Sidewalks of New York (2001)

Posted on February 15, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

In this charming intertwining tale of love, lost, and sex, director and writer Edward Burns stars as a posh New York salesman Tommy who falls for a City school teacher named Maria (Rosario Dawson). She is being annoyed by her door man/musician ex-husband Ben (David Krumholtz), who is re-discovering love with the help of Ashley (Brittany Murphy), who wants to be with him, but is stuck in a tawdry affair with Griffin (Stanley Tucci), who is stuck in a dead end marriage to the highly opinionated liberal real estate saleswoman Annie (Heather Graham) who is falling for Ed Burns’ character, who is being coldly snubbed by Maria. Wasn’t that a mouth full?

Continue reading →

Thirteen Conversations About One Thing (2002)

Posted on February 15, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

This is an interesting and profound drama, because this movie has one underlying theme that is relatable and universal: happiness. This movie has four separate characters whose life and tale seems to interconnect in some odd way. Matthew Mc Conaughey plays Troy, a hotshot lawyer with a triumphant swagger whose luck can’t seem to stop after putting a suspect in jail, and he has everything going for him, until he accidentally hits someone with his car and drives off to leave them to die. Slowly within the movie he descents into madness as his guilt has him take a mental plunge.

Continue reading →

Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood (2002)

Posted on February 15, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

This is based on the book by Rebecca Wells and was adapted into a mildly successful chick flick in the box-office. This easily disappeared but its hard to figure out why. I rather enjoyed this film. It’s a good movie about the bond between a mother and daughter and how you can never truly know your parents as much as you think you do. Sandra Bullock is great as Siddalee Walker, the angry and disgruntled woman who has a cross to bear with her mother and often exhibits the corky odd traits her mother does. She’s terrible in relationships because she fears she may take the same path as her mother did when she was younger.

Continue reading →

Sin (2003)

Posted on February 14, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

Ving Rhames is an ex-cop whose sister, who is a drug addict, was nearly killed by a drug lord (though its all assumption, we’re never told he is a drug lord because he’s so broadly developed), and now he’s on the quest for vengeance despite the warnings of his ex-partner and grizzled ex-boss played by the always great Brian Cox in a small thankless role. He shouldn’t even be considered a part of the cast because he is so wasted in this film it goes beyond unfunny. The somewhat talented Ving Rhames is terrible in this as the lead character Eddie. I’m not sure if it’s the hackneyed writing or his acting alone, but he’s bad.

Continue reading →

Stolen Summer (2002)

Posted on February 5, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

Set in 1976, young Pete O’Malley (newcomer Adiel Stein) lives in a suburb with his Irish Catholic family. He is told by a nun he will go to hell if he continues his bratty ways. Scared by this comment, he decides to go on a “quest” and convert a Jewish person into a Catholic so they can get to heaven. He then meets Jewish boy Danny Jacobsen, the son of a rabbi who is suffering from Leukemia, and the two go on a “quest” to get Danny into heaven. I was rather curious to see this, due to the amount of attention this received from many. The entire movie relies on the performance of Adiel Stein, who does a pretty good job in the film. He’s charming and wide-eyed with a lot of enthusiasm and does a good job. The best aspects of this movie, though, are the character actors that make this enjoyable.

Continue reading →

Cherish (2002)

Posted on February 5, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

This is an excellent movie, I must say. At first I was a bit hesitant to watch this, because the first five minutes drag on with slow moving dialogue and character development. This movie tries to make a clear point of the fact that she is indeed a lonely desperate character, and they use her vulnerability and desperation against the audience as we witness her injustices but can do nothing about it. Finny Taylor is top-notch at both directing and writing this great black comedy and gives us a minds eye view into this character. The character Zoe often hides herself and escapes into music throughout the movie, so much so she is well-known by a DJ at a local radio station.

Continue reading →

Austin Powers in Goldmember (2002)

Posted on January 25, 2003 by Felix Vasquez

I am a huge fan of this series and love the first two sequels but unfortunately it seems Austin has lost his mojo. From the first five minutes of the movie I found myself un-amused and highly disappointed. The movie, though true to its efforts, attempts to bring about new life to the series with a brand-new villain named “Goldmember” which I found sad and very odd. The movie resorts to awful bathroom/gross-out humor to almost desperate measures. The most disgusting aspect of the movie was “Goldmember” who, due to his obsession with gold began to get diseased throughout the entire movie as his skin peeled constantly.

Continue reading →