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The Valero Verdict: Cold Pursuit

| Richard Valero

Welcome to the first edition of the “The Valero Verdict” movie review. In this I will give you a quick movie review with a couple of bullet points of which I either liked or disliked. I will end the review with rating of the movie and a short overall thoughts.

On the docket today, Cold Pursuit, the action packed movie starring Liam Neeson.

  • The score of this movie had a very “western” feel to it, but the movie set in the Colorado Blizzard, it was kind of weird.
  • Tom Bateman was a fantastic bad guy in the movie, they did a fantastic job of making him a big time douche bag and making you buy it with every moment he was on the screen.
  • I was a big fan of the “ruthless” side of Liam Neeson that we really hadn’t seen. He really just kicked some ass without asking a whole lot of questions.
  • One the flip side of that, my one big bone to pick was that you really didn’t have a background story on how Neeson’s character was such a “bad ass”. He turned Citizen of the Year to Cold Blooded Killer in a span of 10 minutes. I know his son got murdered but still, a little background goes a long way.  
  • I was a massive fan of the “RIP” of the characters after they died, it was a nice little touch.

The Verdict:

** ½ out of ***** star

The variety of plot holes aside, it wasn’t a bad movie. The revenge plot is beaten to the grave at this point in Hollywood, especially in Liam Neeson movies but this was a little different which made it a tad enjoyable.

Should you see it?: I wouldn’t rush out to the theaters to catch this movie but I do say it is certainly RedBox worthy.

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The 1st Annual Sports Script Oscar Nominations

| Richard Valero

The Oscar season is right around the corner which is easily one of my favorite times of the year. I like reflecting on the movies from the years past and comparing the movies nominated to what I liked. I always watch the movie nominated no matter what type of movie it is or if it even looks interesting to me. I do this every year but this will be my 1st annual The Sports Script Oscar picks. January 14th is the day the nominations are announced and today I will give you who I think should get the nominations as well around March the 2nd (before the award show) I will give you my picks on who I think will win that were actually nominated. So here we go.

*updated 01/06/13 after watching Dallas Buyers Club*

The 1st Annual the Sports Script Oscar Picks

Best Picture

Captain Phillips
The Wolf of Wall Street
Saving Mr. Banks
12 Years a Slave
Prisoners
American Hustle
Out of the Furnace
Dallas Buyers Club

Best Director

Martin Scorsese – The Wolf of Wall Street
Paul Greengrass – Captain Phillips
Steve McQueen – 12 Years a Slave
David O. Russell – American Hustle
Scott Cooper – Out of the Furnace

Best Actor

Tom Hanks – Captain Phillips
Chiwetel Ejiofor – 12 Years a Slave
Leonardo DiCaprio – The Wolf of Wall Street
Christian Bale – American Hustle
Hugh Jackman – Prisoners

Best Actress

Cate Blanchett – Jasmine
Sandra Bullock – Gravity
Emma Thompson – Saving Mr. Banks
Carey Mulligan – The Great Gatsby

Best Supporting Actress

Jennifer Lawrence – American Hustle
Lupita Nyongo – 12 Years a Slave
Octavia Spencer – Fruitvale Station
Oprah Winfrey – The Butler
Jennifer Garner – Dallas Buyers Club

Best Supporting Actor

Barkhad Abdi – Captain Phillips
Tom Hanks – Saving Mr. Banks
Bradley Cooper – American Hustle
Daniel Bruhl – Rush
Woody Harrelson – Out of the Furnace

Original Screen Play

Fruitvale Station
American Hustle
Saving Mr. Banks
Gravity
Her

Best Adapted Screenplay

The Wolf of Wall Street
Captain Phillips
Rush
12 Years a Slave

Best Score

The Great Gatsby
Gravity
Rush
Captain Phillips
12 Years a Slave

Best Song

Young and Beautiful – The Great Gatsby
Love is Blindness – The Great Gatsby
Atlas – The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
Let It Go – Frozen

Best Cinematography

Gravity
12 Years a Slave
Rush
Captain Phillips
Prisoners

Best Visual Effects

Pacific Rim
Gravity
World War Z
The Lone Ranger
Iron Man 3
Thor: The Dark World

Best Make Up and Hairstyling

American Hustle
The Great Gatsby
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
The Lone Ranger
Dallas Buyers Club

Best Costume Design

The Great Gatsby
American Hustle
Oz the Great and Powerful
The Wolf of Wall Street
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

There you have it my 2014 Oscar picks, make sure to watch the Oscar Nomination show on January 14th and check out my latest piece here at the Sports Script where I review every movie I saw in 2013.

