Advanced Search >
Help Me Search

Movies

Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores

Wide Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Limited Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

58 (Untitled)
96 35 Shots of Rum
56 Adam
72 Adela
39 Adventures of Power
78 Afghan Star
61 After the Storm
66 Afterschool
xx All the Best
58 American Casino
72 Amreeka
48 Antichrist
73 Araya
62 Art & Copy
55 As Seen Through These Eyes
76 Baader Meinhof Complex, The
86 Beaches of Agnes, The
13 Beautiful Life, A
70 Beeswax
35 Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
71 Big Fan
66 Black Dynamite
51 Blind Date
xx Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly
76 Bliss
35 Blue Tooth Virgin, The
26 Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
57 Boys Are Back, The
45 Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
81 Bright Star
70 Bronson
45 Burning Plain, The
xx Carriers
55 Casi Divas
57 Chelsea on the Rocks
62 Cloud 9
65 Coco Before Chanel
69 Cold Souls
59 Collapse
44 Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha
82 Cove, The
75 Crude
82 Damned United, The
67 Departures
xx Dil Bole Hadippa
71 Disgrace
xx Do Knot Disturb
70 Earth Days
24 Eating Out 3: All You Can Eat
85 Education, An
55 Endgame
xx Eulogy for a Vampire
xx Everyone Else
xx Fatal Promises
56 Fifty Dead Men Walking
62 Five Minutes of Heaven
74 Flame & Citron
49 Food Beware: The French Organic Revolution
80 Food, Inc.
28 Free Style
xx From Mexico with Love
50 Fuel
25 Gentlemen Broncos
50 Give Me Your Hand
58 Gogol Bordello Non-Stop
72 Good Hair
89 Goodbye Solo
52 Grace
64 Harmony and Me
81 Headless Woman, The
xx Heretics, The
63 Horse Boy, The
73 House of the Devil, The
xx How to Seduce Difficult Women
74 Humpday
94 Hurt Locker, The
29 I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
16 If One Thing Matters: A Film About Wolfgang Tillmans
75 In Search of Beethoven
83 In the Loop
61 Intimate Enemies
42 Irene in Time
70 It Might Get Loud
46 Killing Kasztner
19 Labor Day
xx Laila's Birthday
41 Little Ashes
41 Little Traitor, The
66 Liverpool
34 Looking for Palladin
80 Lorna's Silence
83 Maid, The
xx Ministers, The
59 More Than a Game
67 Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, The
34 Motherhood
62 My One and Only
xx Mystery Team
48 New York, I Love You
73 Night and Day
66 No Impact Man
47 Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
34 Other Man, The
xx Painter Sam Francis, The
54 Paper Heart
xx Paradise
68 Paranormal Activity
68 Paris
44 Peter and Vandy
35 Play the Game
77 Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
xx Pretty Ugly People
65 Providence Effect, The
76 Rembrandt's J'accuse
69 September Issue, The
79 Serious Man, A
40 Shrink
61 Skin
77 Skin Too Few: The Days of Nick Drake, A
xx Skiptracers
46 Splinterheads
39 St. Trinian's
89 Still Walking
50 Stoning of Soraya M., The
55 Storm
65 Tetro
70 That Evening Sun
72 Thirst
xx Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (re-release)
61 Trucker
xx Turning Green
83 U2 3D
66 Unmade Beds
66 Unmistaken Child
70 Visual Acoustics
55 Walt & El Grupo
67 Way We Get By, The
69 We Live in Public
64 Wedding Song, The
64 Where is Where?
xx White on Rice
74 Woman in Berlin, A
69 World's Greatest Dad
70 Yes Men Fix the World
69 Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg
xx You, the Living

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Big Bad Love

EMAILPRINTIFC Films

Big Bad Love reviews
49
8.5 User Score:

Mixed or average reviews

Based on 24 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 4 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >

Movie Info

Genre(s): Drama

Written by: Jim Howard
Arliss Howard
Larry Brown (stories)

Directed by: Arliss Howard

Release Date:
Theatrical: February 22, 2002
DVD: September 24, 2002

Running Time: 111 minutes, Color

Origin: USA

Summary

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)

What The Critics Said

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...

80

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.

78

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.

Read Full Review >
75

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

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

Read Full Review >
75

Boston Globe Staff (Not credited)

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

75

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.

Read Full Review >
75

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

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

Read Full Review >
70

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.

Read Full Review >
70

New Times (L.A.) Bill Gallo

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

Read Full Review >
67

Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan

It's frustrating and still oddly likable.

Read Full Review >
60

Variety David Rooney

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

Read Full Review >
60

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.

Read Full Review >
58

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.

Read Full Review >
50

The New York Times Dana Stevens

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

Read Full Review >
50

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

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

Read Full Review >
50

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.

Read Full Review >
50

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.

Read Full Review >
50

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

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

Read Full Review >
50

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.

Read Full Review >
40

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.

Read Full Review >
40

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.

Read Full Review >
30

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

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

Read Full Review >
30

Village Voice Michael Atkinson

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

Read Full Review >
30

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

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

Read Full Review >
25

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.

What Our Users Said

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!

Popular on CBS sites: SEC Football | NFL | Video Game Cheats | iPhone | Video Game Reviews | Notebooks | Antivirus Software

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use