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

Answer: The film portrays France's unresolved problems with its colonial legacy in Western (Francophone) Africa through the befuddled and complex psychoanalytical prism of a young woman, France (herein symbolically representing her nation). It is an often engaging and challenging portrait of a young woman's desire to come to terms with a traumatic moment in her past, in particular, and a nation's desire to reach out to the 'other' it once 'owned' and moulded. This is reflected in the way in which it centres entirely around the notion of travelling (or being in transit) from the present to the past; remembered realities to undeniable contemporary political and economic actualities.

The characters all play a symbolic, albeit a limited and unconvincing role. France, meant to be a visual as well as a totemic representation of contemporary French society, leaves one indifferent to her plight as she seems still to be imbued with the same naivete she enjoyed as a child-in fact as a child she seems more in possession of her reality. The rest of the rag-tag ensemble is just forgettable. The black Africans are, to say the least, offencive impressionistic portraits of former colonised peoples now colonised by the director's poor handling of her material. They are no more than a dark and moribund backdrop against which the blythe-like France wonders seeking a world she never knew, and hoping for one that can never be found in Cameroon.

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

Answer: This film aka "the four hundred blows" is a mistranslation.Faire les 400 coups" means"to live a wild life. As a French,I'm stunned when I see the popularity of this good ,but by no means outstanding film. 1.It's not the first film of the "nouvelle vague" move;check Agnes Varda's "la pointe courte",(1956)Alain Resnais's "Hiroshima mon amour"(1958),Claude Chabrol's "le beau serge"(1958) are anterior .Historically,"les 400 coups " comes after. 2.The "nouvelle vague" was sometimes ponderous and hard on their predecessors:Overnight,Julien Duvivier,Henri-George Clouzot,Claude Autant-Lara ,Yves allegret and a lot of others were doomed to oblivion.THis selfishness and this contempt is typically "nouvelle vague".You 've never heard (or read) the great generation of the thirties (Renoir,Carne,Gremillon,Duvivier already,Feyder) laugh at ,say,Maurice Tourneur or Max Linder.So,thanks to Truffaut and co,some people will never discover some gems of the French fifties or forties(Duvuvier's "sous le ciel de Paris",Autant-Lara's "douce",Yves Allegret's "une si jolie petite plage " and "maneges").THe novelle vague clique went as far as saying that William Wyler,Georges Stevens and Fred Zinemann were worthless! 3."Les 400 coups " is technically rather disappointing:it's very academic ,the story is as linear as it can be,the teachers are caricatures,and the mother Claire Maurier delivers such memorable lines as (you've got to be a French circa 1960 to understand how ridiculous it is): Well ,your father 's got only his brevet (junior school diploma)and,as for me ,I've got only my high school diploma!You've got to know,that circa 1960,hardly 10%of the pupils had the HSD in France! Antoine Doinel should have been proud of his mother after all!She wants him to have diplomas,who can blame her? 4.Compared to the innovations of "Hiroshima mon amour",which features a brand new form,and a new "fragmented " content,"les 400 coups " pales into significance.Truffaut will master a new form only with the highly superior "Jules and Jim", helped by the incomparable Jeanne Moreau. 5.The interpretation is rather stiff;Jean-Pierre Leaud ,arguably listenable when dubbed in English ,is still decent,but he will soon degenerate into the most affected of his generation. 6.The topic=stolen childhood had better days,before (Julien Duvivier's "Poil de carotte" ,Luis Bunuel's "los olvidados") and will have after (Maurice Pialat's "l'enfance nue",Kenneth Loach's "Kes") I do not want to demean Truffaut,his movie is not bad,but,frankly,French movie buffs,prefer "Jules and Jim" "l'enfant sauvage" (a film honest ,true and commercially uncompromizing to a fault)"l'argent de poche"(as academic as "400 coups" but much more funny)or his nice Hitchcock pastiche "vivement dimanche".

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

Answer: The Legend of Zu, as I saw it, was a very interesting story. I think many of the people who didn't like it were not seeing the underlying mythology behind the film. They were expecting something akin to Star Wars, and it was not that. Joseph Campbell, I believe, would have liked this film. There were a number of metaphors and hidden meanings that an average viewer might have overlooked. We all have a mountain of swords within us. We all have to go into our own cave of blood sometime in our lives. We all have to face our own insomnia someday. Granted some of the narration was a bit confusing, and some of the action got a little hokey at times, but I think other points of the film easily made up for it. I'd watch it again.

I don't know if there's a difference between The Legend of Zu (which I saw in Mandarin with English subtitles) and Zu Warriors (The dubbed USA version.) It might have been dumbed down for American audiences, which really would have detracted from this film.

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

Answer:
Jude Law gives his all in this beautifully filmed vampire flick which offers little else of value. Completely lacking in eroticism, excitement, or leading ladies with appeal. One decent fight, a few moments of mild suspense. And a one-note plot.

The movie waxes philisophic in a series of conversations between Law's character and a dogged homicide detective, well played by Timothy Spall. But despite their best efforts, both actors are staked to the cross of the film's banality.

With a lesser actor in the lead role -- and without the benefit of Oliver Curtis's cinematography -- Crocodiles would blend into the sea of low-budget vampire quickies.