CNET Networks Entertainment GameSpot | GameFAQs | SportsGamer | Metacritic | MP3.com | TV.com
Home | About Metacritic | About Metascores | What's New | Wireless Versions | Discussion Forums | Advertising Inquiries | Contact Us | RSS
Metacritic.com: We Deal With Criticism
     Help
> Switch to Advanced Search  
Film Video/DVD Music Games Books TV
Printer-Friendly Version Email This Page Discuss In Our Forums

Film

Upcoming Release Calendar
Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

 

Wide Releases

sort by name sort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 

Limited Releases

sort by name sort by score

97 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
83 Alexandra
43 Anamorph
35 Babysitters, The
32 Backseat
80 Band's Visit, The
62 Battle for Haditha
47 Bella
63 Blind Mountain
71 Blindsight
47 Boarding Gate
63 Body of War
58 Bra Boys
70 Caramel
54 Cashback
44 Chaos Theory
32 Chapter 27
69 Chicago 10
82 Chop Shop
46 CJ7
78 Counterfeiters, The
30 Cover
48 Dark Matter
35 Deal
61 Dhamma Brothers, The
92 Diving Bell and the Butterfly, The
73 Duchess of Langeais, The
20 Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
58 Fall, The
43 Favor, The
58 First Saturday in May, The
57 Flawless
87 Flight of the Red Balloon, The
xx From Within
44 Frontier(s)
59 Fugitive Pieces
41 Funny Games
66 George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead
61 Girls Rock!
55 Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts
57 Grand, The
58 Hats Off
68 Honeydripper
xx Jack and Jill vs. the World
67 Jellyfish
xx Kiss the Bride
37 Life Before Her Eyes, The
72 Life of Reilly, The
50 Look
65 Married Life
35 Meet Bill
63 Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day
54 Mister Lonely
52 My Blueberry Nights
71 My Brother Is an Only Child
52 Noise
61 OSS 117: Cairo - Nest of Spies
83 Paranoid Park
55 Pathology
48 Penelope
90 Persepolis
62 Planet B-Boy
xx Plumm Summer, A
67 Praying with Lior
46 Previous Engagement, A
72 Priceless
17 Prom Night
69 Redbelt
72 Roman de gare
48 Run, Fat Boy, Run
85 Savages, The
24 Sex and Death 101
66 Shelter
75 Shotgun Stories
40 Sleepwalking
67 Snow Angels
64 Son of Rambow
71 Standard Operating Procedure
76 Stuff and Dough
64 Surfwise
xx Tashan
82 Taxi to the Dark Side
57 Teeth
56 Then She Found Me
55 Tracey Fragments, The
56 Turn the River
72 Tuya's Marriage
83 U2 3D
59 Under the Same Moon
76 Unforeseen, The
xx Unsettled
91 Up the Yangtze
55 Vice
79 Visitor, The
64 Water Lilies
45 Where in the World Is Osama Bin Laden?
57 Without the King
74 Witnesses, The
63 XXY
67 Year My Parents Went on Vacation, The
75 Young@Heart
45 Zombie Strippers

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Innocence
Fireworks Pictures / IDP Releasing

Innocence reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 73 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
7.8 out of 10
based on 22 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 5 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Julia Blake, Charles 'Bud' Tingwell, Terry Norris, and Kristien Van Pellicom

The story of the love triangle that is created when a widower seeks out the married woman he fell in love with forty years earlier.


GENRE(S): Romance  
WRITTEN BY: Paul Cox  
DIRECTED BY: Paul Cox  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: December 10, 2002 
Video: December 10, 2002 
Theatrical: August 17, 2001 
RUNNING TIME: 95 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: Australia 

Grand Prix des Ameriques (tied with "The Taste of Others"), People's Choice Award, 2000 Montreal World Fim Festival

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...

