes , blown away tries to be more conventional and provide the action with some back story . 
and that is the main reason why it is inferior to speed . 
badly written plot and badly written characters are sometimes worse than no plot and no characters at all . 
screenplay by john bateer and john rice , barely touches the complicated issues of northern ireland , using the tragedy only as the cheap backstory for even cheaper drama . 
the plot is , of course , full of implausibilities . 
the main one is the fact that movie fails to explain how the single individual , no matter how brilliant he is , can produce thousands of deadly devices and hold entire city at bay . 
those questions , same as in the case of speed , could be forgotten while the action goes on , but the pauses between action scenes are filled with cliched and predictable situation that should provide some background to the characters . 
because of them , movie seems a little bit too long , and boring at times . 
the most annoying element of the film , however , is tommy lee jones in the role of mad bomber . 
his acting is so over-the-top that potentially fascinating villain turns into pathetic caricature of himself . 
this role is in painful contrast with the strong performance given by that same actor in fugitive . 
the film have few bright points , though . 
some of the action scenes are fine , which should be credited to director stephen hopkins ( predator ii , judgement night ) . 
and forrest whitaker really shines in minor role of dove's colleague . 
but , all in all , blown away is a film that was justifiably shadowed by its more famous , yet hardly unforgettable competitor .
has hollywood run out of interesting characters and plot-driven suspense thrillers that we must spend two hours watching will smith and a gritty gene hackman exchange obtuse dialogue and run around dodging fireballs ? 
in enemy of the state , that is exactly right . 
a few parts the net , and a few parts conspiracy theory , enemy is about as exciting as watching smith talk to cgi aliens in 1997's lame brained men in black . 
will this guy ever get a real role ? 
he has the bruce willis syndrome . 
the plot is bascially smith , playing a lawyer , getting into hot water with some high government murderers , who assassinated a powerful political figure earlier in the movie , when a tape of the killing gets into his hands . 
he inlists the help of an old conspirator ( hackman ) , and , at the end , er . . . you 
know . 
enemy was one of the worst films of last year . 
not only was it sloppy in telling its story and getting its facts straight , the acting was mediocre when it should have been energy driven , and i didn't like how smith always magically out-smarted the badies when all the other extra characters , seeming more intelligent than smith , somehow got run over by a truck . 
enemy came out around the same time as the superior star trek : insurrection . 
i know these two films are different in , well , everything , but the fact that enemy outgrossed insurrection just baffels me . 
somehow , quality can't overshadow quantity .
vegas vacation is the fourth film starring chevy chase and beverly d'angelo as the heads of the hapless griswold family . 
as with the other three films , their two children , rusty and audrey , are played by a revolving series of actors . 
this time ethan embry and marisol nichols fill the roles . 
also back , is cousin eddie ( randy quaid ) , the slob relative who seems to bring problems wherever he goes . 
in vegas vacation clark griswold ( chase ) decides to take the family on vacation to las vegas so that he and wife ellen ( d'angelo ) can renew their wedding vows . 
it is at this point when comedy is supposed to ensue . 
apparently the filmmakers thought that putting the griswolds into las vegas would be so funny on its own that they wouldn't bother to write any jokes into the script . 
at least that's the way it looks when watching this turkey . 
about half way through vegas vacation i began to have serious doubts as to whether there would actually be a single laugh in the entire film , since there had been none up to that point . 
by the end of the movie i had actually snickered a couple of times , and i had smiled at a couple of gags . 
i might add that none of the funny ( and i use the term loosely ) moments came as a result of anything chase , d'angelo or quaid were involved in . 
they might as well have stayed home for as much as they contributed to this film . 
the two best things in this movie were ethan embry and marisol nichols as the griswold kids , who manage to have a couple of their own adventures . 
rusty becomes a vegas high roller , providing most of the film's best moments . 
every time chase and quaid were involved in a gag , it just made it more and more apparent that they should have stopped this series after the third film . 
which brings me to the best moment of the film . 
the griswolds are driving down the highway and holiday road ( the theme from the original vacation ) begins to play . 
christie brinkley and her red ferrari ( also from the first movie ) drive by . 
