Online Film Critics Society

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 1/31/13] | Don Lewis @ Film Threat

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 1/17] | Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: You are right to suspect that the filmmakers used to make movie trailers. You’re also probably right to assume that, following the countless failings of this film, they probably will do so again soon.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Chris Barsanti @ Film Journal International
  • Excerpt: An eye-opening documentary about the hollow victories of Israel’s top anti-terror fighters, The Gatekeepers is a tart, complicated cocktail of a film sure to send audience members out of the theatre with heads abuzz and arguments a-popping.
• David Bax @ Battleship Pretension
  • Excerpt: That The Gatekeepers even exists is commendable enough on its own. But the sticky, compelling and frustrating result is even more stunning.
• Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
  • Excerpt: As a work of contemporary political history and moral philosophy, it’s essential viewing.
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: This brave documentary draws a line in the sand. One just wishes Moreh had asked these men what they were doing to change the situation now other than having changed their minds.
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Unprecedented and deeply unsettling, it offers little hope for a lasting peace in that war-torn region.
• MaryAnn Johanson @ Film4.com
  • Excerpt: Whatever you know – or think you know – about the Middle East and Israel’s role in its politics may well be challenged or even completely overturned…
• Marty Mapes @ Movie Habit
  • Excerpt: Director Dror Moreh doesn’t rest on his scoop
• Piers Marchant @ Sweet Smell of Success
  • Excerpt: Oscar-nommed doc runs the gamut of political ferver from hope to despair and back again.
• [New - 5/16] | Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
  • Excerpt: The questions that haunt this very haunting documentary are desperately basic ones: Do the things we do in the name of protecting our security work? Do they work on a moral level? Do they work on a practical level? Do they make things better? Or do they make things worse?
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: “The Gatekeepers” is an exceptionally well-crafted documentary that commands repeated viewings to fully absorb the enormous quantity and quality of editorial information it provides about one of the world’s most contentious ongoing political and human dilemmas. See it.
• Ron Wilkinson @ MonstersandCritics.com
  • Excerpt: An inside look into one of the most secretive and sophisticated intelligence apparatus in the world may not be what you expected.
• Amber Wilkinson @ Eye For Film

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 1/17] | Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: …an amusing cultural fish out of water look at how a big, likable, outgoing Black American basketball player fits into life in Shiraz in southwestern Iran. Then it becomes something more around the halfway mark…

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 1/17] | Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
  • Excerpt: One of the most grown-up animated features of the modern age.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 4/4] | Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
  • Excerpt: A meditative movie that turns into a call for compassion for all the animals exploited for entertainment in zoos, safari parks, and circuses.
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 1/3] | Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: Zeevi not only has found himself five incredible subjects, but he’s woven his film together so that their experiences and opinions are studies in contrasts and commonalities.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 1/3] | Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
  • Excerpt: One of the most philosophically and narratively complex films of the year.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 12/21] | Kathy Gibson @ Access Bollywood

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Billy Crystal delivers nostalgic, heartwarming fun for young children, parents and grandparents.
• MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: More akin to the tortures of the damned than the frothy yet tender holiday cinematic treat it thinks it is…
• Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix
• [New - 1/11] | Amir Siregar @ Flick Magazine [Indonesian]
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: A bland, predictable vehicle for what might have been the inspired pairing of Billy Crystal and Bette Midler–sitcom quality holiday fare.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 3/14] | Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: Worlds Away plays like a feature-length corporate advertisement or like a Broadway show consisting entirely of chorus dance numbers.
• Bill Clark @ FromTheBalcony.com
• Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
  • Excerpt: The magic of the legendary Cirque du Soleil, like the magic of a master illusionist, has to be seen live to experience the breathtaking impact of its phenomenal acrobatics.
• Marcio Sallem @ Em Cartaz [Portuguese]
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: Eye-catching without ultimately amounting to much more than a pleasant but innocuous diversion.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 5/16] | Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: Streisand and Rogen have decent chemistry together and better than you’d expect given the different circles they run in.
• Simon Brew @ Den Of Geek
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: …this one works because of the great pairing of Streisand and Rogen and the genuine warmth Streisand brings to the vehicle.
• Jim Dixon @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Road trip movies in recent years have tended to be deservedly R-rated comedies geared towards the young, post-adolescent audience. “The Guilt Trip,” by contrast, is so inoffensive you have the feeling they threw a few profanities in just to get the PG-13.
• Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
  • Excerpt: [A]n experiment in seeing how long a movie can present a series of awkward situations before the entire affair seems awkward in and of itself.
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Mildly funny – with the biggest laughs coming during improvisational banter in the ‘outtakes’ during the final credits.
• Oktay Ege Kozak @ Oregon Herald
• R. Kurt Osenlund @ Slant Magazine
• Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: …a not-so-funny, not-so-memorable comedy that gives us a refreshing, positive mother-son relationship, one we aren’t used to seeing portrayed.
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: All of the complimenting chemistry between Barbara Streisand and Seth Rogen — playing mother and son — can’t compensate for an lethargic comedy by screenwriter Dan Fogelman (“Crazy, Stupid, Love”). Barely a blip of an audience chuckles ever erupt.
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: Has the look and feel of an extended sitcom, and a mediocre one at that.
• Phil Villarreal @ Becauseitoldyouso.com
  • Excerpt: Yet there is no hope of escape, and that’s why the movie works so well. The mental and emotional torture Rogen endures translates to comic bliss. His sacrifice is filmdom’s gain.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Chris Barsanti @ Film Racket
  • Excerpt: a grandiose romance with deeply-buried secrets and soul-stirring declarations of love.
• Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
  • Excerpt: An enchanting romantic comedy set on the Italian Riviera where two middle-agers find their lives in turnaround.
• Stephen Carty @ Flix Capacitor
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: Everything is telegraphed, but that doesn’t mean receiving the message is a let down, largely due to Bier’s expert hand and her wonderful cast….Dyrholm’s luminous performance buoys the film.
• [New - 5/16] | Kate Erbland @ MSN Movies
• MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: What starts out as conventional dramedy becomes a charming, wise story about making the most of whatever life throws at you…
• Diego Salgado @ Fandigital [Spanish]

