TASK DEFINITION: In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.
PROBLEM: bob the happy bastard 's quickie review : i must admit , no doubt 's single " new " is quite catchy .
it was bouncy and energetic enough to get me to go see this new film from director doug limon , the man who had brought us the humorous swingers a little while back .
the result ?
a movie that 's just as good
as that song , really .
it follows the lives of several individuals over the course of one weekend .
first we hear about a grocery bagger ( sara polley ) who runs into a monetary situation problem and ends up selling bogus drugs at a rave ( with bad results , as a drug dealer feels he 's been swindled by her )
; then comes the story of an english grocery store worker ( same store ) who heads to vegas for the weekend with friends , where sex , gunplay , and stolen car trouble come into play ; then we see the story of two gay movie actors ( played by scott wolf and jay mohr ) who deal with a cop 's strange insurance presentation and hitting a girl ( sara ) with their car ; and , finally , we come to another grocery worker ( katie holmes ) who has a strange fascination with said drug dealer ( the one mentioned earlier ) .
really , it 's all confusing to keep track of in review format
, your best bet is to just , well , go .
the movie features some very good acting from all angles , and limon adds the same humorous energy he had with swingers to this particular product .
the dialogue is pretty snappy and the resolution is pretty well realized , not going for the sappy happy ending nor the dreaded bad ending .
think of it as a , well , ending .
the intertwining of stories is a particularly good element to the movie , as it 's never really confusing and tells different sides of the story , like sliding doors kinda did .
however , it 's better suited for the younger generation who want a little spice in their flicks , which sliding doors kinda is n't .

SOLUTION: P

PROBLEM: capsule : godawful " comedy
" that 's amazingly shabby and cut - rate , and rather bereft of laughs
.
i was having a bad week in my life when i saw austin powers :
international man of mystery .
i desperately needed something to cheer me up , or at least distract me so i could get a clear head .
get some perspective .
even dumb movies can do that for me , sometimes .
i tried hard not to let my dejection affect my judgment , but i am certain now that austin powers would have also sucked rocks through bamboo shoots on the day i won the lottery .
michael myers has taken a character that would barely have supported a five - minute sketch on saturday night live and stretched it to the length of a feature film , padding it out with toilet jokes and the sort of props - strategically - positioned - between - naked - actors - and - camera gags that benny hill got tired of fifteen years ago .
the plot , what little there is of it : back in the swinging mod hep sixties ( i do n't think i 'm doing a disservice to the movie 's attempted early look and feel by describing it that way ) , sexy british secret agent austin powers tangled with his nemesis dr .
evil .
evil launched himself into orbit and cryogenically forze himself to return decades later , when powers was out of the picture .
powers also had himself frozen , and he wakes up to find the nineties a very hard time to deal with .
the basic gag , that of powers ' total inability to cope with the nineties , is not so much exhausted during the course of the movie as never even really dealt with .
the bulk of the movie is taken up with dumb jokes of several basic rubrics : james bond gags ( of which this movie has no end , right down to the silly character names ) , inept slapstick , toilet humor , and strategically placed props . . .
the movie 's amazingly bereft of ideas , come to think of it , with a couple of bright exceptions .
one is dr .
evil 's son -- there is a sidesplitting scene where father and son go to an encounter group , chaired by carrie fisher -- and the other is a throwaway gag where austin mimics various forms of transportation from behind a couch ( it 's a visual gag -- hard to describe , and hard to recommend seeing the movie for ) .
a lot of sixties kitsch has been resurrected and thrown on the screen for this movie , but it 's desperate rather than clever .
instead of skewering the whole thing , it 's a rather bloodless and unfunny tribute
.
myers himself is also desperate : he 's given an idea to play , not a character .
plus , the attempts to make the character work by giving him a relationship with another sexy ( albeit " nineties " ) agent are a waste of time .
i wanted to have the movie end with him trying yet again to get it on with her , only to have her deck him one .
with a couple of exceptions , the movie misses all of its own best moments .
the movie even looks cheesy , and not in a good way : i kept wondering if it had been transferred down from hi - def video or something , so grainy was the film stock in a good many scenes .
the whole thing has the air of being done on the cheap .
my definition of comedy is simply : did it make me laugh ?
the few times that i laughed in austin powers were completely offset by the time i spent cringing and wanting out .
the most damning thing i could say about the movie is that wayne and garth would most likely have shoved it into mike tyson 's shorts and sent it sailing .