it was a cute moment , but all it really did was remind me just how funny the first film had been , and just how far that this series has fallen . 
too bad .
burnt money is the perfect festival film . 
it will show once or twice , and then no one , thankfully , will ever have to hear from it again . 
this film from the seattle international film festival 2001's emerging masters series is easily one of the year's worst . 
billed as a gay `bonnie and clyde' , this gritty film from director marcelo pi ? eyro has its only highlight in a well-designed title sequence . 
two gay lovers get involved in a bank robbery that makes a gang leader , whose plan they screwed up , angry . 
this causes the gang leader to send his boys out to get the gay guys , one of whom may not actually be gay . 
hiding out in a prostitute's apartment , the two men must fight off police and gang members in a very long showdown for the movie's conclusion . 
if caught , they risk losing all the money , and their love . 
as an added emotional bonus , one of the gay men is dying . 
or something like that . 
everything that happens is so quick and confusing i was completely lost . 
clarity isn't exactly this movie's striving virtue , so it was a little hard to pick up . 
not much could have really happened though . 
the main events in this long two-hour film are explicit homosexual and heterosexual sex , graphic drug use , extreme violence , and strong language . 
lots of explicit material is never a bad thing when there's a reason , but there's no purpose to anything in this film . 
most of the sex and violence scenes come off as silly , while the heavy drug use comes off as ridiculous and depressing . 
it appears pi ? eyro ( who co-wrote with marcelo figueras , from a novel by ricardo piglia ) purposefully adds more blood and lovemaking for his own amusement . 
he makes the actors as sweaty and dirty as possible , makes them snort cocaine , gives them guns and condoms , and lets them go . 
burnt money is pointless . 
the performances are bad . 
it tries to thrill and shock , but only causes boredom . 
god forbid it will ever get a distributor . 
another disappointing film from this year's so-called emerging masters series . 
pass on by .
claire danes , giovanni ribisi , and omar epps make a likable trio of protagonists , but they're just about the only palatable element of the mod squad , a lame-brained big-screen version of the 70s tv show . 
the story has all the originality of a block of wood ( well , it would if you could decipher it ) , the characters are all blank slates , and scott silver's perfunctory action sequences are as cliched as they come . 
by sheer force of talent , the three actors wring marginal enjoyment from the proceedings whenever they're on screen , but the mod squad is just a second-rate action picture with a first-rate cast .
in 1989 , director edward zwick began his career with the powerful civil war drama , " glory , " but since then , he has made continuous disappointments , to me at least , with 1994's " legends of the fall , " and 1996's " courage under fire . " 
those two films weren't bad , just not very good , but with zwick's latest film , " the siege , " he has finally made one . 
 " the siege , " is a modern-day action-thriller that focuses on terrorism that is sweeping through new york city . 
investigating the matter is fbi agents anthony hubbard ( denzel washington ) and frank haddad ( tony shalhoub ) , who are first hit by the ordeal when a city bus explodes with several innocent people on it . 
later , a bomb goes off in a broadway theater , killing even more . 
they soon meet cia operative elise kraft ( annette bening ) , who may very well hold the key to the identity of the arab terrorist . 
there are some movies that simply don't need to be made , and , " the siege " may very well be one of them . 
oh , sure , zwick thinks he is making a " meaningful " action film , since he has added lots of exposition scenes in which the audience is basically lectured on the horrors of terrorism , but what he really has made is actually no more substantial than , say , " die hard , " which also starred bruce willis . 
this time , willis is horribly wasted as a general of the u . s . army , who puts a state of martial law over nyc during the climax . 
whatever points , " the siege , " earnestly tried to make , were obviously lost in the translation from page to screen , or maybe , zwick never really had anything serious to say in the first place . 
the role of the arab community is offensively stereotypical , just as women were in the recent , " john caprenter's vampires , " by placing them all in the category of " bad guys . " 
 " the siege , " contains three fine actors---washington , bening , and shalhoub---but washington is stuck with a character that contains not an ounce of even remote development . 
bening has slightly more to do , and has an intriguing character to work with , while shalhoub pretty much steals the show , even though , again , he has no real character . 
by the climax of , " the siege , " with washington giving a sermon to willis on the so-called " message " of the story , i felt like i had wandered into a sequel to , " on deadly ground , " in which steven seagal gave a 10-minute speech at the end about preserving the environment . 
