GAMES: GameSpot | GameFAQs | SportsGamer MUSIC: Last.fm | MP3.com MOVIES: Metacritic | Movietome TV: TV.com
Home | About Metacritic | About Metascores | What's New | Wireless Versions | Discussion Forums | Advertising Inquiries | Contact Us | RSS
Metacritic.com: We Deal With Criticism
     Help
> Switch to Advanced Search  
Film Video/DVD Music Games TV

Film

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

 

Wide Releases

sort by name sort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 

Limited Releases

sort by name sort by score

xx All of Us
53 Allah Made Me Funny: Live in Concert
57 Amazing Truth About Queen Raquela, The
64 Appaloosa
69 Ashes of Time Redux
68 August Evening
xx B.O.H.I.C.A.
62 Baghead
84 Ballast
54 Battle in Seattle
xx Beer for My Horses
75 Betrayal - Nerakhoon, The
xx Billy: The Early Years
66 Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story
56 Bottle Shock
55 Boy in the Striped Pajamas, The
50 Breakfast with Scot
61 Brick Lane
43 Call and Response
62 Changeling
49 Children of Huang Shi, The
47 Choke
46 Choose Connor
84 Christmas Tale, A
41 Cthulhu
81 Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father
xx Dostana
62 Duchess, The
46 Dukes, The
63 Eden
xx Eden Lake
66 Elegy
46 Elephant King, The
80 Encounters at the End of the World
26 Everybody Wants to Be Italian
64 Fall, The
69 Fear(s) of the Dark
26 Filth and Wisdom
28 Fireproof
52 First Basket, The
67 Flow: For Love of Water
37 Forever Strong
69 Frontrunners
82 Frozen River
43 Gardens of the Night
73 Girl Cut in Two, A
73 Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
54 Good Dick
30 Guitar, The
84 Happy-Go-Lucky
44 Henry Poole is Here
31 Hounddog
27 House of the Sleeping Beauties
47 How About You
54 Humboldt County
72 I Served the King of England
70 I.O.U.S. A
40 Igor
64 In Search of a Midnight Kiss
78 I've Loved You So Long
63 JCVD
41 Johnny Got His Gun
xx Just Buried
62 Kabluey
63 Kit Kittredge: An American Girl
25 Lake City
78 Last Mistress, The
81 Let the Right One In
xx Lower Learning
63 Man Named Pearl, A
89 Man on Wire
xx Mary
xx Matador, The
62 Mister Foe
84 Momma's Man
51 Morning Light
79 Moving Midway
33 My Name Is Bruce
59 Nights and Weekends
73 Obscene
40 Other End of the Line, The
34 Otto; or Up with Dead People
40 Passengers
xx Phoebe in Wonderland
55 Ping Pong Playa
75 Pool, The
77 Pray the Devil Back to Hell
82 Rachel Getting Married
56 Religulous
32 Repo! The Genetic Opera
xx Roadside Romeo
53 RocknRolla
56 Save Me
74 Secret, A
45 Shoot on Sight
57 Sixty Six
85 Slumdog Millionaire
56 Special
58 Splinter
79 Stranded: I Have Come from a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains
67 Synecdoche, New York
82 Tell No One
64 Thousand Years of Good Prayers, A
57 Towelhead
72 Transsiberian
83 Trouble the Water
43 Tru Loved
83 U2 3D
61 Universe of Keith Haring
84 Up the Yangtze
52 Virtual JFK: Vietnam If Kennedy Had Lived
79 Visitor, The
61 Wackness, The
59 We Are Wizards
55 What Just Happened?
66 When Did You Last See Your Father?

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

 



Printer-Friendly Version Email This Page Discuss In Our Forums

You Kill Me
IFC Films

You Kill Me reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 64 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
8.3 out of 10
based on 25 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 16 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for language and some violence

Starring Ben Kingsley, Téa Leoni, Luke Wilson, Philip Baker Hall, Dennis Farina, and Bill Pullman

This street-smart mob comedy is the story of what happens when two mismatched people find a common calling. (IFC Films)


GENRE(S): Comedy  |  Suspense/Thriller  
WRITTEN BY: Christopher Markus
Stephen McFeely
 
