Problem: negative
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Answer: This has got to be the most stupid film I have ever seen (spoilers ahead)! First of all, the plot is stupid. The little kid is weird and they move to a hotel because his father is the caretaker of it. We find that the kid has a gift, the "Shining". This gift never ever has anything to do with anything except to make the kid seem cool. Then the movie gets more boring and boring until the man finally goes crazy. He goes on a rampage to kill the kid and his wife because... well, he feels like it. Why else would he do it? All of a sudden we see a naked woman in the tub. The man kisses her and realizes he is kissing a dead corpse, which is utterly disgusting. Somehow a black man enters the hotel and is whacked with an axe. Then the kid and the woman take the black man's vehicle and leave the father, who dies within minutes of hypothermia. Most movies aren't a complete waste of time, but this falls right into that category. The music is trashy, the characters are corny (except Jack Nicholson, who is a good actor), the plot is twisted and fits the description of vomit, the ending is very predictable, the storyline is slow, tedious, and boring. This movie is extremely overrated. AVOID THIS MOVIE AT ALL COSTS. I'm surprised it's gotten such a high rating on IMDb.

Problem: positive
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Answer: Catscratch is the best thing to come out of Nickeloden, including Wayne Knight. This show doesn't just appeal to Maoris and PI's. some people love it, and they're all aussies. At first glimpse I admit it seems a little crude, but it grows enormously on you. Also, to correct something that one of the other critics has said In_Correct (Tv.com) doesn't say "Does that mean you're homo now?" he says "Does that mean you're homo, owww?" This is his phrase in the show. Mr. Blik is, i think,the funniest of all like Peww-Weww's Playhouse

Firstly, I'll admit that the early episode were a bit good. But after a while the episodes became great! And just when the series had found it's surreal, whacky ...Nickelodeon cancels it!

I know Nick is meant for kids, but every once in a while a brilliant show appears that can be enjoyed by teenagers and adults. These shows include Mr. Bean the Animated Series, Charlie Brown, Pelswick, Rocko's Modern Life (at times), and Invader Zim. All of these must have been considered too good, with the exception of CatDog, 'cause Nick felt the need to cancel them.

What I like the famous final episode, where Gordon fight a duck.

I'd also like to see a DVD, with plenty of audio-commentaries and behind-the-scenes docos, and including the final episode.

But of course, what I'd definitely like to see is the show come back on the air. Wake up NICK!

I wish there was a list somewhere on the internet with all the gag closing-credits. That would be great.

Problem: positive
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Answer:
This was the second of two filmed "Hamlets" in the nineties, the first being Franco Zeffirelli's, starring Mel Gibson, from 1990. Zeffirelli's version, like Laurence Olivier's from 1948, was based upon an abridged version of the play, with much of Shakespeare's original text being cut. (I have never seen Tony Richardson's 1969 version, but as that ran to less than two hours, shorter even than Zeffirelli's, I presume that was also abridged). Kenneth Branagh was attempting something much more ambitious- a film based on the complete text of the play, with a running time of around four hours.

With his "Henry V", Branagh claimed Olivier's crown as the cinema's leading Shakespearean, confirming his claim with his brilliant "Much Ado about Nothing", a rare example of a great film based on a Shakespeare comedy. "Hamlet" was his third Shakespeare film as director (he also acted as Iago in Oliver Parker's 1995 "Othello") and, as one might expect, it is very different to "Much Ado.". The earlier film, shot in a villa in the hills of Tuscany and the beautiful surrounding countryside, is a joyous, summertime film about everything that makes life worth living.

"Hamlet", by contrast is set in the depths of winter. (The flowers in the description of Ophelia's death suggest that Shakespeare himself thought of the action happening in summer). The look of the film is particularly striking, both sumptuous and chilly. It was filmed at Blenheim Palace, possibly England's most grandiose stately home, but also a rather forbidding one. The snowy exterior scenes are cold and wintry; the interior ones formal and elaborate. The action is updated to the mid nineteenth century; the female characters wear the elaborate fashions of that era, while the principal male ones mostly wear splendid military uniforms. (There is a contrast here with Zeffirelli's film, where both the interiors and the costumes were deliberately subdued in tone). The play is dominated by images of corruption and decay; Branagh's intention may have been to contrast a splendid surface with the underlying "something rotten in the state of Denmark".

The film is notable for the large number of big-name actors, some of them in very minor roles. (Blink, and you might miss John Gieldgud or Judi Dench). Apparently, an all-star cast was required by the production company, who were nervous about a four-hour film. Some of the imported Hollywood stars, such as Robin Williams' Osric, did not really come off, but others, like Charlton Heston's Player King or Billy Crystal's First Gravedigger, played their parts very well. Yorick, normally only seen as a skull, is here seen in flashback, played by the British comedian Ken Dodd. Brian Blessed, who often plays jovial characters, is cast against type as the Ghost, and makes the scenes in which he appears genuinely frightening.

Of the major characters, perhaps the weakest was Kate Winslet's Ophelia. Branagh's leading lady in his first two Shakespeare films was his then wife Emma Thompson, but their marriage ended in divorce in 1995. I did, however, find myself wishing that Thompson had been cast in the role; although Winslet came into her own in the Ophelia's mad scenes, she seemed weak in the earlier ones where her character is still sane. (I preferred Helena Bonham Carter in Zeffirelli's version). Richard Briers plays Polonius with a greater dignity than he is often given, a wise and experienced counsellor rather than a prating old fool. Julie Christie also brings dignity to the role of Gertrude; there is no attempt here, as there was with Gibson and Glenn Close in the Zeffirelli version, to suggest an incestuous attachment between her and Hamlet. (An interpretation which owes more to Freud than it does to Shakespeare). The age difference between Christie and Branagh is great enough for them to be credible as mother and son, which was certainly not the case with Close and Gibson. (Olivier's Gertrude, Eileen Herlie, was, bizarrely, thirteen years younger than him).

Branagh stated that his intention in restoring those scenes which are often cut in cinematic versions was to "reinforce the idea that the play is about a national as well as domestic tragedy." Much stress is placed upon the war with Norway and the Norwegian Prince Fortinbras- a subplot ignored altogether by Zeffirelli. This emphasis on national tragedy is perhaps best shown in the character of Claudius, sometimes played as a one-dimensional villain. There is something about Derek Jacobi's performance which suggests that Claudius could have been a good man under different circumstances, but that he allowed himself to be led astray by ambition and lust. He could have been a good and loyal servant to his brother, but chose to rule as a bad king. Although he is tormented by guilt, he can see no way to make amends for the evil he has done.

Branagh, a wonderfully fluent speaker of Shakespeare's verse, is superb in the main role. Like Gibson, he has little time for the old concept of Hamlet as indecisive, passive and melancholy. His is an active, physical, energetic Hamlet, something best shown in his fatal duel with Laertes. His guiding principle is not world-weary despair, but an active disgust with evil and corruption.

It was a gamble for Branagh to make a four-hour epic, and the film did not do well at the box office. It was, however, praised by many critics, James Berardinelli being particularly enthusiastic. My own opinion is that, whatever the financial returns may have been, Branagh's gamble paid off in artistic terms. By concentrating on the full text, he was able to bring out the full meaning and full emotional power of Shakespeare's most complex play. When I reviewed his "Much Ado", I said it was the greatest ever film of a Shakespeare comedy. His "Hamlet" may just be the greatest ever film of a Shakespeare tragedy. 10/10