Advanced Search >
Help Me Search

Movies

Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores

Wide Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Limited Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

58 (Untitled)
96 35 Shots of Rum
56 Adam
72 Adela
39 Adventures of Power
78 Afghan Star
61 After the Storm
66 Afterschool
xx All the Best
58 American Casino
72 Amreeka
48 Antichrist
73 Araya
62 Art & Copy
55 As Seen Through These Eyes
76 Baader Meinhof Complex, The
86 Beaches of Agnes, The
13 Beautiful Life, A
70 Beeswax
35 Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
71 Big Fan
66 Black Dynamite
51 Blind Date
xx Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly
76 Bliss
35 Blue Tooth Virgin, The
26 Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
57 Boys Are Back, The
45 Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
81 Bright Star
70 Bronson
45 Burning Plain, The
xx Carriers
55 Casi Divas
57 Chelsea on the Rocks
62 Cloud 9
65 Coco Before Chanel
69 Cold Souls
59 Collapse
44 Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha
82 Cove, The
75 Crude
82 Damned United, The
67 Departures
xx Dil Bole Hadippa
71 Disgrace
xx Do Knot Disturb
70 Earth Days
24 Eating Out 3: All You Can Eat
85 Education, An
55 Endgame
xx Eulogy for a Vampire
xx Everyone Else
xx Fatal Promises
56 Fifty Dead Men Walking
62 Five Minutes of Heaven
74 Flame & Citron
49 Food Beware: The French Organic Revolution
80 Food, Inc.
28 Free Style
xx From Mexico with Love
50 Fuel
25 Gentlemen Broncos
50 Give Me Your Hand
58 Gogol Bordello Non-Stop
72 Good Hair
89 Goodbye Solo
52 Grace
66 Harmony and Me
81 Headless Woman, The
xx Heretics, The
63 Horse Boy, The
73 House of the Devil, The
xx How to Seduce Difficult Women
74 Humpday
94 Hurt Locker, The
29 I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
16 If One Thing Matters: A Film About Wolfgang Tillmans
75 In Search of Beethoven
83 In the Loop
61 Intimate Enemies
42 Irene in Time
70 It Might Get Loud
46 Killing Kasztner
19 Labor Day
xx Laila's Birthday
41 Little Ashes
41 Little Traitor, The
66 Liverpool
34 Looking for Palladin
80 Lorna's Silence
83 Maid, The
xx Ministers, The
59 More Than a Game
67 Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, The
34 Motherhood
62 My One and Only
xx Mystery Team
48 New York, I Love You
73 Night and Day
66 No Impact Man
47 Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
34 Other Man, The
xx Painter Sam Francis, The
54 Paper Heart
xx Paradise
68 Paranormal Activity
68 Paris
44 Peter and Vandy
35 Play the Game
77 Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
xx Pretty Ugly People
65 Providence Effect, The
76 Rembrandt's J'accuse
69 September Issue, The
79 Serious Man, A
40 Shrink
61 Skin
77 Skin Too Few: The Days of Nick Drake, A
xx Skiptracers
46 Splinterheads
39 St. Trinian's
89 Still Walking
50 Stoning of Soraya M., The
55 Storm
65 Tetro
70 That Evening Sun
72 Thirst
xx Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (re-release)
61 Trucker
xx Turning Green
83 U2 3D
66 Unmade Beds
66 Unmistaken Child
70 Visual Acoustics
55 Walt & El Grupo
67 Way We Get By, The
69 We Live in Public
64 Wedding Song, The
64 Where is Where?
xx White on Rice
74 Woman in Berlin, A
69 World's Greatest Dad
70 Yes Men Fix the World
69 Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg
xx You, the Living

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Quills

EMAILPRINTFox Searchlight Pictures

Quills reviews
70
7.4 User Score:

Generally favorable reviews

Based on 31 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 16 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >

Movie Info

Genre(s): Drama

Written by: Doug Wright (also play)

Directed by: Philip Kaufman

Release Date:
Theatrical: November 22, 2000
DVD: May 8, 2001

Running Time: 123 minutes, Color

Origin: USA

Summary

RATING: R for strong sexual content including dialogue, violence and language

Starring Geoffrey Rush, Kate Winslet, Joaquin Phoenix, and Michael Caine

Quills boldly enters the debate surrounding the Marquis De Sade by imagining his final days as a blistering black comedy thriller, a battle between lust and love - and between the brutality of censorship and the unpredictable consequences of free expression. (Fox Searchlight)

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...

100

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Kaufman's startling Quills gives us an anatomy of fear, images both silken swift and molten hot, scenes that disrupt and inflame the imagination.

Read Full Review >
90

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

A savage comedy of sexual extremes; the barbed laughs draw blood.

90

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

Profane, sacrilegious, pornographic, sadistic and Sade-istic, titillating and the most honorable movie of the year.

Read Full Review >
90

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

It's an unapologetic dazzler, which is why it's never overwhelmed by its themes.

Read Full Review >
88

USA Today Mike Clark

Uniformly robust acting puts still more feathers in the caps of Rush, Winslet and Caine.

Read Full Review >
88

Boston Globe Jay Carr

A witty yet fiery and, in the best sense, provocative play of ideas about freedom of expression.

Read Full Review >
88

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Finds a tone that remains more entertaining than depressing, more absorbing than alarming.

Read Full Review >
88

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

This playful, immensely entertaining movie knows that art is in the eye of the beholder.

Read Full Review >
80

LA Weekly John Patterson

Remarkable energy and wit, and is probably the most purely enjoyable entry in Kaufman's suboeuvre of literary excursions.

