Divorce, Le

Washington Post Desson Thomson

A relaxed delight, a series of delicately tongue-in-cheek musings about the clash between American and French cultures.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

In this episodic film with a soupcon of "Sex and the City" (just as the Merchant Ivory Slaves of New York presaged the HBO hit), cross-cultural misunderstanding, not character, is the point.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

The actors and acting are so attractive--as is, per usual in a Merchant Ivory production, the scenery--that the movie’s less deft handling of the scenario’s various themes, not to mention some stumbling in the final quarter, when the story’s tone grows a little darker, doesn’t stand out as much as it might have.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

This present-day Paris of Le Divorce is smartly shot and costumed, and the whole affair is breezy and uncharacteristically insouciant, given the reserved nature of the folks responsible for it.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Acted with relish by a note-perfect cast -- a romantic comedy of true sophistication. There's a sting in every laugh.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

While there are too many characters in too much story for the movie to really involve us, it's amusing as a series of sketches about how the French think they are a funny race (or the Americans, take your choice).

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

No masterpiece, but that shouldn't dissuade moviegoers from giving it a whirl as a flavorful alternative to the summer's more gimmicky fare.

San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann

Captures the effervescence and playfulness of Johnson's novel, even as it attempts to shoehorn a tangle of characters and situations.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Utterly charming and not without those subtle insights into character and culture that mark their (Merchant Ivory) best films.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

As in other Ivory-Jhabvala adaptations, ritzy consumerism is very much on display, but what makes this better than most is Johnson's amused admiration for nearly all her characters, regardless of nationality.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

One minor element in Le Divorce, the sale of a disputed and possibly valuable painting that once belonged to Watts' family, welcomes scene-stealing bits by Bebe Neuwirth and Stephen Fry as appraisers with clashing motives.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Paula Nechak

An almost too-sophisticated comedy, pitting the New World mentality and brash pugnaciousness of America against the staid arrogance of custom that defines the French bourgeoisie.

USA Today Claudia Puig

A tasty bonbon, initially appealing but not terribly satisfying.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Characters are left half-developed or undeveloped so that as much plot as possible can be crammed into two hours. The result, while not wholly unsatisfying, will disappoint those used to the cinematic richness we have come to expect from this collaboration.

New York Post Jonathan Foreman

Though not as witty or accomplished as you'd expect from its pedigree, "Le Divorce" provides welcome relief from the lame-brained trash Hollywood has foisted on the public this summer.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

For a movie that boasts a murder, a would-be suicide and the usual generous helping of screwing around à la français, Le Divorce is remarkably calm and contained even as it builds to its climax.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

Feels like a period film in clumsy modern-day dressup.

Village Voice David Ng

Entranced by the natives, Le Divorce reduces the knowing ditziness of Johnson's novel to vapid, exchange-student wonderment.

Chicago Tribune Mark Caro

Somehow lacks lightness and weight. This is a movie that tries to work a bloody suicide attempt and a murder into a comedy of manners, with almost everything registering in the same narrow spectrum of inconsequence.

Los Angeles Times Manohla Dargis

Whatever the reason, his riff on Le Divorce follows the original only in broad strokes, hewing to a similar plot with many of the same characters but without the wit, the barbs and the politics.

Variety David Rooney

This supposed comedy of manners about Americans in Paris feels artificial at every turn, its characters so devoid of backstory and nuance their behavior often makes little sense.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Is this just silly filmmaking, or have Ivory and Jhabvala succumbed to the Francophobia that gave us "freedom fries" in the congressional cafeteria?

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Team M-I knows its way around James and ignores the lazy stereotype of Americans as gauche rubes bumbling around Paris like barbarians at the ballet in favor of sly digs at French and American mores alike.

Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan

Scattered and silly. If it evokes any strong feelings from you, it will probably be hunger -- the food all looks so good.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

A thin and unsatisfying concoction that somehow manages to make one of the richest and most durable sources of culture-clash comedy into an occasion for dullness.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

The French may be guilty of some bad behavior, but that's no reason to punish them with the shapeless, deceptively crass Le Divorce, a Merchant-Ivory production in which all things Gallic are reduced to quirks of snobbery, misogyny and haute selfishness.

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

This is an insignificant film with a passably entertaining premise that goes wildly to hell the instant it strays from its comic ideals with brief, unsatisfying detours into the realms of art and high-end lingerie.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

I'm disappointed to report that Hudson and Watts have no chemistry as sisters, perhaps because Watts never seems like the expatriate artiste she's supposed to be playing.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

It may be that Merchant Ivory need the armature of the past in order to create a sense of the present. Le Divorce is mustier than any of their movies set back in time.

Salon.com Charles Taylor

Kate Hudson gives the best performance in the movie, though she seems always on the verge of being funnier and dirtier than she's allowed to be. Elsewhere the cast is accumulated for their cachet more than for any role they're given to play. Some of the casting makes no sense.

Austin Chronicle Kimberley Jones

There are flashes of wit and flair here, including two stylish sequences detailing the French obsession with food and scarves, but they are but brief respites from the film’s near-pathological drear.

Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf

At its best (which isn't much), Le Divorce blusters along with the tolerable tedium of had-to-be-there home movies; at its worst (which is about 90 percent), it illustrates why the French went and invented the word merde.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Should have been a smart bit of cinematic froth but instead sinks like an overworked souffle.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

The truth is that almost nobody, and certainly no nation, emerges well from this sour endeavor. [18 & 25 August 2003, p. 150]

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

The movie bobbles along on a weird, soft-edged sarcasm.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

A generally mirthless comedy of manners.