05.15.2010 | By Jack Rico |
*Updated January 2026
The Bollywood film Kites, directed by Anurag Basu, is a film unlike any I’ve seen before. It is spoken in three languages, has a diverse cast, and does not come from Hollywood. It is a completely original experience. Read More
05.13.2010 | By Jack Rico |
Men: ‘Letters to Juliet’ is a film with such pipe dream romance that you can’t help but barf more than once. Mexican heartthrob Gael Garcia Bernal co-stars and Puerto Rican Jose Rivera writes this cheesy and predictable film very hard for any straight man to like.
Women: You’ll love, love, love ‘Letters to Juliet’ because you’ll be swept away in the glittering panoramas, the unconditional search for love and the poppy soundtrack that your local top 40 station plays. Moreover, the true reason you’ll love this film is because men like Charlie (Christopher Egan) will fight for your love even though you’ll push men like this away all the time in real life.
The plot of ‘Letters to Juliet’ is interesting. An American girl (Amanda Seyfried) on vacation in Italy finds an unanswered “letter to Juliet” — one of thousands of missives left at the fictional lover’s Verona courtyard, which are typically answered by a the “secretaries of Juliet” — and she embarks on a quest to find the lovers referenced in the letter.
When it comes to romantic movies, I have adopted a philosophy. All you really need to develop a love story, successfully, is that the characters are well developed, the actors playing the leads display a degree of sexual chemistry, and that their relationship is portrayed on the screen naturally. Details of the plot are relatively irrelevant as all romance films follow a predictable path. Unfortunately, lately, romantic movies have become less and less convincing, with stars having higher priority than the narrative and interesting supporting characters never being fully fleshed out. Unfortunately, ‘Letters to Juliet “does not apply my formula to the ‘letter’, thus, its virtues are few. Its core narrative is more given to the sensibilities of young women and tweeny girls.
Gael Garcia Bernal plays Victor, a chef whose top priority in life is to open his own Italian restaurant in New York. Gael plays one the romantic interests to Amanda Seyfried. For Gael to be acting in this film, it had to be a hefty paycheck to convince him. He derides these types of films and more likely did it to make an indie back home in Mexico.
‘Letters to Juliet’ is for women who are looking for their prince charming or are not happy in their own relationship. If you female friend are in this situation, you’re gonna love, love, love this film.
05.13.2010 | By Jack Rico |
The new adaptation of Robin Hood, directed by Ridley Scott (Alien, Blade Runner, Gladiator) and starring Russell Crowe and Cate Blanchett hits the big screen after much anticipation and hype. Is this the definitive version to ever be done by Hollywood? Not by far, but it is a noble intent. This adaptation is a prequel, that is, an account of the origins of the green hero before he stole from the rich and helped the poor. The film has some fine moments but also lacks of a fresh new approach to an old story.
The plot begins with the death of King Richard of England (Danny Huston) and Robin Longstride (Crowe) traveling to Nottingham, a city that suffers from corruption and oppressive taxes from the sheriff, to start a new life. There, Robin falls in love with the widow Lady Marion (Blanchette), meets Friar Tuck (Mark Addy) and fights in the war against the French.
To be fair, I found the film to be entertaining and visually absorbing, but due to weak development of the story and shortcomings of some secondary characters, there were moments of confusion in several of its sequences. For example, for most of the film, I could not distinguish who were the British or the French, I couldn’t understand the dialogue very well at first due to the rough and the villains motives weren’t fleshed out properly.
However, if you’re looking to entertain yourself, any imperfections the film might have are put aside for the high level entertainment value. I particularly left satisfied enough to recommend it for a few reasons: one because Crowe and Blanchette are tremendous actors, second because the director Ridley Scott captured beautiful scenes, and third, the locations and details of the movie transport you to back to that period. Robin Hood is worth the watch.
