Caro the Movie Critic

Don't you wish on things to go well for you? You can have two different arguments on whether or not if the grant will work for you. One could be that you receive glad tidings and great gifts but the opposite side of the coin is that you could be selfish and narcissistic. You would not think of others as to question you and your loyalty as to how you receive these gifts. However, these are questions that are being brought up when you are watching a psychological thriller, not a horror movie. Because of my experience with this horror movie and bringing up these questions and insights about wishful thinking, I was left cold with this heartless and terrible experience. This movie was rather unpleasant. 17-year-old Clare Shannon (Joey King) is having a rough lift as she is haunted by her mother's suicide by hanging. Her father, Jonathan (Ryan Phillippe), who dumpster dives as a hobby, gives her a Chinese music box. She is able to decipher an inscription on the box, known as the...

We have another comedy about a female friendship and it's also taking place during a road trip. Wait a minute, haven't I seen this movie before this year? Yeah, it was Rough Night . Ok. I remember how that trip went: it was miserable and unfunny despite the charismatic friendship and chemistry between four women. The movie felt one-note. So, I saw the trailer for this movie and I thought, "Here we go again...an unfunny raunchy comedy celebrating the friendship between four women." But, here is the difference between Rough Night  and Girls Trip : I actually cared about the characters in this movie and even though the humor gets a bit filthy for my taste, I laughed more during this movie. Ryan Pierce (Regina Hall), an author who titles herself as "the second coming of Oprah", has received news from her agent, Liz (Kate Walsh), that the owner of a major company wants to make a deal with her in New Orleans. It is around the same time as the Essence Music Fe...

2017 has produced some great opportunities for actresses to shine with such strong, bad-ass female characters. I can name some: Logan,   Wonder Woman , Raw  (which I thought was good, not great), Beauty and the Beast,   Colossal,  etc. However, they express themselves in whatever way they want to. But, in the end, it's not about their characters which is great, it is about the story behind them and also revolving around them. And, it comes to my point about this movie in which you are excited about another female character entering into the frame of the spy genre but in the end, I was left disappointed by a confusing, messy narrative that does not serve the main character well. Lorraine Broughton (Charlize Theron), a spy for MI6, is brought in by MI6 executive, Eric Gray (Toby Jones) and CIA agent, Emmett Kurzfeld (John Goodman), about her mission in Berlin. She is dispatched to Berlin to retrieve a piece of microfilm that contains every file of every active fie...

Let's get this over with. The EMOJI movie is basically inspired by the LEGO movie in which studio executives were craving for a movie that can be making money from an actual product or a source from a product. I can picture their evil smirking faces with dollar signs in their eyes thinking they will have no problem for kids and families to watch and spend all their hard-earned money watching this wasted digital use. I will say to both kids and families that to please keep your hard-earned money because this could actually benefit your education and maybe create some new future memories such as a vacation or a family outing. This animated movie is the epitome of a creative nightmare that is at the bottom of the barrel. We travel inside the world of a smartphone that belongs to a teenage boy named Alex (voiced by Jake T. Austin). The Emojis live in a city called Textopolis where each of the emojis are created to function as they were provided by their inventor and engineers. Gen...

Christopher Nolan is one of those directors where legions of fans defend him for anything he does because The Dark Knight trilogy is what put him on the map. But, the question arise is whether or not he belongs on a level where we can highlight him as a legendary director. He is definitely in Tier 1 with Denis Villeneuve, Quentin Tarantino and Ridley Scott. But, he has not on the level of Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese or Stanley Kubrick just yet. He has to make a couple of different genre pictures like a comedy or a dark romance. Dr. Strangelove is a spoof comedy of a war. I'm just saying. However, Nolan is still a great director and he is definitely one of the best working today and now he has gone out of his comfort zone from his science fiction and superhero films, he has chosen to make a movie of real event in a battle during World War II. Was this the right call? It is most certainly the right call for inserting his cinematic techniques and drama into an event about sur...

Luc Besson has had a very interesting career in making many sorts of movies ranging from science fiction films to action films. But, he has a stylistic vision that can mesh over-the-top special effects with a fun story. I recently watched The Fifth Element  and I have to admit despite a couple of corny special effects and an annoying character, I was surprisingly entertained. Here, while watching the movie for about the first half, I was enthralled by its visuals. But, when we enter into the territory of its narrative and its characters, the movie becomes empty. I'll admit that it has some terrible qualities that reeks of Jupiter Ascending  but this movie is a lot better than that monstrosity. In the 28th century, Alpha, a space station, has been populated from hundreds of races from different countries around Earth but also more races from other planets. Special Agents Valerian and Laureline (Dane DaHaan and Cara Delevingne) has received a mission to retrieve a "converte...

Remember when this franchise was somehow non-existent to our generation? Remember that awful Tim Burton reboot that is somehow planted into our minds that we cannot let it escape from us because he is a visual director? Well, thanks to Rupert Wyatt and Matt Reeves, the franchise is back as being two strong chapters of a trilogy now that this movie has been made. Rise  was laughed off as a joke when trailers came out but when the movie was released, mostly, everybody was surprised by the amount of action and warmth that the story offered. Dawn was even better. Now, with War , this movie has the tricky challenge and potential to close out a trilogy that cements Caesar's arc as a great epic and now having seen it, this is a visually stunning and poetic movie that is thoughtful and suspenseful. You can make it the case that now this trilogy is one of the best trilogies ever made. It is three years later after the events of Dawn  and the apes have held off a faction of U.S. so...

