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Masked & Anonymous
Sony Pictures Classics


7.5

based on 28 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 27 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

MUSIC:

MPAA RATING: PG-13 for some language and brief violence

Starring Bob Dylan, John Goodman, Jessica Lange, Luke Wilson, Jeff Bridges, Penelope Cruz, and Reggie Lee

Set somewhere, sometime, in an America wracked by an endless and senseless civil war, this is the story of a benefit concert and a musician named Jack Fate (Dylan).

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Bob Dylan Larry Charles
DIRECTED BY:	Larry Charles
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: February 17, 2004 Video: February 17, 2004 Theatrical: July 24, 2003
RUNNING TIME:	112 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA / UK

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...

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

See it in one glorious shot, grab as much from it as you can and run like hell. I say that not because I hated Masked & Anonymous, but because I loved it.

Premiere Scott Warren

If you dissect Masked line by line, it would be, like a Dylan song, indecipherable. But if you take the allegory as a whole, by simply asking the questions, it somehow makes a statement. Is it muddled? Yes. Imperfect? Sure. Impenetrable? Well, that's open to interpretation.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Bill White

A strange and convoluted film that is as rewarding as a Dylan song, and just as perplexing.

Philadelphia Inquirer Dan DeLuca

Isn't a good movie, at least by any conventional definition of the word good. But it's not a bad movie, either. It's a Bob Dylan movie.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

A fascinating, vexing, indulgent, visionary, pretentious, mesmerizing pop culture curio.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

This one's painful.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

For all its pretensions and avant-garde narrative dislocations, the star-studded cast...keeps this buzzing.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Requires tremendous restraint not to conclude that this entertainingly apocalyptic mess is about nothing, since it may well be about everything. But I doubt it.

San Francisco Chronicle Edward Guthmann

A messy, ambitious comedy.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

It's only when the film attempts to express its ideas in spoken English that logic dissolves into a muddle that would test the most rabid Dylanologist.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

"Masked" is erratic and volatile, too, from scene to scene, moment to moment. The script is chaotic, but the top-flight actors play their hearts out.

Dallas Observer Robert Wilonsky

The film strains for some kind of meaning, but asks you to do the work it can't and won't perform on its own.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Though Dylan shuffles through the dramatic sequences like a dessicated mummy, the music sequences are strikingly vibrant -- he's never looked worse or sounded better.

Village Voice Michael Atkinson

Only Giovanni Ribisi, with a back-of-the-bus speech about the betrayals of insurgent and counter-insurgent politics, finds a genuine moment. All the same, for some unfathomable reason, Dylan's autumnal self-salute is not particularly difficult to watch.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Bob Dylan might have been wrong when he sang that "there’s no success like failure, and failure’s no success at all." His new movie, although a complete narrative mess, is a thoroughly Dylanesque escapade.

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

An apocalyptic Bob Dylan song made cinematic, with all the vision and poetry dissipating in the transfer. It's as if the filmmakers listened to "Desolation Row" just one time too many.

LA Weekly Chuck Wilson

After a zippy first hour, the wackos wear out their welcome and the director, perversely, fails to show the big concert.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

An unholy, incoherent mess.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

The look of the film is great, the soundtrack glorious, but more often than not the dialogue is atrocious, featuring a lot of long-winded gobbledygook.

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

Simply painful to watch as the doomed vehicle it's trapped in comes whistling toward a fiery crash landing.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

There are people who find treasures in celebrities' garbage cans so it's a reasonable gamble they might want to buy tickets to watch their throwaway home-movie projects as well.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

The exact cinematic equivalent of a classic Bob Dylan song. It's also proof that what is towering genius in one medium can go insanely wrong in another.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Dylan's performance doesn't offer any clues. He's an icon and he delivers an icon's performance, literally: He could easily have been replaced by piece of wood with his face painted on it. That distance also means he remains more or less untouched by the embarrassment going on around him, even though it's largely his own creation.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Evinces no interest in such niceties as credible dialogue, character motivation or forward momentum.

Film Threat Peter Lynch

A nearly complete and total disaster.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

A vanity production beyond all reason. I am not sure, however, than the vanity is Dylan's. I don't have any idea what to think about him.

New York Magazine Peter Rainer

Here’s a good rule of thumb: Any movie featuring a quote in its ad from the poet laureate of Great Britain—“Deeply engaging!” -- is in trouble.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

An incomprehensible Bob Dylan vanity project that is not only nearly impossible to sit through, but embarrasses a long list of stars who lined up to work for scale opposite the legendary musician.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.5 (out of 10) based on 27 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

[Anonymous] gave it a1:
Ugh. Fun to see two northern Minnesota kids(Dylan and Jessica Lange) perform together but, other than that, it is a major disappointment given the strong cast.

jw gave it a6:
Like a rare poison dart frog, I can appreciate the miracle of its evolution without wanting to pick it up and kiss it.

Sammy M. gave it a9:
This movie was as mystical as it was cryptic. A host of shining stars light up the screen through captivating dialogue. Features amazing musical performances.

Frank D. gave it a9:
A unappreciated film with great music, great narrative, and a very intelligent script.

WC M. gave it an8:
Not nearly as bad as many are saying, this movie is intriguing, challenging, funny, weird in a good way, and unlike most films where you know what's going to happen before you even buy your popcorn. Lots of great lines, music and performances.

Dave S. gave it an 8:
Like most of Dylan's art, M&A is a lot to digest. A swirling concoction of images, history, ideals, humor, and eccentricities. It was confoundingly just out of reach, but fun to watch. Bob has never looked more iconic or sounded better. The film soars when he and his band performs. I'm not always sure what the guy is trying to tell us but I never get tired of listening.

Sergei P. gave it a 0:
Only Dylan Pool fanatics will like this completely worthless ego trip.

Masked & Anonymous Sony Pictures Classics

Masked & Anonymous
Sony Pictures Classics