DIRECTED BY: John Dahl  
RELEASE DATE: Theatrical: June 22, 2007 
RUNNING TIME: 92 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
Washington Post Stephen Hunter
Frank (Ben Kingsley) meets Laurel (Tea Leoni), a woman who has been around the block a time or 200, and she likes Frank's directness, while he likes her unflappability. This is one of the greatest screwball relationships in years.
Read Full Review
78
Austin Chronicle Marrit Ingman
Cuddlier and more charming, this alcoholic-hitman comedy isn’t your typical Dahl noir (The Last Seduction, Red Rock West), but it is offbeat, lovably deadpan, and just tart enough.
Read Full Review
75
Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
You Kill Me kills you softly with its smiles.
Read Full Review
75
Boston Globe Ty Burr
It's a predictable but acridly pleasant 12-step bonbon: self-help noir.
Read Full Review
75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Bill White
A deviously delightful entertainment.
Read Full Review
75
Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
The acting is fine -- and so is the moody-blues direction -- but, given the subject matter, the movie should be blacker and more disturbing.
Read Full Review
75
USA Today Scott Bowles
Surely there aren't many emotionally fragile mobster stories left in the Hollywood arsenal. But at least Kill is a pretty good shot with the laughs.
Read Full Review
75
Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
Leoni is one of the truly distinctive comic actresses we have in the movies today, a tough broad with murderously effective timing and phrasing.
Read Full Review
75
TV Guide Maitland McDonagh
Director John Dahl keeps a firm hand on Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely's razor-sharp hit-man-in-rehab comedy, which mines the same dark vein as "Gross Pointe Blank"(1997) and "Matador"(2005), and the payoff is both slily funny and startlingly fresh.
Read Full Review
75
New York Post Lou Lumenick
It's the best role in years for Leoni, but You Kill Me really belongs to Kingsley, whose character's deadpan reactions to his new environment are priceless. He really kills.
Read Full Review
75
New York Daily News Jack Mathews
Dahl found the right actors for every part - Bill Pullman as the cynical Realtor hired to look after Frank, Luke Wilson as the gay AA member assigned as Frank's sponsor, and the always amusing Dennis Farina as Irish mobster Edward O'Leary.
Read Full Review
70
The New York Times Manohla Dargis
Straight-up ridiculous, but it's also consistently funny and nicely played by a well-complemented cast that finds its collective groove and never misses a beat.
Read Full Review
70
Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
Even if you can't accept all the movie's left curves, you might still be amused.
Read Full Review
70
Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust
We've seen the inner lives of hit men and mobsters rendered innumerably in recent years on film and television, but You Kill Me does it in a satisfyingly comedic way, loaded with easily identifiable idiosyncrasies.
Read Full Review
70
Variety Ronnie Scheib
With an eclectic mix of strong-minded thesps all pulling in slightly different directions, this shape-shifting genre hybrid successfully commingles 12-step therapy, romantic comedy and hit-man thriller.
Read Full Review
70
The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck
Its razor-sharp script by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely and the hilariously deadpan comic performances by Ben Kingsley and Tea Leoni make it a consistent pleasure.
Read Full Review
70
Film Threat Rick Kisonak
In other hands with another cast, You Kill Me might easily have proven just another modest production indulging in mob violence and postmodern irony. There certainly is no shortage of those. Dahl’s latest, however, is something more than a modest production. It’s a small wonder.
Read Full Review
70
Time Richard Schickel
I don't want to oversell You Kill Me. It is not going to leave you breathless with laughter. But I don't want to undersell it either. For an hour and a half it exerts its own preposterous reality, making you believe it -- and like it.
Read Full Review
67
The Onion (A.V. Club) Staff (Not credited)
The main pleasure lies in watching a cast filled with fine character actors like Kingsley, Farina, Hall, and Bill Pullman work their way around the salty, noir-inflected dialogue. It's just unfortunate that those lines add up to such piffle.
Read Full Review
63
Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez
Leoni's presence adds a jolt of energy to a movie that, while not necessarily worth going out of your way for, turns out to be a lot more clever than it initially appears.
Read Full Review
50
Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
Dahl has directed half a dozen sardonic noir movies, dating back to "Kill Me Again" in 1989, so he should have been the ideal choice for this material. But even he can't make chicken salad from a pile of beaks, bones and claws.
Read Full Review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey
You Kill Me is not so much a bad film as one filled with missed potential and marked by the seams of compromise.
Read Full Review
50
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
You Kill Me is pretty light, but it's well made, and within the built-in limitations of its story -- a hit man goes to Alcoholics Anonymous -- it's fairly pleasing.
Read Full Review
25
Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman
Inert dud of a hitmen-are-people-too comedy.
Read Full Review
20
Village Voice Scott Foundas
The past decade has been less kind to Dahl, and though his latest, called You Kill Me, has the outward appearance of a return to form, it may in fact be the worst thing he's ever done--an inert, tone-deaf mélange of "The Sopranos" and "Six Feet Under."
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 8.3 (out of 10) based on 16 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

JC A. gave it a10:
A classy and jazzy masterpiece.

Joyce C. gave it a10:
Every seven years your taste of food changes, maybe you used to like cheese wiz and now you hate it. Well my taste changed pretty fast. I saw this movie the day it came out and I didn't like it what so ever. Around two weeks later, I watched it again just 'cause I was bored and for some reason a I enjoyed it much more than the last time I saw it. After that, I noticed that you have to put full thought when you're watching this movie. And I did. I highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys and puts full thought into their movies. Great film.

Gary C. gave it a10:
I just watched this movie the other night and I have no idea why my wife didn't like it but I loved it. You Kill Me is a classic. It deseves what it gets and what its going to get because there's absolutely nothing wrong with this movie what so ever.

Jared C. gave it a10:
It was humorous. It was classy. It was the jazziest comedy of the year, until Superbad came along.

G-Rad Andrew gave it a10:
I saw this movie on Whyte Avenue in Edmonton, Alberta. I enjoyed it a lot. The humor wasn't laugh-out-loud comedy, it was more of funny show that made you giggle in your head because you knew it was funny but seriously funny. Through my opinion, I thought it was very classy and stylish.

Scott R gave it an8:
Funny in the way Thank You For Smoking was funny. And I have never seen Kingsley so wry.

Bill D. gave it an8:
Very funny movie, especially if you're familiar with the AA 12 Step Program. The entire cast is great, but Pullman and Leoni especially stand out. The only flaw, albeit a big one, is the ending, which seems patched together by nervous studio executives. The fact that the Kingsley character's support group is pulling for his successful recovery from alcoholism so he can get his life as a hired killer back on track appears to have created several competing, unresolved opinions by the film makers as to how this otherwise terrific comedy should end.

Read more user comments...

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page
Home | FILM | DVD/VIDEO | MUSIC | GAMES | TV | Forums | About Metacritic metacritic.com

Popular on CBS sites: MLB | Spore | iPhone 3G | Paris Hilton | Antivirus Software | GPS | Recipes | Shwayze | NFL

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2008 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use