Comedies this year have been dreadful. It is like no stand-up comedian could come up with any joke for one hour and all I got were a few chuckles and cricket noises. I have to be honest that I have been craving for not solely a comedy but also a good romantic comedy because we have not had one of those in an awfully long time. I thought I had lost hope for a good comedy until this movie came along and I thought, "Gee...we may have something here." I came out of the theater thinking that I was not pleased with the film but I actually witnessed a story of consequences and heart that dealt with more issues not solely because they are an interracial couple but because they do truly love each other and it is a bumpy road when dealing with a multitude of issues. And, I believe The Big Sick  handles their story perfectly since it comes from a true story. Kumail (Kumail Nanjiani) works an Uber driver in Chicago in between stand-up gigs, intertwining jokes with his multicultural,...

In (almost) celebrating the 50th anniversary, why not review the movie that started it all? Science fiction movies and TV shows were starting to come into fruition with B-level science-fiction films, adaptations from novels and TV shows such as Star Trek . But, 1968 was the year when two kinds of science fiction movies came into play and believe it or not, they both came out the same weekend in the United States. 2001: A Space Odyssey  is a movie that opened one chapter in history in which Stanley Kubrick created a film that showed us the evolution of humanity and in a way, if there is more life in the universe, which was symbolized by the monolith. Planet of the Apes  opened another chapter in which what happens if humanity was crippling and had reversed. It is a weird concept but it is a terrifying revelation as we witness apes taking over for better and for worse. Astronauts Taylor, Landon, Dodge (Charlton Heston, Robert Gunner and Jeff Burton) and Stewart are in deep ...

This is no ordinary fantasy tale. This is fate that is crossing between a soldier and a congregation of women and girls in the middle of the American Civil War. Watching the trailer, I was a bit excited about this movie because it looked like a chess game of charm and deception. Plus, it is directed by Sofia Coppola, a person who is also contributing to a year of female directors getting opportunities to make their own projects. It is fantastic. However, she has been in the directing game for a while. Even though it is a remake of the 1971 Don Siegel movie starring Clint Eastwood, the movie is ambitious and impeccably artful, but the narrative is surprisingly thin and juggles so many themes it reaches that the thriller aspect is lost. The movie starts in the middle of the American Civil War in 1864 as almost all of the slaves, teachers and students have left to get away from trouble and potential death. Miss Farnsworth (Nicole Kidman), teacher Edwina Morrow (Kirsten Dunst) and fiv...

We though that the Spider-Man movies were finished, right? I am interpreting that whether or not the Spider-Man films had their run. We've had 5 whole movies. But, when Captain America: Civil War  came out, people praising the movie but one of the few aspects that was talked about was Spider-Man. Tom Holland surprised many people including myself in his limited screen time and also how the Russo Brothers, the directors of the two latter Captain America movies, incorporated both the character/superhero into the MCU franchise. Going into this movie, I had somewhat good expectations, not great compared to the Marvel fans or as an overall summer movie, because of Sony Pictures and how they interfered with the other movies. Because of the agreement between Sony and Marvel, I had faith and this time around, my faith in them has paid off because this is a fun, different origin story that combines both a John Hughes sort of movie and a solid superhero movie. Peter Parker (Tom Holland)...

There are many cases regarding animal abuse and how animals are treated before they are transported onto a machine to become produce for many people around the world. Yes, it is a turn-off but unfortunately, no matter, how much we love certain animals (pigs, cows, chickens), it is the circle of life. However, it provides us social commentary and probably an allegorical commentary about how meat businesses operated in the real world. Because of this movie and a couple of documentaries I've watched (watch Food, Inc. ), it made me realize how sad I was feeling before I eat my meals (come on, I am human) because of maybe how animals were treated in the factories before they meet their fate. However, this movie places that commentary to incorporate with a sweet story between a pet and her owner and also a satire of corporate evil that jumbles a lot of tonal shifts that becomes entertaining but wacky. In 2007, Lucy Mirando (Tilda Swinton) is the CEO of the Mirando Corporation, succe...

Almost every week we have the same set of circumstances when another comedy comes along this year. It is not marketed correctly or it is close to not being marketed at all. The only thing I knew about this movie was its trailers. My reaction to the trailer to this movie was that I chuckled once or twice and it is shocking because Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler were not only two of the funniest comedians of SNL but two of the funniest comedians right now. Their comedic chops are aggressive and can almost strike a laugh-out-loud reaction. And, boy, this is a low for these two comedians because this movie is basically improvisations and attempts at jokes with an old-fashioned script that seems to go nowhere with its laughs and goes in a predictable route with its main storyline. Scott and Kate Johansen (Will Ferrell and Amy Poehler) take their daughter, Alex (Ryan Simpkins) around on a campus tour in Bucknell University, her first option. A few weeks later, the family is gathered aroun...

This franchise has taken a turn to become a couple of memorable movies for better and for worse. The first movie is nearly exceptional in combing both the values of family and villainous deeds that pays homage to other spy films. The second movie was decent. Minions  was too much of a good thing and it became annoying after a while. So, going into this movie, I had a good level of anticipation going into it because I hoped bring back that winning formula of having a good family film, a very good spy comedy and an entertaining villain and of course, the Minions could return into their supporting roles. They have some things right, but it is a scattered film that sort of amounts to nothing. However, the villain almost nearly saves the movie. A former child star, Balthazar Bratt (voiced by Trey Parker), has been constantly rejected by Hollywood and other executives who do not want to hire him. When he hit puberty, his fame withered and his show was cancelled. Brett and his robot ...