Caro the Movie Critic

They wonder if their stripper years are outnumbered. Doesn't it feel sometimes when you have that glimmer of success and glory that you feel like you are on top of the world for a brief span of time or for about a few weeks? Nowadays, it is equally frustrating that your success is so short-lived that sometimes you have to start the next chapter quickly and you have no plans whatsoever and you are basically dead and are going to be bored for the rest of your life. Mike, even though he retired himself from stripping in the first film, has been in a normal life of running a furniture company but most of the time he misses his infamous life. However, this movie has some entertaining value of characters interacting with each other and trying to become better people during their road trip, but the movie has enough charm to propel enough entertainment. But, the movie is inconsistent in its pacing and does try too hard on what it wants to be as a motion picture for its demographic. M...

Cara Delevingne and Nat Wolff talking at Cost-Co. A friend comes along and makes an impression on you that could last a brief time or a lifetime. Let me emphasize: this person could probably turn your life around in a positive way. Sometimes, a group of friends would like to hang out with you when going to the movies, out for a drink, on a road trip and probably studying with them. But, there could be that one person that can catch a twinkle in your eye and may be have a chance to make your relationship more than just being friends. It could be something special. Even though there is not much logic provided into its story, this coming-of-age tale inspires enough imagination and complexity into its main characters to fully appreciate the movie. Quentin (Nat Wolff) narrates how Margo (Cara Delevingne) changed her life as she is adventurous, popular and can do whatever she likes. He has had a huge crush on her since the day she and her family moved next door. However, they were not ...

Jake Gyllenhaal confronting 50 Cent.  The rise and downfall of boxing is cut-clear from many of the movies from its "niche genre". As I define a "niche genre", it means that it is a specific genre of sports in a category of sports films. Nevertheless, I categorize this movie as another addition to the boxing genre because there have been many and there have been a lot of good ones. My personal favorite two are easy: Raging Bull , a masterful film directed by Martin Scorsese and starring an excellent performance by Robert De Niro and Rocky , an underdog story starring Sylvester Stallone. I can name off the top of my head right now: Million Dollar Baby , Cinderella Man , The Fighter , etc. But, however, all boxing movies are not created equal because there has to be a story to back the fighting up that we want to root for and care about so we can try to identify with the character(s). Even though this recent boxing film has some of those powerful elements, it beco...

Joseph Fiennes and Nicole Kidman struggling. There have been a lot of missing teenagers and little children in the media and in the ads because these young people run away with a lot of subjects in their minds. However, teenagers can blossom right in front of the parents' eyes and that brings a teenage boy or girl in another stage and also the parents on a different stage trying to protect children from more harm. So, what can opt them to run away from their parents? The movie tries to bring its eerie and delicate atmosphere into its ambiguity that sometimes the mood becomes so depressing that you even will care less on what the fates of each character will be. Tommy and Lilly (Nicholas Hamilton and Maddison Brown) live with their parents, Catherine and Matthew Parker (Nicole Kidman and Joseph Fiennes) in a desolate town on the Australian outback. Lilly is a 15-year-old girl who is being promiscuous as, for example, she greets an aboriginal repairman at the door during breakf...

Run away from the Pac-Man! This movie has the most creative and interesting premise with video game arcade characters attacking the city and the people. I mean, why not? That's not a bad idea. However, when something creative and inventive comes up in the conference room, everyone, including the top movie executives, will agree to it because all they could think about are dollar signs in their head. Money is essential and great to the SONY company, from which this year they have not a good year with their movies. Even though I predict they'll probably get a lot of earnings, the material inside the creative premise meshes into one great disappointment that I wish the PAC-MAN could eat up. Sam Brenner (Adam Sandler) is a former arcade video game aficionado who works for a company that installs software. And, Will Cooper (Kevin James) is the President of the United States, who gets mocked constantly for not running the country properly and also is teased because he failed to...

Amy Winehouse. This is a short movie review. Is it or is it not a cliche to document musicians as subjects for documentaries? Yes and no because we would want to get to know the musician(s) in their personal and professional lives in terms of working, loving the music industry, fame and struggle. However, when a musician remains on the terms of just being talented to write/create songs and perform them as artistically as he or she can, then you "gotta leave him/her alone to perform it". Even though Amy Winehouse is not an artist I listened to often, I now understand how life treated her unfairly and we lost a very talented musician that could've brought more sensational work. We take on a journey in director Asif Kapadia's (director of Senna ) documentary as we take a journey through the obstacles of fame and privacy above and under the tabloids as she tries to prepare and process in her mind how to perform on-stage and off-stage in her personal life. We see t...

Paul Rudd as Ant-Man, not his likely choice. A lesser known superhero or lesser known group of superheroes can come out of nowhere to surprise and delight an audience. Look what happened last year with Guardians of the Galaxy . Flawed, yes, but it was a total fun entertainment from beginning to end and as I watched the movie more times, my initial reaction was in the past and I enjoyed it more and more that I put it on my honorable mentions list last year. Every time I watched that movie it was the exchange of dialogue between the main cast that kept me laughing repeatedly and the action, of course, is exciting. We were never familiar with the next superhero that is released this weekend, but despite a sluggish first third, the movie achieved in something rare that it got a lot better as it went along. The movie is off-beat and in small scale, but it is still a fun superhero movie. Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) is a thief who just got out of prison staying over at Luis' (Michael Peñ...