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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
67
$9.99
75
24 City
66
Adoration
74
Afghan Star
48
Alien Trespass
56
American Violet
82
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
57
Away We Go
81
Beaches of Agnes, The
62
Big Man Japan
28
Big Shot-Caller, The
78
Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
55
Brothers Bloom, The
82
Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
xx
Call of the Wild
63
Cheri
62
Cherry Blossoms
63
Dead Snow
65
Departures
18
Downloading Nancy
58
Easy Virtue
70
End of the Line, The
77
Every Little Step
64
Examined Life
80
Food, Inc.
38
Gigantic
56
Girl from Monaco, The
67
Girlfriend Experience, The
87
Gomorrah
89
Goodbye Solo
63
Great Buck Howard, The
79
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
xx
Home
82
Hunger
91
Hurt Locker, The
16
I Hate Valentine's Day
81
Il Divo
54
Is Anybody There?
71
Jerichow
58
Julia
74
Lemon Tree
36
Life is Hot in Cracktown
40
Limits of Control, The
42
Little Ashes
64
Lymelife
50
Management
57
Merry Gentleman, The
66
Moon
35
New York
62
Not Forgotten
xx
Offshore
78
O'Horten
64
Outrage
40
Paris 36
54
Pontypool
71
Pressure Cooker
52
Quiet Chaos
83
Revanche
67
Rudo y Cursi
86
Seraphine
65
Sex Positive
70
Shall We Kiss?
77
Sin Nombre
59
Sleep Dealer
74
Song of Sparrows, The
54
Stoning of Soraya M., The
82
Sugar
84
Summer Hours
61
Sunshine Cleaning
28
Surveillance
42
Tennessee
63
Tetro
64
Throw Down Your Heart
80
Tokyo Sonata
63
Tokyo!
70
Tony Manero
74
Treeless Mountain
88
Tulpan
74
Two Lovers
83
Tyson
83
U2 3D
60
Under Our Skin
69
Unmistaken Child
69
Valentino: The Last Emperor
22
What Goes Up
45
Whatever Works
57
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
91
Hurt Locker, The
89
Goodbye Solo
88
Tulpan
87
Gomorrah
86
Seraphine
84
Summer Hours
83
U2 3D
83
Revanche
83
Tyson
82
Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
82
Sugar
82
Hunger
82
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
81
Il Divo
81
Beaches of Agnes, The
80
Food, Inc.
80
Tokyo Sonata
79
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
78
Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
78
O'Horten
77
Every Little Step
77
Sin Nombre
75
24 City
74
Treeless Mountain
74
Afghan Star
74
Two Lovers
74
Song of Sparrows, The
74
Lemon Tree
71
Pressure Cooker
71
Jerichow
70
Shall We Kiss?
70
Tony Manero
70
End of the Line, The
69
Valentino: The Last Emperor
69
Unmistaken Child
67
$9.99
67
Rudo y Cursi
67
Girlfriend Experience, The
66
Adoration
66
Moon
65
Sex Positive
65
Departures
64
Outrage
64
Examined Life
64
Throw Down Your Heart
64
Lymelife
63
Tokyo!
63
Cheri
63
Dead Snow
63
Tetro
63
Great Buck Howard, The
62
Cherry Blossoms
62
Big Man Japan
62
Not Forgotten
61
Sunshine Cleaning
60
Under Our Skin
59
Sleep Dealer
58
Julia
58
Easy Virtue
57
Away We Go
57
Merry Gentleman, The
57
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
56
Girl from Monaco, The
56
American Violet
55
Brothers Bloom, The
54
Is Anybody There?
54
Pontypool
54
Stoning of Soraya M., The
52
Quiet Chaos
50
Management
48
Alien Trespass
45
Whatever Works
42
Little Ashes
42
Tennessee
40
Limits of Control, The
40
Paris 36
38
Gigantic
36
Life is Hot in Cracktown
35
New York
28
Big Shot-Caller, The
28
Surveillance
22
What Goes Up
18
Downloading Nancy
16
I Hate Valentine's Day
xx
Call of the Wild
xx
Home
xx
Offshore
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Birthday Girl
Miramax Films
MPAA RATING: R for sexuality and language
Starring
Nicole Kidman,
Ben Chaplin,
Vincent Cassel,
Mathieu Kassovitz,
Stephen Mangan,
Alexander Armstrong,
Mark Gatiss,
and
Ben Miller
A thriller about a mild-mannered banker (Chaplin) who takes a chance on a Russian mail-order bride (Kidman) arranged via the internet. (Miramax Films)
| GENRE(S): |
Romance
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Jez Butterworth
Tom Butterworth
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Jez Butterworth
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: August 13, 2002
Video: August 13, 2002
Theatrical: February 1, 2002
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
93 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
UK |
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
Variety
Deborah Young
Charmingly setting aside glamour for a turn at pure acting, Nicole Kidman zings up the already zingy script of Birthday Girl.
