A Big Thumbs Up From Roger Ebert For Nothing Like The Holidays
12 December 2008, 10:40 PM. By Anastasia Hinojosa
Based on Roger Ebert’s Chicago Sun-Times column this week, it looks like the great, white masses may hear about the little, middle-class Latino film that could, after all.
Every once in a while, you sense you’re watching actors being allowed to do what they hoped to do when they got into show biz. That would be playing characters familiar to their experience, in a warm-hearted story, without exploitation and without a “message” as much as the right kind of feeling. Oh, they wanted to make blockbusters, too, and cavort with superheroes and be in great love scenes and get to drive fast and dodge bullets and plunge into deep drama and tear their hearts out and win Oscars. But those things are less rare than such a movie as Alfredo de Villa’s “Nothing Like the Holidays.”
Nothing Like The Holidays opened today nationwide.
Nothing Like the Holidays [RogerEbert.com]
Earlier: Guanabee Cruises LA With Nothing Like The Holidays Writer Rick Najera
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You guys are really pushing the mediocrity, and just because it has a Latino cast, which is shameful. Roger Ebert is notorious for this kind of thing–anything with an all-black cast or an all-whatever-cast that ain’t white, and he’s creaming his chinos for a week. It would be nice to see something with an all-Latino cast that, oh I don’t know, doesn’t suck.
@urban latino: have you seen the movie?
If only it was called TROPIC THUNDER.
This has Luis Guzman in it? In that case, it automatically gets the Chicano Seal of Approval. Dos cuetes p’arriba.
Hey guys, I just returned from seeing it and I promise it’s good. And, yes, Luis Guzman steals the show. He just walks on screen and you’re laughing. Everyone did a great job. And, yes, it’s a holiday film, so if you automatically hate Xmas, largate. otherwise, you’ll love it.
W-o-a-h, it looks like Keanu killed everybody this weekend. Nothing like a trouncing. I suppose with aliens destroying everything we hold dear, Puerto Ricans being loud at the dinner table never stood much of a chance. Still, even if the only holiday people took this weekend was from practically every theater showing “Nothing Like The Holidays”, how much could it have possibly cost to make? I’m sure it’ll recover on DVD.
But hold on! All is not lost.
It still beat that milky gay guy and those annoying African animals (no, not those). Oh, and Britain’s answer to the question no one asked: What if Steven Seagal wasn’t fat, was coarsely British and drove like your drunk Mexican uncle with all those outstanding warrants.
(Source: Yahoo News)
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Media By Numbers LLC. Final figures will be released Monday.
1. “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” $31 million.
2. “Four Christmases,” $13.3 million.
3. “Twilight,” $8 million.
4. “Bolt,” $7.5 million.
5. “Australia,” $4.3 million.
6. “Quantum of Solace,” $3.8 million.
7. “Nothing Like the Holidays,” $3.5 million.
8. “Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa,” $3.3 million.
9. “Milk,” $2.6 million.
10. “Transporter 3,” $2.3 million.
I saw this movie over the weekend with my family and we all really enjoyed it. We were cracking up! I have to agree with Cindy that Luis Guzman steals the show because even his expressions were funny.
I don’t want to give anything away so I’m not going to say much else. But I gave th movie my own two thumbs up and I really want to see it again.
@ La Cindy: if you get to talk to Rick Najera again, ask him why Junot Diaz was in the “Special Thanks” portion of the ending credits along with the state of Illinois.
Eh, it was mediocre. There were some funny parts, and Luis Guzmán definitely was the most entertaining, but the rest? In particular I found Debra Messing’s character and the storyline regarding the parents to be weak and a bit contrived. Definitely rental material. But on a very superficial level, it wasn’t too bad looking at Jay Hernández or the guy who played Nando, either.
I maintained my silence in the hope that someone would see the light of reason. Thanks, Kata, for proving my point. And I admire the fact that you chose not to run with the herd . . . right off the cliff.
I love the movie funny touching and sweet it’s good to know a latino man can still be sensitive I hope more latinos support the film