 " the siege " is constantly heavy-handed , not entertaining or insightful , and just goes to prove that not even the best actors can save a film that lacks a satisfactory screenplay .
i guess that if a very wild bachelor party had gone really bad , there would be broken furniture , traces of smack and cocaine on the floor , and a dead prostitute in the bathroom . 
i guess that if a movie had also gone really bad , there might be the same elements present . 
coincidence ? 
poor kyle ( a meek looking jon favreau ) . . . he is about to marry his radiant fiancee , laura ( cameron diaz ) . 
but before he exchanges his vows , he embarks to las vegas with his friends for one last blowout . 
but this bachelor party has gone about as bad as it could possibly get . 
the prostitute has met a horrible , though accidental death , and drugs are everywhere . 
the five friends agree that there is enough bad evidence here that will send them to jail for a very long time . 
a surprisingly calm robert boyd ( christian slater ) , who looks like he was groomed to make nefarious decisions , ponders their dilemma for a few minutes before deciding that the best thing to do is to bury the body in the desert where she'll never be found . 
although they stomach the gruesome deed of getting rid of the body ( which also disturbingly involves dismantling the body using power saws in order to stuff it into suitcases ) , when they return from their trip , guilt and paranoia begins to set in which slowly consumes some of the five friends . 
one is adam ( daniel stern ) he grows increasingly agitated . 
whenever people look at his van or whenever a cop glances his way , his blood pressure increases . 
or that just may be because of his dysfunctional family . 
another is michael , who was actually responsible for her death . 
he tries to bury his feelings , but the burden of guilt begins to affect his judgment as well . 
boyd is the ? doer' of the group . 
seemingly suffering from a long psychosis , when he feels as if his secret is about to be exposed , he is apt to take extreme measures to cover up his tracks . 
kyle just hopes that his wedding will live up to laura's demanding expectations . 
then , there's moore ( leland orser ) who speaks 5 lines and walks around with a puzzled look on his face . 
the problem with this reprehensible movie is that it wants to be a cruel comedy , but it presents things in a manner that just aren't funny . 
drugs , mutilation , and killing your own friends isn't something to be laughed at . 
as a straight psychological drama , i could see how it might have worked , as each one tried to maneuver and overcome the weight of their own guilt in their own sometimes-sick ways . 
but this movie insults us by assuming that we could simply discard our values for 2 hours . 
if you do like this movie , i don't think that i want to know you . 
i did find slater a convincing leader who sways his friends to choose not the right thing but the ? smart play . ' 
and diaz adds some brightness to this film as a wedding-needing fiancee . 
but her talents are essentially wasted here . 
it's obvious that the film maker is trying to strike a certain tone . 
but the way that he chooses to do it is tasteless . 
do not make a very bad decision by seeing this film .
i had been looking forward to this film since i heard about it early last year , when matthew perry had just signed on . 
i'm big fan of perry's subtle sense of humor , and in addition , i think chris farley's on-edge , extreme acting was a riot . 
so naturally , when the trailer for " almost heroes " hit theaters , i almost jumped up and down . 
a soda in hand , the lights dimming , i was ready to be blown away by farley's final starring role and what was supposed to be matthew perry's big breakthrough . 
i was ready to be just amazed ; for this to be among farley's best , in spite of david spade's absence . 
i was ready to be laughing my head off the minute the credits ran . 
sadly , none of this came to pass . 
the humor is spotty at best , with good moments and laughable one-liners few and far between . 
perry and farley have no chemistry ; the role that perry was cast in seems obviously written for spade , for it's his type of humor , and not at all what perry is associated with . 
and the movie tries to be smart , a subject best left alone when it's a farley flick . 
the movie is a major dissapointment , with only a few scenes worth a first look , let alone a second . 
perry delivers not one humorous line the whole movie , and not surprisingly ; the only reason the movie made the top ten grossing list opening week was because it was advertised with farley . 
and farley's classic humor is widespread , too . 