05.6.2010 | By Jack Rico |
*Updated December 2025
Iron Man 2 is very fun, but the story in this sequel isn’t as interesting as the first origin story. It also felt longer than the original. Why? Dialogue was heavy and the action sequences weren’t as prevalent. Overall, an entertaining experience, but my main criticism of the first one was that it needed more action at the beginning and in the middle. This new film has a brief stint of action a quarter of the way in, but then becomes laughable halfway through. Read More
05.6.2010 | By Jack Rico |
I’m a fan of documentaries. It’s a great way to learn, in-depth, about a specific topic in a quick and efficient way. ‘Babies,’ unfortunately, wasn’t very insightful. It was extremely cute and adorable, but to pay $12 to see this, I’d rather recommend you string together 2 hours of cutesy YouTube videos of cuddly baby stunts and call it a day. Or just call your sister or friends who just had one and have them pop out their digital portraits of them. I’m sure the collection is already prepped and ready to go!
Because this is a documentary, there is no concrete plot, except that it focuses on one year in the life of four babies living on different continents: Namibia, Mongolia, Tokyo and San Francisco.
The cameras capture the social, economic and cultural contrasts that each baby is provided. We also have a peek at how their parents raise them with the resources that life has made available to them. Besides the lovely tender moments of these infants, the film depends solely on the innocence of its four protagonists. The target audience is newly parents who will appreciate the idiosyncrasies that they have lived with their own children. It’s difficult to recommend you pay to see this in the theater. The wiser option for your pocket will be YouTube or when it comes out on DVD.
04.29.2010 | By SBC Staff |
The family film, Furry Vengeance, lacks a lot of imagination, it seems to have gotten most of its ideas from other family films such as Dr. Dolittle and Evan Almighty. The few laughs it achieves out of the audience (and I mean children) are based on ridiculous physical humor that at some point is more distasteful than funny. The good thing about the film is the messages it carries: to conserve our forests, prevent the destruction of them to build housing and the need to respect animal’s rights and homes. Unfortunately, these are barely important points of the movie; it’s more of a story of man vs. wild carried out by nature’s pranks against the protagonist.
Dan Sanders (Brendan Fraser) is a real estate developer who is sent to take down a forest and build a private community called “Rocky Springs”. His family Tammy (Brooke Shields) and Tyler (Matt Prokop) miss the noisy city where they used to live, Chicago. His wife tries to be supportive and make the best of their new home, but their teenage son hates having been taken away from his friends and being in the middle of a forest where there is nothing to do. Dan tries everything to please his boss (Ken Jeong) and believes the supposed year they are to live in the forest while they build the community will bring them closer to nature and that it would fly by, but he’s wrong. The animals that live in the forest soon realize what is to become of their home and begin plotting against Dan by pranking him and making his life miserable. Dan is shun by his family when he starts acting crazy, saying the animals are pranking him and also once they realize what the company he works for is to do to this natural haven.
If the film would have focused on the importance of protecting our forest and keeping family as a priority, this at least would have given it some substance. There really isn’t much to take from this film that would even be of much entertaining value for anyone. Fraser as well as Brooks have played these same roles many times, the one of the goof and the patient wife. As a cartoon this movie might have been more successful. There’s nothing new that this movie has to offer nor in the story line or characters. This is not the worse movie i’ve seen but it definitely makes the list.
04.23.2010 | By Jack Rico |
Puerto Rican actress Jennifer Lopez makes her long awaited comeback to the big screen in the New York romantic comedy ‘The Back Up Plan’. Lopez is back to form in what is, in my opinion, a charming and pleasant cinematic experience. Any thoughts on Lopez being washed up will have to wait since she can still carry a film on charm alone even with a modest B list cast. The movie possesses appeal, mostly from its star, but also from its relevant and topical plotline.
Zoe (Jennifer Lopez) has been on hundreds of dates looking to find a prince charming whom she can fulfill her life long dream of starting a family with. Regrettably, she discerns her time has past and resorts to what she feels is her ‘back up plan’ – artificial insemination. As fate must have it, Zoe meets the man of her dreams (Alex O’Loughlin) on the same day she submitted herself to the procedure. Will she tell her shining prince that she’s pregnant with some unknown man’s sperm? Will he feel he has to father kids that aren’t his own? How will it all end for Zoe?
