Frem Here To Awesome Festival
Advertisement

movies
mavens
communities

erico_77375

Member since 6/26/2007, last signed in 5 days ago.
"Houston Movie Man"
Send a message
Invite to a group

Personal statement:

I'm here in Houston, Texas with some good friends, a pretty lady, and a lot of great movies that I want to share with others around town and around the world. I review films, discuss subjects of interest about filmmaking and filmmakers. You won't get the usual Hollywood gossip here.

I also what to invite you to listen to my podcast FilmScope, now available on iTunes. You can also catch it at http://blog.filmscope.org/. I hope you enjoy it and join us for discussion on Spout Group: FilmScope

[more]

erico_77375's movie tags

Advertisement

Talk

Juno
Juno
Babies Are Made With Sugar And ...
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "What is it with all these baby movies all of a sudden? Between Knocked Up and Waitress, we’ve seen both male and female perspectives on pregnancy. August Rush is looking for his parents who don’t even know he exists (I’m not kidding). And now we have the best baby film this year in Juno, director Jason Reitman’s sophomore film after his amazing Thank You For Smoking. This time, he’s gone from razor-sharp satire to razor-sharp coming of age story with one of cinema’s most charismatic heroines in recent history with the only actress who could pull this part off.That character’s name is Juno MacGuff and she is played by Ellen Page, most notably seen in 2005's Hard Candy. She’s sixteen, quick-witted, and just found out she’s pregnant. The boy involved (I won’t say he did it to her since we find out quickly she initiated) is the shy but cute Paulie Bleaker (Michael Cera). He’s a track runner in school who has two vice ... " [More]
Fred Claus
Fred Claus
A Movie To Leave You Bored For ...
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "What is wrong with this picture: Vince Vaughn and Paul Giamatti in a family film about Santa Claus and his older, meaner brother, Fred? Well, you take out the family part of the sentence, make Neil LaButte the screenwriter and you’ve got something. But add in elves, the director of Wedding Crashers, and more pratfalls than a Charlie Chaplin film, now you have a recipe for disaster. And that is what Fred Claus is.The movie starts off with one of the worst openings ever. It is the 16th Century. We find out that the arrival of Nicholas to the Claus family has made life hard for his older brother Fred. Their mother (Kathy Bates) from the start shows favor towards her younger “perfect” son. And then Nick becomes a saint, which comes with a clause (har-har) of it’s own that they come with immortality, but not just him, his entire family as well. Does this play at all into the rest of the film? Do we ever get a joke about Christmas during the Revolution? Nope. We&r ... " [More]
Bee Movie
Bee Movie
Bee Movie Nearly Put Me To Zzzz
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "I don’t know exactly what to think of Bee Movie, but then again, I don’t think the movie knows either. Written by Jerry Seinfeld, animated by Dreamworks, the movie seems to have serious potential, but only minutes into the film, the flaws become clear.This is the story of Barry B. Benson, who is a bee if you can’t tell by now and is voiced by Mr. Seinfeld. He’s just graduated Bee College and is about to be placed in his permanent job in the hive where he will stay forever. But Barry, like Benjamin Braddock before him, isn’t so sure that plastics…sorry, honey is in his future. But one day he takes up a dare laid down by a “pollen jock” and decides to leave the hive. His little day trip takes a detour when a tennis ball, a rainstorm and a leather boot puts him in the house of a young florist (Rene Zellweger). By the way, bees can really talk, but they don’t around humans. They spark a friendship that sometimes feels eerily like a ... " [More]
Black Book
Black Book
This Black Book Is Worth A Peek
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
1 out of 1 people found this review helpful. [What do you think?]
 "What can I say; Paul Verhooven has proven me wrong. How, you may ask? Because he’s probably the only director with enough guts to make this kind of film. And in doing so has shown that he commands cinema like a fierce conductor; without fear or limit. I had to remind myself that this is the man behind Basic Instinct, Hollow Man, and Showgirls. He has also done RoboCop, Total Recall, and The 4th Victim, which were not bad. But nothing prepared me for Black Book, an absolutely brilliant film that dares us to hold on for dear life and gives us a story that challenges as well as entertains.The film starts off in the 50s in a small town in Israel. A bus full of Dutch tourists stop for a quick spell. A woman from that group recognizes a woman who lives there. It turns out they knew each other from The War. The rest of the film is in flashback to the war, but this scene is important for several reasons, the biggest is to assure the audience that no matter what happens in the film, t ... " [More]