almost heroes almost works , but misses the wagon-train by quite a longshot . 
guys , let's leave the exploring to lewis and clark , huh ? 
stick to " tommy boy " , and we'll all be " friends " .
to put it bluntly , ed wood would have been proud of this . 
a totally ridiculous plot is encompassed with bad humor , hokey drama , zero logic and a crap screenplay . 
also , a beautifully anti-climactic ending . 
not to say it didn't look intriguing when i saw the previews . 
so much for truth in advertising . 
roland emmerich , who's later " independence day " would look like " the 400 blows " compared to this , co-writed and directed this inane sci-fi film which uses the cliche of there being some connection between eqypt and aliens . 
in a useless opening sequence , men find a stone in 1914 with hieroglyphics on it . 
it wouldn't be till present day ( '94 ) till they would actually figure it out . 
they're decipherer ? 
a slightly-neurotic scientist ( nice twist ) , dr . dan jackson ( james spader , doing his best outside of erotic thrillers and some indy fare ) who's life sucks so much that people walk out of his lectures after the third word . 
why do they use him to decipher what no one else could ? 
so there is a hokey ending ! 
duh ! 
he figures it out in about a minute . 
yea . 
and then they get a suicidal colonel or something , " jack " o'neill ( kurt russel , with his wyat earp locks in the beginning then a flat-top that would make howie long snap into a fetal position ) . 
why a suicidal colonel ? 
for the ending ! 
you'll get the hang of this . 
they open the stargate , a bunch of them go through it with a bomb to blow it up if they find anything bad . 
after an overdone special effects thing , they're . . . inside a goddam pyramid . 
so they went to egypt , right ? 
wrong . 
they're on another planet that was filmed in egypt . 
they discover a cilvilization ruled by ra , the sun god ( the androginous jaye davidson , with a voice modifier to make him sound like barry white with asthma ) , and there are fights , explosions and a kiss between two people . 
yea . 
also melodrama , stupidity , hokey scenes and a bizarre language . 
an anti-climactic ending ends with stupid lines ( " say hello to king tut , asswhole ! " 
- the quintessential line , lemme tell ya ) and some convenient pesudo-pseudo-pseudo-character development . 
by the end , you just wanna go home and watch , i don't know , the " outer limits " or something . 
the script's terrible . 
the special effects are okay , but nothing great . 
the story's so weak that it's almost opaque . 
the whole experience just isn't worth it unless you're so bored that you'd consider watching a " full house " marathon . . . or 
this . 
i'd pick this , obviously , but still , it's just not fun at all . 
and i can't wait for it to premier on mst3k .
aspiring broadway composer robert ( aaron williams ) secretly carries a torch for his best friend , struggling actor marc ( michael shawn lucas ) . 
the problem is , marc only has eyes for " perfect 10s , " which the geeky , insecure robert certainly is not . 
meanwhile , marc's spoiled ( hetero ) female roommate , cynthia ( mara hobel ) , spends her days lying about their apartment and harrassing magazine editor tina brown . 
writer-director victor mignatti's " very romantic comedy " ( as the ad campaign states ) is supposed to be ( pardon the pun ) a gay ol' romp , but it's hard to have much fun with these annoying , self-absorbed characters and their shallow personal problems : marc and cynthia have sitcom-level domestic " crises " ( such as trying to kill bugs--how hilarious ) ; robert and marc go to acting class ( how riveting ) ; the zaftig cynthia goes on eating binges ( how original ) . 
but more than anything else , the three whine . 
constantly . 
marc whines about his turbulent romance with an apparent " 10 , " david ( hugh panaro ) , the hunky musician from across the way ; robert whines about not being able to find the right guy ; cynthia whines about having to find a job ( horrors ) . 
the terrible trio whine their way to a happy ending that is wholly undeserved . 
add in overly broad performances and some laughable lipsynching by panaro , and you're left with one astonishing piece of cinematic damage .
these days , people have rather short attention span and hardly anything can satisfy them for the long run . 
