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Dying Gaul, The
Strand Releasing


6.6

based on 23 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 10 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for strong sexual content and language

Starring Robin Bartlett, Patricia Clarkson, Linda Emond, Ryan Miller, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Peter Sarsgaard, Campbell Scott, and Jason-Shane Scott

A fiercely original psychological thriller, The Dying Gaul is a tale of lust, power, corruption, betrayal and revenge set in the seductive world of the Hollywood elite. (Strand Releasing)

GENRE(S):	Drama \| Romance
WRITTEN BY:	Craig Lucas
DIRECTED BY:	Craig Lucas
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: March 21, 2006 Theatrical: November 4, 2005
RUNNING TIME:	101 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

Nominated, Grand Jury Prize (Dramatic), 2005 Sundance Film Festival

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...

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

A small, self-contained gem of incisive writing, superb acting and rich, expressive visuals.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

Mr. Sarsgaard gives the riskiest screen performance of his career. Save perhaps for Sean Penn's outbursts in "Dead Man Walking" and "Mystic River," no actor in a recent American film has delivered as explosive a depiction of a man emotionally blasted apart.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Has too many contrivances, but as an act of sinister staging, it proves Lucas, the noted playwright, to be a born filmmaker.

Film Threat Bob Westal

The Dying Gaul is Craig Lucas's film directing debut, and it's impressive. The film never feels one bit like a stage adaptation.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Lucas' beautiful script and a trio of first-rate performances carry the material with an intermittently breathtaking urgency.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The Dying Gaul stays interesting even when it asks more and more--too much, probably--of the audience's disbelief suspension.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The actors could not be better. Sarsgaard, Scott and the luminous Clarkson negotiate the film's razor-sharp laughs and bone-deep tragedy with resonant skill. Lucas' powerfully haunting film gets under your skin.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Exchanging Buddhist mantras like diet tips, they thoughtlessly destroy themselves after destroying each other.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

This may be the best work we've seen from either actor, which is saying something.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

The Dying Gaul has the best kind of story in that it unfolds as a series of surprises, and yet every step, twist and turn seems inevitable in retrospect.

LA Weekly Scott Foundas

If you cut through Lucas' thickets of self-reflexivity, metaphysical mumbo jumbo and banal potshots at media violence, there are three ace performances here by actors who can elevate and enliven even as mediocre a piece of material as this.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Before it disappears into a fog of confusion and damaging contradictions within its characters, The Dying Gaul presents an ironic, provocative look at what its creator, Craig Lucas, calls a postmodern Hollywood noir.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

It leads to one of those endings where you sit there wishing they'd tried a little harder to think up something better.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

The heavily symbolic The Dying Gaul doubtless worked better as a play, but the film is worth seeing for its peerless cast.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

The film builds into a lurid and suspenseful thriller.

Variety Robert Koehler

Despite a reliable cast led by Scott, Patricia Clarkson and Peter Sarsgaard, the human impact is ultimately lost in a too calculated scenario.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Entertaining if cornball, lacking the cold-eyed nastiness of something like Mike Nichols's "Closer," The Dying Gaul is tricked out with strident montage sequences and tremulous Steve Reich music. It's already drowning in an icky sea of language when Lucas makes a stretch for Greek tragedy and sends the whole Malibu playhouse abruptly crashing down.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Paula Nechak

Takes itself awfully seriously. It feels a bit like a grudge piece, laboring to grasp at large themes, but it is as trivialized as the capricious world it explores.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Does not go gentle into that good night.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

Although The Dying Gaul tries to evoke the pathos of Greek tragedy and the stars strive heroically, there's none of the requisite grandeur in this trio of creeps to make it worth caring what happens to them.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

These are three characters in search of a moral pulse.

Slate David Edelstein

A sour little psychodrama.

Dallas Observer Jean Oppenheimer

The Dying Gaul becomes so overwrought in the last act that it ends up as pure histrionics.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.6 (out of 10) based on 10 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Chad Shiira gave it a6:
This film is the oddest thing. The three principal actors in "The Dying Gaul" play such appealing characters, but then they inexplicably stop being appealing after the set-up. The script starts to break down when the film makes its transition from a spot-on look at how Hollywood thinks to a psychological drama that has its talented actors trying to prove the old adage that people would pay good money just to see them read from a telephone book (in this case, their dialogue from a chat-room). [***SPOILERS***] Sometimes "The Dying Gaul" just doesn't make sense. In one scene, Robert (Peter Saarsgard) seems to have outed his tormentor, but in the next scene, he's caught off-guard and floored by a revelation we think is already established. When you get right down to it, Robert is pretty stupid, or rather; the screenplay made him that way. Robert gives his internet stalker pertinent information that could be used against him, in which he seems to have forgotten, when trying to identify the true identity of his chat-room poltergeist. This is a pity, because the opening scenes are almost as fun as Robert Altman's "The Player".

Wayne B. gave it a5:
An entrancing mess. Sarsgaard gives a shattering performance in an utterly senseless plot. There are so many logic leaps in the story that it becomes a pointless jumble wallowing in its own pretentiousness. But like a spectacular car wreck, you keep watching nonetheless. Sarsgaard will blow your mind.

Rhett W. gave it a6:
A very watchable movie with three totally captivating performances, but not totally satisfying.

oliva V. gave it a10:
One of the most original and emotionally scary film i have seen in a long time. a wonderful accomplishment that everyone should see!

Jeff M. gave it a4:
The acting is to die for. The house on the cliff is to die for. Peter Sarsgaard is to die for. But after the first third the plot rends into hole like Boston's Big Dig. Go, see it, really, if you've been curious. Then talk about other things.

katherine s gave it a10:
Utterly breathtaking, will stay with you long after you leave the theater, a beautiful haunting movie!

P. Nicol gave it a10:
Awesome...Crazy ending...but awesome!

Dying Gaul, The Strand Releasing

Dying Gaul, The
Strand Releasing