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Trust the Man
Fox Searchlight Pictures

Trust the Man reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 43 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
5.9 out of 10
based on 30 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 15 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for language and sexual content

Starring David Duchovny, Julianne Moore, Billy Crudup, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Eva Mendes, and James LeGros

An unflinching yet winsome exploration of modern relationships -- and modern men and women -- in all of their humor, tragedy, imperfection and triumph, this sophisticated comedy follows the romantic escapades of two New York couples. (Fox Searchlight Pictures)


GENRE(S): Comedy  |  Drama  |  Romance  
WRITTEN BY: Bart Freundlich  
DIRECTED BY: Bart Freundlich  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: February 6, 2007 
Theatrical: August 18, 2006 
RUNNING TIME: 103 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

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...

80
The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen
A smart, sharply observed, highly affable look at contemporary relationships that finally injects a little life in the stagnating genre.
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67
Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
If a movie that uses the word "relationship" 7,000 times puts your teeth on edge, stay away.
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63
TV Guide Ken Fox
The cast, however, is great -- Crudup and Duchovny in particular share a fun chemistry that's just toilet-obsessed enough to be absolutely believable.
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63
Miami Herald Connie Ogle
The film makes coupling look less like bliss and more like an exhausting series of skirmishes that can send one party scurrying into infidelity or out the door in search of something better.
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63
ReelViews James Berardinelli
Its strength is its humor, which is half-"Seinfeld" and half-"Sex in the City." There's a reason why those shows ran for only 30 minutes each - it's difficult to sustain comedic momentum for longer, as becomes apparent here.
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63
New York Post Lou Lumenick
A better than adequate date movie.
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60
Empire Liz Beardsworth
Freundlich's intelligent, very funny take on male-female relationships manages the not inconsiderable feat of being both jaded and appealingly fresh.
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50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Stephen Cole
A botched adult romantic comedy that strands its leading player, and its audience, in a wearying, sitcom-slight battle of the sexes.
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50
Austin Chronicle Toddy Burton
A relationship dramedy wields little power without an emotional punch. And when the theatrical (literally) climax attempts bold emotionality, one can’t help but wince.
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50
San Francisco Chronicle Ruthe Stein
Superficially entertaining romantic romp.
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50
Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea
Does the world really need another movie about a married guy wandering blindly into an affair, or the married gal who can't decide whether to remain faithful or fool around?
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50
USA Today Claudia Puig
Trust-- and the genre itself -- needs to dump the stale formula and embrace reality and reinvention.
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50
Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano
The actors gamely keep up their spirits, but the male characters are too one-dimensional and the female characters too bizarrely divorced from reality to be at all engaging.
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50
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
It wasn't so bad, aside from the god-awful ending; at the very least Freundlich manages to come up with funnier jokes than the ossified one-liners decorating Allen's recent movies.
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50
New York Daily News Jack Mathews
Offers a passably entertaining bridge between empty-headed summer fare and fall awards hunting.
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50
Variety John Anderson
For those who appreciate the Woody Allen view of New York but would prefer fewer neurotics, Trust the Man provides a loving take on bourgeois Manhattan contentment that's usually only found in episodes of "Will & Grace."
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50
Chicago Tribune Jessica Reaves
Trust the Man could easily carry the following subtitle: "Men Who Behave Like Petulant, Spoiled Children and the Women Who Decide It's Easier to Love Them As-Is Than To Try to Turn Them Into Grownups."
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50
Washington Post Ann Hornaday
Trust the Man quickly begins to feel hopelessly derivative of other, better movies.
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42
The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias
Trust The Man presents itself as a funny, insightful Manhattan relationship comedy in Woody Allen mode, but morphs into the phoniest of Hollywood rom-coms.
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42
Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
Can these banal relationships between undifferentiated lovelies be saved?
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42
Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach
It's possible that a smart, insightful, sharp-edged comedy could have been written around these characters, but Trust The Man isn't it.
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42
Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell
Has some good laughs courtesy of its cast -- but they're basically papering over a script that's masquerading as urbane and trenchant, when it's really self-involved and didactic and more than a little foolish.
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42
Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold
The cast tries hard and a sprinkling of laughs results, but the project is defeated by a concept that is not very novel, a script that is not especially witty, direction that is neither sharp nor insightful and one-note characters that are simply not very interesting.
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40
Wall Street Journal Joanne Kaufman
Does not bring a single fresh, inventive idea to the table.
40
The New York Times Manohla Dargis
Ms. Moore is nicely lighted, but she too is poorly served by Mr. Freundlich's unfunny, unfocused screenplay, which basically stitches together a series of short scenes of four people whining in various combinations.
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40
LA Weekly Ella Taylor
Emerges a weakling comedy of manners.
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38
Premiere Ethan Alter
Trust the Man mainly feels like the work of a New Yorker who hasn't left his trendy neighborhood in ten years.
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38
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
"Man" is like a sour, half-formed version of a TV sitcom full of dislikable, disconnected characters.
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25
Boston Globe Wesley Morris
This is a movie that's built around characters the audience is bound to find more insufferable than anyone does in the movie itself.
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20
Village Voice Robert Wilonsky
Writer-director Bart Freundlich (Moore's husband) has nothing to say and nowhere to go with this material, except to the most contrived ending this side of a "Will & Grace" episode.
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What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 5.9 (out of 10) based on 15 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Robert D. gave it a10:
One of the funniest film that I ve seen in last years. Smart, romantic and extremely ironic and funny. I loved it. David Duchovny is one of the best actor ever.

Meg M. gave it an8:
Enjoyable movie, funny cast, a little implausible, but life is often implausible today. A lot of it rang very true, especially the relationships between the two guys and the one between the two women.

Digital Fat gave it a7:
Certainly, it has its flaws (the son of Moore & Duchovny's character’s is an annoyance). Duchovny should be in more movies, because he's quite good in this. It is a good movie for adults -- not the MyTube YouSpace set (wait for the next bit of Lindsay Lohan drivel).

griffin m gave it a3:
The performances of Moore and Gyllenhaal, combined, save the film from a rating of -5. Otherwise, the script is sitcom stale; the (usually) fine Cruddup channels Jack Black badly; and Duchovny seems to be working an uninteresting temp job. Here is a capable cast, poorly directed in an unimaginatively scripted Lifetime "original."

Gio A. gave it a1:
A schlockfest. What a disappointment.

Benny gave it an8:
Ignore the critics. This is a smart, funny movie, well written and well acted, very entertaining. Eschews drama created at the point of a gun in favor of clever dialogue and characters.

Michelle C. gave it a10:
This movie is not earth shattering, it will not be oscar nominated. It was, however, very funny, well acted and extremely entertaining. Anyone interested in romantic comedies or relationship issues will enjoy this.

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