Code 46

Premiere Glenn Kenny

Provocative, quietly erotic, deeply romantic, and slyly witty (a cameo by a giant of punk rock is funny at first sight, and funnier still when you figure out the joke it's making), Code 46 is a very effective antidote to summer blockbuster bloat.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Cyberpunk meets renegade romance, à la Orwell.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Code 46 has a noirish fatalism that renders it a close cousin to ''Blade Runner,'' but Winterbottom's film, shot mostly in the light, uses the theme of memory erasure to peer into the eternal sunshine of tragically altered minds.

Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf

Astonishing, haunting and lyrical on its own terms.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

What is deeply stirring is Code 46's sound, light and texture. It's probably bad critical form to recommend a movie based largely on abstractions like "vibe," but Winterbottom does such a glorious job building his world that a certain breed of filmgoer can get punch-drunk lost in the pure cinema of it all.

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

Updates a classic premise -- the struggle for personal freedom -- by pairing it with ethical and moral quandaries.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Not always compellingly made, but intelligent and perhaps prophetic.

LA Weekly Scott Foundas

If the movie is finally something of a failure as a romance, it's rarely less than a triumph of soulful imagination.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

You may soon forget the specifics of the plot, but you'll always remember the world it came from.

Wall Street Journal Jim Fusilli

At times somber, and now and then dangerously close to self-important, Code 46 is nonetheless a smart, mature film that examines who and what we can be to each other, in a world full of invention and change.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Jason Anderson

It all contributes to a vision of the future that is as haunting as it is dispiriting.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The problem with Code 46 is that the movie, filled with ideas and imagination, is murky in its rules and intentions. I cannot say I understand the hows and whys of this future world, nor do I much care, since it's mostly a clever backdrop to a love affair that would easily teleport to many other genres.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

But for what is at heart a thriller, Code 46 lacks both energy and tension.

USA Today Claudia Puig

For at least half the movie, you need a code book a few inches thick to decipher Code 46.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Ultimately the sci-fi fillips — human cloning, memory wipes, empathy viruses — are subordinate to screenwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce's doomed romance.

The Hollywood Reporter Jean Oppenheimer

Code 46 lacks the visceral power of "28 Days Later," as well as what might be termed its "gross-out" appeal.

Variety David Stratton

An intriguing but only partly successful co-mingling of film noir and sci-fi.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Late in the day, Code 46 bursts its chemical chains to become a convincingly irrational love story.

Empire Genevieve Harrison

Cinematography, production design and music are all top-notch, but the film largely succeeds because of the leads -- two fine actors at the top of their game.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

What this dystopia doesn't do is shock. In truth, Code 46 traffics in notions of speculative social fiction that are so familiar by now as to feel disconcertingly normal.

Slate David Edelstein

It's about unruly passion, but it's icy and cerebral, and Robbins has become a disappointingly tentative actor, playing emotionally straitjacketed men in a self-imposed straitjacket.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

This film sounds better than it plays; there are too many echoes of "Alphaville" and of the dreamy drift of "Blade Runner." But the style of the opening and closing credits is pretty spiffy.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

Their doomy romance is supposed to be fated, but it just seems sloggy, certainly not the stuff of myth. A good comedy could be made from this same premise.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

What doesn't spark is the love story. Morton still seems soggy from her "Minority Report" role as a drenched pre-cog. Who wants romance in a future where glum is the word?

The New York Times Dana Stevens

The movie's atmosphere is, in many ways, more interesting than its story. Mr. Robbins and Ms. Morton are not the warmest actors. He can be mannered and smug, and she often seems to beam her performances from a strange, private mental universe.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

I won't spoil the ending, but if Code 46 is to be believed, women will have it even worse in the years to come.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Winterbottom, who's never been a director with a gift for warmth, can't make this romance come alive. Morton and Robbins are gifted actors, but they seem straitjacketed here, and the film finds it difficult to avoid tedium as their lugubrious relationship unfolds.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray

Though Robbins acts a little stiff, Morton remains stunning throughout, playing a mixture of her wide-eyed, deeply sensitive characters from "Morvern Callar" and "Minority Report." She suggests worlds within worlds.

Chicago Tribune Allison Benedikt

Too ambiguous, too meandering to envelop us. It's ambitious work but ultimately cold, distant and difficult to piece together.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

An intriguing, if seriously flawed, film noir.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Paula Nechak

This sci-fi film noir craves a passionate center, an intoxicating core or some pulse that makes us want to keep taking that first step into dark waters, but it leaves us drowning in its quiet tedium instead.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Code 46 is like "Solaris" without the psychological depth and strong acting. The movie is flat, boring, pointless, and nonsensical.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

Michael Winterbottom's Code 46 commits a Code 1 violation: It's boring.