Disagree? Agree? Movie I am missing? Hit me up on twitter @rickygangster and let me know.

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A Review of All the Movies I saw in 2013

| Richard Valero

I am a huge movie goer and actually at the theater quite often. Whether I am on lunch break at work or on a vacation, I am always trying to make it to the cinema. 2013 was a great year for movies and a ton of movie came out that were definitely worth going and seeing. I saw almost 80 films that came out in 2013 and still have a list of the movies that I haven’t seen yet and will update the list as I do. Below I will list in no particular order of my top 10 movies of the year, my top 5 performances of the year and I will give you a chart with what movies I saw and a little one sentence review of it and how many stars I gave the film.

My Top 10 Movies of 2013 (In no particular order) – This was a lot harder to make a list of 10 than I thought it would be.

Prisoners
This is the End
Olympus has Fallen
The Great Gatsby
Now You See Me
You’re Next
Captain Phillips
The Wolf of Wall Street
American Hustle
Lone Survivor

My Top 5 Performances in a movie

Hugh Jackman – Prisoners
Christian Bale – American Hustle/Out of the Furnance
Tom Hanks – Captain Phillips
Chiwetel Ejiofor – 12 Year a Slave
Leonardo DiCaprio – The Great Gatsby

Now onto the list of movies that I saw in 2013 and a short one-line review and how many stars I gave it. *Updated 01/07/13*

The movie stars are on scale of 0-5 stars. 0 being the lowest and 5 being the highest.

Movie Short Review Stars
Gangster Squad Great cast and awesome movie *** 1/2
A Haunted House Just another terrible spoof movie *
Broken City Tons hated this movie but I really liked it ***
Last Stand Arnold is back but this movie fell flat **
Parker A lot like other Jason Statham movies good not great **
Warm Bodies Boring, not funny and just a waste of my time *
Bullet to the Head Stallone is just kick ass at anything he does. **1/2
Identity Thief I liked it the 2nd & 3rd time better than I did the 1st. Pretty Funny ***
A Good Day to Die Hard Jai Courtney is a future star. Willis & company kept me   entertained ***
Beautiful Creatures Not good, Not terrible just not my cup of tea. **
Snitch Jon Bernthal is great in this & the Rock delivers again. ***
21 and over Tried way too hard in this to make it funny, mediocre at best. **
Dead Man Down Way better than it should’ve ever been. ** 1/2
Oz the great and powerful Visually really good, enjoyable movie. ** 1/2
The Call High hopes & let down. Terrible movie *
Spring Breakers FRANCO KILLS IN THIS MOVIE!!!!!!!!! Loved this! ****
Incredible Burt Wonderstone Not good not funny just should’ve never made it to theaters
Olympus Has Fallen So good. Start to finish a really good movie ***1/2
Admission Tina Fey is hot, Tina Fey is hot. That’s about it. *
GI Joe Retaliation 1st move was good & this one didn’t disappoint. **1/2
The Place Beyond the Pines Ryan Gosling kills it. One of the MUST SEE movies of the year *****
Jurassic Park 3D The 3D done on this was done perfect. ***1/2
The Company You Keep Shia LeBeouf was great. Robert Redford is the man! ****
Trance Boring, stupid and just not good. *
Evil Dead Worst movie of the year is an understatement.
42 Great movie about one of the best baseball players ever! ***
Scary Movie 5 Funny at times but like the rest just an average movie. **
Pain and Gain Top 5 funniest movies of the year easily. ****
Iron Man 3 Favorite Iron Man movie, Downey Jr is money as Tony Starks ***
The Great Gatsby Not enough words to describe how much I enjoyed this film. *****
Star Trek Into Darkness A sequel that was much better than the original, suprising. ***
Fast & Furious 6 Over the top, crazy & a kick ass time at the movies. RIP Paul Walker ****
Hangover part III Not nearly as bad as II but not on the same level as the 1st. **
Now You See Me Top movie of the year for me. The whole cast/movie was money. ****
The East All over the place and sad because it had some real potential. *
The Purge Look so forward to this movie and it let me down big time. *
The Internship One of the most underrated/under apperciated movies of the year. ***1/2
The Heat Bullock & McCarthy team up one of funniest movies of the year. ****
Man of Steel Henry Cavill was good as Superman but the movie lacked something **1/2
Vehicle 19 Not bad but felt like it was a movie I have seen before. **
This Is the End The funniest movie since the Hangover. *****
World War Z Brad Pitt in his best movie of his career. *** 1/2
Lone Ranger Johnny Depp always plays weird characters. Meh movie **
The Way Way Back One of the feel good movies of the year. Loved it ****
Grown Ups 2 Was it possible to be worse than the 1st? Please stop makint these. *
Pacific Rim It was fun to see on the big screen but wasn’t a great movie. ** 1/2
RIPD Thought it was possible to be a good movie, boy was I wrong. *
Red 2 Not as fun as the 1st but not a bad sequel at all. **
Wolverine Way better than the 1st and a solid piece to the franchise. ***
2 Guns Denzel & Marky Mark, combo made in heaven. Loved it. *** 1/2
We’re the Millers 1000% better than I would’ve thought. Aniston is HOTTT in this. ****
Kick Ass 2 Funny spots but not nearly as good as the 1st. Let down big time. **
Paranoia Liam Hemsworth is a star in the making. ***
You’re Next Underrated movie of the year. Great film that kept you guessing *** 1/2
The Family Terrible just terrible. Good acting but the plot holes were huge! *
Prisoners Arguably the best film of the year. MUST SEE!!!!!!! *****
Rush Fantastic Film. Daniel Bruhl was money. ***
Don Jon JGL 1st direct/star movie and it was a fun little popcorn flick. ***
Gravity Lots of praise but not be me at all. Mediocre at best. **
Runner Runner Very smart movie that won’t get the credit it deserves. ***
Captain Phillips Loved it! Tom Hanks derserves some award buzz for his role in this. ****
Escape Plan Very good movie. Loved the concept and the old times killed it. *** 1/2
Thor – The Dark World Light years better than the original. Hemsworth is carving his nitch. ****
Hunger Games – Catching Fire So so good. I am already for the 3rd movie. ****
Homefront Good, not great but James Franco played a great villian. ** 1/3
Grudge Match It wasn’t terrible by any means but wasn’t all that and a bag of chips. ** 1/2
The Wolf of Wall Street Fun FUN FUN FUN – Don’t listen to the critics go enjoy this movie!!! ****
Lone Survivor One of/if not the best time I’ve ever had inside a theater. *****
Jobs Not as bad as some of sad but left you wanting a lot more. ***
Blue Caprice If you know the story than you really need to see this movie. ***
The Worlds End Terrible. *
Mud Long but McConaughey is becoming one of my favorite actors. ** 1/2
12 years a slave Just brilliant film. Chiwetel Ejiofor is name you should know. ****
Fruitvale Station Michael B Jordan has arrived in the movie scene. *** 1/2
Only God Forgives This gave Evil Dead it’s run of worst movie of 2013. no stars
Out Of the Furnace Harrelson & Bale give some of the best perf. of 2013. ****
American Hustle Nothing about this movie was bad. Cast/Story/Score all perfect. **** 1/2
Dallas Buyers Club McConaughey/Leto were absolutley amazing in this! ****
Saving Mr. Banks Tom Hanks is back and better than ever. *** 1/2
The Butler Just wasn’t very good. **
The Kings of Summer Fun movie with a very cool story and some solid young acting. ***

Side note – If there were any films in 2013 that I haven’t listed and you think I should check out or if there is any film on this list that I gave a bad review and think I should give a second chance let me know. Comment below or hit me up on twitter @rickygangster