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Dolls

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 16 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 5 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama | Foreign | Romance
Written by: Takeshi Kitano
Directed by: Takeshi Kitano
Release Date:
Theatrical: December 10, 2004
DVD: March 8, 2005
Running Time: 114 minutes, Color
Origin: Japan
Language(s): Japanese (with English subtitles)
Summary
RATING: Not Rated
Starring Miho Kanno, Hidetoshi Nishijima, Tatsuya Mihashi, Chieko Matsubara, Kyôko Fukada, Tsutomu Takeshige, Nao Omori, and Yuuko Daike
Three contemporary stories inspired by the everlasting emotions expressed by the precious dolls of Bunraku theater. Three stories delicately intertwined by the beauty of sadness. Three stories of undying love. (Palm Pictures)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Brother Kikujiro The Blind Swordsman: Zatoichi
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database 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...
Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
The overall mood is stately and melancholy, the selective use of color is ravishing, and some of the natural views are breathtaking.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
As an exception to the norm, Kitano doesn't appear this time, confining himself merely to writing, directing, and editing.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Darrin Keene
The cinematography is stunning, particularly where Matsumoto and Sawoko walk through the four seasons of life.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias
Kitano's gentle side reigns in Dolls, a gorgeous meditation on love and devotion, but the film's hypnotic tone and beautifully formalized color scheme makes it unlike anything he's done to date.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
A work both rigorously stylized and deeply personal. Devotees of Kitano and Japanese cinema will admire Dolls.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
Dolls isn't a film for everybody, especially the impatient, but Kitano does succeed, I think, in drawing us into his tempo and his world, and slowing us down into the sadness of his characters.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
Dolls is an art film, and a languid, inexplicably haunting one at that.
Read Full Review >New York Post V.A. Musetto
Lush and poetic, Dolls proves once again that Kitano is one of the world's most original filmmakers.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Stephen Holden
With some staggeringly beautiful photography of cherry blossoms and scarlet autumn leaves, Dolls is so enthralled with its own cinematography that it can't bear to edit itself, and during the autumn and winter segments of the bound beggars' journey, it almost reaches a standstill.
Read Full Review >Variety David Rooney
Despite an excessively meandering final act, the drama's three intertwined stories have a cumulative impact, their affecting sadness matched by meticulously composed visual poetry.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano
The movie's pace is appropriate to its mood, which is crisp, melancholy and gently cruel.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Robert Dominguez
Rife with beautiful imagery and loads of symbolism, though none of the stories is particularly compelling on its own.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Whether this measured exercise in romantic melancholy moves you to tears or bores you to them is probably a matter of personal susceptibility to the sting of bitter regret for love lost.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Michael Atkinson
Dolls risks the bank on symbology as gaudy as teen anime and as heavy as a stone temple.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Richard James Havis
Dolls soon becomes overloaded with symbolism, and consequently suffocates the audience.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 9.0 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
marie gave it a7:
Nice pictures, but a bit too smart for me.
procphecy gave it a 10:
The best movie to go see during the x-mas holiday.