100
Boston Globe Jay Carr
Films that achieve the dimension of seraphic embrace achieved by 'Innocence, as it explores a return to first love, are the rarest of the rare.
100
Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
Here is the most passionate and tender love story in many years, so touching because it is not about a story, not about stars, not about a plot, not about sex, not about nudity, but about LOVE itself.
Read Full Review
88
Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
If there's a more passionate love story out there, then I haven't had the privilege of seeing it.
Read Full Review
88
New York Post Lou Lumenick
This is a beautifully acted chamber piece --especially by the magnificent Blake, who is married to Norris in real life.
Read Full Review
88
Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
A beautiful, almost defiant film on an unusual subject: love among the elderly.
80
Washington Post Desson Thomson
A film that's tender and disarming for its intimate honesty. It's also deeply refreshing to see a movie that dares to explore sexuality among mature characters.
Read Full Review
80
LA Weekly F. X. Feeney
Cox's own directorial style is innocent, in the sense of being original without ever straining for effect.
Read Full Review
78
Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten
The originality of Innocence makes it stand apart from the romantic pack.
Read Full Review
75
USA Today Mike Clark
No situation could be more human, and it's one the youth-dominated film industry rarely touches.
Read Full Review
75
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Remarkable in several big ways.
Read Full Review
75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Paula Nechak
Sometimes so intimate it's embarrassing, and the messiness at falling in love at any age is disquieting.
Read Full Review
75
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
Like an impressionist painting. Scrutinize it closely, and the details don't make sense individually. Step back from it to study the big picture, and it will make a sweeping effect.
Read Full Review
75
Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
This unusual romantic drama is sensitively acted by a well-chosen cast and subtly directed by Cox.
Read Full Review
70
Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan
The film never quite shakes its self-consciousness about just how special it is and that is a hindrance.
Read Full Review
70
New Times (L.A.) Bill Gallo
Paul Cox's admirers are sure to embrace this latest eruption of sincerity and sensitivity.
70
TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
A beautifully acted, intensely felt story.
Read Full Review
70
Washington Post Rita Kempley
A sweet but labored love story.
Read Full Review
63
Miami Herald Marta Barber
Innocence is a gentle love story, one that touches on an issue of great sensitivity -- sexuality in old age.
Read Full Review
63
New York Daily News Jami Bernard
It's reassuring to see love and sex in one's 70s depicted as fully replenishing. At the same time, it's sobering to think that it's no easier in the twilight of life to make rational decisions regarding the heart.
60
The New York Times A.O. Scott
Mostly mediocre melodrama, though the actors suffering over love's labors lost are quite fine.
Read Full Review
40
Chicago Reader Ronnie Scheib
It's all so overdetermined -- each encounter of the present-day lovers mirrors some moment from the long-ago day when they parted -- that it reduces their whole affair to a matter of last-minute revisionism.
Read Full Review
40
Village Voice Leslie Camhi
Something lured Paul Cox down memory lane, but he should have stayed at home.
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 7.8 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Greg gave it a9:
This is a beautiful film for all ages. The flashing back and forth between the young lovers and themselves as seniors is done tastefully and emotionally. The husband is played passionately and understandably. It would ruin the experience to say more. Thanks to the writer/director/camera operator/actors. A wonderful film about love. I would have given it 10, but I remain unsettled about one or two questions, which I feel should have been clearly answered and were not.

Chad S. gave it a10:
When Claire(Julia Blake) encounters her husband in the kitchen, this septuagenarian suddenly radiates twenty-one through posture, facial expression and by walking with a spring in her step. You say to yourself, "Aaaah, now that's acting." Never has a film used flashbacks more effectively than "Innocence". Something eerie happens. You sense their twenty-something souls radiating out of their wrinkled faces.

Jiva D. gave it a 10:
I've only seen it twice. Next time I will figure out whether the man who crosses the RR tracks is indeed the director. If you don't cry toward the end (the Dance) then you ought to learn how to do so!!

Chad S. gave it a 10:
When Claire(Julia Blake) encounters her husband in the kitchen, this septuagenarian suddenly radiates twenty-one through posture, facial expression and by walking with a spring in her step. You say to yourself, "Aaaah, now that's acting." Never has a film used flashbacks more effectively than "Innocence". Something eerie happens. You sense their twenty-something souls radiating out of their wrinkled faces.

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page
Home | FILM | DVD/VIDEO | MUSIC | GAMES | BOOKS | TV | Forums | About Metacritic metacritic.com

About CNET Networks | Jobs | Advertise | Partnerships                                Visit other CNET Networks sites:

Copyright ©2007 CNET Networks, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms of Use