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
66 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.

Blood Simple: The Director's Cut

EMAILPRINTUSA Films

Blood Simple:  The Director's Cut reviews
81
9.1 User Score:

Movie Info

Genre(s): Suspense/Thriller

Written by: Ethan Coen
Joel Coen

Directed by: Joel Coen

Release Date:
Theatrical: July 7, 2000
DVD: September 18, 2001

Running Time: 97 minutes, Color

Origin: USA

Summary

RATING: R for violence and language

Starring John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya, and M. Emmet Walsh

The restored and re-edited director's cut of the Coen Brothers' 1984 crime thriller stars Hedaya as a jealous bar owner who hires a nefarious detective (Walsh) to kill his young wife (McDormand).

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...

100

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

If you are squeamish, here is the film to make you squeam.

Read Full Review >
100

New York Post Hannah Brown

It's like watching Alfred Hitchcock try to solve a Rubik's cube in a roadside diner.

100

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

All in all, Blood Simple looks better than ever.

Read Full Review >
100

Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan

Filled with wonderful performances, especially by Hedaya and Walsh, Blood Simple remains a tight, beautifully ugly, neo-noir classic.

100

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Savor their technique and the sizzling performances of Frances McDormand as an adulterous wife, Dan Hedaya as her vengeful husband and M. Emmet Walsh as a private detective from hell.

90

Washington Post Desson Thomson

I love the movie's originality, its sense of macabre humor, its resourcefulness, and the great Walsh, whose memorable narration kicks off the movie.

Read Full Review >
90

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

I love the unsettling details.

Read Full Review >
89

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

As good as it ever was, and improved slightly by hindsight, experience, and extra cash.

Read Full Review >
88

San Francisco Examiner Wesley Morris

It's the boys' most immediately gratifying movie: The goods are delivered in a hearse.

88

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

(The Coens have) never again achieved the one-two punch of Blood Simple and "Raising Arizona" - the first darkly cynical, the second light-headedly comical.

Read Full Review >
88

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

This is not an inspirational drama about finding yourself; it's a Hitchcockian comedy about adultery, murder and losing a corpse.

80

Los Angeles Times Chris Barton

Don't miss this opportunity to see a film that many believe started the renaissance of indie films as it was intended to be shown.

80

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Boldly facetious and monstrously clever.

Read Full Review >
80

TV Guide Editor

The Coens' concern isn't emotional intensity but bravura camera moves and chic lighting of cinematographer Barry Sonnenfeld.

Read Full Review >
75

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Clever as it is, Blood Simple is derivative and self-consciously stylized.

Read Full Review >
75

Baltimore Sun Ann Hornaday

Grisly, stylish and often weirdly funny, Blood Simple is a reminder of how rarely an original artistic sensibility is announced to the world and how much better movies are when that sensibility is allowed to keep going its own way.

75

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

If you can handle its horror-comic grotesquerie, you'll find an enormous amount of cinematic imagination at work.

Read Full Review >
70

Film.com Ernest Hardy

All these years later, the film is far more infuriating than it is exciting.

Read Full Review >
63

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

It is an exploitation picture disguised as a hipster comedy.

60

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Remains mired in a smart-alecky film-school sensibility.

Read Full Review >
50

LA Weekly Manohla Dargis

On viewing, the cuts seem negligible, but what is new and clearly improved is the sound, which now booms with each door slam and gunshot.

Read Full Review >
50

Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf

Revelatory and disappointing.

Read Full Review >

What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 9.1 (out of 10) based on 10 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Bill C gave it a7:
A movie that doesn't follow a set pattern and you never know what is next. Bravo!

J. Ryan G. gave it a9:
Like "Fargo" and "Raising Arizona," and unlike just about every other deliriously overrated Coen movie, this one is stripped down to its twisted soul. It exposes people who are at their worst regardless of the place or time of day - and aren't there so many of them walking the earth! One can see from this early film that the Coens had Orson Wellesian potential, though it was only seen again (and fully realized) in "Fargo."

Cameron S. gave it a 10:
Beautiful in the most unconventional way, "Blood Simple" is one of two odes the Coen's do - film noir. Every silhouette is atmospheric, and the all events unfold with all due interest like an engaging pulp novel, with the characters in situations that they know how they got into but have no idea how to get out.

Pat C. gave it an 8:
Vintage Coen. Their style is too quirky and volatile to manufacture a reliable product. They go too far into themselves in their creative process to step back and evaluate their ongoing work. Good thing I'm here. Fargo & Raising Arizona were superior efforts. You can see their better influences in this early work. Definitely not for all tastes, but I say Go with it.

Yoon C. gave it a 7:
An indie movie that showed alot of promise and cleverness, and for better or worse, anticipated both the talent and shortcomings of the Coen Brothers in their successive films. It's at its best with the oddball private detective around and mostly rudimentary regurgitation of noir coventions with the other three principals.

Rick J. G. gave it a 10:
There must have been at least a decade time gap between my viewing of the original and the director's cut, so I have no idea what is different about the two versions. My impression of this great movie was not changed in the least by this version of it. One of the great American movies.

Beau F. gave it a 10:
I never saw the original version, but the Director's Cut is incredibly good. M. Emmet Walsh as you've never seen him!

Read more user comments >

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