1970s nostalgia is already wearing off , and now , people are becoming more and more interested in 1980s . 
few years in the future , early 1990s are going to be regarded as next golden age of nostalgia . 
however , i doubt that people are going to be very nostalgic about the hollywood products of that period . 
one of the reason would surely be films like national lampoon's loaded weapon 1 , that , in many ways , symbolise the biggest problem of contemporary american film industry - lack of originality and ideas . 
being made as some kind of parody on lethal weapon series , this film pairs two l . a . policemen - jack colt ( emilio estevez ) , burn-out alcoholic cop on the edge , and wes luger ( samuel l . jackson ) , by-the-book policeman , days away from retirement . 
two of them , following the murder of luger's ex- partner , must confront evil general mortars ( william shatner ) , crime lord who is going to flood the market with cocaine stashed in wilderness girl cookies . 
the authors of this films ( whose director , gene quintano , worked on such projects like third and fourth sequel of police academy ) lacked any original idea before they undertook the projects , and that reflects in the lack plot , characters , and , even original lines . 
the plot , or what goes for the plot in this movie , is nothing more than a series of gags that make laugh of some popular films made in previous few years ( apart from lethal weapon series , this film " borrows " its female lead from basic instinct ) . 
the best gags , are , same as with many other similar movies , shown in the trailers . 
the rest simply doesn't work . 
only those who used to watch a lot of hollywood products in that period would laugh . 
others would probably wince at the lameness of humour . 
some would be entertained by celebrity cameos that pop up every once in a while . 
but , at the end , spending hour and half in front of this disorganised mess of a movie is simply not worth the effort . 
the film was sometimes criticised for being the parody of a series that already had strong comic overtones . 
the authors of lethal weapon returned the favour by using the loaded weapon 1 joke in their fourth sequel .
overblown remake of the 1963 robert wise film of the same name ( based on shirley jackson's novel " the haunting of hill house " ) stars lili taylor as one of three " lab rats " that participate in a supposed " insomnia " study being initiated by liam neeson . 
he is actually conducting a study on the causes of fear and why the human mind is still affected by it . 
he drags the test subjects out to a foreboding mansion where all types of " creepy " cgi effects scare the cast and try the audience's patience . 
i know this question has been posed before , but why do people keep remaking good movies ? 
the original was a great psychological horror film . 
this new version is dull and very decidedly not scary . 
in fact , i feel it is downright impossible to make a modern day pg-13 horror movie that is scary . 
unless you find obvious computer generated special effects frightening , then there's nothing in this film that will raise hackles . 
i nearly fell asleep twice during the film , and probably would have if they guy two rows behind me didn't seem to have such a personal relationship with the characters that he felt he needed to discuss every decision they made with them as the film progressed . 
it's sad to see such an amazing cast wasted so badly . 
owen wilson spends most of the film wandering the halls of the house , and the script does no justice to his wonderful comic ability . 
catherine zeta-jones ( always nice to look at ) is given the woefully underwritten role of a bi-sexual insomniac that gets to run out of her bedroom perplexed every time some strange noise occurs . 
liam neeson pops in from time to time to talk into his tape recorder and attempt to convince the others that he has as much knowledge about what's going on as the rest of them do . 
finally , poor lili taylor , the center of the film , gets the brunt of the cgi effects thrown at her while everyone else gets to scream and try to rescue her . 
apparently , a subplot involving a tryst between zeta-jones and taylor's characters was filmed but removed . 
that's too bad , because it might have lent some better characterization to the narrative . 
this is jan de bont's second straight misfire ( speed 2 : cruise control being the first ) . 
when is he going to learn that bigger is not always necessarily better ? 
robert wise knew that when he made the original and the makes of the blair witch project also knew that . 
one should not approach a haunted house movie with a twister mindset . 
if de bont and screenwriter david self had let our minds fill in the blanks as to what was happening instead of showing us everything , it would have served to make the film terrifying . 
what our mind fashions on it's own can be a thousand times more frightening than having having it completely led towards everything . 
apparently , yet another version of this story is being filmed under it's original title . 
i certainly hope that this newer rendition will not be hurt by the insanity of jan de bont's version and that it will retain the psychological impact that the original release had . 