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Christopher Bourne @ Film-Forward
  • Excerpt: Opulently designed, this version re-creates 1930’s Shanghai in the golden tones and soft focus of old Hollywood glamour. Dangerous Liaisons is a diverting and beautifully designed film, and a well-acted piece of eye candy.
• [New - 2/7] | Peter Nellhaus @ Coffee Coffee and more Coffee
  • Excerpt: Most interesting to me is how flexible the essential story is for adaptation to film, both in when and where the story takes place.
• Jamie S. Rich @ DVD Talk
  • Excerpt: This Chinese appropriation of Dangerous Liaisons is a noble effort. It might even be seen as a really great one if there weren’t already better examples of how to adapt the classic French novel to cinema.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Beth Accomando @ KPBS Cinema Junkie
  • Excerpt: I know Quentin Tarantino has his detractors and that movies with any kind of violence are currently under fire but that said I hope “Django Unchained” will be appreciated for being a complex film delivered under the guise of simple pop entertainment.
• Marco Albanese @ Stanze di Cinema [Italian]
  • Excerpt: Inteso come secondo capitolo di una possibile trilogia di contro-storia, Django Unchained è un Tarantino d’annata, che piacerà ai suoi fans, perchè riesce a rinnovare ancora una volta i suoi punti di forza: violenza parossistica, lunghi dialoghi memorabili e feroce ironia.
• [New - 5/30] | Dragan Antulov @ Draxblog VI [Croatian]
• Rick Aragon @ Rick’s Cafe Texan
  • Excerpt: Out of curiosity I kept a count of the number of times a certain word was used…my tally was 112 times spoken, once written on a sign.
• Jason Bailey @ Flavorwire
  • Excerpt: What’s most remarkable about Django Unchained is how skillfully Tarantino navigates the shaky ground between muddy Western oater, blaxpoitation-style shoot-‘em-up, earnest love story, and honest-to-God socio-political commentary.
• Chris Barsanti @ Film Journal International
  • Excerpt: Brilliant comic turns from Christoph Waltz and Samuel L. Jackson help string together this audience-pleasing, highly uneven Quentin Tarantino spaghetti western/slave vengeance mash-up.
• Jason Bellamy @ The Cooler
  • Excerpt: It’s “lesser” Tarantino, and still one of the best of 2012.
• Matthew Blevins @ Nextprojection.com
• Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: Django is arresting cinema for most of its nearly three-hour runtime, Tarantino having impressive command of everything technical to complement his confident use of writing and actors. If only the director could have ended the film twenty minutes earlier than he does.
• Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
  • Excerpt: A lesser work by one of America’s most ebullient auteurs.
• Joshua Brunsting @ The CriterionCast
• Enrique Buchichio @ Cartelera.com.uy [Spanish]
  • Excerpt: Aún una película imperfecta de Tarantino es mucho mejor que el 90 por ciento de lo que se verá en cine este año, y probablemente el año que viene también.
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: This Spaghetti Western via Blaxploitation Mandingo revenge film is told in three acts, the first of which is easily the best – the bounty hunters aka ‘That’s a Black man riding a horse!’.
• Philip Concannon @ Phil on Film
• Edwin Davies @ A Mighty Fine Blog
  • Excerpt: It’s more John Shaft than John Wayne. It’s an angry, intelligent film about the great obscenity of American history dressed up as one of its most conservative genres, but which also happens to work as a great example of that genre.
• Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
  • Excerpt: …another revisionist take on history by Tarantino, one that finds the director losing the thread of the conversation he himself instigates.
• Jim Dixon @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Quentin Tarantino is certainly our most exuberant current auteur, and certainly no other director takes such extravagant delight in the least respectable subgenres of exploitation films. His latest feature, “Django Unchained,” an over-the-top celebration of both the spaghetti western and the Blaxploitation flick, is a very R-rated epic peppered with equal parts brutal violence and raucous, adolescent humor.“Django Unchained” is a wildly entertaining, high velocity theme park ride of a movie, which doesn’t stop to trouble itself over minor matters of taste or decorum.
• Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
  • Excerpt: [A] chronicle of a most reprehensible chapter in American history, seen through the amoral prism of the Spaghetti Western and drenched in blood and spit—but mostly blood.
• Candice Frederick @ Reel Talk
  • Excerpt: Much like his previous film Inglourious Basterds, with Django Unchained Tarantino treads the very thin line between pseudo drama and comedy with a film that eagerly takes as many risks as it pushes the boundaries of telling a story like this.
• Dustin Freeley @ Movies About Gladiators.com
• Panagiotis Gkaris @ Movies Ltd
  • Excerpt: Tarantino has come a long way since his only true classics, namely Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. He is a hipster god and a film persona to behold for he has always been fresh, juicy and creatively provocative. I feel these elements are pushed aside here in the name of a self -congratulating kill-‘em-all mannerism which will indoctrinate many new adherents but will lose some old true believers.
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Indulgent and excessive, it’s Tarantino at his bloody best.
