Head-On

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Impeccably made, uncompromising in its implacable vision of the deranging power of love, sex and controlled substances, this savage and staggering film knows how to take our breath away.

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

Not about crashing into walls or crashing into other people. It's about crashing into yourself and living to tell the tale.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

In its breathlessly claustrophobic way the movie is vital and passionate, and lit with a lyric beauty that washes over love scenes and violent acts alike.

Newsweek David Ansen

Akin's raw, powerful, multileveled movie takes us places we never expected to go.

New York Post Debra Birnbaum

An intoxicating, heartbreaking Turkish-German drama that's already won a slew of awards from international film festivals.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

The love that heals and the love that kills are one and the same in the exhilarating Head-On, Fatih Akin's overgrown dead-end-kid romance for live-wire adults.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

It's a brutally convincing movie about two hell-bent young Turkish-German lovers dancing on the edge of destruction in a Hamburg underworld of drugs and casual sex. Yet it's also compassionate and even tender.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

No matter what is going on in the story, these star-crossed lovers are always fascinating to watch.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Has its share of surprises, especially in the performances of its two main players.

Dallas Observer Melissa Levine

A solid, well-crafted drama, with a tight script, sharp editing, and strong performances by the leads. Beware, however: This is no comedy.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

This is not just pliable filmmaking; it is an exercise in worldliness, in a feel for the cracks and warps of circumstance, which is all the more startling when you learn that the director is thirty-one.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

Fatih Akin is a filmmaker to be reckoned with. His characters grow and change in a stunning film that pulses with life.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Vital and affecting romantic drama.

Variety Eddie Cockrell

Fine, gritty, contempo love story.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

A romantic comedy with jagged edges, Fatih Akin's exhilarating Head-On paves the road to love through miles of prickly thatch.

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

Despite the tears, the blood and the booze, Head-On is a hopeful film.

Austin Chronicle Kimberley Jones

But for all the film's griminess and doom, bad behavior and bad luck, it's hope that engines Head-On.

Portland Oregonian Marc Mohan

Intense, well-acted love story.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Violent and sexy and funny and sad, Head-On is a big collision that doubles as a bizarre love story.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The movie is well and fearlessly acted, and the writer-director (Fatih Akin) is determined to follow her story to a logical and believable conclusion, rather than letting everyone off the hook with a conventional ending.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

What ensues is a love story ringed by barbed wire and etched in blood with the jagged neck of a broken beer bottle.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Winner of the top prize at the last Berlin Film Festival, the film is sporadically powerful, sensitively acted and full of music, used with imagination and flair.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Superbly acted.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Despite all its roiling melodrama, Head-On has its moments of sharply observed humor.

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

Sexy and intoxicating.

The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann

Burns with sincerity and serious intent.

Slate David Edelstein

Head-On doesn't sound like a lot of fun, but it keeps you on edge, laughing nervously, appalled and, against all odds, entertained.

Chicago Reader Chris Fujiwara

Director Faith Akin has skill and panache, and the lead actors are likable. But the film's high energy can't compensate for the muddled conception.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Fatih Akin's surprisingly grisly feature spills more blood than both of Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill" films combined, which is strange when you consider that it's a love story.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Head-On loses its merry mojo once events turn irrevocable and the action switches from Hamburg to Istanbul.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Propelled by ferocious sex, nasty violence, and coy interludes of traditional Turkish love songs.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Unremittingly explosive, Head-On is not an easy film to watch. It is, however, a memorable one.

Empire David Parkinson

Ünel and the debuting Kekilli are as impressive as Akin’s atmospheric snapshots of Hamburg and Istanbul.