In this task, you must classify if a given review is positive/negative, indicating your answer as P or N.

[Q]: plot : a separated , glamorous , hollywood couple must pretend to reunite for a press junket of the last movie that they ever shot together .
kewl . . .
now
i only wish that i could pretend never to have seen this movie . . .
critique : trite , unfunny , boring and a waste of everyone 's talent .
how a premise with such zest and bite can turn into a movie that does n't feature any chemistry , any real laughs , any surprises or any spice is beyond me .
how julia roberts is used solely as a " puppy dog " character , puttering around in the background while we endure the complete bitchiness of zeta - jones ' character , who is not one bit funny or romantic
( two ideal ingredients in a " romantic comedy " ) , is also beyond me .
and why they chose john cusack , a great , quirky actor in his own right , to play
the most bland , uninteresting and unfetching character ( with zero chemistry with either of his leads ) is further more , beyond me .
and to anybody who decided that this project was " funny " enough to greenlight featuring the talents mentioned above , along with billy crystal , christopher walker , seth green and stanley tucci .
. .
well , what can i say .
. .
i just do n't have the words .
so is this the worst movie that i 've seen all year ?
no .
but it definitely sucks
and it 's basically because . . .
well , it 's just not funny .
and for the record , allow me to state a few more problems with it .
it starts off slow , it 's got no energy , it does n't engage you with any of its characters
( julia barely gets somewhat interesting in the film , everyone else . . .
lame ! ) , it utilizes way too many flashbacks to move the story forward , it 's utterly predictable , standard , routine , see - through and uninteresting as a plot and it just sits there on the screen , big and ugly , waiting . . .
waiting for you to laugh or find something in it that is amusing .
and then hank azaria shows up . . .
aaaaaah , the film 's savior ( mind you , some might be offended by his exaggeration of a stereotype , but that 's another story altogether ) .
but when an experienced " voice " actor upstages all of the main stars in a summer " blockbuster " romantic comedy with an over - the - top antonio banderas accent , damn dude . . .
your film 's in trouble ! ! rent this movie on video just to see what went wrong yourself .
the references to ricky ricardo and senor wences
( huh ! ? ) , the idio - plot points like when one of the characters goes on the roof to stretch his arms out and relax , but everyone believes that he 's going to kill himself ( hardy - har - har ) and the cheap way of getting the audience to leave the theater laughing by bringing back a ball - sniffing dog that has no place being in the location at the end of the movie , well .
. .
i could go on .
but i wo n't because i do still respect all of the actors in this film and actually did laugh at azaria , green and tucci 's antics from time to time ( ironic , eh .
. .
what about the leads , dammit ! )
and liked the premise behind the film ( before i saw the finished product , of course ) .
a dud all the way around .
btw , all the talk about this film was that julia roberts was to be in a fat suit for one scene
( her character is supposed to have lost 60 pounds ) , so when the scene finally came , i did get a little excited about what it might look like and then . . .
well , it basically just looked like julia roberts in a fat suit ! ugh .
i think i 'm gon na start drinking again after this lame - ass movie .
c'mon hollywood , enough with the crud !
where 's joblo coming from ?
beautiful ( 1/10 ) - my best friend 's wedding ( 7/10 ) - notting hill ( 5/10 ) - pretty woman ( 7/10 ) -runaway bride ( 5/10 ) - someone like you ( 4/10 ) - wedding planner ( 3/10 ) - when harry met sally ( 10/10 )
- you 've got mail ( 4/10 )
[A]: N

[Q]: andrew lloyd webber 's musicals , preferably his early work with lyricist tim rice , present a musical which is totally unlike any musical before its time .
webber and rice do not subscribe to the gaity of such musicals as " oklahoma ! , " or the slapstickness of shows like " a funny thing happened on the way to the forum .
"
they instead tackle hot issues from our past , and view them differently , and pack them together with redundant , catchy music , as well as thoughtful lyrics .
like " jesus christ superstar , " which examined the rise and fall of jesus in his last days from a fame perspective ( in the cool tune " superstar , " a dead judas comes back from the dead to ask jesus why he did n't spread his message wider ) , " evita " takes an inventive stance on its topic , this time being the famed wife of argentinian dictator , juan per ?
n ,
eva , who slept her way to the top and became famous chiefly because she got attention , much like the woman playing her : madonna ( although i think madonna did rise to the top for her musical talent , among other things ) .
