Closer

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

They are all so very articulate, which is refreshing in a time when literate and evocative speech has been devalued in the movies.

Time Richard Corliss

Funny, hurtful, splendidly acted.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Closer is an un-love story as honest and naked as Cupid in the devil's dock, the whole truth, and nothing but.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

From Marber's fiercely polished writing, Nichols wrings every drop of acid, yet it's a show of the director's goodness that a movie fundamentally preoccupied with interpersonal ugliness is allowed to end on a convincing note of beauty.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Mike Nichols' haunting, hypnotic Closer vibrates with eroticism, bruising laughs and dynamite performances from four attractive actors doing decidedly unattractive things.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Few directors are more adept at playing with all this anguish and exhilaration than Mike Nichols.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

This is most definitely NOT a date movie. But if you appreciate films that are more substance than style, that take challenges and don't follow formulas, and that feature Oscar-caliber performances, Closer is not to be missed.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

If you're the sort of person who laughs at funerals, train wrecks, earnest political documentaries and stories about the rape of nature, you'll love Closer.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

An intelligently written, well-acted, and thoughtful film about adult relationships. I’m surprised it came out of Hollywood.

Empire Kim Newman

It’s almost as structurally daring as "Memento," demanding that the audience fills in the gaps.

Dallas Observer Bill Gallo

Full of intellectual stimulation as well as low, dark pleasures--"Carnal Knowledge" redux!

Newsweek Sean Smith

Here's a surprise: of the four actors in Closer, Clive Owen is the least famous, but he delivers the most memorable performance.

New York Magazine Ken Tucker

Closer is marred by some drippy music courtesy of Damien Rice and a small-surprise ending that feels like gimmicky irony. But the film's core idea is compelling.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Dramatically leaps through time, covering months or sometimes years in the span of a single cut. The effect is jarring and exhilarating, but it also bucks the common idea that relationships deepen over time.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

Most of the dialogue is pretty fresh, and it’s delivered with great brio, particularly by Owen. Roberts, alas, is not at her best here, but she has almost nothing to work with.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Closer, in the end, lacks a certain heft. The language and the actions of the characters are brutal and devastating. The movie itself, a little too nice.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

It's too emotionally honest and psychologically dense for its own good. It's a movie that demands more than one viewing to absorb all its ideas and feelings.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

An impeccably acted and directed - but quite icy - portrait of deception and betrayal.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Despite Marber's sardonic wit and Nichols's intelligent direction, the film winds up in the ironic position of practising exactly what it preaches: Closer invites and even gains our intimacy, only to finish by driving us ever farther away.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Overall, Owen and Law are more nuanced than Roberts and Portman, but Portman's dewy youth is 90 percent of Alice (the remaining 10 is an eleventh-hour twist), and Nichols uses the unkindly costumed Roberts so skillfully that her performance looks like a revelation.

Village Voice Dennis Lim

Closer casts a smugly amused eye on the human capacity for betrayal. But because it also seeks to congratulate its audience for its urbane unshockability, it never strays beyond the limits of middlebrow complacency.

Variety Todd McCarthy

The caustic wit and brute force of Patrick Marber's acclaimed play come across with a softened edge in Mike Nichols' bigscreen version of Closer.

The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann

The finish is so asymmetrical that it, too, seems a comment on the kind of film this might once have been.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

The last thing Marber's quartet of modern miserables needs is to be admired; they are the very worst of average people, but on screen they have become the very best of the baddest.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

It's in its aspiration to depict deceit and obsession, selfishness and recklessness, bitterness, revenge and fury that the film's power lies. There and in Clive Owen's sure and powerful hands.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

While its execution is fine, the movie is almost shockingly vapid.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Offers a bleak though thought-provoking take on relationships. The challenge for the viewer is in caring enough to become invested in characters who seem hellbent on hurting one another.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

It's the most claustrophobic, airless movie of the year, a menage a quatre among unstable, manipulative, needy people who prey on each other like sharks at a feeding frenzy of the emotions.

Slate David Edelstein

Closer is in the same arena as Labute, and I found it sour and airless, with the feel of a mathematical proof. The acting is superb, though, with one key exception. Jude Law.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Despite involved acting and Nichols' impeccable professionalism as a director, the end result is, to quote one of the characters, "a bunch of sad strangers photographed beautifully."

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

The actors are brilliant, the dialogue extremely clever, and the direction assured. But by the end I couldn't have cared less about any of the characters.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

Unlike most movie love stories, Closer does have the virtue of unpredictability. The problem is that, while parts are provocative and forceful, the film as a whole collapses into a welter of misplaced intensity.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

The Nichols of 1971 was bold and speedy, keeping pace with Jack Nicholson's contempt, whereas the more civilized Nichols of 2004 seems a beat behind the lines, waiting for peace or charity to break out. They never do.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

Strip away the cavernous lofts, the minimalist art galleries and the pricey consulting rooms, and you have four characters unable to earn their keep with the audience.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

One of the most pessimistic movies about love Hollywood has ever made, a star-studded, glossy anti-date movie.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Determined to be faithful to the strong, often shocking language and in-your-face drama in Marber's mannered writing, Nichols and his actors find no way to lift Closer into a realm that enlightens.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

So bloodless that it feels like an act of arty dishonesty.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Despite four very strong performances, Closer is hard emotional work to sit through. It's impossible to empathize with either the viciously insecure Larry or the unscrupulous, childlike Dan.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Whenever Roberts is onscreen, Closer freezes and starts to atrophy. And when she's off, tender shoots of life begin to sprout.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

The word "yuppie" has fallen out of favor from overuse, but Closer's young urban professionals are so vain and superficial they may bring it back as the ultimate putdown. This movie is a yuppie nightmare.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

Bring Zoloft and a tank of oxygen to Closer, an airless, ultimately joyless drama of sexual politics.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Everything is tearful confessions, angry interrogations and breakups. But there's nothing underneath.