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True Lies
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation


6.0

based on 17 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 5 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

MPAA RATING: R for a lot of action/violence and some language

Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tom Arnold, Bill Paxton, Tia Carrere, Art Malik, Eliza Dushku, and Grant Heslov

Special agent Harry Tasker (Schwarzenegger) is a top spy, while his neglected wife (Curtis) has been gathering secrets of her own. When their two secret lives unexpectedly collide, Harry and Helen must fight to save their marriage - and the world! (20th Century Fox)

GENRE(S):	Action \| Adventure \| Comedy \| Romance \| Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	James Cameron Claude Zidi (screenplay La Totale!) Simon Michaël (screenplay La Totale!) Didier Kaminka (screenplay La Totale!)
DIRECTED BY:	James Cameron
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: May 25, 1999 Video: August 31, 1999 Theatrical: July 15, 1994
RUNNING TIME:	144 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

Winner, Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical (Curtis), 1995 Golden Globe Awards

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

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Director James Cameron always works on a mega- canvas, yet he's brought off something unique here.

The New York Times Caryn James

Much of the appeal of True Lies comes from the smooth grafting of battle-of-the-sexes comedy onto a high-tech action picture.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

One of the best things about True Lies is that it's genuinely funny.

TV Guide Staff(not credited)

On the surface, True Lies is an affectionate homage to James Bond movies, ratcheted up to meet the action/adventure expectations of today's audiences.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

True Lies is so eager to give you a giddy good time that you're more than happy to let it work you over. It's a likably disposable pop cocktail.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

As the perfectionist creator of bravura set pieces, Cameron is still the leader of the pack. [14 Jul 1994 Pg. F1]

Empire Caroline Westbrook

The net result is unbeatably good fun, helped along by that inherent fantasy that one man can create global mayhem without stopping to worry who's going to clean up afterwards.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The director, James Cameron, is a master of action (he worked with Schwarzenegger on "Terminator 2"), and when he's doing his thing, no one does it better.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

The comedy is extremely broad (with Curtis eliciting almost as many laughs as Schwarzenegger), the action sequences are as well crafted as one can expect from Cameron, and the meaning is as root basic as anyone would wish.

The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann

Here is a film that carries within itself not only the parody but the very material it exploits and subverts. [05 Sept 1994 Pg. 34]

Washington Post Desson Thomson

This mixture of comedy and super-agent spectacle works well at first. But when Schwarzenegger's family and working worlds link up -- an inevitable development -- the plot becomes increasingly ridiculous and overwrought.

Washington Post Rita Kempley

Deceptively labeled a domestic epic by writer-director James Cameron, the $100 million movie is, in fact, a weird hybrid of action juggernaut, buddy cop caper and reactionary soft-core pornography.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

The catch is, once you get past the stunning special effects and the mind-numbing stuntwork, there's not all that much there.

USA Today Susan Wloszczyna

Let others recharge that tired Die Hard formula. Cameron invents a new kind of family therapy that saves your marriage and the world. [15 Jul 1994 Pg. 01.D]

Variety Brian Lowry

Yet even with its ribald laughs and spectacular action sequences (clearly seeking to up the ante on the latter front), the movie gets mired in a comedic midsection that wears the audience down, sapping their energy before the film shifts to a chaotic third act that just doesn't know when to quit.

Time Richard Corliss

For a viewer sympathetic to Schwarzenegger's and Cameron's best selves -- the ironist with muscles and the mordant fabulist -- True Lies is a loud misfire. It rarely brings its potent themes to life.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

The tale begins and ends in a flurry of joke violence; Cameron has decided to spoof what he used to take seriously, and the result, though bright and deafening, feels oddly slack -- he loosens the screws, and our interest drops away.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.0 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Jared C. gave it a0:
Arnold's worst acting, worst role, with great action being ruined by that.

R. Dalvi gave it a5:
Usual Arnold movie. The aeroplane fight in the end is fantastic. But Arnold has no novel action sequences. All of these are similar to those of Terminator series. But Arnold rocks! Jamie Lee Curtis is good. But the violence is usual. I wonder why it was rated "R".

[Anonymous] gave it an8:
Two enjoyable movies in one...high-budget action and the grimmest of romatic comedy, fitting together quite nicely. Its story isn't groundbreaking or deep, but it's so entertaining, it's hard to resist, despite pacing that's a tad bit uneven.

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True Lies Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

True Lies
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation