Caro the Movie Critic

Charlize Theron doing some shootin' in the Old West. I have seen many various westerns that persuade to discover the brilliance or struggle filmmakers, producers or writers they had to go through to make the poetic and perfect western. We do not get as many westerns today because all directors back off or do not have the courage to make a very good western. It is very hard to make a memorable western, because if it is badly made, then, the director will ask himself, "Why did I make the movie from the beginning?" I think Seth McFarlane's talent is too good for this broad material to comically spoof this genre. The movie opens in Arizona, 1882, where the narrator says to the audience that only the bravest survive the unsafest time in the American west, otherwise, they are described as "weak human beings", to put it nicely. Albert Stark (Seth McFarlane) is a subdued sheep farmer who is afraid of owing debt to a gunfighter with a standoff. He tries to impr...

Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), Magneto (Michael Fassbender) and Professor X (James McAvoy). Besides the Spider-Man and Batman franchise, this is an on-going series that never ceases to take the movie franchise up a level. However, ever since The Avengers , producers and filmmakers aspire to craft the same movie with the most amount of superheroes and mutants to ever be put on screen. But, the test is to craft a great story or plot to attract the audience's attention. X-Men: Days of Future Past  successfully does that. The movie opens in the year 2023 where it shows a desolate New York City in rubble and a myriad of dead bodies scattered throughout the city. The movie follows an attack in Moscow where the mutants are fighting the Sentinels, a massive killing machine that consumes all of the mutants' powers to defeat every mutant in their way. After the attack, an X-jet carrying Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart), Storm (Halle Berry), Logan/Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) and...

Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore at dinner entertained by Terry Crews? Adam Sandler. I cannot believe I am going to start writing my review about his journey. He started out a promising and likable comic that maneuvered his path to stardom by appearing in sitcoms, for example, The Cosby Show . (Yes, the Cosby Show.) He also starred in Saturday Night Live. After his departure from SNL, he co-starred in a film called Airheads and made a name for himself in Billy Madison and Happy Gilmore . After watching the commercials and previews for the film, I was hoping to see a decent Sandler film because he has a good and charming chemistry with Drew Barrymore. This is one of Sandler's best films of the decade, but that does not say much because it is still a very bad movie. Lauren Reynolds (Drew Barrymore) and Jim Friedman (Adam Sandler) are on a blind date at a Hooter's restaurant and the date is not going too well. Jim pays much more attention to the waitress and the television th...

Every now and then, people sometimes ask me "what characterizes a great performance". A great performance is something that goes beyond the limit and complex and original. Some performances can trigger your emotions. Some performances can leave you mystified. Some performances can get you scared. Finally, a great performance can also define an actor's and actress' work as something to be remembered in the history of cinema. Does that mean when an actor or an actress win an Oscar, that considers that the person had the best performance in the category or in history? True, the winners will be recorded in writing. But, everybody is opinionated. Here are the performances that I considered the best: 25. Heath Ledger as The Joker in "The Dark Knight" (2008) 24. Robert Duvall as Lt. Col. William "Bill" Kilgore in "Apocalypse Now" (1979) 23. Peter Sellers as "Dr. Strangelove" in "Dr. Strangelove" (1963) 22. Al...

Godzilla is back! I have to honestly confess that I am not a huge fan of the Godzilla  movies or TV shows. I felt that they were a bit overwrought and cheesy, but most of all, they were not scary. I do understand that the monster is iconic and many people are and will still be familiar of its name. The audience wants to be awe-struck by the monster's size and tenacity to destroy buildings and rival monsters and also by its ferocious roar. At the very least, this movie is a big improvement over the awful and stupid 1998 Hollywood version. In the Philippines in 1999, a Japanese researcher and scientist, Dr. Serizawa (Ken Watanabe) and his British assistant, Vivienne Graham (Sally Hawkins), land onto the mining site to be informed that the miners found something in the cave. They find a skeletonized carcass of the creature and fills the cave as far as it can go. Meanwhile, in Japan, Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) is a scientist and engineer that works in a nuclear power plant and ...