• Vadym Grygoriev @ kinoblog.com [Ukrainian]
• MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: Quentin Tarantino spins a dark fantasia of the pre-Civil War South that is hilarious, ferocious, shocking, and wise, sometimes all at once.
• Oktay Ege Kozak @ Oregon Herald
• Benjamin Kramer @ The Voracious Filmgoer
• Josh Larsen @ LarsenOnFilm.com
  • Excerpt: Despite the way it functions as flashy entertainment, the weight of slavery can still be felt in Django Unchained.
• Donald Levit @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
• Mathieu Li-Goyette @ Panorama-cinéma [French]
• Wesley Lovell @ Cinema Sight
  • Excerpt: No one can glorify violence the way Tarantino can…and that’s a good thing.
• Marty Mapes @ Movie Habit
  • Excerpt: Countless great scenes in the Tarantino universe
• Marty Mapes @ Movie Habit
  • Excerpt: Countless great scenes in the Tarantino universe
• Piers Marchant @ Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
• Matthew McKernan @ FilmWhinge
  • Excerpt: Django Unchained is too long, too flippant and too childish. Rated 18, it is way beyond the demographic that would appreciate it most.
• Jason McKiernan @ Next Projection
  • Excerpt: Django Unchained is a masterpiece of awesomeness, birthed in that wacked-out brain of Quentin Tarantino’s and hurled at the screen with equal parts breathtaking beauty and unflinching severity, at once underscoring its repulsive origins and then its gleeful subversion of them.
• Brent McKnight @ Beyond Hollywood
• Ryan McNeil @ The Matinee
  • Excerpt: Tarantino returns with another piece of revisionist history. Can lightning strike in the same place twice?
• Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix
• Darren Mooney @ the m0vie blog
  • Excerpt: It’s not a Western, it’s a Southern. And it’s a good one.
• Jason Pirodsky @ Expats.cz
  • Excerpt: This Django flick represents Tarantino Unchained: it’s the director’s longest, most indulgent, and gratuitously violent film yet.
• Tiago Ramos @ Split Screen [Portuguese]
• Jamie S. Rich @ DVD Talk
• Jerry Roberts @ Armchair Cinema
  • Excerpt: Bloody and sometimes profane, but always fearless and inventive.
• Marcio Sallem @ Cinema com Crítica [Portuguese]
• Amir Siregar @ Flick Magazine [Indonesian]
• Amir Siregar @ Flick Magazine [Indonesian]
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: Campy, funny, shocking, and seeping with sardonic social commentary, “Django Unchained” is Quentin Tarantino’s finest film to date.
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: Though extremely long and ultra-violent, it leaves you neither exhausted nor repulsed, but exhilarated.
• Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
  • Excerpt: The first half of this movie boasts some of the most entertaining filmmaking of 2012 — or perhaps of any year.
• Phil Villarreal @ Becauseitoldyouso.com
  • Excerpt: Django may be unchained, but his movie could have used some tighter shackles.
• Ron Wilkinson @ MonstersandCritics.com
  • Excerpt: A fine example of unabashed bloodletting in the context of the two worst applications of capitalism in our history, bounty hunting and slavery.
• Andrew Wyatt @ Look / Listen (St. Louis Magazine)
  • Excerpt: Tarantino signals quite explicitly that Django Unchained is not aiming to present a historically accurate depiction of chattel slavery in the American South, but a Hero’s Journey where Django assumes the role of a dragon-slaying, maiden-rescuing Siegfried. It’s not Roots, but Wagner through the lens of Sergio Leone with a splash of James Brown funk.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Marco Albanese @ Stanze di Cinema [Italian]
  • Excerpt: Jackson, pur raccontando una storia apparentemente più semplice e lineare, la affronta con lo stesso spirito avventuroso e la guasconeria sfrontata e malinconica, che ne hanno fatto il degno erede di George Lucas.
• [New - 4/25] | Dragan Antulov @ Draxblog VI [Croatian]
• Rick Aragon @ Rick’s Cafe Texan
  • Excerpt: The first part of The Hobbit Trilogy, like the first Star Wars prequel, goes through a lot of material, takes a long time going through it, and ultimately ends up saying very little.
• Sean Axmaker @ MSN Movies
  • Excerpt: [Peter Jackson] directs the entire film with the same gravity and sense of peril as we experienced in “LOTR”… which seems like overkill to this smaller scale story.
• David Bax @ Battleship Pretnsion
  • Excerpt: In The Fellowship of the Ring, Wraiths and Orcs offered palpable danger and the undertaking of the film’s central mission was not a thing done lightly. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey has no stakes and, therefore, it lacks any reason good enough to make seeing it worthwhile.
• Steve Biodrowski @ Cinefantastique oNLIN
  • Excerpt: Unfortunately, instead of simply adapting J.R.R. Tolkien’s novel, Jackson has opted to use the story as a jumping off point for a convoluted prequel that threatens to do for Middle Earth what George Lucas’s STAR WARS prequels did for a galaxy far, far away.
• Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: It’s clearly a stretch for The Hobbit to fit the epic mold that Jackson and New Line Cinema have nearly three billion reasons to believe that moviegoers want.
• Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
  • Excerpt: Full of stuff… all the way up to a bloated 169-minute running time. But stuff is not exactly the same thing as having a rich and complicated plot.
• Enrique Buchichio @ Cartelera.com.uy [Spanish]