[pg-13]
everything in the phantom you have seen many times before and there is nothing new presented here . 
wincer displays absolutely no skill in setting up an exciting action sequence . 
billy zane is wooden as the hero . 
kristy swanson is given very little to do , and does very little with it . 
treat williams , looking like rhett butler but sounding like mickey mouse , is one of the worst villains i have ever seen in a movie . 
only catherine zeta jones , as one of williams cohorts turns in a good performance . 
she has energy and spunk , which the movie needed much more of . 
oh yeah , the phantom also has a secret identity but this is so poorly played out you won't even care . 
about the only things i can recommend are a good performance by jones , and some colorful scenery . 
however , if youre looking for a fun family movie , go watch the underrated flipper . 
this is not a good movie .
" return to horror high , " wants to be a couple different types of movies at once . 
the film tells the story of a low-budget horror movie being filmed at the closed-down crippen high , a school where a group of serial murders took place five years before . 
but what the cast and crew don't know is that a real killer , maybe the same one that was never apprehended , is going into action again . 
on one level , " return to horror high " is a slasher movie , and it is at this level that it works the best on . 
watching the film , which was made in 1987 , i couldn't help but take notice that the killer's costume was almost identital to that of the ghostface in , " scream , " and " scream 2 . " 
on another level , the film wants to be a slapstick comedy , and there are many hints of this throughout . 
unfortunately , most of these jokes fall flat . 
and the last thing the film wants to be is a " behind-the-scenes " look at an exploitation film being made . 
the only problem is that , while much of it is supposed to be from the movie itself being made , no cameras are shown filming it , thus making it far more confusing than it had to be . 
and to top it all off , the " twist " ending makes very little to no sense whatsoever , and so we are basically left with feeling as if we wasted our time . 
there are story developments that are beyond ludicrous , and plot holes you could drive a winnebago through . 
if you see the film , or have seen it , you'll know what i mean . 
the premise of " return to horror high , " is admittedly pretty crafty , and i liked the atmosphere of the school , which is where the whole thing takes place . 
but director froehlich , judging from this movie , is an incompetent director , except for being able to film the seldom suspeneful scene . 
well , come to think of it , there is only one scene that is actually scary , and it has to do with two actors being locked in a room as the killer tries to break in . 
but other than that two-minute distraction , " return to horror high , " is certainly no great shake . 
note : look for george clooney in a supporting role as one of the actors on the film . 
and strangely enough , he is the first character to get the ax . . . literally .
the art of woo attempts to be one of those films like breakfast at tiffany's in which the audience is rooting for some sweet , vulnerable , irresistible woman to work out her problems and to find happiness . 
the problem is that helen lee who writes and directs seems to have written alessa woo ( played by sook-yin lee ) as neither sweet nor vulnerable and she is quite resistible . 
alessa is a young woman who happens to be a brilliant art dealer in the toronto art scene . 
this is some sort of alternate world art scene where people pay tens of thousands of dollars for paintings by talented beginners and dealers in these paintings fly back and forth to places like switzerland . 
one of the most knowledgeable of the art dealers is alessa . 
she also happens to be the center of adulation of her friends and every party has suitors camped outside her window . 
next door to alessa moves struggling genius artist and native american ben crowchild ( adam beach ) . 
he sees that behind the facade that there is really a sad little girl within alessa who really will not be happy with the rich art collector she is dating . 
ben gets emotionally involved with alessa . 
 ( as alessa so delicately puts it , " we were bosom buddies , now we're fuck buddies . " ) 
but alessa will have to decide whether she wants love with ben or wealth with her rich suitor . 
the real problem with the film seems to be helen lee's inability to decide what she wants to be saying . 
she undercuts nearly everything she wants us to believe about alessa . 
alessa is looking for financial security but she makes decisions about large sums of money for her clients . 
this appears to be a high profile and well-paid job . 
we are supposed to care about alessa's feelings , but she coldly refuses to visit her own ailing father . 
alessa cannot be portrayed as sweet and vulnerable if at an art auction she turns into our man flint . 
this is a charmless romantic comedy that bets everything it has on the appeal of its main character and comes up double-zero . 
i rate it a 3 on the 0 to 10 scale and a -1 on the -4 to +4 scale .