" evita " deals with the rise and fall of eva per ?
n , a woman who captured the heart of the nation after marrying juan ( jonathan pryce ) , then died at the young age of 33 , creating an international stir of mourning not unlike that of princess di ( the two do share a bit in common , although it was n't like di slept to " the top " ) .
webber and rice sure chose bizarre topics for their musicals , but they always have a point for doing it .
here , they wish to expose her for what she is , but still show that despite all of her many drawbacks , her lying , and covering up for her fascist husband , but show that she was still a good woman with fairly good intentions , and her death was very sad .
it 's also a musical , with almost no words not unsung .
the film plays like a rock opera , much like their " jesus christ superstar , " with many giant musical sequences just like the old musicals , even if they do possess very intelligent lyrics , which create not only an intellectually enlightening experience , but also a very entertaining one . after all , this is a musical , and webber 's musicals never undermine this .
they are a balance of energy and intellectual depth , walking on a fine line between the both , and never stumbling on either side .
this is why the beginning of " evita " is kind of a let - down .
okay , it is a let - down .
i 'm not saying the opening moments are bad , because they 're pretty good .
but what comes after is a lifeless , un - entertaining , and totally unrewarding sequence where she cons a singer ( jimmy nail ) into taking eva to buenos aires after a one - night stand .
in the musical , it 's a fun , energetic sequence , culiminating in the show stopper , " buenos aires , " which is also lifeless .
then a punch is pulled as we see eva being screwed over by the singer , instead of her leaving him , where she ends up singing the sad tune , " another suitcase in another hall , " which was meant for a later character , screwed over by eva .
the portrayal of eva in the beginning is too soft , seeming like parker and oliver stone , who adapted it for the screen , are afraid to present her for what she is , even while it 's being narrated by a hater of eva 's , the omnipotent ( antonio banderas ) , who presents her in a negative light .
for a while , it looks like alan parker ca n't pull it off . however , the film pulls itself together in a flash , and after that song is over , and the giddily nihilistic song " goodbye and thank you , " where we see eva go through a long line of lovers who help her ascend , is magnificent , darkly comical , and just gleeful .
from this point on , the film is hypnotic , satisfying , and satirical .
no more punches are thrown , and the basic outline of the original musical are in tact .
we see eva woo and marry juan , get him out of jail , rise to stardom , falter a bit , come back , and then gradually die of cancer ( i think it was because of cancer ) .
more importantly , many of the themes from the musical carry on with this , as well as some filling - in - the - gaps reconnassaince work .
juan , who is pretty underwritten in the musical , is given some extra scenes , and exposed as what he was for eva : an accessory .
a muted scene where he tries to visit her respective room but is shunned allows us to learn more about juan , and understand his sadness more than we did before .
> from the " goodbye and thank you " number on
, the film shows eva trying to cover up for the horrible government by doing cheap and petty things which wooed a nation , and saved a government , even while it left the nation 's people downtrodden .
but despite this , the nation still loved eva , and when she slipped into death , the world mourned her because she was a star .
that 's when our narrator , ch ? , comes out to show that she was n't the great woman she really was , and expose her fame .
describing this character is difficult , mainly because he has no real realistic background ( he 's said to be based on the revolutionary ch ?
guevera , but the two probably could have never met , like they do in the film ) , but he serves as a perspective on eva , but even his perspective ca n't help us from feeling bad when eva dies a pathetic death .
alan parker , no stranger to bizarre musicals ( he 's done " fame , " " the committments , " " bugsy malone , " and " pink floyd the wall " - the latter which is absolutely brilliant ) , nails the film , exposing everything for what it is .
we cry for evita at the end because we feel we should , by the way it is presented .
his direction is manipulative for a reason : to show the mourning for what it is .
and there is energy throughout ,
with lots of bright colors , and scenes which are cinematically entertaning , as well as enriching and deep , such as the balcony scene where she sings " do n't cry for me , argentina , " and her death sequence , which is poignant becuase of how sad it is .
madonna 's golden globe winning performance is much like the movie : starts kinda downhill then goes up quickly , remaning there for the rest of the film .
at the beginning , she looks like she 's too busy concentrating on her singing to act , but she eventually gets it right , though never really getting the presence of , say , patti lupone ( who did the role in its american premiere back in the late 70s ) .
her death , though , is brilliant .
her singing could be better though .
i know she took lessons to improve her range and all , but it still sounds like she 's trying to hard .
she sounds way too soft in several places where she should be comanding ( like . . .
patti lupone - i heard her sing on an old " evita " cd , and you could just feel her stage presence without even seeing her ) .
but it 's generally very good , although not up to the brilliance the role really requires .
antonio banderas , who is almost like a guilty pleasure these days ( i 'm one of the few people who thinks he rocks ) , is
extremely comanding in his performance , presenting a lovable narrator .
his singing is very good , though nothing compared to the original , mandy patinkin .
he does have a pretty good singing voice , and a great range . and jonathan pryce is pretty awesome , although very brief at times , in his role as juan , seeming to put on a poker face for his melancholy facade .
although it gets off to a rocky start ( " rocky " 's polite for what it really is ) , it soon picks up and becomes a wonderully poignant musical .
like the other musical released in ' 96 ( woody allen 's
" everyone says i love you " ) , it 's a reminder that the hollywood musical may be dead , but it can come back every now
and then for a brief performance .
[A]: P

[Q]: i 'm an avid fan of the " alien " saga , so this review is obviously a tad biased ( at least i admitted it ) .
of course , that does n't mean that i 'm gon na be giving this a four - star review or something , because " alien : resurrection , " the fourth film in the cool - as - hell series is not an absolutely amazing film , much like the first two were . however ,
it 's a very good film which never fails to entertain , and consists of yet another mutation in the style of the series .
in short , i had a good time .