  • Excerpt: A pesar de los esfuerzo de Peter Jackson por revivir la magia de Tierra Media, la historia de El Hobbit es menos interesante y menos épica que la de El Señor de los Anillos, y probablemente no justifique una nueva trilogía.
• Daniel Carlson @ Pajiba
• Kevin Carr @ 7M Pictures
  • Excerpt: The action is solid, and the effects are awesome. With a decade of digital evolution since the last set of films, this is easily the best-looking Tolkien movie yet.
• Bob Cashill @ Popdose.com
  • Excerpt: There and back again with Peter Jackson.
• Bill Clark @ FromTheBalcony.com
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: …for the faithful. For everyone else, it will probably prove the same as any long journey, periods of discovery and excitement countered with long stretches of boredom.
• Jim Dixon @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” is long, and it is more of the same, but truth be told, that’s what the fans wanted. There may not be a lot of new ground broken here, but the journey back to Middle Earth does deliver what it promises.
• Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
  • Excerpt: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey … is clumsy where Tolkien’s book is streamlined — filling in the gaps where the novel is vague…
• Dustin Freeley @ Movies About Gladiators.com [French]
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Grandiose and visually spectacular, although the visual effects overwhelm the narrative.
• Steven D. Greydanus @ National Catholic Register
  • Excerpt: Almost all highlights and bombast, with little if any room for subtlety or poetry.
• Vadym Grygoriev @ kinoblog.com [Ukrainian]
• MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: More than a bit like slogging through overly completeist volumes of fan fiction, and that is going to bore more casual moviegoers, and also some serious fans.
• Oktay Ege Kozak @ Oregon Herald
• Benjamin Kramer @ The Voracious Filmgoer
• Josh Larsen @ LarsenOnFilm.com
  • Excerpt: …after seeing The Hobbit I couldn’t wait to see it again – projected at 24 frames per second and without 3-D.
• Matt Looker @ TheShiznit.co.uk
  • Excerpt: The Hobbit may be a different story to The Lord Of The Rings … but there is really nothing all that unexpected about this journey.
• Wesley Lovell @ Cinema Sight
  • Excerpt: Returning to Middle Earth is like returning to a favorite vacation retreat and with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the audience is quickly and easily transported back to the places that they fell in love with 11 years ago.
• Joe Lozito @ Big Picture Big Sound
  • Excerpt: Get ready for a more heated debate than any election season. Is Peter Jackson’s ambitious, overblown adaptation worth it, or is it a flagrant attempt to create a cash cow out of a children’s book? The answer is yes.
• Marty Mapes @ Movie Habit
  • Excerpt: Tolkein geeks rejoice
• Piers Marchant @ Sweet Smell of Success
  • Excerpt: Peter Jackson returns us to Middle Earth — but everything is depressingly the same.
• Jason McKiernan @ Next Projection
  • Excerpt: An Unexpected Journey begins to suffer from its overstretched material, resembling a less engaging Fellowship of the Ring until the most memorable portion of the material – the Gollum-Bilbo confrontation – kicks the film off in earnest and holds us in its grasp until the credits roll.
• Brent McKnight @ Beyond Hollywood
• Ryan McNeil @ The Matinee
  • Excerpt: Nine years after the king returned, Peter Jackson is taking us back to Middle Earth to show us how it all began. The question is, will the prologue measure up to the wonderful chapters we’ve already read?
• Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix
• Darren Mooney @ the m0vie blog
  • Excerpt: Worth a trip.
• Jason Pirodsky @ Expats.cz
  • Excerpt: I enjoyed The Hobbit just as much as – if not more than – the previous LOTR films, and appreciated the leisurely, easygoing pace.
• José M. Robado @ CineCritico [Spanish]
• Diego Salgado @ FanDigital [Spanish]
• Márcio Sallem @ Cinema com Crítica [Portuguese]
• Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: And by the way, couldn’t our heroes just ride Gandalf’s birds all the way to The Lonely Mountain? Ah, but that would result in fewer films, and think of the billions of dollars that would be lost.
• Amir Siregar @ Flick Magazine [Indonesian]
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: Peter Jackson has formally moved away from the artistic act of directing, and into the business of creating synthetic movie “product.”
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: The unhappy truth [is] that this return visit to Middle Earth is a bloated letdown.
• Phil Villarreal @ Becauseitoldyouso.com
  • Excerpt: Like that sad, bug-eyed creature, moviegoers may not have realized how much they missed movies like this onscreen in the past several years. Yet we now have our precious back in hand, and here’s to two more years of wild, sure-to-be-met expectations of supreme Tolkien mastery.
• Ed Whitfield @ The Ooh Tray
• Andrew Wyatt @ Look / Listen (St. Louis Magazine)
  • Excerpt: While the events of An Unexpected Journey take place against the backdrop of fallen kingdoms, whispered prophecies, and age-old racial enmities, its story lacks the apocalyptic, Wagnerian sweep of Rings. Jackson studs his vision of the The Hobbit with plenty of fantastical action set-pieces, but generally conveys a mood that is more homespun and cheeky.
• George Zervopoulos @ Movies Ltd [Greek]

