City by the Sea

LA Weekly Chuck Wilson

For the first time in years, De Niro digs deep emotionally, perhaps because he's been stirred by the powerful work of his co-stars, including a subtle Frances McDormand and a ferocious Patti LuPone, as well as the heartbreaking (and achingly beautiful) Franco.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Moves along with a quietude, a scruffy direct plainness that has long gone out of style.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Not an extraordinary movie. In its workmanship it aspires not to be remarkable but to be well made, dependable, moving us because of the hurt in the hero's eyes.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Against the backdrop represented by stark images of abandoned buildings and lost dreams, the tale that is City by the Sea emerges, with the power of the visual cues giving this film its forcefulness.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

It's so bleak that it would play like a contrived neo-noir if it weren't so consistent, committed and obviously sincere.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Calls on De Niro to drum up the sort of emotional intensity that's been allowed to atrophy of late. City By The Sea isn't always worthy of him, but it makes enough demands to bring out his best.

New Times (L.A.) Luke Y. Thompson

We so often hear the lament that Hollywood films don't have characters we can care about that it's a real pleasure to note that all the people in this one feel fully developed. It'd be nice if there were more of a plot to go along with them.

Variety Robert Koehler

De Niro's reunion with helmer Michael Caton-Jones doesn't stoke the same fire as their previous pere-fils drama, "This Boy's Life," partly because De Niro's latest portrayal of a troubled cop feels so familiar.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

For some reason, the emotional payoff of the film -- the healing of a dysfunctional family -- doesn't quite come off. Possibly this is because Franco doesn't generate the necessary sympathy or father-son chemistry with De Niro, possibly because it's just not in the script.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Of course, bad writing can undo the best actor. If you doubt that, check out De Niro's soliloquy at the film's climax. He's acting the heck out of the words, but they're still dragging him down with them.

Boston Globe Sam Allis

The movie will be remembered primarily for the huge, emerging talent of James Franco, who plays De Niro's troubled son.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

As a character study, City by the Sea is engaging. As a police thriller, it's not all there.

USA Today Claudia Puig

It's a run-of-the-mill cop thriller but also a gripping family drama. It is in the moments spent untangling the threads of troubled relationships that the movie is at its best.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

A great cast can't quite pull City by the Sea out of the drink.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Takes a fascinating true story and turns it into a conventional cop thriller, hoking up the provocative three-generation saga of the LaMarca family.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

Suffers from dialogue that often sounds like convenient exposition as well as from a climax that feels too pat and prosaic. But the film is peppered with small, explosive scenes that have a refreshing complexity.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

The cast and the direction are too good, in the end, for the rather desultory place the movie ends up.

Wall Street Journal Collin Levey

Notwithstanding a thin script and a color-by-numbers ending, the movie is redeemed by its solid performances.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

A murky, vaguely fact-based melodrama that quickly sinks into the same swamp as such recent De Niro mistakes as "15 Minutes" and "Showtime."

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

The changes are meant to make it easier for audiences to accept Vincent's loyalty to Angelo and Joey, but they blunt the genetic mystery that made McAlary's story so compelling in the first place.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Shot in gloomy shades of gray, this earnest but banal story about the legacy of bad parenting strands fine actors in a contrived situation and lets them squirm.

Film Threat Michael Dequina

The saccharine conclusion would be problematic in any film, but given how much talent is involved, it's especially disappointing here.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Has trouble seeming real. Its back story, involving the sins of Detective LaMarca's own father, feels contrived and the eventual resolution is simultaneously shaky and too pat.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Frances McDormand and Patti LuPone are solid as his girlfriend and ex-wife, respectively, and James Franco is just right as his wayward son. They're a talented team. Too bad the movie doesn't live up to their abilities.

Slate David Edelstein

That City by the Sea isn't laughed off the screen is testament to Caton-Jones' attention to actors and to some tightly written scenes.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

Stumbles from restrained, fine-edged realism into blunt and muddy melodrama.

Austin Chronicle Steve Davis

The biggest shame in this movie is how it wastes Frances McDormand.

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

Robert De Niro and Frances McDormand almost rescue this lifeless, clichéd cop drama! Close isn't good enough!

Village Voice Mark Holcomb

There's nothing wrong with a little creative license, but the abundance of self-serving fabrication in City by the Sea not only diminishes LaMarca's experience and cheapens McAlary's work, it all but desecrates the memory of the real murder victim.

The New Yorker David Denby

After the complex buildup of tensions, the last ten minutes of the movie are a comic-pathetic letdown: the subdued acting and the trash-strewn street scenes lead to nothing more striking than the kind of overexplicit clichés heard in mediocre TV dramas. Even De Niro's discipline and skill can't save lines that should never have been spoken in the first place. [9 September 2002, p.162]

Chicago Reader Fred Camper

De Niro sinks this crime drama with his vacant, inattentive performance as an affectionally challenged homicide detective.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

The role plays all too easily into De Niro's worst current habits. He's dulled himself out in the service of a phony kitchen-sink pseudo-realism. For De Niro, less has become less.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The true story of the LaMarcas, well told by the late Mike McAlary in Esquire, has been pounded into TV-crime mush by screenwriter Ken Hixon and director Michael Caton-Jones. Shockingly, the acting doesn't help.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Yields the same sort of archetype and the usual results: De Niro's workmanlike in a dismayingly familiar role.