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CQ
United Artists / MGM


7.0

based on 26 reviews
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How did we calculate this?

based on 6 votes
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MPAA RATING: R for some nudity and language

Starring Jeremy Davies, Angela Lindvall, Élodie Bouchez, Gérard Depardieu, Giancarlo Giannini, Massimo Ghini, Jason Schwartzman, and Billy Zane

Paris, 1969: The filming of a sci-fi movie set in the distant year 2001 is in trouble. (MGM)

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Roman Coppola
DIRECTED BY:	Roman Coppola
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: September 10, 2002 Video: September 10, 2002 Theatrical: May 24, 2002
RUNNING TIME:	87 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA / Luxembourg / France / Italy

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

San Francisco Chronicle Jonathan Curiel

The film deserves some kind of honor for its campy originality, smart and funny dialogue, and provocative yet sensitive look at the making of a film circa 1969.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

A frothy, sexy, '60s delight with a movie lover's heart.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

Exceptionally likable and affecting as well as entertaining.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

May not make the splash it should; films about moviemaking rarely do. And that would be a shame, because the contrasts the director sets in motion and keeps playing against each other make an entertaining wrestling match.

New Times (L.A.) Gregory Weinkauf

It's a feel-good movie for people tired of paying to feel bad. Bring it on.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

It may not be art, but it's vastly more entertaining than anything Coppola senior has done in far too long.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

CQ is a movie for movie-lovers, by a movie-lover: Roman Coppola, son of Francis Ford and a successful commercial and video director in his own right, making a witty, whimsical feature debut.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Good-natured and fun, the Austin Powers silliness of the era shines through, and Coppola family art director Dean Tavoularis ("Apocalypse Now," "The Godfather" trilogy) makes the film -- and its kitschy film-within-the-film -- look consistently terrific.

Film Threat Chris Gore

While I personally love this movie, I’m not sure how well received a film about a frustrated filmmaker seeking creative solutions in his personal life and work life is going to be to the average moviegoer.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Coppola, who has made clever music videos, including the one for Moby's ''Honey,'' clearly had a lot of fun detailing the mod cheesiness of this intergalactic period piece, though the satire would have been more ticklish if ''Austin Powers'' hadn't gotten there first.

New York Post Megan Lehmann

Coppola sure knows his late-'60s cinema and he's meticulous in reconstructing the style of the era.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

CQ has a modicum of IQ and a dash of style -- the jury's still out on the extent of the inheritance, but the kid clearly learned something at his pater'sknee.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

May have more enthusiasm and attitude than good story sense, but it, too, is the work of someone who might be at this game for a long time.

Washington Post Hank Stuever

A certain sexiness underlines even the dullest tangents, bouncing along to the all-too-essential groovy soundtrack.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

It looks great -- thanks in large part to production designer Dean Tavoularis and Wes Anderson cinematographer Robert Yeoman -- but just as importantly, it looks like it's interesting. Ultimately, it's not, but that almost doesn't matter.

LA Weekly John Powers

CQ is modest, especially for something bearing the grandiose family name, and it possesses both a tenderness and a quiet intelligence.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

Not everything in this ambitious comic escapade works, but Coppola, along with his sister, Sofia, is a real filmmaker. It must be in the genes.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

A triumph of art direction over narrative, but what art direction!

Boston Globe Chris Fujiwara

Triumphs over its own trendiness only by being vapid and superficial.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Pretentious and self-indulgent -- those two words come to mind when considering CQ.

Los Angeles Times Jan Stuart

The result is stylish but awfully slim.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Coppola's satirical debut movie is too ambitious for its own good. The cast is good, though, and ambition isn't the worst fault a fledgling filmmaker can have.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

A charming, spirited movie for cinephiles, or those who aspire to be. It's the kind of movie every kid in film school wanted to make but didn't have the father to produce.

Village Voice Dennis Lim

Endearing but pointless, at once cluttered and tinny, this film-dork fantasia suggests a shopping spree at a high-end vintage emporium underwritten by Daddy's blank check.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Writer-director Roman Coppola is trying to capture a time he's too young to remember, when the French New Wave reinvigorated film art.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Roman Coppola's first film has sympathetic aims but is distressingly lacking in flair, style, wit or fun.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.0 (out of 10) based on 6 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Jay H. gave it a6:
This movie has some hits as well as some misses. Roman Coppola's is ambitious but his direction is unpolished. He complicates the film more than he needed too. Decent effort to recreate the era, and I liked the art direction and score. Giancarlo Giannini is memorable.

Brian A. gave it a9:
This movie is amazingly under appreciated. There are so many aspects that lleft this viewer with a giddy feeling throughout. the music, superbly scored by Mellow, with a few classic french pop songs thrown in, is great. I bought the soundtrack as soon as I left the theater. There are two films within the film; one is a sci-fi epic in the vein of Barabarella, which is hilariously on key, the other is the main characters' personal documentary, and is a perfect satire of pretentious film making.

Bruno gave it a 10:
It's getting better all the time.

Chad S. gave it a 9:
"CQ" will make young film enthusiasts, like myself, wish we weren't born so late. To trade the memory of hearing Haircut One Hundred for the first time with seeing "Breathless" at a first-run theater would be great, but alas, Francois Truffaut was that guy from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" before we saw "The 400 Blows" on the Betamax format. "CQ" is more style than substance, but there's just enough of the latter to make this triumph of art direction and production design, not completely usurp our affection for the young filmmaker's bout with tunnel vision to be a man of vision, an auteur. Jeremy Davis doesn't blend into the background. He's self-absorbed and yet we like his dream better than his girlfriend. We hope the critics in the makeshift screening room at a second-class hotel, which is hosting a film festival for auteurs, like his movie. The moment is so lovingly rendered, you want to be there; holding the filmmaker's hand if you're a girl, or patting him on the back if you're a boy. "CQ" is like that. It will evoke nostalgia, or false nostalgia, depending on your age, but quasi or not, the yearning is a real one if you love movies, which Roman Coppola must certainily do.

Brian R. gave it a 2:
Boring lead and weak script. Visuals aren't bad. Too disjointed to enjoy.

Michael F. gave it a 6:
Good dialouge, directing, screenplay, art direction, acting. I know that the film is about a man who is lost, but it seems like director/writer Roman Coppola is lost as well, the movie goes nowhere and says nothing. It's fun though. The ending wrapped it up pretty well though.

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CQ United Artists / MGM

CQ
United Artists / MGM