Here's an announcement regarding my movie blog that I think will excite many people (I hope.)

Greg Kinnear communicating with his son. Does one person truly believe that a person going "under the knife" or being dead for about 30 seconds has experienced Heaven? I cannot answer or anybody cannot answer except that person because the victim is the only human being that experienced the afterlife. You only live once. We cannot say to ourselves or to any other loved ones that he or she or I want to see what Heaven (or Hell, if it exists) is like. The experience is a rare disclosure. I will get to what I truly believe in later in the review. However, this movie was at times, self-indulgent and a tad over-melodramatic in this subject, but, in the end, I was surprised how good the movie presents the story. The story sets in Imperial, Nebraska where Todd Burpo (Greg Kinnear) is a repairman, a high school wrestling coach, a volunteer firefighter and a pastor of his local church. He is a dedicated man, however, I cannot figure out how wrestling and being a pastor can fit i...

Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne letting Zac Efron to "keep it down".  Neighbors. It is a rarity to have a perfect suburban neighborhood because it is common to have a noisy family or a noisy person among the innocent bystanders of any particular neighborhood. But, what about tackling the premise of having a fraternity next door to you? I mean, why not? It is a pretty good concept to tackle with if you have the right people. Therefore, I was pretty much anticipating this movie because of the comic talent that is inserted onto this project. Neighbors is not a laugh-out-loud riot, but it is a solid comedy. The movie begins with new parents Mac (Seth Rogen) and Kelly (Rose Byrne) trying to be "spontaneous" by having sex after about six months while their 6-month-old baby girl, Stella, cannot stop watching them. They declare themselves that they are not old by having a baby and owning a house. The parents are bored and want to get out of the house and have some fun when ...

Scarlett Johansson as a seductive woman or...is she a woman in this movie? Looks can be deceiving, right? Have you had a moment when a beautiful stranger seduces you with just a glance and/or a gesture? How do you know if it could be a trap? What will this seduction lead to? There's many conclusions to these questions, but only oneself can reveal your fate. Science fiction is a particularly interesting genre to pick regarding a woman luring men to have sex with her. What was so interesting about this picture is that Scarlett Johannson is the only recognizable actress in the movie and the men are just innocent bystanders. It is one hell of a scary sci-fi flick. The movie begins with a man riding a motorcycle through a tunnel and comes up to a lake and walks inside the lake. When he comes out, he is holding a young woman's body and is brought to a nude female alien (Scarlett Johannson). She observes the deceased woman's form and retrieves her clothing and goes into a Ma...

Leslie Mann, Cameron Diaz, and Kate Upton. Wow, haven't we all seen this on television or on film or even on the Internet a million times when news is brought out that someone is cheating on another person? It is funny to look at the affair from the outside, but if you are involved in the affair, well...it's most likely anybody will see you on the show Cheaters . Anyway...what would anybody do if someone had cheated on you? I guess, according to three main women in the movie, take him down. The formula has been played many times, but, as a result, it is surprisingly not a total disaster. Carly Whitten (Cameron Diaz) is engaged in a relationship with Mark King (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and Carly is happy with her love life and she tells her secretary (Nicki Minaj) that she has not been with another man in "like...forever". As Mark fabricates an excuse to leave town for a few days, he explains to her that there are plumbing issues in his house. The argument gets a b...

Darth Vader. May the 4th be with you as Star Wars fan celebrate this day and I said to myself: "Why the heck not? Let me post my favorite to least favorite Star Wars movies." So here is the order: The Empire Strikes Back (1980), PG, 4 stars This movie is The Dark Knight of the original series with a lot of riveting action sequences starting with the Battle of Hoth on the snowy planet with all those walkers firing at the good guys. It elevates the tension between all of the characters, especially between Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker in their infamous and climactic lightsaber duel and the commencement of Han Solo's and Leia's romantic relationship while hiding from Vader. This is a classic sci-fi action film. Luke and Han Solo rescuing Princess Leia. A New Hope (1977), PG, 4 stars A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away... I wished I could have been born and watch this film for the very first time in a movie theatre. I bet it was packed and an exc...