Stephen King's The Mist
Stephen King's The Mist
Darabont Got Lost In The Fog
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "Five minutes can change everything, especially in how you see a film. This is doubly the case when it comes to the ending. Sometimes it’s intended (The Sixth Sense), sometimes not so much (Manhattan). Looking back at The Mist, the last five minutes is what I think about, and not for good reasons. And it will be these five minutes that most of my review is going to be talking about. I’ll try not to spoil it intentionally, but I cannot make any promises.The Mist is the third Stephen King adaptation by director Frank Darabont, who’s The Green Mile is a small classic and his The Shawshank Redemption is a mega classic. This time, he turns to one of King’s oldest novellas about a group of Maine townspeople who get cornered into a supermarket by an unnatural mist. The story focuses on David Drayton (Thomas Jane), an artist who comes to town with his small son and is trapped in the store when sirens go off and a bloodied townsfolk scream about something in the mist ... " [More]
I'm Not There
I'm Not There
The Times, They Are A-Confusing
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "When does innovation end and pretentiousness begin? I found myself asking this question near the start of I’m Not There, director Todd Haynes’ follow-up to Far From Heaven. The idea is interesting: Six actors who couldn’t be more different in both look and feel playing one of the most contradictory of American icons, Bob Dylan. We have Batman and the new Joker Christian Bale and Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw from Perfume, Richard Gere, a 10-year-old black kid (the sensational Marcus Carl Franklin), and the greatest actress of our generation, Cate Blanchett. Here’s the kicker: We never hear the name Bob Dylan used with any of these six actors. They tell Dylan’s story through his music, without any care to chronology or to the people who inspired or were inspired by Dylan, except for one great scene where the Woody Guthrie Dylan (Franklin), goes to the deathbed of the actual Woody Guthrie and sings him a song. We do get a sense of a few of the defining momen ... " [More]
No End in Sight
No End in Sight
How The Middle East Was Lost
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "Maybe the appeals of Michael Moore’s tactics are just wearing a little thin on me. I still consider him to be an influential filmmaker (and his Bowling for Columbine to be one of the best documentaries ever made), but there’s something very self-promoting about his technique. That’s probably why the likes of Charles Ferguson is starting to quench the thirst for thoughtful political documentaries that are not intended to scathe, but to reflect. In doing just that, his first film No End in Sight is one of the best-planned, best executed documentary I have ever seen. In the course of 108 devastating minutes, Ferguson lines out the big and small events that lead America to a quagmire in Iraq, one that has very little hope of ever getting better. Unlike the feel-good documentaries that loves to kick an already lame president, No End in Sight is more interested in fact over opinion and gets it’s facts from the people that made the decisions and that were there (an ... " [More]
Beowulf
Beowulf
The Grandfather Of Action Heroe ...
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "I am beginning to believe that Beowulf, as a story, is one that you have to admire, but can never really love. While even the poem has action and adventure, it also has a detachment to it that leaves a lot to want. And while director Robert Zemeckis seems to enjoy this story, it’s easy to see that he doesn’t ever truly embrace this hard-as-nails tale of lust in all it’s forms. The film has the spirit of the old poem, but dances to a completely different tune. Writers Neil Gaiman (author of the novel that inspired this summer’s Stardust) and Roger Avery (the co-writer of Pulp Fiction) take the story and circle around the wheels of raw lust, be it for sex, ambition, immortality, fame, or gold. It starts off at a Norwegian king’s (Anthony Hopkins) new mead hall in the middle of winter. The wine, women and song seems friendly enough to those in attendance. But the monster Grendel who lives in the caves outside of town seems to dislike any kind of merry-mak ... " [More]
No Country for Old Men
No Country for Old Men
This Old Man's Country No Place ...
