Elektra

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

Electric as Elektra, Jennifer Garner does a high-powered, blade-thrusting star turn as Marvel Comics' ninja-inspired superheroine, bringing such unbridled energy and sexuality to her performance, one barely notices the movie itself.

Slate David Edelstein

Elektra isn't half-bad--only maybe two-fifths.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

The role needs a steely, inhuman reserve, and Garner's innate likeability works against her.

Village Voice Benjamin Strong

The pedestrian Elektra offers no surprises, and whether or not you'll appreciate its modest charms depends entirely on whether you too have been anticipating Garner's new outfit.

Dallas Observer Luke Y. Thompson

The fights are mostly cool, save the final one with too many quick cuts, and the morphing graffiti and tattoos are nifty. If only the rest of it weren't so stupid.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Leah McLaren

For the better part of this movie, Elektra appears to be a sensible, stylish young superhero.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

One of the least effective comic book-to-movie stories to have come along in the past few years. Without a viable screenplay, there's nowhere for the character to go, and no way to avoid making her look silly.

Variety Brian Lowry

Elektra proves no more than fitfully satisfying, a character-driven superhero yarn whose flurry of last-minute rewriting shows in a disjointed plot.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Watching this is like sitting by a pinsetter at a bowling alley. That's too bad, because the picture had potential.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

"Kill Bill" without irony, and without Quentin Tarantino's flair for cool dialogue and chop-socky action (and without Uma Thurman, for that matter), Elektra is a pretty-looking, pretty dull adaptation of the Marvel Comic about a dishy, deadly assassin.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Her (Garner) grace and mystical abilities make for a lonely burden, and we are supposed to feel her pain. Instead, we feel our own for having to sit through this silly movie.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

This doesn't exactly set the world on fire, but I was charmed by its old-fashioned storytelling, which is refreshingly free of archness, self-consciousness, or "Kill Bill"-style wisecracks.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

An adequate but none-too-thrilling star vehicle for Jennifer Garner in flame-colored bustier and low-riding pants.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

A poorly written collection of comic-book movie cliches that offers nothing new to the genre, generates very little in the way of action thrills and plays like a self-important, humorless rip-off of "Kill Bill."

Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano

No fun at all.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

No question, the film's best special effect is Ms. Garner, especially when she's in costume.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Pinup appeal alone does not a compelling movie make.

Salon.com Charles Taylor

What's missing -- apart, of course, from a plot -- is any character development.

Empire Helen O'Hara

Enormous plot holes and a script that’s fatally light on character mean there’s few selling points beyond Jennifer Garner's corset...

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Plays like a collision between leftover bits and pieces of Marvel superhero stories. It can't decide what tone to strike.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

We end up with a piece of B-grade junk in which Elektra exchanges "banter" with the unexceptional Prout between fight scenes so badly shot that even Garner looks like a stunt double.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Just as all regular models can't be supermodels, so all action chicks can't be superheroines. Elektra Natchios turns out to be walled off rather than mysteriously alluring; blank rather than deep.

LA Weekly Kim Morgan

When a movie makes you wish you were watching Halle Berry in "Catwoman," something is most definitely wrong.

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

What it suffers from most is the sense of offhand storytelling that lies halfway between creative laziness and cost-cutting sloppiness.

The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen

Along comes Elektra to effectively lower the bar for Marvel Comics page-to-screen transitions.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

Long on cutlery and décor (including, of course, the marvelously decorative Ms. Garner, of the TV series "Alias") and woefully short on narrative.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Deadly dull.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

As she sashays, mirthlessly, from one thankless confrontation to the next, it's unclear why anyone would find Garner any more deserving of stardom than certain mannequins.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Devotees of awful filmmaking can't go wrong with this one.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Another inert, soul-dead action drama that turns actors into zombies...It's garbage.

Miami Herald Peter Debruge

Part of the problem is that Garner, so irresistible on television and in last year's "13 Going on 30," just can't pull off the cold-hearted killer routine.

Premiere Aaron Hillis

Lacks thrills, narrative, emotion, believability, character development--and frankly--watchability.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Breathlessly boring.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Not stupid enough to qualify as good, dumb fun.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

Elektra isn't just poorly executed, it's emotionally false and makes absolutely no narrative sense.