" alien : resurrection " leaves off 200 years after the last one , where our heroine protagonist , ellen ripley ( sigourney weaver ) , the science fiction genre 's answer to job , had killed herself after discovering that an alien was inside her body , waiting to pop out like it did to john hurt in the first one .
of course , the last one was n't very great or anything
( i liked it , though not as much as the first two ) , and more importantly , it was n't financially successful ( a tawdry 55 million bucks ! )
.
so back we are , with ripley back as a clone , which means we get another little satirical look at cloning ( not that that 's a bad thing , but it 's becoming a cliche ) .
so she 's cloned aboard an even more futuristic - looking ship called " the auriga " by some doctors ( including the necessary bad government guy , dr .
wren , played by j .
e . freeman , as well as the little - seen dr .
gediman , played by none other than brad douriff ) , mainly because they have a version of her with the alien still inside her .
once you get past the fact that you ca n't figure out where they got her blood ( although i think it might have been from the blood samples taken by charles dance in the third one ) ,
the film 's okay .
also on board are a band of mercenary pirates , including michael wincott , ron perlman , kim flowers , raymond cruz , dominique pinon ( a jeunet sytable ) and . . . winona ryder , who plays analee call , who turns out to have a bit of a secret
( i wo n't state it , but unless you 've been shacking up with salinger for the past two years , you probably know all about it - although it 's nicely covered up ) .
there 's a bit of a non - sexual - yet - slightly - homoerotic relationship between her and ripley , but it 's never really deepened enough .
oh well .
well , as you might have guessed , the alien and its spawn escape and run around the ship .
and it pretty much does away with most of the people on the ship ( including some shocks - dan hedaya , for instance , who 's death is comical yet sad since
, well , he 's dan hedaya ) , and the remaining people ( about 7 or 8 ) are left to try and escape and stop the aliens from doing any major harm since the ship is heading quickly towards earth .
of course , the plot is all balderdash , and just an excuse for some good old " alien " -brand fun .
the real focus of the series seems to be on style , not really substance ( although there 's always a bit of it , most notably in " aliens " with the relationship between ripley and the little girl ) .
what 's interesting about the series is that each film is stylistically different in its approach .
" alien " is a claustrophobic exercise in quiet frights .
" aliens " is a wild , tense thriller .
" alien 3 " is a bleak , moody piece of semi - noir .
" alien 4 " is kind of like an off - beat french film , filled with lots of humor , and cool scares .
jean - pierre jeunet ( without his usual directing partner , marc caro ) creates a ship filled with the kind of scares films like " das boot " has , with echoes hinting at a possible threat .
the chills in the film are really cool , especially with the music , which is sometimes turned down completely for certain scenes ( there 's the most tense surgery scene since " face / off " towards the beginning ) .
and not every chill turns into a bloody mess or anything like that .
this all combined with some good old humor makes this as interesting visually and stylistically as the others .
there are even a couple scenes which just stick out afterwards as being brilliantly executed .
one is the aforementioned surgery scene .
another one takes place between call and ripley , which is just awesome .
the underwater chase scene and the ladder scene afterwards is one of the most tense , thrilling , and jaw - dropping scenes in the entire saga ( with a small allusion to jeunet 's earlier film , " delicatessen " ) .
and the way they do in the final alien is hysterically cool ( with a lovely allusion to " goldfinger " ) .
but the best scene in the entire film ( i 'm sure i 'm not the first to mention it ) takes place when ripley sees all the variations on her as they cloned her
( she has a an " 8 " tatooed on her arm ) .
it might be the most emotionally stimulating scene in the entire saga .
the screenplay by joss whedon is not a great piece of work , as it never really deapens a lot of the characters .
however , it does make us care about most of them , so that when there 's very little of them , and it looks like one or more of them may become alien chow
, we are pretty scared .
and , yeah , there are some very funny lines ( ripley :
" who do i have to fuck to get off this boat ? !
" johner : " well , i can get you off .
but not this ship .
" ) the acting is good all around , with stand - out performances from ron perlman as the male chauvenist pig johner , and leland orser ( the poor bastad in " se7en " who performed the " lust " sin ) as an anxiety - ridden wannabe woody allen who has an alien inside him .
winona ryder is good , but not amazing like she usually is ( although she meshes well with the film ) .
of course , and as usual , sigourney weaver steals the show .
playing a variation on the ripley character ( less emotional , and more rude and bitter ) , she pulls it off while still being utterly lovable .
she 's not going to get an oscar nomination
like she did for " aliens ,
" but she 's just awesome .
overall , it 's a thrilling , entertaining film which does n't really amaze like the first two , but is much more amazing than the third installment .
the style is the best part of the film , which is n't really a bad thing , but it being the best part takes away from a lot of the depth the film occasionally tries to apply .
but it 's entertaining as hell ,
and it 's definitely fit for the " alien " series .
[A]:
P