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X-Files: I Want to Believe, The

EMAILPRINT20th Century Fox

X-Files: I Want to Believe, The reviews
47
6.1 User Score:

Mixed or average reviews

Based on 33 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 140 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info

Genre(s): Mystery  |  Sci-fi

Written by: Chris Carter
Frank Spotnitz

Directed by: Chris Carter

Release Date:
Theatrical: July 25, 2008
DVD: December 2, 2008

Running Time: minutes, Color

Origin: USA | Canada

Summary

RATING: PG-13 for violent and disturbing content and thematic material

Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson, Xzibit, Amanda Peet, Billy Connolly, Callum Keith Rennie, and Adam Godley

The supernatural thriller is a stand-alone story in the tradition of some of the show's most acclaimed and beloved episodes, and takes the always-complicated relationship between Fox Mulder and Dana Scully in unexpected directions. Mulder continues his unshakable quest for the truth, and Scully, the passionate, ferociously intelligent physician, remains inextricably tied to Mulder's pursuits. (20th Century Fox)

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...

88

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

The movie works like thrillers used to work, before they were required to contain villains the size of buildings.

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75

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Knowing nothing about "X-Files" is no impediment to appreciating this for the well-acted, adult piece of work that it is.

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75

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Billy Connolly, as a scurvy priest who may or may not be a visionary, steals the acting honors.

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70

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Duchovny gives a nicely shaped performance here -- he still has the ability to suggest the boyish eagerness beneath Fox's blasé demeanor. But the movie really belongs to Anderson.

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63

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

The Carter and Spotnitz's credit, such weighty concerns aren't the stuff of most mainstream genre movies. But they're also not sufficiently gripping to transform a middling thriller into something truly provocative or haunting.

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63

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

I Want to Believe provides a welcome reminder of what made Carter's franchise a pop-culture gem.

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60

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

The truth is, the mystery pales next to the best "X-Files" plots. But fans will appreciate sly references to past episodes, an unexpected appearance from an old friend and the still-poignant bond our heroes share.

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60

Film Threat Rory L. Aronsky

Please Chris Carter, bring us X-Files fans back to where we belong. If there is to be another movie, and there damn well better be, return us to our beloved mythology.

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60

Empire Kim Newman

An okay paranormal mystery, with solid work from the regulars – but please Mr Carter, next time, could we have liver-eating mutants or post-modern comedy like the really good episodes of The X Files?

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60

Time Richard Corliss

For the uninitiated, The X Files: I Want to Believe may seem as musty and forbidding as one of those dank secrets that Mulder and Scully were forever digging up from some backyard, or fetid swamp, or their own aching hearts.

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58

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Travis Nichols

Does nothing so much as stir up a pining for the show in its prime -- a darkly imaginative and wonderfully weird thing -- though it is always nice to see old friends, however mellowed by age they turn out to be.

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58

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Older and sadder, Mulder and Scully are no longer sure they've got the energy to even ask if the truth is still out there. And it feels as if Carter is skeptical, too.

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50

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

The problem is that only a fan would be inclined to tolerate this dunderheaded mystery.

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50

Portland Oregonian Marc Mohan

Worst of all, not once does Mulder answer his cell phone to hear those immortal lines: "It's Scully. There's been another death."

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50

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

In not knowing who it needs to please, I Want to Believe pleases no one.

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50

USA Today Claudia Puig

It feels like a wan version of the show -- one that has lost its otherworldly edge.

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50

Slate Dana Stevens

The problem with the movie's semisupernatural crime plot, though, isn't that the resolution is completely outlandish; it's that the outlandishness is insufficiently grounded in pseudoscience.

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50

Variety Brian Lowry

The warming glow of nostalgia only goes so far, with one's level of forgiveness likely dictated by where they reside along the "X-Files" fan continuum.

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50

Washington Post Hank Stuever

A taut, well-acted, not very scary, not very hard to figure out serial-killer mystery.

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50

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The story is both a muddle and a drag.

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50

The Hollywood Reporter Justin Lowe

Overall, the film plays like an improbably skewed but comparatively routine criminal procedural that would have served the original show well as an extended season opener or sweeps-week contender.

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50

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Anderson, who's turned Brit in a number of TV series and films, including "Bleak House" and "The Last King of Scotland," is compelling in her white lab coat and surgical scrubs, and she brings some real tenderness to her tete-a-tetes with Mulder.

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50

ReelViews James Berardinelli

An exercise in mediocrity. It's curious how little of the TV series' charm and appeal can be found in this uneven, plodding excuse for a reunion.

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50

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

The story is shockingly ordinary. The movie plays like an extended mediocre episode of the X-Files TV show or, for that matter, even a contemporary crime series such as CSI.

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50

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Atmospheric and moves briskly, but it's basically TV writ large.

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50

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

The whole enterprise suffers from tired blood.

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42

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Carter and his underachieving cohorts have seldom given cultists less to believe.

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40

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

Baggy, draggy, oddly timed and strangely off the mark, The X-Files: I Want to Believe is the generally bad-news follow-up to the show’s first feature-film incarnation, "The X-Files."

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38

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

The truth is, indeed, still out there. And when Carter finds it, may he heed its wisdom: Let go.

