Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

This is one of Downey's most enjoyable performances, and one of Kilmer's funniest. It's a relationship comedy wrapped in sharp talk and gunplay, a triumphant comeback for Black, and one of the year's best movies.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

It's one nutty holiday fruitcake that is appetizing and tasty.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

The deliriously enjoyable noir comedy-thriller Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang does nothing by halves and everything by doubles.

Chicago Tribune Robert K. Elder

Black's retro-noir reminds us why we love movies: because they can surprise us, even when we're ankle deep in bullet casings, bodies and enough twists to tie us in knots.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

This tribute to old-fashioned hard-boiled detective fiction is laced with Hollywood satire and snappy, lightning-fast dialogue.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

The plot is thin: You'll guess the villain early, then pick holes in story construction. But Black's ear for mock-noir speeches doesn't fail him, and he gleefully parodies the chase scenes that dominated his action movies.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Black, who wrote "Lethal Weapon," makes his directorial debut, and he puts a fresh spin not only on that film but also on a whole slew of films noirs.

Empire Staff (Not credited)

Bold and breathless, this trippy, hilarious, know-it-all comedy-thriller will have you reliving its ironic spoils for days, but you'll still be hard-pressed to nail the actual story.

Dallas Observer Luke Y. Thompson

The zingers come so fast and furious that if you miss a few (and even the most alert viewer will the first time), there are always more.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Macabre, yes, but the movie's also inventive and funny. You get a lot of smart bang-bang for your buck.

Film Threat Clint Morris

One of the coolest and most memorable films of 2005 – I just want to see it again.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

Amazingly and incessantly funny, a free-form riff on Hollywood shenanigans, the film noir genre and film in general.

LA Weekly Mark Olsen

Snappy, fun and outrageously irreverent, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is the work of someone with nothing to lose, which is only to the audience's gain.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

It's also a doozy of a comedy, matching the dark wit of Ross MacDonald's Lew Archer novels to the stylized theatrics of Matt Helm-era Dean Martin.

Miami Herald Peter Debruge

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang is a movie obsessed more with the act of telling a story than the story itself, which explains why, when the movie's finally over, less than half the audience will have understood the finer points of the mystery.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Has some hilarious moments and still succeeds in dramatic terms.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Shane Black creates a movie that is defiantly smartass and too cool for the room. I couldn't have liked it more.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Robert Downey Jr. is perfect as Harry. He brings the right mix of cynicism, self-doubt, and unpretentiousness.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

One of the season's most delightful surprises.

Premiere Glenn Kenny

The picture’s great, fast-moving fun for the most part, and Kilmer gives his most appealing, relaxed, and amusing performance since "Real Genius."

Boston Globe Ty Burr

It's a merry deconstructive delight and easily the best party in town.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

The movie is pretty damned funny in its insubstantial, gratuitously violent, gratuitously everything way.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

I wouldn't trust him (Downey) to look after my handkerchief, but I'll watch him in anything, and that is why Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang--smug as it is, and more like a day in the reptile house than a night at the movies--remains a slithery treat.

Newsweek David Ansen

Jumpy and ironic, Downey is a quicksilver delight and Kilmer is funny as the gay Perry. But Black’s inventive, self-conscious script--heavy on voice-over narration--can be too clever for its own good. The movie is baroque fun, but exhausting.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Black's sadistic streak remains as uncomfortable as it ever was, and his direction is very much in the house style of producer Joel Silver. But both elements perfectly suit the material, which sneaks in a lot of sly stuff beneath the slick surface.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

Downey and Monaghan are wonderful at playing characters that compensate for the harshness of their past with flippant swaggers.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Once again making a diverting but insubstantial movie look better than it is, Downey, with haggard charm to burn, is winning all the way. Kilmer is riotous at times as an impeccably groomed, businesslike guy keen to assert his orientation at every opportunity.

Slate David Edelstein

The comic surface of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang is all polished brilliance, with surprisingly few dull patches...The movie doesn't deliver in the kiss-kiss department, though.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

It's rowdy, often tasteless and very much in the buddy-action vein of the scripts that made him famous, but in a much more comic spirit.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Steeped in attitude - a smart-alecky, insider sarcasm that can be pretty clever at times, but also pretty insufferable.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang contains a lot of comedy and invention, but doesn't much benefit from its clever style. The characters and plot are so promising that maybe Black should have backed off and told the story deadpan, instead of mugging so shamelessly for laughs.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Designed as a giant put-on, "Kiss Kiss" is so inside Hollywood, so anxious to bite the hand that fed Black, that it plays like an elaborate prank. Some of it is a lot of fun; most of it is a lot of nonsense.

USA Today Mike Clark

All three actors give it their all, but Monaghan stands out with a sexy yet oddly down-to-earth variation on the Midwest girl gone wrong, thanks partly to a dark dysfunctional family secret.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Cheerful mess of a pulp-fiction parody.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

The sort of movie that believes coolness is next to godliness, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang trades heavily and successfully on Downey's unflappable likability.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

It's just a movie with no particular reason for existing, a flashy, trifling throwaway whose surface cleverness masks a self-infatuated credulity.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Turns into a film that is too ostentatiously pleased with itself, so in love with its own cleverness it doesn't notice it's darn near worn you out.