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Twentynine Palms
Wellspring Media


6.7

based on 16 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 8 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Yekaterina Golubeva, and David Wissak

Twentynine Palms is a small, remote American town deep in the desert of central California. It provides the unique setting for this darkly comedic chronicle of the romantic and sexual life of a young couple in love. (Wellspring Media)

GENRE(S):	Drama \| Foreign
WRITTEN BY:	Bruno Dumont
DIRECTED BY:	Bruno Dumont
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: September 21, 2004 Video: September 21, 2004 Theatrical: April 9, 2004
RUNNING TIME:	119 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	France / Germany / USA
LANGUAGE(S):	English / French (with English subtitles)

Nominated, Golden Lion, 2003 Venice 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

New York Post V.A. Musetto

At turns sexy, ultra-violent and sweet, it will infiltrate your brain long after you've seen it.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Dumont's methods are radical, but there's a fascinating method to his seeming cinematic madness.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Even adventurous moviegoers who are familiar with Bruno Dumont's previous features...may be taken aback by the intensity of this shocker.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

For most of the way, the film is perceptive about the hot-and-cold volatility of wounded relationships, when couples are struggling to communicate yet familiar enough to exploit each other's weaknesses.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Slams us with an absurdly repugnant ending, for absolutely no reason other than to shock viewers and generate cheap controversy.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

The sustained force of Mr. Dumont's vision of existence as a swirl of brute instincts may not be easy to absorb, but it marks him as a major filmmaker.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

This is one of those films in which the Act of Driving becomes a 10-minute statement of high emptiness; Dumont even manages to make sex in the desert boring.

The New Yorker David Denby

The latest minimalist provocation from the infuriating but talented French director Bruno Dumont. [12 April 2004, p. 89]

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

It's alternately monotonous, hot and dramatic, which makes for a peculiar, not entirely unsatisfying atmosphere of neo -- or is that post? -- noir. What it all means, of course, I have no idea.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

A textbook example of how a director can strip away plot, motivation, character, and meaning and still leave arrant pretension standing tall.

Los Angeles Times Manohla Dargis

Embedded between all the sex and sunlight are some woefully underdeveloped ideas about American militarism and masculinity. Dumont doesn't bother to develop these ideas, principally because he seems to think it's enough to arrange his characters like puppets and tear off their heads.

The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck

Ultimately a hollow and pointless exercise.

San Francisco Chronicle Ruthe Stein

Muddled, to put it kindly.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Alas, the plot eventually takes over, and it's exceptionally ugly and unpleasant.

Village Voice Dennis Lim

The "Humanite" director's Death Valley void is the real "Lost in Translation."

Variety Lisa Nesselson

Fails to captivate or intrigue at the most basic level.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.7 (out of 10) based on 8 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Anton C. gave it a9:
The only simile that suits all the attributes to this film is "as hell".

Chad S. gave it a7:
The central question surrounding "29 Palms" for me is if the final violent act would've occured independently of the nod to "Deliverance". After all, why else would you be driving around the California desert? [***SPOILERS***] Maybe, just maybe, David was double-crossed by those men in the white truck. If you believe he was, the scene in which David boots Katerina out of the motel room, post-b.j., gains a noir-ish edge. Maybe her paranoia about that passing car is an unconscious premonition. Unlike Catherine Breillart's "Fat Girl", filmmaker Bruno Dumont might be planting clues under our noses.

pa pa gave it a9:
Human just being animal being human unusual violent.

Dave Van H. gave it an8:
Not as good as Dumont's Humanite, but a fascinating film nonetheless. most people will be put off by it's deliberately slow pace, but those who go along will not be disappointed.

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Twentynine Palms Wellspring Media

Twentynine Palms
Wellspring Media