80
Village Voice
Mark Holcomb
It may not be particularly innovative, but the film's crisp, unaffected style and air of gentle longing make it unexpectedly rewarding.
80
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Keith Phipps
Nicole Kidman -- continuing the string of remarkable performances that have followed "Eyes Wide Shut" -- finds plenty of fodder in the long-delayed Birthday Girl. A grimy thriller with a wicked streak of humor.
75
USA Today
Mike Clark
The actress may get an Oscar nomination for the wrong movie -- "Moulin Rouge" over "The Others" -- but it would be a double misfortune for audiences to overlook a performance that boosts its movie from moderate to memorable.
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Rick Groen
Rare is the movie that arrives without fanfare -- that sneaks between the cracks, pops up relatively unheralded on the big screen, and takes the viewer by delighted surprise. Well, check the moon for blue because Birthday Girl is just such a picture.
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
Black comedies are rare enough. Birthday Girl is a member of an even rarer species, the black romantic comedy.
75
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
It's a slight, old-fashioned B movie, the last thing you would expect from an actress coming off a breakout year, but it has a charm and freshness we don't see much these days.
70
Los Angeles Times
Kenneth Turan
Butterworth guides us through the world of chaos and romantic confusion he's created as if it's the most natural place in the world. After a while, we actually believe it is.
70
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Keep your eye on Kidman, whose kinky, kittenish performance turns unexpected emotional corners that pull you up short.
67
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
Still, it's worth checking out if only to see Kidman immolate everything else on screen through sheer sexy charisma. Tom who?
67
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Ellen A. Kim
The good news is that Kidman's the best thing in this rather subdued film: sexy, coy and even a bit funny. The bad news is that the movie itself is unlikely to register very long on anyone's radar.
67
Entertainment Weekly
Staff (Not Credited)
If British writer-director Jez Butterworth had let his sophomore picture get as dirty as Kidman's game recklessness invited -- she started this before ''Moulin Rouge'' and ''The Others'' -- he would have served up a tasty piece of cake.
63
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
The romantic comedy doesn't have much, but it has Kidman.
63
Boston Globe
Loren King
This bizarre, uneven comedy is notable mostly for the unsettling presence of Nicole Kidman in full, kinky, sex-kitten mode.
63
Chicago Tribune
Michael Wilmington
A paper-thin wish-fulfillment comedy about escaping small-town repressions and blasting conformity.
63
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
The movie runs out of steam before its finish, but she (Kidman) doesn't.
63
Miami Herald
Connie Ogle
Won't make you forget Kidman's better work, but it's not a film you long to excise from your memory.
60
TV Guide
Maitland McDonagh
Kidman accomplishes a remarkable feat of transformation, adopting not only an accent, but a slightly seedy, faintly feral demeanor that almost makes you forget her icy good looks and fashion model's figure.
60
Film Threat
Tim Merrill
Starts out as a first-rate chick movie and winds up a second-rate guy movie. But if this somehow proves to be a formula for the perfect date movie, then Kidman is even more brilliant than we thought.
50
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
Quickly devolves into a violent thriller that resolves itself in sadomasochistic romance.
50
New York Post
Lou Lumenick
Ultimately, Birthday Girl disintegrates into a fairly routine -- and brutal -- caper movie.
50
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
There is a curious problem with Birthday Girl, hard to put your finger on: The movie is kind of sour. It wants to be funny and a little nasty, it wants to surprise us and then console us, but what it mostly does is make us restless.
50
Baltimore Sun
Chris Kaltenbach
See it to be reminded (if you need further reminding) of this actress' remarkable range. Otherwise, take a pass.
40
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
This breathless demi-noir has so much bounce that we barely get any time to mull over the gaping holes in its moth-eaten plot. It is competent but extremely slight.
40
Salon.com
Charles Taylor
It's that sense of ardor that's missing from Ben Chaplin's performance in Birthday Girl.
40
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
There's nothing wrong with beguiling star turns, but I wish this one had been surrounded by more of a movie. Birthday Girl is a harmless trifle that makes 93 minutes go by as if they were hardly more than an hour and a half.
40
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
Uneven, not particularly inspired comic thriller.
30
LA Weekly
Manohla Dargis
Kidman, who speaks Russian for much of the movie, turns in a technically impeccable performance, but the movie gets far more out of her than she out of it.
30
Washington Post
Stephen Hunter
Between bad hair and tonal irregularity, the movie doesn't give you much to like.
30
New York Magazine
Peter Rainer
The film's Russians are all played by French and Australian actors. Too bad Butterworth didn't find a Russian to play the Brit. That would have made the inauthenticity complete.
20
Chicago Reader
Lisa Alspector
The most subtly revolting aspect of the movie is how it manages to exploit violence for cheap thrills, in part by equating submission with love.
10
New Times (L.A.)
Gregory Weinkauf
It's just that this clunky, inane vehicle sputters barely a few feet down its quaint English highway before you want to bid it "do zvidániya, dumb-ass!"
 The average user rating for this movie is 7.3 (out of 10) based on 6 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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