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Heights
EMAILPRINTSony Pictures Classics

Mixed or average reviews
Based on 25 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 34 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama
Written by:
Amy Fox
Chris Terrio (additional written material by)
Directed by: Chris Terrio
Release Date:
Theatrical: June 17, 2005
DVD: November 1, 2005
Running Time: 93 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: R for language, brief sexuality and nudity
Starring Glenn Close, Elizabeth Banks, James Marsden, Jesse Bradford, Isabella Rossellini, Matthew Davis, Susan Malick, Eric Bogosian, and George Segal
Heights follows five characters over twenty-four hours on a fall day in New York City. As the interrelated stories proceed, the connections between the lives of the five characters begin to reveal themselves and their stories unravel. (Sony Pictures Classics)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer 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...
Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
There's much subtle beauty in the last movie completed by Merchant Ivory Productions before Merchant's untimely death.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
Fox uses her earth-tone-clad, Ivy-League-schooled characters the way Jane Austen used hers: taking their privileged, rigid social structures and building a stage to explore deeper human problems.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jack Mathews
Heights is stage-bound throughout, and the secrets it would like to keep are very predictable. But its heart is in the right place, and the performances are first-rate.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Ty Burr
Heights breathes, is briefly and immediately present, and is over. In this summer of noisy steroid cinema, such small favors are welcome.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
The film is one of those interlocking dramas where all of the characters are involved in each other's lives, if only they knew it. We know, and one of our pleasures is waiting for the pennies to drop.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano
Beautifully shot on location in New York and consistently well-acted, but it sticks a little too closely to the surface to be very compelling.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Jeremy Mathews
Director Chris Terrio confidently delivers a solid first feature, but sometimes doesn’t always engage in the characters’ inner demons, which could have made an even better film given the cast and material.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Allison Benedikt
These are not people me and you and everyone we know know--these are "short version" people, characters who comfort each other by quoting Shakespeare.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Jason Anderson
Lacks the energy and vibrancy of the best films to come out of the city in the past few years.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
This is brisk and fun to watch, thanks to the actors...But once you catch the main drift of the plot, it becomes awfully ho-hum.
Read Full Review >Dallas Observer Bill Gallo
The result is a kind of quirky, high-toned soap opera.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Laura Sinagra
In this study of keeping up appearances while everything falls apart, the stakes never seem as high as the title suggests.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps
Director Chris Terrio adapts Amy Fox's play with flashes of wit, moments of insight, and some fine performances. But Heights' characters move along such preordained paths and perform such familiar movie actions that they might as well sport antennae.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Manohla Dargis
Like the film, the characters mean well and look good. But they're so deeply immersed in their own heads that they can't see the world for their needs.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Terrio keeps the multiple stories flowing smoothly, and the setting goes a long way to justify the web of fortuitous interconnections -- New York is the ultimate two-degrees-of-separation town.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
As enjoyable as Close is, Heights as a whole is a mannered simulation that only occasionally and accidentally feels like real New York life.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Gianni Truzzi
Themes at the heart of Heights of despair among the beautiful people are a bore.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer David Hiltbrand
Heights manages to make the lives of all these beautiful people seem quite tedious. Despite their accomplishments, the only thing they seem suited for is hailing cabs.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Kimberley Jones
Terrio's technically proficient film is mature, modern, and minus the all-important passion and risk.
Read Full Review >New York Post Kyle Smith
Working in Terribly Serious mode, rookie director Chris Terrio proves as pompous as filmmakers three times his age.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Ann Hornaday
Heights is nothing more than a second-rate version of several much better movies, all of which are available on DVD and video.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
If there's anything good to be said about Heights, it's Glenn Close's strutty, booming performance.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 4.4 (out of 10) based on 34 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Tom M. gave it a6:
Interesting storyline, excellent cast, and good performances. Poor sound or an inferior print resulted in my not giving this film a higher rating. I missed too many crucial lines. Even when a film is operating within the confines of a low budget, there is no excuse for second rate sound or substandard equipment.
Joe W. gave it an8:
I don't know how people can do cartwheels for a terrible movie like "You, me and Everyone we Know", and pan this one. It has really good dialougue and acting. Elizabeth Banks is going to be huge--she's great in everything, comedy and drama. This is a solid, entertaining movie worth seeing.
Kay W. gave it a4:
A movie that means well with very good actors but limited dialogue and predictable TV sitcom-type behavior. Glenn Close does her best, and that's worth a watch.
George F. gave it a0:
This is a terrible movie that got some good reviews because it has a gay love scene.
Rajiv gave it a1:
My God this was awful. The advance Scout team obviously took No Doze before entering the theater. Earth to Greg don't quit your day job as your review is awful. Shakespear it is not.
Mark B. gave it a6:
Famed producer Ismael Merchant's last screen effort doesn't take place in India or interpret Henry James, but some viewers may very well end up wishing it had. A diffuse, meandering look at one day in the lives of several New York theatrical or otherwise "artsy-fartsy" types at crucial points in their personal relationships (at least one is facing an all-time worst day ever!) this simply doesn't have the tightness, discipline or command of pacing necessary to build any tension or much interest in most of the individuals involved; unlike Miranda July's multicharacter gem Me and You and Everyone We Know, in which absolutely everything works and all the pieces fit together beautifully, first time director Chris Terrio doesn't seem to have left anything off the cutting room floor; as a result, the few bits and sequences that really work (such as an uproariously funny meeting between an engaged couple of different faiths and a rabbi played by George Segal, who responds by administering a Ladies Home Journal-type psychological test) are set adrift in a sea of interminable sequences involving characters getting into cars, climbing out of cars, crossing the street, and doing nothing. It's worth a DVD rental (although it surely won't have any deleted scenes, for reasons mentioned above) because Glenn Close, who does more acting with her eyes here than most actors do with every muscle in their bodies, is so much fun to watch as an outrageously manipulative diva actress trying to break up her daughter's impending marriage by any means necessary. Close's interpretation of her character Diana's behavior restored fond if creepy memories of her most famous movie role--and made me extremely relieved that Terrio and Amy Fox's script didn't call for her to come in contact with any rabbits!
Sidiot gave it a0:
Tony stop sniffing the glue will you please? Boring as hell unless you like to watch moss grow on a rock or paint drying? Avoid. If I want to Shakespear I will watch Shakespear not this twill.
