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

Answer: This is something new.

There's a coup d'etat and a couple of irish documentary filmmakers are right inside of it.

A democratically elected president who uses his power to bring literacy to his people and encourages them to read the constitution is being slandered by the private media openly as dictator, mentally unstable, new hitler, etc. without repercussion from the governments side (like, say, silencing them via bullets and other traditional dictatorial methods). Oh, and they still claim that they are being suppressed, of course.

See how the media gloats about their own role in the coup d'etat on TV after they toppled the government with the help of rouge generals (how much more stupid can you get?? ).

And see how the people of Venezuela march to the palace, holding the constitution in their hands, and reinstall their elected government.

This sounds like a Hollywood fairytale, but it happened for real, against the explicit wishes of the USA. The documentary is a historical masterpiece, shot from the center of the action, acute and totally embarrassing for the prime supporters of the coup: The good, democratic, freedom loving, benevolent USA (who still channel large amounts of money to Chavez' political opponents).

Also highly entertaining and exciting. 10 points.

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

Answer: For anyone who may not know what a one-actor movie was like, this is the best example. This plot is ridiculous, and really makes no sense. It's full of cliched situations, hackneyed lines, melodrama, comedy... you name it!

But Amitabh Bachchan can make anything convincing, and this movie is by no means an exception. Everyone turns in a decent performance - Shashi Kapoor, Waheeda Rehman, Ranjit, Om Prakash, Smita Patil... But it is the Megastar who overshadows everyone with his towering presence. Without him, this movie would have been a non-starter... The story is about separation / mistaken identities / misunderstandings / love / hate / loyalty / good vs evil - everything, really! Amitabh's is a brilliant performance on all counts, in an otherwise silly film! And did I mention that it is ridiculously funny?

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

Answer: 'Shock Corridor (1963)' was my first film from Samuel Fuller, and there I was impressed with the director's astute blending of B-movie and big-budget aesthetics, even if the story itself was pure schlock. 'Pickup on South Street (1953)' was released a decade earlier in Fuller's career, obviously produced on a larger budget from a big-name studio, Twentieth Century-Fox. Nevertheless, the visuals are still notable in that there's a somewhat raw, naturalistic element to the photography, not unlike Dassin's 'The Night and the City (1950)' and Kazan's 'Panic in the Streets (1950)' {the latter was also shot by cinematographer Joe McDonald}. In some scenes, Fuller shoves the camera so close to his actors' faces that they're out of focus, bluntly registering the intimate thoughts, emotions and brief inflections that are communicated through that most revealing of facial features, the eye. Though (unexpectedly) prone to melodrama, and with just a hint of anti-Communist propaganda, 'Pickup on South Street' is a strong film noir that succeeds most outstandingly in its evocation of setting the underground of New York City.

When just-out-of-prison pickpocket Skip McCoy (Richard Widmark) snags the purse of a woman on the subway (Jean Peters), he pockets more than he'd originally bargained for. The woman, Candy, and her cowardly ex-boyfriend Joey (Richard Kiley) had been smuggling top-secret information to the Communists, and McKoy has unexpectedly retrieved an important roll of micro-film. Will he turn in the MacGuffin to the proper authorities, or sell it to the highest bidder? If 'Pickup on South Street' has a flaw, it's that the story seems designed solely to bolster an anti-Communist agenda, reeking of propaganda like nothing since WWII {Dwight Taylor, who supplied the story, also notably wrote 'The Thin Man Goes Home (1944),' the only propagandistic movie of the series}. For no apparent reason, every identifiable character even the smugly self-serving Skip McCoy eventually becomes a self-sacrificing patriot, the transformation predictable from the outset. In traditional film noir, the unapologetic criminal always gets his comeuppance, the rational punishment for his sins, but apparently not when they've served their country; patriotism wipes the slate clean.

Richard Widmark, an actor who I'm really beginning to like, plays the haughty pickpocket with composure, though always with that hint of ill-ease that suggests he's biting off more than he can chew. The opening scene on the train is the film's finest, as McCoy breathlessly and silently fishes around in his victim's hand bag, recalling Bresson's 'Pickpocket (1959).' Thelma Ritter is terrific as a tired street-woman who'll peddle information to anybody willing to pay for it (though, of course, she draws the line at Commies). Jean Peters is well-cast as the trashy dame passing information to the other side, playing the role almost completely devoid of glamour; Fuller reportedly cast the actress on the observation that she had the slightly bow-legged strut of a prostitute. Nevertheless, Peters must suffer a contrived love affair with Widmark that really brings down the film's attempts at realism. Fascinatingly, upon its release, 'Pickup on South Street' was promptly condemned as Communist propaganda by the FBI, and the Communist Party condemned it for being the exact opposite. Go figure.

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

Answer:
It's pretty bad when the generic movie synopsis has more information than the film itself. The paragraph-long "plot summary" written on the movie page has details I could not glean from watching the actual movie. I found myself constantly backing it up to see what details I had just missed which could tell me what the (bleep) was going on. Alas, to no avail--this movie leaves out monstrous pieces of the story, if you could call it a story. It's like they were trying to fool us into thinking that there was some kind of movie here, filming just enough so that there was the resemblance of a story and leaving the rest to our imaginations. Newsflash to the the creators: I paid to watch you MAKE a movie. I can sit home and imagine plots and story lines for free. And Rosario Dawson? This is somebody I've never paid enough attention to to be able to put the name to the face, and I can see why. She had one of the most artificial performances I have ever seen for a leading character in any movie, A or B. I figured okay, maybe she didn't really want the role, just got a hefty offer for a movie she wasn't into? Wrong. She was listed as one of the producers. Next time you produce something, don't book yourself as the lead if you can't act. If you really can, then create a decent character for you to become. Also, somebody here mentioned the white/latino issue--yes, I hate to say it, but this movie does come across as an act of vengeance against white college-age males who wear baseball hats. That's what happens when there is nothing in the movie to endear the watcher to latino characters. The Adrian character seems like a cocky jerk who is no better than the story's antagonist. As for the Maya character, she didn't seem like a real person. Anyway I'm ashamed for Hollywood that this movie was even made.