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Big Bad Love
IFC Films


8.5

based on 24 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 4 votes
Read user comments
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MPAA RATING: R for language and some sexuality

Starring Arliss Howard, Debra Winger, Paul Le Mat, Rosanna Arquette, Angie Dickinson, Michael Parks, Alex Van, and Zachary Moody

Based on the acclaimed short-story collection by celebrated Mississippi writer Larry Brown, Big Bad Love is a tale of Viet Nam veteran Barlow (Howard) struggling to make fiction from his past, his dreams, and the dim sound of the future bearing down on him. (IFC Films)

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Jim Howard Arliss Howard Larry Brown (stories)
DIRECTED BY:	Arliss Howard
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: September 24, 2002 Video: September 24, 2002 Theatrical: February 22, 2002
RUNNING TIME:	111 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

Brave and admirable for the trust that it puts in a viewer's intuition and willingness in going along with it right through to its rewarding finish.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

One glance at the cast should be enough of a recommendation for any film lover -- it's Winger's first time on the screen in seven years, and Howard deserves a nod or two if only for getting his wife back in front of the camera where she so clearly belongs.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Too long (and it sure ain't taut), but it brims with passion.

Boston Globe Staff (Not credited)

It's messy, but in the end satisfying, a film worth making, a journey worth taking.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

There's a sass and bite to Winger's acting, a grinning intelligence, unabashed sexiness and total immersion that make her one of the movies' few hipster female stars.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

It's an impressive movie, pointing to Howard as a promising new director.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

It's made with an accurate and loving, but also wary and squinty-eyed, view of the South. If only the movie hung together better overall.

New Times (L.A.) Bill Gallo

Constantly touching, surprisingly funny, semi-surrealist exploration of the creative act.

Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan

It's frustrating and still oddly likable.

Variety David Rooney

A flawed and overlong but ultimately affecting account of one man's struggle to regain control of his life.

LA Weekly Manohla Dargis

Held together by the blues -- Brown's prose and Howard's performance, Big Bad Love is a mess, but it's a sincere mess, beautifully shot by Paul Ryan and faithfully adapted by screenwriter James Howard.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Howard luxuriates in writerly misery as Barlow, and the participation of the filmmaker's real-life wife, Debra Winger, as Barlow's ex gives the scenes between the two of them an unfakeable erotic charge.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

Beneath its stylistic and structural quirks, Big Bad Love -- is a self-indulgent celebration of self-indulgence.

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

Brown, is a good enough actor and director to keep the film afloat for long stretches.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Has a secret weapon in Winger, whose part is small but crucial. Looking a bit older and with redder hair than previously, she brings an earthiness to a movie that could use a lot more of that quality.

TV Guide Ken Fox

The film's few saving graces include Dickinson's sardonic southern belle; Winger's welcome return to the screen after a five-year absence; and Howard's voice-over readings of Brown's powerful prose, which ultimately saves the film from itself.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

The cast is so oddly interesting you wish you could see them doing something less wasteful

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

It all comes down to whether you can tolerate Leon Barlow. I can't. Big Bad Love can, and is filled with characters who love and accept him, even though he is a full-time, gold-plated pain in the can.

Slate David Edelstein

I don't know if Howard had fun directing, writing, and starring in this thing; but he had to have gotten more masochistic pleasure out of it than the audience does.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Howard lacks the sense of film rhythm --required to make such an exercise work. Just about the only clear triumph here is an underplayed performance by Angie Dickinson, though Winger and Rosanna Arquette also provide welcome relief from Howard and Le Mat's self-indulgent carousing.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

The junk-shop surrealism ultimately gets the better of everyone's good intentions.

Village Voice Michael Atkinson

Brown's saga, like many before his, makes for snappy prose but a stumblebum of a movie.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

The only reason to check out Big Bad Love is Debra Winger, last seen onscreen in 1995.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

If the point of this umpteenth posttraumatic stress drama is that war is hell, even years after it's over and you're sitting in a movie theater, Big Bad Love makes it.

The average user rating for this movie is 8.5 (out of 10) based on 4 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Brad S. gave it a9:
This is a movie I can't stop coming back to. It's passionate and poetic - a gem that slipped through the cracks. Big Bad Love is a work of art as much as a movie whcih critics just didin't get.

Joe T. gave it an 8:
Whether or not you'll like this movie depends largely on how well you like the protagonist. For those of us with hopeless cause friends or family we can't give up on, Leon really rings true. If you identify with Leon you won't find the film long -- you'll be wishing it didn't end.

David P. gave it a 9:
I know writers, alcoholics mothers, women and the south; this movie is not a fantasy. It is largely based on Larry Brown's story "92 Days" (which I believe he dedicated to "Buk", Charles Bukowski, another alcoholic writer). And regardless of what the critics may say, I loved this movie and highly reciommend it!

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Big Bad Love IFC Films

Big Bad Love
IFC Films