Problem: Write a positive (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive) movie review.

Answer: The film is not visually stunning in the conventional sense. It doesn't present a series of pretty pictures. Instead it is a visually interesting film. It forces the viewer to constantly process or perhaps imagine the context of the various shots. This sort of thing is easy to try but hard to succeed at. The film refuses to use the crutch of a genre to help the less than fully engaged viewer get what's going on. Instead the film touches on and moves through a number of different genres. The trick to loving the film is being able to enjoy this playfulness. I suspect 99% of North American viewers will just not get it. If you try to pin down the narrative of this film, or the philosophical message, or the symbolist structure, etc. you will waste your time. There are none of these. The film only feints towards these genres and others at times. The only unifying force in the film is Claire Denis's own sense of what fits together. There are so few feature length films that come close to satisfying Kant's description of what art is, namely the enjoyment of the power of judgment itself instead of simply subsuming experiences under concepts. Film usually takes the easy way out and opts for the simpler pleasure of understanding what's happening. Most film is not art. Most film doesn't come close to art. When a film does, as this one does, and is still enjoyable by a large range of viewers, it's something of a miracle. My on negative comment is that at times I find the film too simplistically buying in to the various narrative threads that run through it. The Tahiti father-son narrative, even though it's not exactly conventional, ends up making things a little to clear and simple. It dominates too much.
Problem: OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive negative
=++++=
Answer: A trio of low-life criminals, led by Matt Dillon, botches a late-night burglary. They flee but quickly cross paths with the police who just happen to be in hot pursuit of a terrorist. Of course the police mistake the burglar gang for the terrorist, the real terrorist gets away, and the burglars are forced to take refuge in a small dive of a bar, taking hostages, unaware why the police are so intent on catching them. And guess who else has picked the bar as a sanctuary for the night?

Unbelievable? Absolutely. And it goes down hill from there. Spacey did acquire a good bit of acting talent; Matt Dillon, Faye Dunaway, Gary Sinise, Viggo Mortensen, and M. Emmett Walsh, but they're all wasted. Mostly because after all the characters get stuck in the bar, all they do for the remainder of the film is argue. Endlessly and aimlessly. Long before the conclusion of the film you've stopped giving a damn about what happens to them.
An example of a movie review. positive (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive).

A: The obvious parallels between Walt Disney's charming fantasy Bedknobs and Broomsticks and C.S. Lewis Chronicles of Narnia are pretty apparent. There are more coincidences here than comparing Bedknobs and Broomsticks than with Mary Poppins even though a lot of the same creative talent went into the two Disney films.

Like The Chronicles of Narnia it involves some English children leaving London during the blitz and coming to live in the country. And those kids have to deal with a world of magic. But unlike C.S. Lewis the Rawlins kids have the magic invade their world and help defeat the people making a mess of it in the here and now. No retreating to a fantasy kingdom like the Pevensie kids.

No heavy duty philosophy here from Walt Disney except maybe it's not a good thing to mess with witches even apprentice ones like Angela Lansbury who learn their magic from a charlatan like David Tomlinson. Ms. Lansbury didn't get to be one of the most bankable of performers for nothing. She carries her own brand of magic that even the special effects boys at Disney couldn't top. And they won an Oscar for the Magic Kingdom in that department for this film.

Two performers made their farewell to films in Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Tessie O'Shea played her last role in this film, she graced many a film in the United Kingdom as one of their best loved music hall performers. And that grand character actor Reginald Owen as the retired general who leads the Old Home Guard in war and in song bids adieu to film audiences around the world.

The team of Robert B. Sherman and Richard M. Sherman who wrote the score for Mary Poppins wrote a good and serviceable one here. The Age Of Not Believing was nominated for an Oscar, but lost to the Theme from Shaft. Personally though I do like David Tomlinson's tribute to that most colorful of London streets, Portabello Road.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks is a fine fantasy film that still holds up well after almost 40 years. Imagine what it would be like with computer generated graphics.
Problem: Write a positive (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive) movie review.

Answer:
I liked nearly all the movies in the Dirty Harry series with the exception of the one I think is titled "Enforcer". "Deadpool" was a bit weak in areas too, but I still enjoyed it. This one is one of my favorites of the series, if nothing else for the great line of "Go ahead, make my day". This one also features an interesting albeit familiar plot of someone killing those that have done her wrong. Just think "Magnum Force" with less mystery about who is behind the killings and you have your plot. Granted there is a bit more than that as this one does feature a very nice final showdown at an amusement park. It also features Dirty Harry getting a bulldog as a gift and it tripping up Sandra Locke in a rather humorous scene. The only question that remains is why Clint Eastwood had to have the rather mediocre actress Sandra Locke in so many of his movies. She brings the score down a point every time even when overall the movie is enjoyable to me. Granted she is not to bad here, but her character could have been so much better by someone else. Another problem with this movie and other Dirty Harry movies, at times they almost seem to be advertisements for guns. I like guns as much as the next person, but do we really need scenes of him explaining all the different strengths of his newest weapon and how many bullets it holds? Still, very nice entry into the Dirty Harry series of movies.