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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

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
91
Hurt Locker, The
89
Goodbye Solo
88
Tulpan
87
Gomorrah
86
Seraphine
84
Summer Hours
83
U2 3D
83
Revanche
83
Tyson
82
Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country
82
Sugar
82
Hunger
82
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
81
Il Divo
81
Beaches of Agnes, The
80
Food, Inc.
80
Tokyo Sonata
79
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
78
Boys: The Sherman Brothers' Story, The
78
O'Horten
77
Every Little Step
77
Sin Nombre
75
24 City
74
Treeless Mountain
74
Afghan Star
74
Two Lovers
74
Song of Sparrows, The
74
Lemon Tree
71
Pressure Cooker
71
Jerichow
70
Shall We Kiss?
70
Tony Manero
70
End of the Line, The
69
Valentino: The Last Emperor
69
Unmistaken Child
67
$9.99
67
Rudo y Cursi
67
Girlfriend Experience, The
66
Adoration
66
Moon
65
Sex Positive
65
Departures
64
Outrage
64
Examined Life
64
Throw Down Your Heart
64
Lymelife
63
Tokyo!
63
Cheri
63
Dead Snow
63
Tetro
63
Great Buck Howard, The
62
Cherry Blossoms
62
Big Man Japan
62
Not Forgotten
61
Sunshine Cleaning
60
Under Our Skin
59
Sleep Dealer
58
Julia
58
Easy Virtue
57
Away We Go
57
Merry Gentleman, The
57
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love
56
Girl from Monaco, The
56
American Violet
55
Brothers Bloom, The
54
Is Anybody There?
54
Pontypool
54
Stoning of Soraya M., The
52
Quiet Chaos
50
Management
48
Alien Trespass
45
Whatever Works
42
Little Ashes
42
Tennessee
40
Limits of Control, The
40
Paris 36
38
Gigantic
36
Life is Hot in Cracktown
35
New York
28
Big Shot-Caller, The
28
Surveillance
22
What Goes Up
18
Downloading Nancy
16
I Hate Valentine's Day
xx
Call of the Wild
xx
Home
xx
Offshore
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Personal Velocity
MGM / United Artists
FILM:
MPAA RATING: R for brief violence, some strong sexuality and language
Starring
Kyra Sedgwick,
Parker Posey,
Fairuza Balk,
Tim Guinee,
Wallace Shawn,
Ben Shenkman,
Patti D'Arbanville,
and
John Ventimiglia (narrator)
Based on Rebecca Miller's acclaimed book of short stories, this film tells three tales of women who have reached a turning point in their lives.
| GENRE(S): |
Drama
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Rebecca Miller
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Rebecca Miller
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: March 18, 2003
Video: March 18, 2003
Theatrical: November 22, 2002
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
86 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
USA |
Grand Jury Prize, 2002 Sundance Film Festival

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
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
Miller shows terrific talent as a director with a sharp eye for images, a keen ear for dialogue, and a refreshing willingness to take storytelling risks.

100
Entertainment Weekly
Owen Gleiberman
A no-frills docu-Dogma plainness, yet Miller lingers on invisible, nearly psychic nuances, leaping into digressions of memory and desire. She boxes these women's souls right open for us.

90
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
Everything and everyone is observed sharply, succinctly and indelibly.
90
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
The cumulative effect is that of watching misspent lives disintegrate before your eyes. Ms. Miller's canny accomplishment is a triumph, giving the material weight and heart. This is one of the finest pictures of the year.

88
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
The actors are gifted at establishing character with just a few well-chosen strokes (as a short story writer must also be able to do). We learn as much about each of these women in half an hour as we learn about most movie characters in two hours.

80
Washington Post
Stephen Hunter
Embraces reality, humanity and compassion, as leavened by wisdom and wit.

80
Los Angeles Times
Manohla Dargis
Miller's strength in her stories and in the film is in her ability to push past ideology and get right down to the nitty-gritty of desire.

80
Variety
Dennis Harvey
Impresses with the originality of its observation, storytelling techniques and filmmaking style.

80
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
The movie's much more than a castor-oil feminist message about self-realization, bad old Dad and all those awful men. The performances take care of that.

80
Dallas Observer
Bill Gallo
Moviegoers bewailing the absence of literacy and shallowness of character they usually get for their seven bucks need look no further than this fluent and satisfying triptych for a source of hope.

75
Portland Oregonian
Kim Morgan
It's not afraid to be funny, tragic and decidedly female.
75
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
The acting is uniformly excellent, with Kyra Sedgwick and Fairuza Balk in particular deserving to be singled out for praise.

75
New York Post
Megan Lehmann
Succinct yet detailed storytelling, evocative cinematography (by Ellen Kuras) and arresting central performances add up to a trio of engaging character portraits.

75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Rick Groen
A drama that's often insightful and occasionally powerful but is still, at heart, a piece of television and not a work of film.

75
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
Has the confessional intimacy of a video diary and performances to match, particularly those of Kyra Sedgwick and Parker Posey.

70
Film Threat
Merle Bertrand
An intensely moving and oftentimes haunting film; a compelling look at the unique life paths of three totally different women.

70
TV Guide
Ken Fox
All three actresses are simply dazzling, particularly Balk, who's finally been given a part worthy of her considerable talents.

63
New York Daily News
Jami Bernard
The first two stories are so well-drawn you hate to leave them. But Miller's femaleempowerment anthology carries a smart whiff of other literary looks at ordinary, extraordinary women, such as Grace Paley's "Enormous Changes at the Last Minute."

63
Chicago Tribune
Mark Caro
The movie's title refers to a comment about how people grow at their own rates. Miller's movie has its moments of impressive velocity, but it never quite takes off.

60
Village Voice
Laura Sinagra
Miller's women share the affliction of scars left by dominating fathers. But the stories lean toward self-importance, and used verbatim in heavy voice-over, they register as a parody of spareness. Posey is the only one who has fun puncturing the solemnity, turning the real surreal in a softer version of her usual attack.

60
Salon.com
Jeff Stark
The thing I took away from that opening was that it was small, and looked beautiful. There was some technique and a little confusion. It didn't seem to have a conflict all plotted out and neatly resolved. The thing I didn't like is that the rest of the movie did.

60
Chicago Reader
Richard M. Porton
Rebecca Miller's second feature shows her to be a careful but somewhat schematic scenarist; her shaky directorial skills are partly offset by her skill at eliciting convincing portrayals from actors.

60
LA Weekly
Ella Taylor
Liberal use is made of freeze-frame and flashbacks as a kind of emotional chronology, yet it's precisely in this regard that the characters feel tentative and half-formed. I'm still trying to figure out why this perfectly serviceable movie won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance last year.

58
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Paula Nechak
The actors navigate tough characters through emotional mayhem with such intense determination it's a shame they're undercut by the intrusive voice-over.

50
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
The writing is self-consciously literary in a way that probably worked better on the page.

50
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
A hit-and-miss affair, or, to be more precise, a miss (story one), hit (story two) and break even (story three) affair.

50
Boston Globe
Ty Burr
This isn't a movie -- it's an author in love with the sound of her own voice.

40
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Scott Tobias
Taken together, the stories are a watershed of feminist clichés, composed of half-hour sections that are too tidy by half, and overlaid with writerly voiceovers that suggest an author too enamored of her own narration. But one salvageable piece emerges in the middle: a sharp and acerbically funny segment that seems written specifically for Parker Posey.


The average user rating for this movie is 7.4 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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