In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
Example: plot : two teen couples go to a church party , drink and then drive .
they get into an accident .
one of the guys dies , but his girlfriend continues to see him in her life , and has nightmares .
what 's the deal ?
watch the movie and " sorta " find out . . .
critique : a mind - fuck movie for the teen generation that touches on a very cool idea , but presents it in a very bad package .
which is what makes this review an even harder one to write , since i generally applaud films which attempt to break the mold , mess with your head and such ( lost highway & memento ) , but there are good and bad ways of making all types of films , and these folks just did n't snag this one correctly
.
they seem to have taken this pretty neat concept , but executed it terribly .
so what are the problems with the movie ?
well , its main problem is that it 's simply too jumbled
.
it starts off " normal " but then downshifts into this " fantasy " world in which you , as an audience member ,
have no idea what 's going on
.
there are dreams , there are characters coming back from the dead , there are others who look like the dead , there are strange apparitions , there are disappearances , there are a looooot of chase scenes , there are tons of weird things that happen , and most of it is simply not explained .
now i personally do n't mind trying to unravel a film every now and then , but when all it does is give me the same clue over and over again , i get kind of fed up after a while , which is this film 's biggest problem .
it 's obviously got this big secret to hide , but it seems to want to hide it completely until its final five minutes .
and do they make things entertaining , thrilling or even engaging , in the meantime ?
not really .
the sad part is that the arrow and i both dig on flicks like this , so we actually figured most of it out by the half - way point , so all of the strangeness after that did start to make a little bit of sense , but it still did n't the make the film all that more entertaining .
i guess the bottom line with movies like this is that you should always make sure that the audience is " into it " even before they are given the secret password to enter your world of understanding .
i mean , showing melissa sagemiller running away from visions for about 20 minutes throughout the movie is just plain lazy ! !
okay , we get it .
. .
there are people chasing her and we do n't know who they are .
do we really need to see it over and over again ?
how about giving us different scenes offering further insight into all of the strangeness going down in the movie ?
apparently , the studio took this film away from its director and chopped it up themselves , and it shows .
there might 've been a pretty decent teen mind - fuck movie in here somewhere , but i guess " the suits " decided that turning it into a music video with little edge , would make more sense .
the actors are pretty good for the most part , although wes bentley just seemed to be playing the exact same character that he did in american beauty , only in a new neighborhood .
but my biggest kudos go out to sagemiller , who holds her own throughout the entire film , and actually has you feeling her character 's unraveling .
overall , the film does n't stick
because it does n't entertain , it 's confusing , it rarely excites and
it feels pretty redundant for most of its runtime , despite a pretty cool ending and explanation to all of the craziness that came before it .
oh ,
and by the way , this is not a horror or teen slasher flick . . .
it 's just packaged to look that way because someone is apparently assuming that the genre is still hot with the kids .
it also wrapped production two years ago and has been sitting on the shelves ever since .
whatever . .
. skip it !
where 's joblo coming from ?
a nightmare of elm street 3 ( 7/10 ) - blair witch 2 ( 7/10 ) - the crow ( 9/10 ) - the crow : salvation ( 4/10 )
- lost highway ( 10/10 ) - memento ( 10/10 ) - the others ( 9/10 ) - stir of echoes ( 8/10 )
Example solution: N
Example explanation: The phrases used in the review convey a negative sentiment (e.g. "presents it in a very bad package").

Problem: few films in 1999 have divided the critical consensus as sharply as alan parker 's adaptation of frank mccourt 's memoir angela 's ashes .
many dismissed it as an humorless , sentimentalized , uninteresting version of the hugely popular novel ; others hailed it as a heartfelt , sincere portrait of the human spirit .
i 'm somewhere in between , leaning strongly towards the latter .
it 's certainly well - made and it never becomes tedious like some literary adaptations have a tendency to be .
but i have a feeling that parker filled the movie with pseudo - lyrical shots of rain falling on the homely streets of ireland just so it can have the two - and - a - half hour running time that screams " i 'm important !
" mccourt 's book of the same name was about him and his family moving from the us to ireland in the early 1900 's , a time when most people were desperately trying to get into the us .
as he comments , " we were the only irishfolk to say goodbye to the statue of liberty .
" in ireland , frank ( played by joe breen as a small child ) , his 3 brothers , his mother angela ( emily watson ) and his father malachy ( robert carlyle ) get financial help from angela 's mother , a stereotypically strict catholic who chides her daughter for marrying a northern irishman .
she helps them get a rat - infested apartment and malachy goes looking for a job .
positions are scarce and when he does finally find one , he is unable to hold on to it because of his fondness for drinking .
meanwhile , frank goes to an uptight catholic school , where the instructors beat students with blunt wooden objects as often as their heart desires .
two of frank 's brothers soon die , crippled by the dreadful living conditions and malnutrition .
as if the poverty and the suffering were n't intense enough as it stood , malachy and angela have another baby , worsening the situation further .
i imagine this does n't sound like much of a plot .
that 's probably because it is n't one .
these are people .
this is their story .
director alan parker ( the commitments ) knows how to tell a good story and angela 's ashes , despite its relentlessly literary tone remains interesting .
though the film occasionally indulges too much in its gloomily picturesque irish setting , it avoids looking like a glorified travelogue . supplementing parker 's able direction are the engaging , often poignant performances of the leads , some of them seasoned thespians , others relative beginners .
carlyle , the charismatic british actor who has shown astonishing range by hopping from the lead in a rowdy slapstick comedy to the villain in a james bond movie and now to sentimental melodrama , perfectly portrays his rather pathetic character .
we empathize with the guy , but we do n't like or admire
him .
emily watson turns in a heartfelt , sincere supporting performance .
it is mostly she who implants that lump in our throats .
also worthy of mention is little joe breen , whose face graces the film 's superb poster .
it is breen 's first feature film
and he 's extraordinary as young frank .
not unlike sudden oscar darling haley joel osment of the sixth sense , you can peer into the character 's soul through breen 's sad eyes .
on the flip side , one thing that could have vastly improved angela 's ashes is a more decisive editor .
while gerry hambling sure makes the most of the scenery , he and parker also leave in at least a half an hour of unnecessary footage .
the first half , especially , could have been trimmed down , bringing the film to a more reasonable running time and doing our bladders a favor in the process .
things pick up at about the halfway point , sort of dismissing a lot of the criticisms i accumulated during the opening hour , but i maintain that the aggressively deliberate pace parker and co. set in the first half was ludicrously unnecessary .
* spoiler warning !
skip next paragraph if in suspense !
* the film 's final message is somewhat conflicted , as frankie , in effect , leaves his family famished in ireland while he himself goes back to america .
what , exactly , are we supposed to make of that ?
his mother does n't seem to mind because she wants the best possible future for her son , as any mother would , but it still seems inconsiderate of him .
i have n't read the book , but i 'm sure that mccourt justifies his actions therein
; therefore , i 'm suspicious .
another thing that 's never made clear in the movie is the meaning of the title , which , i 'm sure , is also explained in the memoir .
if seen as a film onto itself , rather than an adaptation , angela 's ashes stands tall .
despite a few minor setbacks , it is a captivating story of people forced to live in the trenches by an merciless society where those of weaker character are shoved to the bottom of the financial ladder .
Solution: P