Family Stone, The

Premiere Rachel Clarke

The Family Stone may not be super-serious or even, well, sly, but none of that matters: this is a warm and engaging film that is sure to become a perennial Christmas favorite.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

This is the best adult holiday film in a while.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Parker has a great time being the anti–Carrie Bradshaw while Keaton-as-matriarch is a particular joy -- funny, beautiful, elegant, touching, and at ease with a familiar, get-out-your-hankies holiday subplot.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Keaton, a sorceress at blending humor and heartbreak, honors the film with a grace that makes it stick in the memory.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Silly at times, leaning toward the screwball tradition of everyone racing around the house at the same time in a panic fueled by serial misunderstandings. There is also a thoughtful side.

USA Today Mike Clark

As stuffed with beguiling performances - some of them unexpectedly good - as its script is overstuffed. And though even the beguiled may feel manipulated the next morning (or when hitting the exits), the players put it over by a nose. Happy holidays.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

A satisfying, big-hearted celebration of diversity that will brighten holiday moviegoing.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Indie director Bezucha has held on to just enough individuality to breathe a little life into the cliches.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

The potential for moral confusion in a liberal-minded family -- unpacked so ruthlessly in Noah Baumbach's "The Squid and the Whale" -- is scrutinized with more ambiguity in this good-natured comic subversion of the holiday get-together.

Slate David Edelstein

The performances are delightful, and the picture comes together.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

A film that's at times as ragged and shaggy as its family unit. But as written and directed by Thomas Bezucha, its offbeat mixture of highly choreographed comic crises and the occasional bite of reality make for an unexpectedly enticing blend.

Dallas Observer Robert Wilonsky

As ridiculous, as mawkish and schizophrenic as The Family Stone is, it's also surprisingly endearing.

Austin Chronicle Kimberley Jones

There are just too many damn characters, with the best ones taking a backseat to the dullish love quadrangle.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

A machine-tooled entertainment that's as fake and flimsy as a plastic Christmas tree. The only reason the movie isn't as bad as it has a right to be is the marvelous Diane Keaton.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Popped in the oven and marked with a predictable P, The Family Stone is the Christmas cookie of Christmas movies -- this thing is so pat it should come with the recipe attached.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

The movie is a holiday romantic comedy that wants to put the holiday romantic comedy out of business.

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

The Family Stone should have been a glittering holiday bauble along the lines of the irresistible Love Actually. Instead, Bezucha stuffs into our stockings what he thinks is good for us. It's not coal, but it's not entirely what we were hoping for, either.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

The slapstick weeper The Family Stone is a lump of coal brightened by four diamond-sharp performances.

Empire Genevieve Harrison

Although in danger of being unable to decide what kind of film it wants to be, a well-written script and well-judged performances make this a family outing worth taking.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

If there was ever a testament to the resilience of actors, in the face of a flawed script and wonky direction, The Family Stone is it.

Film Threat Michael Ferraro

Luke Wilson has done some of his best work in dramatic roles (see "The Royal Tenenbaums" for clarity) and while he is not playing an entirely serious role here, his performance is still the most engaging.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

In place of the dysfunctional family Christmas story we've come to expect for the holidays, The Family Stone gives us a cheerfully uncensored, generic counterculture clan and tosses a tightly wound control freak into the center of their holiday celebration.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

The women make The Family Stone, especially Ms. Parker, whose nimble performance is reason alone to see the film: not since Philippe Petit has anyone walked a tightrope with such finesse - and in high heels, no less.

Newsweek David Ansen

Lurching uncertainly from slapstick to tears, The Family Stone works hard to warm the cockles of our hearts. The cast is attractive. The sentiments are commendable. But the love Bezucha wants us to feel for the family couldn't possibly compete with the love they already feel for themselves.

Variety Justin Chang

Keaton embodies the formidable Stone matriarch with an offhand sense of humor that cuts like a knife.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

A potentially interesting tale flailing haplessly in the quicksand of holiday-movie formula.

The Hollywood Reporter Sheri Linden

Spends too much time on unconvincing romantic-comedy contrivances to be consistently engaging. Throughout the uneven film and its mixed bag of performances, the compelling point of focus is Diane Keaton's smart, funny, spot-on natural portrait of the formidable Stone matriarch.

Chicago Tribune Allison Benedikt

Parker is pretty much a disaster here, shrill and phony and, worst of all, spineless. She reminded me of Tea Leoni in "Spanglish," her performance working against the movie, serving only as a cumbersome, opaque obstacle.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

The talented and quirky-pretty Sarah Jessica Parker gives an excruciating performance. It's a keenly self-conscious caricature - the bold, showy kind that often wins awards yet sends audiences running from the theater.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Could we please declare a moratorium on funny-sad movies about dysfunctional families, especially families that come together for the holidays?

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

Almost totally emotionally bankrupt. But it's a very specific form of total emotional bankruptcy, one that feels honest and even uplifting at the time, because the actors are great and the direction's well intentioned and just-so.

Village Voice Dennis Lim

It's hard to fathom why anyone would voluntarily endure a holiday family reunion movie -- a genre devised solely to demonstrate how grotesque and how heartwarming families can be--when actual holiday family reunions already exist for those very reasons.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Most of it falls on Bezucha, not just for devising these monstrously cruel characters, but for putting them in situations that are far too serious to be resolved by Christmas morning. When the melodrama gets too intense, the film collapses in slapstick.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

There are many ways to define the shrieking awfulness of The Family Stone, from the general lack of wit to the cheap exploitation of cancer to its casual cruelty, but it's writer-director Thomas Bezucha's casting that really goes awry.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Bezucha made something perverse, a feel-bad holiday film about a repellent family, with a milquetoast dad and a smug, devious harpy of a mom.