Jennifer Lopez’s movie career spiraled down a bit when El Cantante was released in 2006 (the film only generated 7.6 million dollars). For those who have followed her career since Money Train we have noticed her strengths lie in the romantic comedy genre and even perhaps in action films. When she naturally decides to branch out into more demanding genres such as drama, her deficiencies as an actress are magnified. I disagree with people who say she isn’t a good actress. She is not an Oscar caliber actress, but she is a good one. You might think it’s easy to play cutesy and adorable in a movie. But she makes it look that easy. That’s her gift. I compare her to Sandra Bullock and put her in that range set. You never know Jennifer Lopez might have one Oscar win in her.
Nevertheless, most women will love this film, at least the ones that are suckers for romance. Men will barf at it because Alex O’Loughlin, the male lead, portrays a character at the end of the film of a man that doesn’t seem to exist in real life. The implausible fantasy is a bit too much to bear. It is a fantasy film full of romance though, full of hope and obviously a feel good sentiment. That is what you’ll be buying for the price of a movie ticket, and that is not bad. I liked it, it made me like that world a bit better than ours, even if it’s just for an hour and a half.
To follow Jack Rico’s film reviews check him out on Twitter at @jackricofficial
04.21.2010 | By Jack Rico |
Disney is once again at it, creating rapturous sea imagery in ‘Oceans,’ their second cinematic effort distributed through there newly minted Disneynature Studios. If you are glued to the National Geography or Animal Planet channels, you won’t see anything different or innovative here, but what you will see is never before seen footage of sea creatures that we never even knew existed. That one fact makes all the difference in the world.
Documentaries don’t really have scripts, but the ‘plot’ here is the chronicling of the mysteries of the sea the way no human has ever seen it before. Directors Jacques Perrin and Jacques Cluzaud dive deep into the very waters that sustain all of mankind—exploring the harsh reality and the amazing creatures that live within. Actor Pierce Brosnan, an active environmentalist, narrates some of the most fantastic and surreal scenes on Earth.
The filmmakers began my sea experience through the eyes of a boy as he lays his eyes on the beach for the very first time. He’s overwhelmed. Brosnan begins speaking about what questions the boy, as well as us, might have about the crystal, deep blue sea.
What is remarkable and astounding is the onerous production in making a doc like this. Filmmakers traversed all five of the Earth’s oceans and devoted two full years to the preproduction process. That was followed by four years of shooting, with 75 excursions to dozens of the planet’s most untouched spots. It took nearly another year of postproduction to winnow down the 480 hours of footage. Overall, the task took seven years to create all for the price of a movie ticket.
Many of the sites visited where in Latin America such as Costa Rica, Panamá, Argentina, Galapagos, Venezuela and Mexico. The beauty that still lies there is ethereal.
For a mere 83 minutes, “Oceans†manages to extract some emotions from me by putting me in the middle of the action with a great white shark shredding to pieces a lovely sea lion, or watching a symphonic ballet of traveling tuna and awing me with the spectacle of exotic creatures that looked like something out of a Phillip K. Dick novel – The Blanket Octopus, The Spanish Dancer, The Manta Shrimp, The Ribbon Eel and the Leafy Seadragon.
This is beyond art, it is the best nature film I’ve ever seen of the sea. Oceans along with IMAX: Hubble 3D are by far the best documentaries of the year.
To follow Jack Rico’s film review check him out on Twitter at @jackricofficial
04.21.2010 | By Jack Rico |
*Updated December 2025
An action film with some heart, family values, and a Latino flair is the way I would describe WB’s film The Losers. The genres, though, do not necessarily fit well together. It is a fun movie, but somewhere along the way it goes through a bit of an identity crisis. Does it want to be an action film or a family film? The producers seem to think both. Read More