SOLUTION: N

PROBLEM: seen may 2 , 1998 at 3
: 40 p .
m .
at the crossgates cinema 18 , theater # 13 , with chris wessell and sean o'shea for $ 5 .
[ theater rating :
*
* * 1/2 : very good sound , picture , and seats ] the big - budget , mega - hype " event " movie is becoming so trendy now it is becoming a weekly routine instead of a seasonal one .
gluttony is hollywood 's favorite sin , but it is the movie - goers who pay the price by being dealt the same things over and over on an ever - worsening basis .
" lost in space " is the latest such offering - a film
so poor it would be twice as good if it were mediocre
.
it 's made up of every element of science fiction , but at no time does it evoke the slightest amount of wonderment
the genre was meant for .
audiences ' attention spans are rapidly decreasing and as is the trend with such films , this one opens with a fast - paced space battle which serves not only as the most interesting scene in the film ( probably because it has " star wars " written all over it ) , but as the producers ' way of showing off their budget through the special effects .
battle scenes are worthless without tension , and since we have no idea what the setting is it 's impossible to care about anything that happens .
in essence , the entire segment works like a teaser for an arcade game , not a piece of filmmaking .
we meet the robinson family - a family of five that does not get along but has been chosen to act on earth 's behalf in effort to find another planet worthy of colonization due to the exhausting of our natural resources .
each member of the family has a special trait and personality , and yet none of them seem like actual people .
professor john robinson ( hurt ) is the intelligent , quiet leader who has devoted so much time to his work his family and marriage are suffering without his realizing it ( it 's obvious what role this aspect will play ) .
of course this is all established through extremely melodramatic scenes such as the children and parents arguing and bickering among themselves and with each other , while the necessary problems are " resolved " at the right moments .
the only thing worse than the screenplay is the fact it 's presented in a completely serious manner without a trace of satire , and is so pathetic it 's laughable
.
the first act is not a building of a story , but a juxtaposition of scenes that serve no purpose other than to plug in all the required elements ( such as plot , conflict , and characterization - god forbid ! ) .
we 're provided with the minimum amount possible of these elements to keep the film from being completely silent .
in fact , it might as well be since
the dialogue is virtually non - existent .
yes , the characters do speak , but they do not talk .
they say things that only relate to the conflict , but they never really interact ( unless it 's the cartoony flirting scenes between arrogant major don west ( leblanc ) and uptight , unemotional judy robinson ( graham ) ) .
it 's amazing that after an hour of trite dialogue and generic plot devices
that so little happens .
eventually the pacing rapidly increases , but the amount of genuine interest does not .
the story finally gains some prospective by living up to its title as the robinsons find themselves lost in space after narrowly managing to defeat dr .
smith ( oldman )
, the cartoony villain , and his plans for sabotage .
what ensues is a series upon series of completely unrelated conflicts .
the first such scene takes place on an abandoned spaceship and what ensues could best be described as " alien " -lite .
the story changes again when the robinsons crash land on an alien planet and must act quickly to escape it and survive .
but there 's never any real notion of suspense here because the script
constantly wanders aimlessly .
plotlines are developed , but each becomes totally irrelevant as the story changes from scenario to scenario .
the atmosphere attempts to be surreal by incorporating time travel and various time paradoxes , but it 's presented in such a ridiculous way it 's utterly boring
.
by the time the last act rolls around , there is no sense of a payoff building .
the ending does not go out on a high note with any kind of climax , instead , it seems to come to a sudden halt ( but at least it ends at all ) .
" lost in space " is major film production at its worst .
it 's frightening that a film so poorly written , directed , and acted might be considered mainstream entertainment .

SOLUTION:
N