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "When I think about No Country For Old Men, the word that comes to mind is fate. And while the film is ultimately about fate, I thinking also about how the Cohen brothers have been angling towards this film from their first bloody satisfying Blood Simple. Cormac McCarthy, whose novel is being adapted, has written better works himself (The Road by far his most important), but whose sensibility makes for the creation of the ultimate film we are bestowed upon. And we have three actors who have been moving towards their unforgettable roles in a film that I will deem now to be a classic.The film starts us off with Sheriff Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) discussing in a monologue about how the times are changing when he talks about a boy who killed a 14-year-old girl just for the sake of killing. We can tell that he doesn’t flinch at the violence that is around him, but he isn’t unaffected. While he talks, we see the barren wastes of the open ranges of West Texas. This will be the ... " [More]
American Gangster
American Gangster
Washington Vs. Crowe: Round Two
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "This has been the rematch I’ve been waiting for since 1995 when a little-known film came out called Virtuosity. It starred Denzell Washington as a cop-turned-convict who is used to track down a serial killer computer program who literally grew legs. That program, joyfully called Sid 6.7 was played by the wildly over-the-top Russell Crowe. That movie was one of my favorites when I was a teenager, primarily because it was just so insane and silly and Crowe, whom I had never heard before, seemed to be having so much fun that I kept waiting to hear about any other film that he starred in. So when I heard that Washington and Crowe, both of now are at the height of their respected careers, were going to match wits ala Heat, I could hardly contain my joy. And while American Gangster isn’t anywhere as crazy as Virtuosity, this is a much better film.American Gangster is Frank Lucas (Washington), a second-in-command under “Bumpy” Johnson during the 60s in Harlem where ... " [More]
Lust, Caution
Lust, Caution
Lee Let Lust Get Away From Him
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "If there is one filmmaker that can be called one of the new masters of cinema, that man would be Ang Lee. Over the course of nearly 20 years, he has given us a wide variety of films to celebrate. Like Spielberg, there might be one film of his you don’t like, but there’s at least one that you do, no matter your taste. He has paved new ground more than a few times, a couple of them most recently with his Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Brokeback Mountain. And to follow up the latter, he has decided to go back to China to tell a World War II drama. How can any film nut pass that up?The film is Lust, Caution and truer words could not explain this movie. It’s been the epicenter of debate over the NC-17 Rating given by the MPAA due to graphic sex scenes that Lee refused to edit (and for good reason). The film stars a newcomer Tang Wei as the young college student Wang Jiazhi who gets involved in a revolutionary drama group during the Japanese occupation of China duri ... " [More]
Things We Lost in the Fire
Things We Lost in the Fire
One Thing Is Lost, Another Is G ...
By erico_77375 in erico_77375 Blog
Was this review helpful? [Be the first to tell us!]
 "It is said that when a good man dies, that his song will resonate to all who loved him. That certainly is the case from Steven, who died trying to keep a man from killing his wife, only to killed along with the wife in a murder/suicide. And what stems from that is the focus of Things We Lost In The Fire, the first American film from Swedish filmmaker Suzanne Bier (After The Wedding, Brothers).Steven (David Duchovony) leaves behind a wife, Audrey (Halle Berry) and two kids. She is a hysterical mess with little to do than to go over the good times she had with her husband and try raising two children on her own. Just before the funeral, she realizes that one person doesn’t know about Steven’s death, his childhood friend Jerry (Benicio Del Toro). Audrey doesn’t like Jerry too much, even with Steven was alive. A former lawyer in another life, Jerry is now a heroin junkie living for the day. When everybody turned their back on him, Steven didn’t. Audrey feels tha ... " [More]

Lists

Films I've seen (128)
Films I've seen
My favorite films (23)
There are some films that just leave impressions on you as you leave. Some keep leaving impressi ...
Films I want to see (1)
Films I want to see
Worst Films of 2006 (10)
I can't believe it's come down to this, but I've actually found 10 movies so bad, that I could m ...
Best Films of 2006 (10)
If there's something that can be said about 2006 and the movies, perhaps it should be that this ...
Films I want to buy (0)
Films I want to buy