An example of a movie review. negative (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive).

A: I'll be honest- the reason I rented this movie was because I am a huge fan of Kyle Chandler's (most notably from Early Edition). Since he usually plays the good guy, I wanted to see him as in a different role (out of curiosity). The plot itself also drew me in; a wanna-be hitman (Tony Greco- a.k.a. Mr. Chandler) must kill a person at random before he is trusted with the life- or, rather, the death- of a witness who will testify against someone in "the family". The movies was nothing like I expected. It was sick, I hated the end (if you saw it, you'd know why), and there were so many unnecessary parts. Basically- it was filthy, and made little sense. Yes, it was a mob movie, and yes the guns do go BOOM. But there's more to a movie than that. This film acted as if it didn't have the time to go into detail- just deal with it and understand it. The acting really made up for it- James Belushi was pretty amusing as "The Rose". Sheryl Lee made Angel seem as believable as she could get. She surprised me the most. And Kyle Chandler was equally convincing as an anxious newcomer to "the family". If only the script did justice to the actors.

An example of a movie review. negative (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive).

A: I didn't really know what this movie was about when I went to the theater to see it (hype about the Satanism etc etc etc) as the trailers in the last movie I saw looked pretty interesting.

Oh dear, Roman Catholic mythology? Not my idea of a good scare and honestly, I just felt like watching a really good, scary movie, not some loosely plotted religious farce that tries to score cheap thrills by having some chick getting bloody every few minutes!

I'll try to keep away from the spoilers (!) but I found it very odd that an Atheist, who gets a string of rosary beads from a deceased priest, could suddenly end up with Christ's wounds (aren't stigmata supposed to be deeply religious??) I mean, she hangs out with losers, does loser stuff, behaves like a typical rebel et al, and here she is displaying the wounds of Jesus Christ?? Come on!

Scenes of her crucified, head thrown back, screaming, blood everywhere, became rather tedious after seeing it a dozen times. It was neither frightening or scary, just repulsive. It did, however, become quite painful to watch - those flicking scenes were highly annoying...

CONCLUSION: If your a Catholic, defintly don't see this. If you're not, still don't see it.

An example of a movie review. negative (OPTIONS:
- negative
- positive).

A:
I am a huge, huge fan of John Cusack, Samuel L. Jackson, and Tony Shalhoub. I'm slightly less fond of Stephen King, but I like some of his work.

This said, I should have LOVED 1408.

***POSSIBLE SPOILERS AFTER THIS POINT****

I walked in eager. I walked out disappointed.

This is not the fault of the actors. Shalhoub and Jackson both have very small roles because the premise of the movie puts Cusack in the "guy in a locked room" scenario.

This wasn't a BAD movie, but I can't call it a good one either. It was a muddied mess that had moments of "ouch, that's just WRONG," combined with moments of "ouch, that's just painful," and moments of "oh, now THAT'S just unfortunate" with very little continuity-connectivity between them. Eislin's father shows up once, and there's no seeming connection to the rest of Mike's personal life that we see displayed while he tries to survive the room.

A previous commenter described the Olin/Enslin argument as worth watching, and I very much agree. But other than that, aside from some clever musical cues (the room almost playfully torments Enslin a little bit, and gives him one chance to get out before upping the ante...at which point it gives him the one-hour countdown clock and the titular line from the Carpenters "We've Only Just Begun.") it's mostly "stuff jumps out at you when you least expect it!" type horror that was fun when I was fourteen, and surrounded by friends my age, clutching each other in the summer while Jason stalked Camp Crystal Lake.

The rest of the movie was "let's make him relive some of his most painful experiences" mindgaming, with "let's animate the paintings in creepy ways" cliche cheesiness.

******END SPOILERS*****

I expected better from this movie with Stephen King's name attached to it, as well as the actors I mentioned above.

We never find out the origin of the evil. We never get to see the evil defeated, though we can presume maybe it was defeated.

And the ending was just a jarring "What?!" moment.

Wait for it to come on cable. I wouldn't have minded paying for it as a matinee, but I'm feeling a bit shortchanged for having paid opening night prices for it.