Read Full Review >
80

Film.com Peter Brunette

The dialogue is sparkingly witty, and Phoenix and Winslet are excellent in what are, after all, meant to be fairly one-dimensional roles.

Read Full Review >
80

Slate David Edelstein

What the film does have is coruscating anger, impish wit, and a breathtaking style.

Read Full Review >
80

The New York Times A.O. Scott

Occasionally becomes pretentious and shrill -- sometimes Mr. Wright isn't aware that his material is so good that he doesn't need to comment on his characters.

Read Full Review >
80

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Kaufman's earnestly overblown celebration of the Marquis de Sade.

Read Full Review >
80

Mr. Showbiz Kevin Maynard

A literate, dialogue-driven treat delivered by a cast that truly savors the script's wicked wit.

Read Full Review >
80

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Ridiculous enough to be hilarious, but this didn't prevent me from thoroughly enjoying Philip Kaufman's silly romp.

Read Full Review >
75

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

The things you can look forward to, however, are the humor, intellectual musing, emotional tumult, superb acting and challenging adult questions.

Read Full Review >
75

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Stack

Rush is amazing throughout this absorbing, provocative film.

Read Full Review >
70

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Rush is too sinfully good for the drama he's in.

Read Full Review >
70

Variety Todd McCarthy

Lacks an edge of danger or excitement that might have brought the subject alive in more than a cerebral way.

Read Full Review >
70

Newsweek David Ansen

Ultimately, Quills descends into overwrought melodrama. But at its bright and bawdy best, it bubbles with subversive wit.

Read Full Review >
70

Film.com Gemma Files

Quills -- like the Marquis himself--is a posey, pungent, ultra-theatrical yet weirdly seductive mess which wants to have its cake, eat it too and discuss the whole concept and context of its meal (constantly, contradictorily) while it does so.

Read Full Review >
67

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

A stunningly impassioned and articulate study of a writer's life and the censorial demons that can strangle that voice.

Read Full Review >
67

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Quills bleaches the danger -- and fascination -- out of De Sade, turning him into a kind of mad saint of ''Masterpiece Theatre'' porn.

Read Full Review >
63

Philadelphia Inquirer Desmond Ryan

It's a work that preaches to the choir, and the song has been more subtly sung in better movies.

Read Full Review >
60

Dallas Observer Gregory Weinkauf

Quills is bound to titillate some, but for most it's likely to summon little more than a few Oscars and appreciative yawns.

Read Full Review >
60

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Censorship, madness, social rebellion and the power of art.

Read Full Review >
50

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

The acting is passionate, but the film would be more effective if it presented a more thoroughgoing lesson in the raging horrors that swept through European culture during the era of the French Revolution.

Read Full Review >
50

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

One gets the feeling Kaufman was so intent on putting fury and fanaticism on-screen, he forgot about having it serve any greater purpose. Which makes Quills the film equivalent of one of de Sade's novels: artifice, without art.

Read Full Review >
30

Time Richard Schickel

This is soft-gore porn, obvious in its strategies, witless in the play of its ideas, absurdist only in its pretense to seriousness.

Read Full Review >
25

New York Post Jonathan Foreman

Resembles a period version of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" - played dead straight.

Read Full Review >
20

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Soon becomes a sadistic experience in its own right. Experiencing this pretentious wallow -- overwritten, under-thought and overdone -- is a very sophisticated form of torture.

Read Full Review >

What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 7.4 (out of 10) based on 16 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Jay H. gave it a6:
Exquisitely produced, excellent acting by all, especially Geoffrey Rush, Joaquin Phoenix and Kate Winslet. The costumes and sets are outstanding. However, I found it very talky and often tedious and I was downright bored at times. Yak yak yak yak.

she hex gave it a10:
Well now...sublime. Magnifique. I absolutely love Geoffrey Rush and I must say that his role as the Marquis de Sade was performed exceptionally. My favourite part of the movie is , you know...that intimate encounter between the late Maddy and the youn priest.Call me kinky, but I dare say that this movie fits perfectly not only the mind of those evolved in a different manner, sexually speaking, but it evoques sexuality in such a manner that it fits each and every living thing on earth.

S Marjones gave it a4:
*yawn* Thinks it's more important than it is. Why does every “period/historical piece” coming out of Hollywood have actors speaking with English accents? This took place in -hello- France during the age of Enlightenment. It's like casting Eminem to play Malcolm X - you miss the subtleties of the culture in question by being so consistently Anglo-centric. They do the same with ancient Roman films - can't they at least cast prominent Italian-American actors like De Niro and Pacino?!? As if Americans are too stupid to associate European culture with anything other than the British. It colored my whole view of the film, negating anything positive about the performances. Would it truly be that risky if they accurately portrayed the culture and character of the times? Kate Winslet with a Cockney accent – ooooh! I’m so impressed. *spit*.

Gabor A. gave it a9:
Perfect up until the overdone ending. But literally perfect to that point.

Eric S. gave it a 9:
A disturbing vision of the dark side of self-expression. Intentionally sensationalized and deliberately off-color, it ventures to the very edge of the R rating. In doing so, it achieves an anarchy typical of all great indie films.

Wibble gave it a 9:
It may not make a profound statement but i can think of worse ways to spend my time... geoffrey rush is fab in this..

Allan F. gave it an 8:
Witty, sexy, and entertaining!

Read more user comments >

Popular on CBS sites: SEC Football | NFL | Video Game Cheats | iPhone | Video Game Reviews | Notebooks | Antivirus Software

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use