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Life or Something Like It
EMAILPRINT20th Century Fox Film Corporation

Generally unfavorable reviews
Based on 32 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 7 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >
Movie Info
Genre(s): Romance
Written by:
John Scott Shepherd (also story)
Dana Stevens
Directed by: Stephen Herek
Release Date:
Theatrical: April 26, 2002
DVD: October 15, 2002
Running Time: 103 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for sexual content, brief violence and language
Starring Angelina Jolie, Stockard Channing, Edward Burns, Melissa Errico, Tony Shalhoub, Christian Kane, Lisa Thornhill, and Gregory Itzin
What's the most important thing in life? Is it love or is it your career? Is it work or is it your family? Lanie Kerrigan (Jolie) must ponder these questions after a street savant tells her that she will die in seven days. (20th Century Fox)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure Holy Man Man of the House Rock Star
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...
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
The result is a worthy woman's film and Jolie's best showcase to date.
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
Manages to squeeze by on Angelina Jolie's surprising flair for self-deprecating comedy.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
It's dispiriting to see Jolie wasting herself (and a good supporting cast) on a story that requires little more than an average pretty actress who can wear clothes well and laugh and cry on cue.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
It's cheerful nonsense from blithe beginning to obvious end.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
Affable, but, as something with more ambition, it disappoints. Herek has once again found the feel-good path to mediocrity.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Kimberley Jones
Life at least deserves a nod for supplying the mostly dramatic actress with her first starring comedic role.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
If the heroine really had seven days left, she wouldn't waste it watching stuff like this.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey
This is an excellent movie for watching Jolie, one of the more entertaining sidelines in recent Hollywood movie going. There are two firsts for her here: Angelina does blonde and, more importantly, Angelina does comedy.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly John Patterson
Jolie hogs the spotlight as usual, leaving romantic interest Ed Burns struggling to register and only Shaloub -- fetid, dirty, soulful -- with his dignity intact.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek
Dimly entertaining, the sort of thing that doesn't insult you so much that you feel compelled to flee the theater, but it's too inert to be anything close to charming or compelling.
Read Full Review >Variety Todd McCarthy
A deeply metaphysical film by contempo Hollywood standards, this middlebrow trifle may engage the emotions of a certain tier of young professional women.
Read Full Review >New York Post Jonathan Foreman
Partly a schmaltzy, by-the-numbers romantic comedy, partly a shallow rumination on the emptiness of success -- and entirely soulless.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
The movie creaks and groans, weighed down by clichés.
Film Threat Michael Dequina
Director Stephen Herek certainly doesn't come up with anything, and he fails to make the swings between silliness and schmaltz smoothly.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Dana Stevens
The relentless upbeatness of Life or Something Like It wrecks the possibility of either real laughter or genuine pathos.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
It's difficult to concentrate on the story. Not that there's much to concentrate on anyway.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
Mostly about slapping together a bunch of clichés -- outdated clichés at that -- regarding the loneliness of ambitious women.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
This film about a career gal's date with fate careers out of control.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Renee Graham
Delivered with all the subtlety of a steel-toe boot, you may be galled that you've wasted nearly two hours of your own precious life with this silly little puddle of a movie.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
This is an ungainly movie, ill-fitting, with its elbows sticking out where the knees should be. To quote another ancient proverb, "A camel is a horse designed by a committee." Life or Something Like It is the movie designed by the camel.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
To top it off, the ending is a clumsy cheat. Of course, I was rooting for the news gal to expire and the film to die a quick death.
Village Voice Mark Holcomb
Cloaks a familiar anti-feminist equation (career - kids = misery) in tiresome romantic-comedy duds.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Joshua Rothkopf
In the hands of Preston Sturges, this could have been the basis for some snappy mordant comedy, but Stephen Herek (Mr. Holland's Opus) sees only fields of corn, winding up with one of those pseudodeep stories (e.g. American Beauty) that Hollywood takes for spiritual.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Steve Simels
The truth of the matter is that, given the thoroughly manipulative, red-herring plot twists that get her to the happy ending, most audience members will have ceased to care about whether she lives or dies long before the matter is settled onscreen.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Bill Gallo
Say what you want about Hollywood losing its way in recent years, there's something beautiful about moviemakers who paint themselves into corners this tight.
Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern
Every now and then, though, a movie comes up with a scene of surpassing stupidity, and then builds from that defining moment to a climax of perfect ineptitude. Life or Something Like It is such an achievement.
What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 5.7 (out of 10) based on 7 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Tatiana K. gave it a 5:
Did it really get the right answer for the meaning of life?
Rebecca S. gave it a 9:
I thought this was an overall great movie about how serious life is taken and it has a lot of good messages about life.
Drew B. gave it a 4:
It wasnt too great. jolie aint a blonde. it was dragged.
Matt M. gave it a 1:
There wasn't one honest moment in this hokey, contrived, and wretched excuse for a film. Angelina Jolie's somewhat nuanced performance barely saves it. It's almost entirely unwatchable. Detestably disingenious. "Life or Something Like It" is one of the worst films of the year!
