An example of a movie review. positive.

A: Laurence Olivier, Merle Oberon, Ralph Richardson, and Binnie Barnes star in "The Divorce of Lady X," a 1938 comedy based on a play. Olivier plays a young barrister, Everard Logan who allows Oberon to spend the night in his hotel room, when the London fog is too dense for guests at a costume ball to go home. The next day, a friend of his, Lord Mere (Richardson), announces that his wife (Barnes) spent the night with another man at the same hotel, and he wants to divorce her. Believing the woman to be Oberon, Olivier panics. Oberon, who is single and the granddaughter of a judge, pretends that she's the lady in question, Lady Mere, when she's really Leslie Steele.

We've seen this plot or variations thereof dozens of time. With this cast, it's delightful. I mean, Richardson and Olivier? Olivier and Oberon, that great team in Wuthering Heights? Pretty special. Olivier is devastatingly handsome and does a great job with the comedy as he portrays the uptight, nervous barrister. Oberon gives her role the right light touch. She looks extremely young here, fuller in the face, with Jean Harlow eyebrows and a very different hairdo for her. She wears some beautiful street clothes, though her first gown looks like a birthday cake, and in one gown she tries on, with that hair-do, she's ready to play Snow White. Binnie Barnes is delightful as the real Lady Mere.

The color in this is a mess, and as others have mentioned, it could really use a restoration. Definitely worth seeing.

An example of a movie review. negative.

A: I got lured by the title... I was expecting an insightful and intriguing journey into alcoholism, instead I got a rather boring and uninspiring story about a rowdy Scot.

The leading character isn't given much psychological depth, unless you are willing to classify cheesy teen-like poetry as psychology.

It was a shame, because the core of the story could have been good, with a better effort to depict the inner feelings of a man who had to live with alcohol and violence since his youth.

Sadly, the general idea seems to be more like "I'm the way I am because that's the way I am". And the laughingly bad attempt at giving some sort of poetic edge to a lower-class man makes things even worse. Resorting to the overused cliche of the "poete maudit" reeks of a quick fix, a cheap way to make a dull movie seem smart, artsy and meaningful.

But "16 years of alcohol" isn't much smart, artsy or meaningful... The leading character doesn't evolve at all, and the feeble attempt of changing fails without a good explanation. Just like the initial attempt happened rather out of the blue.

The movie borrows heavily from classics such as A Clockwork Orange and Trainspotting, but it ultimately fails to recapture their greatness, not even for a few seconds.

Jobson put too much emphasis on the artistic side of the story, and neglected the rest, giving us a movie which is pleasant to the eye but insipid to the brain.

An example of a movie review. positive.

A:
I watched this on an 8 hour flight and (presumably because of the pressure and the altitude) I actually found it mildly entertaining (emphasis on the "mild").

The actual idea behind the film was brilliant: a woman dies, her fiance falls in love with someone else, she decided to make sure they don't get together, but eventually she lets them do it. Sadly the actual film wasn't as good. OK, there were a few laughs and the actors all worked well. But from the beginning the plot was about as predictable as the destination of the flight I was on. I think the whole gay-but-not-gay friend part of the story could have been worked a lot better. The talking parrot was a nice idea but to be honest: it wasn't really very funny.

In summary the film was more interesting than staring at the seat in front of me, but it was a close call.