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Dragan Antulov @ Draxblog VI [Croatian]
• [New - 5/30] | Rick Aragon @ Rick’s Cafe Texan
• Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: Don’t tell Tom Cruise that he’s 50. He’s still game for action hero mode, welcoming fights, stunts, and shirtless scenes.
• Patrick Bromley @ DVD Verdict
• Samuel Castro @ Ochoymedio.info [Spanish]
  • Excerpt: Tom Cruise demuestra que sigue siendo una estrella, al traernos la historia del justiciero solitario, sin más armas que su carisma y una excelente producción.
• Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
  • Excerpt: As the twisting and turning revelations unfold, the movie’s grasp of and focus on its titular character lessen.
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Exciting, escapist entertainment
• Vadym Grygoriev @ kinoblog.com [Ukrainian]
• MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: Like a midseason episode of a basic-cable detective show you’ve never heard of.
• Daniel Kelly @ eFilmCritic
• Danny King @ The King Bulletin
  • Excerpt: It’s quite agreeable to run into a film that really cares about the details of the investigation — a questionable bullet there, an odd bouquet of flowers there.
• Benjamin Kramer @ The Voracious Filmgoer
• Matt Looker @ TheShiznit.co.uk
  • Excerpt: The film does revel in the kind of eye-rolling cliché that always comes with this kind of man-on-a-mission territory, there is one important difference that makes up for all of it: it doesn’t take itself too seriously.
• Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix
• Darren Mooney @ the m0vie blog
  • Excerpt: Efficient.
• Jamie S. Rich @ DVD Talk
  • Excerpt: For Christmas, e-mail your father and tell him to go see “Jack Reacher”. He’ll thank you.
• Marcio Sallem @ Cinema com Crítica [Portuguese]
• Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Here’s a film that knows what it is and doesn’t try to be anything more.
• Amir Siregar @ Flick Magazine [Indonesian]
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: So long as you accept that the twain will never meet between the film and book versions of Jack Reacher, you should be able to enjoy each exclusively if not necessarily as a compliment to one another.
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: A clumsy collection of genre cliches…very dumb and surprisingly lethargic.
• Jean-François Vandeuren @ Panorama-cinema.com [French]