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38

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

We waited 10 years for a sequel to the movie version of "The X-Files" – and the best Chris Carter could do is The X-Files: I Want to Believe?

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30

LA Weekly Scott Foundas

The truth is still out there, like an unsold lawn chair at a garage sale, in this just plain lousy second big-screen outing for erstwhile FBI agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully.

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30

Los Angeles Times Jan Stuart

Even at its stride, "The X-Files" was a load of malarkey. But it was thoughtful malarkey and compulsively watchable. One could say the same about the first two-thirds of The X-Files: I Want to Believe before it spins out of control and into a delirious plane of awfulness.

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11

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

They've become deadly dull, these two once-keen buckers of bureaucratic BS, and watching them interact on screen is akin to having your pleasure centers removed by knobby little aliens whose only knowledge of mankind comes from Jack Webb's stoically unvarying television incarnations.

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 6.1 (out of 10) based on 140 User Votes

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

Peepors McPeeps gave it a0:
I hesitated seeing this film in the theater, since I was already put off hearing that it's considered a stand alone plot. I waited until last night and rented it. Growing up with the show, by owning and watching every episode countless times and liking the first movie. Even wanting to look like Dana Scully, but have Fox Mulder's "believe" drive, I was completely brokenhearted when I watched this piece of garbage, X-Files: I Want To Believe. I didn't see the Scully I knew with short bright red hair. She didn't even have her "move over. I need answers NOW!" drive. For the first quarter of the movie, Mulder looks like a mountain man with his beard. Who the HELL are these people? They weren't even in character. Then the movie goes on and on with some perverted weirdo with physic abilities. LAME! No drama. No conspiracy. No X. No nothing. It dragged on so much and was so bad that I kept on fast forwarding the movie. And just when you think something is about to happen to the only person in this movie who is in peril. Scully and Skinner burst in but almost without effort and/or lack of surprise. I lost so much respect that I almost can't watch the X-Files seasons that I own anymore. And they were so good that I was actually afraid to go to bed at night thinking that there's an alien or something in my room. But since I watched this horrible movie, I have to laugh sadly knowing that these two characters will never be idolized by me and my fond memories of watching the show anymore. I want to believe that I never saw this.

tom p gave it a0:
What a load of crap. I very much enjoyed the series on TV but this second film has killed the franchise. The parallel disjointed plot lines served no purpose other than to remind us that Scully is a doctor. The reference to stem cell therapy was an over-romanticized attempt to sell the audience on its merits. There was no character development for the villains so why would we care or be scarred. The on-again, off-again, on-again, off-again, on-again romance/drama was contrived. Scully's reason for stepping away from the relationship made about as much sense as a tweener's twitter about why she doesn't have the nerve to have her bff tell the new boy Spaulding that she kinda, sorta, maybe likes him. I only have myself to blame. I've told myself I would not see movies that score under 55. But forgetting this and hoping to recapture the enjoyment of watching the series I took the BlueRay DVD off the shelf at the DVD store only to plunge my Saturday night into a two hour stretch of high resolution boredom.

Brad A gave it a3:
Ummm.....did I watch the same movie as all of you? Just because it has "x-files" in front of it does not make it a good movie. This was awful! I enjoyed the first movie but this was rubbish. It was a twisted episode of C.S.I. with the actors from the X-files in it. This should never have been made. Holes after holes in the plot (if you can call it that). Where is the conspiracy, the intrigue...it's not here.

Chris B gave it a1:
As a long time fan of the show, I was incredibly upset and disappointed when I walked out of the theater after seeing this movie. It was like they spent 10 years building up an intricate story arc that finally culminated in the series finale, and the first X-files movie even played into that storyline, but then for some reason many years later they just decided to ignore all of that and make a mediocre 'monster of the week' episode into a full movie. And it wasn't just that the movie didn't tie into the main story arc of the television series with the alien invasion and government conspiracies either, but it was that the movie even ignored the many years of character development and the evolution of Mulder and Scully's personalities in favor of just going back to the original scenario where she is a 'skeptic' and he is a 'believer', even though that isn't the way things were at all when the series left off. I have no idea what they were thinking when they made this movie, but as a fan of the actual series (which this movie clearly had little to no connection to), I wish that X-Files: I Want To Believe had never been made.

Weasel G. gave it a7:
I can see everyone's problem with this film. When something carries a cult name like X-Files people expect a certain degree of escapism and adventure as in the first film and this unfortunately hasn't happened here. The film stands quite well individually (if without the X-Files name). Had this been made without the necessary cast and certain personnel this could have easily been passed off as another crime thriller with a couple of character name changes. In short this was a good film not great but but good, even though I missed the little green men

Steve T. gave it a5:
Where was the "X"? I thought the X-files was supposed to centre around the paranormal yet that aspect wasn't even a sub-plot. It was a sub-sub plot. As a crime thriller it was an okay film (hence the 5) but it was supposed to be an "X-files" film so, in those terms, I'd give it a 1. It was like watching a Rocky film where there were 10 seconds of boxing at the beginning and 10 seconds somewhere in the middle and then everything else was about something completely unrelated. I don't see how any 'real' X-files fan could rate this highly as it just isn't about the paranormal. Okay crime thriller but about as paranormal as the ham sandwich I am about to eat.

Rick W. gave it a10:
Excellent movie for the thinking man.

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