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.

Sweet November
Warner Bros.


7.7

based on 31 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 43 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

MPAA RATING: PG-13 for sexual content and language

Starring Keanu Reeves, Charlize Theron, Jason Isaacs, Greg Germann, Lauren Graham, and Michael Rosenbaum

Nelson (Reeves) and Sara (Theron) have nothing in common except an hour spent in DMV hell. Intrigued by each other, but not quite ready to commit, they settle on a rather unconventional courtship: a one-month trial, after which they'll go their separate ways. No expectations. No pressure. No strings attached. What neither of them counts on is falling in love. (Warner Brothers)

GENRE(S):	Romance
WRITTEN BY:	Kurt Voelker (also story) Paul Yurick (story) Herman Raucher (1968 screenplay)
DIRECTED BY:	Pat O'Connor
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: July 24, 2001 Video: July 24, 2001 Theatrical: February 16, 2001
RUNNING TIME:	120 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

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

Neither a masterpiece nor a remake of one, but its wistfulness is infectious, and its melancholy mood lingers for days.

Boston Globe Jay Carr

It's a small film, and a far from perfect one, but it allows her (Theron) to extend her range as no previous role has done.

Chicago Tribune Loren King

Nice to look at but too calculated and clichéd to resonate beyond its surface slickness.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Anyone in the market for a bittersweet romantic comedy could do worse.

Slate David Edelstein

He's (Reeves) not as good as he was playing a menacing Georgia wife-beater in The Gift, but he's an awfully convincing jerk.

Village Voice Michael Atkinson

If the movie works on its own insipid level, it's because of high-gear star power -- 50 times the captivator Dennis ever was, Theron is terrific at creating adorable intimacy with little help from the script or director and exudes more guileless élan than any of the film's many puppies.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Does neither of its leads any favors. But they fill their roles admirably, and then some. Time and again, in a movie that repeatedly threatens mawkishness, you can sense them gently steering away just in the nick of time.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

The sort of movie that seems to exist for no good reason except to keep the studio's pipeline filled with filmed product.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

The sweetest thing about Sweet November (a remake of the 1968 movie) is the on-screen magic between Charlize Theron and Keanu Reeves. But that's pretty much where the magic ends.

Portland Oregonian Kim Morgan

It's classic movie manipulation gone amok.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Chicago Reader Lisa Alspector

It's all corny and contrived and usually sensitive. The filmmakers even dare to show the effects of illness--a subject frequently glamorized to the point of being insulting--in a love scene of rare honesty.

Variety Todd McCarthy

A contrived but entirely workable premise is given a well-tooled treatment in Sweet November, a femme-slanted doomed romance with a heavily calculated feel to it.

USA Today Susan Wloszczyna

November is when we eat turkey, and Sweet November is pretty much a fat, juicy gobbler passed off as Valentine's Day date bait.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

If Sweet November were a puppy, it would have rabies.

Mr. Showbiz Kevin Maynard

This is one of those movies in which there are only two types of people: officious yuppie pricks, and the beautiful folks who stop and smell the daisies. What keeps it (barely) from being completely intolerable is Keanu Reeves' hilariously awful lead performance.

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

This whimsical weeper gets off to an awkward start and never finds its footing.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

A film that means to be seductive but merely progresses from the contrived to the manipulative.

Film.com Robert Horton

Charlize Theron has charm and skill, but no actress could survive this role, which has the gravity and verisimilitude of a sketch from a late-sixties Nancy Sinatra TV special.

Miami Herald Curtis Morgan

The enigma of Reeves, sort of a human black hole on screen, works well in "The Matrix" but it drains the life from weepy romance.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Passes off pathological behavior as romantic bliss. It's about two sick and twisted people playing mind games and calling it love.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

A hellacious stew of romance and tragedy that gives the words "screwball" and "pathos" a bad name.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

A very low grade romantic drama indeed, a love story with all the life and death intensity of a heat rash.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Get out your handkerchiefs. No, scratch that -- get out a pair of windshield wipers and staple them to your brow. Perhaps they'll obscure the screen.

LA Weekly Hazel-Dawn Dumpert

This feeble remake offers little more than two pretty and willing leads who nonetheless can't hide their embarrassment over being set up as distractions to hide the film's thorough lack of coherence and appeal.

The New York Times Dana Stevens

The film's last half-hour -- or do I mean its final two weeks? -- is meant to keep the audience sniffling and sobbing uncontrollably, but the only thing likely to elicit tears is the sight of Mr. Reeves dressed in a white dinner jacket crooning "Time After Time."

Washington Post Desson Thomson

A front-end collision of a romance.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Beware all male viewers who enter here, you are in chick-movie hell.

Dallas Observer Staff (Not credited)

It could be said that Reeves is one of the great manifestations of the mysteriousness of stardom. He gives the worst performance in Sweet November, and he's the best thing about it.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

Shamelessly manipulative in a crude, bullying way.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

Sara is supposed to be an adorable screwball with a fatal disease. Ms. Theron certainly gets the adorable right. With a comic style that's close to unerring, she not only deserves better than this junk but the very best.

The average user rating for this movie is 7.7 (out of 10) based on 43 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Ivan N gave it a9:
After looking through "professional" critic reviews, I finally understood why I like Chicago Tribune so much over other periodicals. The thing is that those guys at CT do have hearts and do understand that there is more to life than what you expect in an average, credit-backed, bubble-life.

Manish S gave it a10:
This is one of the best movie ever written and acted. You may not like it but it is the best movie for any "Human" being. Before anything else we are human beings. so being Human is being"with " love. always giving always caring always forgiving, No demanding etc etc. rest is the movie. frankly speaking I did not like the last few minutes. I think director spoiled it due to time limitation....Love infact does not know time. etc etc.....anyway take care and love you.

Gloria C. gave it a5:
It was a very drama movie i love it alot.

Madison S. gave it a 10:
It's reality. It's not some fairy tale where everyone falls in love and lives happily ever after.

Leah W. gave it a 10:
One of the best films i have ever seen.. well romance film neway! extremely moving.. made me cry 10/10 without a doubt.

Buffy fan gave it a 10:
This is one of the best drama movies that I have ever seen. Keanua Reeves is magnificent in this movie I actually cried when I watched this it difently is a classic.

Niall M. gave it a 9:
I really enjoyed this film, it is one of the best iv seen in the past while. charlize and keanu did a great job, the chemistry between them i thought was electric. im not a person that would cry at a film but this film had me very close, it certainly caused a lump in my throat. up to the last quarter of this film had me feeling heart warmed and feeling that this is was happiness is (especially that scene which keanu realised this is all he ever wanted), and then the last quarter moved me tremendiously. good film.

Sweet November Warner Bros.

Sweet November
Warner Bros.