Kevin Spacey

Thanks For The Drink! (Now, How Long Do I Have To Sit Here?)

Girl walks into a hotel bar. Traveling alone and therefore (she thinks) drinking alone. She plunks herself down and orders a Sidecar from the bartender who looks uncannily like Kevin Spacey. From across the room, a male stranger, not completely unattractive and certainly not scary-looking, approac ... More >>

RiFF RaFF and Hip-Hop's Greatest Method Rappers

There's an idea floating around in the pools of rap consciousness that most guys within the genre are merely method actors on par with Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln. Rick Ross might have already secured a few Academy Awards with his confusing portrayal of a flamboyant mafioso kingpin who dwells in mat ... More >>

Too Late to Succeed

Dramatizing the financial crisis, tone-deaf to the times, in Margin Call.

Your 2011 Fall/Movie Preview (Part 1)

​Note: Pop Rocks will return next week. Labor Day has come and gone, which means the official start of the fall movie season is just around the corner. In fact, two of the more anticipated releases of latter 2011 -- Warrior and Contagion -- come out tomorrow. After what has been widely rega ... More >>

White Man's Lament

It's hard out there for an employed, middle-class, white-collar male in Horrible Bosses.

Oscar Night 2011: The Live Blog!

​We are only less than three hours out from bringing you live-blogging coverage, right here, of this year's Academy Awards, and we are more than excited to take you through the night for every win, loss, awful dress, awesome dress, foible, and foul-up Hollywood throws our way.

"Hannibal's On The Jazz:" A Stephen J. Cannell Retrospective

​If you were born before, say, 1976 (the year of my little sister's birth and hence my arbitrary demarcation line for coolness), you probably spent a healthy chunk of your prime TV-watching years enjoying the programs of the late Stephen J. Cannell. The longtime writer/producer created some of ... More >>

Pop Rocks: Flame, Hollywood, Flame

Another well-adjusted Prop 8 supporter​I'm sure you've all heard the terrible news by now: Judge Vaughn "Mussolini" Walker declared California's gay marriage ban unconstitutional. Obviously I don't have to tell you what severe ramifications this will have, not only for the soul of our country ... More >>

Lil' Keke's 11 Favorite Gangster Movies

Welcome back to Five Spot. Every Friday, we'll examine a recent bit of music news and, albeit sometimes awkwardly, tie it to a bit of Houston rap. We'll incorporate the number five in there somewhere. Send tips to introducingliston@gmail.com. ​As research for an upcoming music feature, we met up w ... More >>

Got Your Goat

We don't mean to sound paranoid, but: Did aliens abduct George Clooney's sense of humor?

The H-Town Countdown, No. 13: DJ Screw's 3 N' Tha Mornin' Pt. 2 (Blue)

Roughly 84,000 rap albums have been released in Houston since 1989. We're counting down the 25 best of all time every Thursday. Got a problem with the list? Shove it. Just kidding. Friendship. Email it to sheaserrano@gmail.com. DJ Screw 3 N' Da Mornin, Part 2 (Big Tyme Records, 1995)​While researc ... More >>

For National Boss Day: The Five Most Misundrestoor Bosses In The Movies

It's National Boss Day, because apparently getting more weeks of vacation, a higher salary, and an actual office with privacy isn't enough. You can be forgiven if it slipped your mind. After all, you were probably busy using the phone in your cramped, depressing cubicle to argue semi-publicly with ... More >>

Houston Music Fight Club: Brett Koshkin vs. Ceeplus Bad Knives, Late Nite Pie vs. Mai's, Nick Gaitan vs. ???

​This week brings three new bouts and a special announcement to all past winners and losers of our imaginary brawls on Houston Music Fight Club. Next Tuesday, Rocks Off is presenting David Fincher's Fight Club at our (mostly) weekly Movie Nite at the Mink. We would like all past winners and losers ... More >>

Mexicans in the Movies

Counting Sheep with 21

This flick doesn't hit the jackpot. Doesn't even come close.

Fred Claus

Vince Vaughn tries to attract a different set of underage babies with Fred Claus

Martian Child

Schmaltzy Martian Child attacks John Cusack, all dads

Way Out of Sync

Recycled Steel

You'll swear you've seen this Superman somewhere before

Grizzly Man

Redford grows old gracefully in An Unfinished Life

Splish Splash Thud

Kevin Spacey honors a man who did it all, and somehow nothing much happens

From Major to Minor

Why the best films of 2004 look like indies but aren't

Crash and Yearn

Howard Hughes gets what he wants, in this case a fun and loving biopic

Gale Farce

Kevin isn't the only thing Spacey in this overlong death penalty drama

Year of the Woman

The big-screen dames of cinema 2003 will keep you watching

Flesh for Fantasy

Dreamy Red Dragon completes the Hannibal boxed set

Pie Kids

How two American filmmakers made a very British Boy

Devil's Advocate

Audiences love Jerry Bruckheimer. Critics don't. Like he cares.

Blowin' Smoke

Ted Demme and Denis Leary are a match made in effin' heaven

Adjust the Contrast

Director can't juggle the contradictory tones of his ultraviolent action flick 15 Minutes

The Tired Gun

Or: Why winning an Oscar sometimes means losing sight of a career

Better in Pairs

Generally a letdown, the year in film offered some well-crafted works that are best viewed as double features

Special Delivery

With Cast Away, Robert Zemeckis unearths the part of Tom Hanks we've been hoping to find: His brittle humanity

Paid In Full

Sensitive, saccharine and practically messianic, Pay It Forward works like a charm

Write and Wrong

Chris McQuarrie won an Oscar for Usual Suspects, to which Hollywood responded, "Big deal"

The Play's (Not) the Thing

All the world's a stage in the toothless Big Kahuna

Bold Beauty

The hilarious and heartbreaking demise of a family

L.A. Pass

The Hollywood of Hurlyburly has moved on to better places

Fantastic Antics

A Bug's Life brings out the best of Pixar's new breed

Non-Negotiable

The Negotiator surrenders to a silly plot

Denatured Dixie

Police Brutality

The terrific L.A. Confidential captures our worst suspicions of how the world works

Cold-Blooded Sacrifice

Black, White and a Few Shades of Gray

A Time to Kill does John Grisham proud

The Year in Film

Though not great, 1995 still produced some movies worth seeing (and reseeing)

Vile and Viral