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Marco Albanese @ Stanze di Cinema [Italian]
  • Excerpt: La modestia assoluta del libretto e delle musiche e la mancanza di un’idea originale di messa in scena, conducono al noiosissimo naufragio un’operazione la cui inutilità era evidente sin dalle premesse.
• Marco Albanese @ Stanze di Cinema [Italian]
  • Excerpt: un melodramma del tutto indigesto, tronfio, appesantito da una serie infinita di primi piani di attori, che tentano faticosamente di evitare il ridicolo, mentre si porgono le battute, cantando a mezza voce
• [New - 5/30] | Dragan Antulov @ Draxblog VI [Croatian]
• Rick Aragon @ Rick’s Cafe Texan
  • Excerpt: I think the film version of Les Misérables is a straightforward, respectful, respectable, even reverential adaptation of the musical. That may be the problem.
• Sean Axmaker @ MSN Movies
  • Excerpt: I find the production elephantine and overwrought and Hooper’s direction simply a mess.
• Chris Barsanti @ Film Racket
• Jason Bellamy @ The Cooler
  • Excerpt: A musical review: “Hooper’s In the House”
• Tim Brayton @ Antagony & Ecstasy
  • Excerpt: It is unsubtle, but magnificently so.
• Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
  • Excerpt: Three cheers for a sentimental musical about forgiveness, freedom, and love that brings tears to our eyes in unison with others!
• Enrique Buchichio @ Cartelera.com.uy [Spanish]
  • Excerpt: Hay dos momentos que justifican toda la película, y ambos le pertenecen a Hugh Jackman y Anne Hathaway. El problema es que ambas escenas suceden en la primera media hora…
• Sarah D Bunting @ Tomato Nation
• Bob Cashill @ Popdose.com
  • Excerpt: A review of the new movie musical.
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: …one of the ugliest big budget awards season movies to date with framing that cuts off the top of young Cosette’s head, close ups so insistent the focus puller must have ulcers and a camera that moves in to the underside of Hathaway’s chin while Fantine lies dying.
• Edwin Davies @ A Mighty Fine Blog
  • Excerpt: It’s a big, brassy musical that flies its colours proudly, and which revels in its sheer exuberance.
• Tony Dayoub @ Cinema Viewfinder
  • Excerpt: I even pointed out to my wife the specific tear Hathaway sheds that will win her the Oscar just as it fell down her face.
• Jim Dixon @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Universal clearly wanted movie stars in this movie, and they have them. You get what you pay for. There’s star presence to spare, and the acting is excellent. The problem here is that “Les Misérables” is a musical, so singing counts, and this musical is almost entirely sung. Stars who could do justice to the songs would have been an asset.
• Jim Dixon @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Universal clearly wanted movie stars in this movie, and they have them. You get what you pay for. There’s star presence to spare, and the acting is excellent. The problem here is that “Les Misérables” is a musical, so singing counts, and this musical is almost entirely sung. Stars who could do justice to the songs would have been an asset.
• Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
  • Excerpt: This is an underwhelming adaptation, but the film is executed with a unique, admirable approach and, ultimately, is a solid — with reservations — arrangement.
• Candice Frederick @ Reel Talk
  • Excerpt: After countless adaptations of Victor Hugo’s nineteenth century politically charged tale, Les Misérables, Hollywood (by way of director Tom Hooper) has revamped the classic once more, giving it an uber glamorized look despite its dismal themes.
• Dustin Freeley @ Movies About Gladiators.com [French]
• Panagiotis Gkaris @ Movies Ltd
  • Excerpt: Is Les Misérables an oscar frontrunner? No way. A contender maybe? Yes, granted the Academy controlled love for Musicals. Is it recommendable entertainment? I am sure that it will most please the fans and alienate if not infuriate the others.
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Anguished, unrestrained, relentlessly amplified, it’s a uniquely overwhelming, even exhausting extravaganza.
• Vadym Grygoriev @ kinoblog.com [Ukrainian]
• Phil Hall @ Film Threat
• Roderick Heath @ This Island Rod
  • Excerpt: There’s no art here at all; there isn’t even the disturbing pleasure of excess or shamelessness for its own sake. ‘Les Misérables’ represents an absolute bastardisation of both cinema and the musical.
• MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: There’s an alchemy here that brings together the best of screen and the best of stage…
• Benjamin Kramer @ The Voracious Filmgoer
  • Excerpt: Less a great movie, more a movie in which you can find greatness, Les Misérables is never better than when its director can get out of his own way.
• Josh Larsen @ LarsenOnFilm.com
  • Excerpt: Hathaway’s tragic solo leaves an aftershock that shudders through the rest of the picture.
• Mathieu Li-Goyette @ Panorama-cinéma [French]
• Wesley Lovell @ Cinema Sight
  • Excerpt: Reminiscent of the great crowd-pleasing musicals of the 1950′s and 1960′s, Hooper’s story of a 19th century criminal seeking redemption takes the audience on a spectacular excursion into 19th Century Paris and the class warfare that has eerie similarities to conflicts in evidence today.
• Piers Marchant @ Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
• Mike McGranaghan @ The Aisle Seat
  • Excerpt: A lush, engaging take on the tale, filled with strong performances of both the musical and the dramatic variety.
• Matthew McKernan @ FilmWhinge
  • Excerpt: Les Misérables is a film that aims for greatness and every now and then that greatness does manage to seep through, yet the overall impression is of an unsubtle and cack handed emotional barrage in which many potentially moving scenes are either botched or overblown.
• Jason McKiernan @ Next Projection
  • Excerpt: Hooper’s interpretation of the material doesn’t jibe with expansive staging and choreography. It’s like he wants to be a revolutionary but still clings to tradition, and neither discipline is fully functional.
• Brent McKnight @ Beyond Hollywood
• Simon Miraudo @ Quickflix
• Darren Mooney @ the m0vie blog
  • Excerpt: Hooper’s a little out of tune with how to adapt from stage to screen…
• Paulo Peralta @ CinEuphoria [Portuguese]
• Jason Pirodsky @ Expats.cz
  • Excerpt: http://www.expats.cz/prague/article/film-cinema/les-miserables/
• Bev Questad @ It’s Just Movies
• Tiago Ramos @ Split Screen [Portuguese]
• Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
  • Excerpt: http://www.jonrichardsplace.com/jonrichardsplace.com/Les_Miserables.html
• Jerry Roberts @ Armchair Cinema
  • Excerpt: Tom Hooper creates entertaining adaptation of a musical that leaves subtlety smoldering in the dust. Is it full of grimness and death? You bet, but hey, it’s Les Misérables.
• Marcio Sallem @ Cinema com Critica [Portuguese]
• Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Is it a musical? Yes. Is it a long movie? Yes. But if either of those facts deter you from seeing Les Mis, it’s your loss.
• Norm Schrager @ Meet In the Lobby
  • Excerpt: Hooper’s faithful adaptation suffers its bumps and bruises throughout its sizable running time, but has a collection of stirring moments that overwhelm the pain.
• Amir Siregar @ Amir at the Movies [Indonesian]
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: Audiences new to Boubil & Schoenberg’s stage musical — based on Victor Hugo’s novel of historical fiction — may be surprised to discover the wooly narrative as compelling as they imagined it might be.
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: Tom Hooper’s opulent but bloated version of another insipid pop opera proves a lump of coal in moviegoers’ Christmas stockings.
• Phil Villarreal @ Becauseitoldyouso.com
  • Excerpt: While there’s some value in making a slavish adaptation of a near-universally beloved stage musical, sticking to all the trappings of the play is a sure path to making the film feel like a translation rather than a similarly inspired production.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 12/13] | Kenji Fujishima @ Slant Magazine

