Now Playing
Critics & Publications
Archives: A-Z Index
Advanced Search

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

sort by name

sort by score

38 12 Rounds
48 17 Again
76 Adventureland
48 Angels & Demons
54 Battle for Terra
xx Bruno
80 Coraline
40 Dance Flick
83 Drag Me to Hell
72 Earth
45 Fast & Furious
61 Fighting
34 Ghosts of Girlfriends Past
72 Gran Torino
73 Hangover, The
47 Hannah Montana: The Movie
51 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
54 Imagine That
41 Knowing
32 Land of the Lost
56 Monsters vs. Aliens
34 My Life in Ruins
51 My Sister's Keeper
46 Next Day Air
42 Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian
54 Observe and Report
25 Obsessed
48 Proposal, The
70 Public Enemies
61 Soloist, The
83 Star Trek
64 State of Play
55 Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, The
52 Terminator Salvation
35 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
77 Under the Sea 3D
88 Up
43 X-Men Origins: Wolverine
34 Year One

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

sort by name

sort by score

67 $9.99
75 24 City
66 Adoration
74 Afghan Star
48 Alien Trespass
56 American Violet
82 Anvil! The Story of Anvil
57 Away We Go
81 Beaches of Agnes, The
62 Big Man Japan
28 Big Shot-Caller, The
78 Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
55 Brothers Bloom, The
82 Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
xx Call of the Wild
63 Cheri
62 Cherry Blossoms
63 Dead Snow
65 Departures
18 Downloading Nancy
58 Easy Virtue
70 End of the Line, The
77 Every Little Step
64 Examined Life
80 Food, Inc.
38 Gigantic
56 Girl from Monaco, The
67 Girlfriend Experience, The
87 Gomorrah
89 Goodbye Solo
63 Great Buck Howard, The
79 Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
xx Home
82 Hunger
91 Hurt Locker, The
16 I Hate Valentine's Day
81 Il Divo
54 Is Anybody There?
71 Jerichow
58 Julia
74 Lemon Tree
36 Life is Hot in Cracktown
40 Limits of Control, The
42 Little Ashes
64 Lymelife
50 Management
57 Merry Gentleman, The
66 Moon
35 New York
62 Not Forgotten
xx Offshore
78 O'Horten
64 Outrage
40 Paris 36
54 Pontypool
71 Pressure Cooker
52 Quiet Chaos
83 Revanche
67 Rudo y Cursi
86 Seraphine
65 Sex Positive
70 Shall We Kiss?
77 Sin Nombre
59 Sleep Dealer
74 Song of Sparrows, The
54 Stoning of Soraya M., The
82 Sugar
84 Summer Hours
61 Sunshine Cleaning
28 Surveillance
42 Tennessee
63 Tetro
64 Throw Down Your Heart
80 Tokyo Sonata
63 Tokyo!
70 Tony Manero
74 Treeless Mountain
88 Tulpan
74 Two Lovers
83 Tyson
83 U2 3D
60 Under Our Skin
69 Unmistaken Child
69 Valentino: The Last Emperor
22 What Goes Up
45 Whatever Works
57 Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Man Push Cart
Films Philos


7.1

based on 14 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 7 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

Chop Shop

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Ahmad Razvi, Leticia Dolera, Charles Daniel Sandoval, Ali Reza, Farooq 'Duke' Muhammad, Panicker Upendran, Arun Lal, and Razia Mujahid

Man Push Cart tells the story of Ahmad (Razvi) a former Pakistani rock singer who ekes out a living selling coffee and donuts to morning commuters from his push cart in Midtown Manhattan. (Noruz Films)

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Ramin Bahrani
DIRECTED BY:	Ramin Bahrani
RELEASE DATE:	Theatrical: September 8, 2006
RUNNING TIME:	86 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA
LANGUAGE(S):	English / Urdu

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

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Bahrani, as director, not only stays out of the way of the simplicity of his story, but relies on it; less is more, and with restraint he finds a grimy eloquence.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

Filmed in less than three weeks, Man Push Cart is an exemplary work of independent filmmaking carried out on a shoestring. Mr. Razvi’s convincing performance is a muted portrait of desolation bordering on despair.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

Man Push Cart, largely the work of newcomers and near-newcomers, is a remarkably disciplined, subtle film that avoids striking a "triumph of the human spirit" note or any other cliché.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

A slow-burn stunner, where nothing much of consequence happens, except life itself.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

This modern slice of neorealism has been made with a skill, and humanity, that suggests Bahrani may have a "Bicycle Thief" in him yet.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

A fascinating, sad, sometimes quite poetic window into a grueling way of life most of us know little about.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Quietly heartbreaking.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

A realistic drama about life's uncertainties.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Razvi, once a pushcart vendor himself, is particularly good; he brings a visceral poignancy to a character who comes to represent every desperate soul who ever tried to make it in the land of plenty.

Slate Dana Stevens

If one of the things movies are supposed to do is make you look anew at the world around you, you may never see your doughnut vendor in the same way again.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

This is somewhat fuzzy as narrative, but it's a potent mood piece, and its portait of urban loneliness has some of the intensity of "Taxi Driver" without the violence.

Variety Jay Weissberg

An example of spare, slice-of-life indie cinema at its most unpretentious, Man Push Cart adeptly and subtly layers facts about the protag's history and character into his story.

Village Voice Michael Atkinson

Man Push Cart is a diminutive film, finally--vying for a neorealist vibe, it lacks the Italian history makers' narrative urgency, and the sociopolitical conflict at the heart of the immigration "issue" is hardly engaged.

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub

The makers of Man Push Cart seem so dedicated to making a film that defies Hollywood conventions that the finished product lacks enough entertainment value to justify price of admission.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.1 (out of 10) based on 7 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Chad S. gave it an8:
What happens in Pakistan, stays in Pakistan. When Mohammad(Charles Daniel Sandoval) encourages Ahmad(Ahmad Razvi) that he resume his music career, you can imagine the direction in which "Man Push Cart" would go had this film not been an homage to Italian neorealism(there's a specific reason as to why Noemi(Leticia Dolera) is from Barcelona). But this filmmaker knows that you don't crossover from Pakistan. Mohammad isn't naive. He refers to Ahmad as "this Pakistani guy" even though the immigrant is Pakistani himself. "Man Push Cart" nails the peculiar divide that exists between successful and unsuccessful men from the third world. Although "Man Push Cart" seems gratuitous in its need to be unrelentingly downbeat, the film is nevertheless a thoughtful character-driven story about how dogged perseverance in a racially hierarchical society, you suspect, often has no payoff if you don't hail from a westernized society.

Jim C. gave it a1:
To describe this movie as depressing and without any redeeming qualities would be a gross understatment. i saw this with 2 of my sons (age 30 +\-). One agreed with me that this was the worst film ever. My youngest thought the director had managed to capture the complete hopelessness of (clinical) depression. The young Spanish actress is riveting. Everything else is tripe.

Ken G gave it an8:
Sad, haunting, and unlike much of what Hollywood puts out, this feels refreshingly honest.

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page

Man Push Cart Films Philos

Man Push Cart
Films Philos