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Confessions of a Dangerous Mind

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 33 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 16 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama
Written by:
Charlie Kaufman
Chuck Barris (book)
Directed by: George Clooney
Release Date:
Theatrical: December 31, 2002
DVD: September 9, 2003
Running Time: 113 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: R for language, sexual content and violence
Starring Sam Rockwell, Linda Tomassone, Drew Barrymore, George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Rutger Hauer, Fred Savage, and Matt Damon
Television made him famous, but his biggest hits happened off screen. This is the story of the double life of legendary showman Chuck Barris -- television producer by day, CIA assassin by night. (Miramax)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Good Night, and Good Luck
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
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...
Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
It's a funny, strange, sad and wonderful picture, packed with delightful performances by Hollywood stars and made by a director with a startling facility for the form and an expansive cinematic imagination.
Read Full Review >Dallas Observer Bill Gallo
A fascinating, frequently hilarious meditation on delusion, self-loathing and personal salesmanship
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
A darkly enjoyable roller-coaster ride -- Clooney and Kaufman deftly interweave the macabre with lightheartedness.
Read Full Review >New York Post Lou Lumenick
A head-clearing, mind-blowing blast from the past - one of the year's best.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
Screenwriter Kaufman is in fine meta-fettle here, even if he's still losing control of his material toward the end, and while it's too soon to tell whether Clooney has the stuff of a great director, he certainly knows who to hire.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
As for myself, I think he made it all up and never killed anybody. Having been involved in a weekly television show myself, I know for a melancholy fact that there is just not enough time between tapings to fly off to Helsinki and kill for my government.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
The fascination of Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, the sharp, funny, unreasonably compelling adaptation of Barris' autobiography, is the way it soft-shoes past our skepticism.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Michael Atkinson
Confessions keeps its cards close, and Kaufman is perfectly capable of starving his screenplay to save it, and perfectly happy with being misunderstood.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Stephen Hunter
A picture that is surely one of the oddest ever made.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Mark Caro
Reflects the sensibilities of its director, whose comedic performances in particular have indicated a game spirit and droll sense of humor.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
A perversely enjoyable entry in that new genre, the biopic of the tawdry TV personality.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone Peter Travers
Clooney fashions a style all his own: visceral, vital and churning with off-the-wall ideas. That's what makes you want to see Clooney direct again. You can feel his joy in it.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
Clooney shows strong filmmaking imagination in his directorial debut, but the movie's driving force is Charlie Kaufman's screenplay, a genre-bending romp that blurs all boundaries between the factual and the fantastical.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
This fairy-tale quality gives director Clooney, who's making his debut behind the camera, his stylistic clue. He's in perfect sync with writer Kaufman; they treat even the most "serious" scenes like Monty Python routines.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
All about the wacky borderlands where reality and invention intersect. But there are no safe demarcations -- no demilitarized zone, no Berlin Wall -- to cue us to which side we're operating in, or that Barris is operating in.
Read Full Review >USA Today Claudia Puig
May not be a straightforward bio, nor does it offer much in the way of Barris' motivations, but the film is an oddly fascinating depiction of an architect of pop culture.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy
An attractive, charming film that has fun with its period settings, its goofy plot and its off-kilter performances.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
A moody picture that's filled from start to finish with camera tricks, unexpected angles and innovative flourishes.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
Even though he's strikingly played by Rockwell, Barris comes off as such a distasteful character and the silliness is so unrelenting that the movie wears you out. Long before it's over, you feel yourself reaching for that gong clapper.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
A great, bizarre, and ultimately very, very unique film.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
It's nice to see Clooney choosing something offbeat (as opposed to "safe") for his first outing behind the camera. If he continues to develop, he has the potential to become a good director -- he's just not there yet.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly John Powers
Ultimately just another celebrity bio-pic, and far less trenchant than, say, the more conventional "Auto Focus." For all their whirring ingenuity, Kaufman's scripts require a director who will tether his cleverness to reality.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine Peter Rainer
Sam Rockwell plays Barris with a hipsters shimmy thats creepily effective -- The problem with making a movie about a hollow man is that, when things start to get heavy, youre stuck with nothingness at the core.
Read Full Review >Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
The finished film afflicted my own mind with an unwilling suspension of belief. I couldn't connect with it on any level, despite Sam Rockwell's terrific performance as an emotional desperado who wants only to be loved.
The New York Times A.O. Scott
A good piece of work more often than not, and this is one of the few times an actor turned director has chosen to subvert the feel-good genre for his maiden voyage.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
Clooney badly botches the spy plot by casting himself as Barris's agency contact... and a truly awful Julia Roberts as Barris's Mata Hari lover (she's soundly upstaged by Drew Barrymore as his devoted girlfriend). Yet the mounting delirium drives home Kaufman's basic point: that a shadow government rules by bread and circuses.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
I suppose it's too much to expect Pirandellian stature from the madness of Chuck Barris -- but that's about the only thing that would have made this mixed-up ego trip work.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Darrin Keene
The ingredients were there for Confessions of a Dangerous Mind to become a cult classic, but the resulting film is a tedious Hollywood yawner.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
You won't believe the story director George Clooney and his goofball TV host are trying to sell. Really.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
For the story of a man who made his mark on pop culture by being a likable buffoon, the irritatingly arch Confessions of a Dangerous Mind takes itself way too seriously.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
George Clooney's first effort behind the camera was doubtless more stimulating to direct than it will be for audiences to watch.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 8.6 (out of 10) based on 16 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
tony b. gave it a9:
There's just something about this movie that i love. Just the way everything was put together like the scene when he goes crazy and they start playing the song if i had a hammer I cant get that scene out of my head. very creative movie great acting great writing and i love the music.
natalie e. gave it a10:
This is the best film I have seen in a long time. George Clooney’s use of creating scenes within the camera is fantastically refreshing.
Chan B. gave it a 10:
This movie is excellent...It was very intresting to find out about everything chuck barris did...I was glued to the screen.
Mark C. gave it a 9:
For some reason, I was entertained by this movie. Can't put a finger on it though. Must be that it's delightfully absurd.
[Anonymous] gave it a 9:
Not what I was expecting, but very good. Some scenes were very funny.
Chris W. gave it a 7:
It's a good movie, just short of great. Sam Rockwell is excellent, in what may very well be his one chance at a leading role. Drew Barrymore is fine, though regardless of the decade, she comes across as the same person, not someone who's made it through the sixties to the eighties. Julia Roberts is miscast. What you'll remember most are the striking visuals (some work, some don't) and the fact that George Clooney, of all people, actually made a movie this experimental, through a major studio, and got it released. That alone is impressive.
NJ B gave it an 8:
Ironic use of music montage made it for me. Sam Rockwell was great to watch too.