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Christopher Bourne @ Twitch
  • Excerpt: Dustin Hoffman, by discreetly staying out of the way of the great actors and actual singing stars and musicians he has assembled, has created a quietly touching and poignant tribute to the artists he has so lovingly put on display.
• Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat @ SpiritualityandPractice.com
  • Excerpt: A meditation on aging and the possibilities for transformation of four retired opera singers in a retirement community.
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: …American actor Dustin Hoffman’s feature directorial debut and although it aims for the same demographic [as "Best Exotic Marigold Hotel"] and has its own share of cliches, it’s a mite better than Madden’s film.
• [New - 1/24] | Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: This deliciously tart comedy revives the old Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland ‘let’s put on a show’ formula with great panache.
• [New - 1/24] | MaryAnn Johanson @ FlickFilosopher.com
  • Excerpt: A lovely film with heartfelt performances from a fantastic cast that focuses on the upsides of getting older…
• [New - 1/25] | Piers Marchant @ Sweet Smell of Success
  • Excerpt: Four notable British thespians perform as four notable British opera singers in Dustin Hoffman’s sweet little ensemble.
• Matthew McKernan @ FilmWhinge
  • Excerpt: Quartet tries to present the ‘modern’ elderly, who are open to rap and who swear profusely, though to a 12A standard, but there is none of reality’s complications in the film’s representation. In fact, for a film that lectures about acceptance, there is a lot of denial.
• Darren Mooney @ the m0vie blog
  • Excerpt: It’s not quite pitch perfect, but it hits a lot of the right notes…
• R. Kurt Osenlund @ Slant Magazine
• [New - 1/24] | Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
  • Excerpt: Quartet is not the fare you turn to for startling insights into the human condition. But it will take a hard heart indeed to resist the wonderful gala program to which the story builds, and the tried but true romance of reconciling lovers too long apart.
• [New - 1/25] | Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Cut from the same cloth as last year’s The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, Quartet is a film featuring a talented cast of senior” British actors, centering on the idea that there can still be enjoyment and excitement in life, even in one’s golden years.”
• [New - 1/25] | Norm Schrager @ Meet In the Lobby
  • Excerpt: For any bland flavor Quartet may leave lingering, these stars more than make up for it, easily providing the most sophisticated of tastes.
• Frank Swietek @ One Guy’s Opinion
  • Excerpt: Pretty thin stuff…a geriatric version of the old “let’s put on a show!” plot…but it’s been cannily cast for maximum effect, and Hoffman gives the actors plenty of room to do their thing.
• [New - 1/24] | Betty Jo Tucker @ ReelTalk Movie Reviews
  • Excerpt: Divatude becomes Maggie Smith, who definitely knows how to command the screen here.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• R. Kurt Osenlund @ Slant Magazine
• [New - 5/30] | Jamie S. Rich @ DVD Talk
  • Excerpt: Save the Date dresses up in the trappings of a romantic comedy but slowly sheds those clothes and reveals itself to be something more. Actually, at first, it appears to be a twee urban love story, the kind of precious indie effort that becomes overwhelmed by its own quirkiness.

Reviews for this film from our members:

• Luke Bonanno @ DVDizzy.com
  • Excerpt: Stand Up Guys might qualify as a pleasant surprise if it starred some unknown elderly actors, but with the likes of Al Pacino and Christopher Walken in the fray, it often disappoints. Even without high expectations, the movie’s erratic stumble through tones does not add up to the feel-good experience it’s clearly meant to.
• Daniel Carlson @ Pajiba.com
• [New - 6/13] | Samuel Castro @ Ochoymedio.info [Spanish]
  • Excerpt: Con gracia, la última jornada de unos asesinos veteranos que son en realidad actores inmensos
• Laura Clifford @ Reeling Reviews
  • Excerpt: Considering the cast there are moments to be sure (Pacino’s one note performance doesn’t offer any of them), and the film is a real calling card for young Addison Timlin (“Afterschool,” SHOtime’s ‘Californication’), luminous as Doc’s waitress granddaughter Alex, but for most of its running time, “Stand Up Guys” is positively enervating.
• Mark Dujsik @ Mark Reviews Movies
  • Excerpt: The movie is all over the place in terms of tone and only finds something resembling honesty when it drops the embarrassing shtick of crude comedy and lost-glory adventuring.
• Dustin Freeley @ Movies About Gladiators.com
• Susan Granger @ www.susangranger.com
  • Excerpt: Wobbly and contrived: given that cast, it could have and should have been so much better.
• Jason Pirodsky @ Expats.cz
  • Excerpt: Stand Up Guys is the kind of half-hearted, half-serious Tarantino-esque pulp that went out of style in the late 90s. It’s always a pleasure to see these guys in action, but this material is so weak it drains all the fun away.
• Jonathan Richards @ www.jonrichardsplace.com
  • Excerpt: Stand Up Guys delivers a tasty serving of entertainment, and a chance to watch three great old pros at work.
• Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Here’s a film that’s entertaining and thoughtful, starring three powerhouse actors performing right in their wheelhouses. It carries with it effective messages and life lessons with each character putting his own future on the line for the sake of family, trusting in the ideal that life is what we make of it…at any age.
• Amir Siregar @ Flick Magazine [Indonesian]
• Cole Smithey @ ColeSmithey.com
  • Excerpt: “Stand Up Guys” is a compact crime drama comedy about camaraderie among a specific generation of aging wiseguys

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 12/13] | Kathy Gibson @ Access Bollywood

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 12/7] | Mark Harris @ About.com

Reviews for this film from our members:

• [New - 12/7] | Tom Santilli @ Examiner.com
  • Excerpt: Though it’s a well-made and eye-opening film, as a Detroit-er, I also found myself feeling slightly agitated and frustrated while watching Burn. Another movie about how bad things are in Detroit?