Metascore
61 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 30 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 19 out of 30
  2. Negative: 4 out of 30
  1. More than a high concept stretched to feature length. This is a funny and extremely satisfying comedy, the best in a while.
  2. Crystal turns in his best (read: least sappy) performance in ages, getting through an entire movie -- most of it, anyway -- without mugging.
  3. 90
    Ramis has made a fleet, unself-conscious, eminently enjoyable picture, where one-liners carom merrily like stray bullets, and where there's casual ease, like the drape of a sharpster's trousers, in the rapport between its two stars.
  4. 90
    Watching De Niro take Paul through his first panic attack ("I'm crying like a woman") is an unalloyed joy.
  5. 90
    Sure, the territory is not exactly fresh...but the chemistry between the two leads is so explosive yet assured, and the comic timing so perfect, that the cliches are given new life.
  6. 80
    A funny, tightly plotted, well-conceived comedy that transcends both Crystal's '90s curse and its horrible title.
  7. As he demonstrated in "Groundhog Day," Ramis knows how to handle a high-concept story with unusual cleverness, and he does it again here. It helps to no end that De Niro and Crystal, despite their obvious differences, are perfectly in tune.
  8. 80
    Ramis...does extract every last yuk from this lively clash of id and superego, this spoofy buddies' odyssey from underworld to Prozac nation.
  9. 80
    You can see the jokes coming well in advance, but you still laugh uncontrollably.
  10. 75
    The comedy here isn't all on the surface, and Viterelli [the bodyguard Jelly] is one reason why.
  11. Maybe the problem with Analyze This is that it isn't enough of a Ramis movie. [5 Mar 1999]
  12. It's the most liberated and alive [DeNiro]'s been since his deluded Rupert Pupkin tried to kidnap Jerry Lewis in "King of Comedy."
  13. 75
    Frequently funny and occasionally hilarious.
  14. It's still possible to have a good time at this movie, and the primary reason is De Niro.
  15. Reviewed by: Andrea C. Basora
    70
    There are some moments that fall flat—the cinematic world might be a better place without Crystal's deeply unfunny parody of a gangster—and the delightful Lisa Kudrow is woefully under-used.
  16. Reviewed by: David Edelstein
    70
    Its structure is repetitive, but each scene begins with a joyous blast of comic energy...A hoot.
  17. 70
    Analyze This won't win any Oscars, and its comedy is pretty tortured in places, but the pleasures of watching DeNiro onscreen never diminish--not even when he's putting the glories of his criminal past at risk.
  18. As enjoyable as it is, it's hard to escape a sense of Analyze This being the work of competent talents who knew exactly where the good-enough line was and didn't feel particularly inspired to push far beyond it.
  19. Reviewed by: Mike Clark
    63
    Because De Niro's performance is aptly ''Scorsese-aggressive'' while Crystal effectively underplays, one can easily sit through this bottom-line disappointment with a smile painted on, waiting for belly laughs that rarely come. [5 Mar 1999]
  20. Reviewed by: Sandra Contreras
    60
    Though not much about the film sticks with you, it's a reliable piece of fluff that delivers the goods.
  21. Ramis doesn't reach the comic heights of his "Groundhog Day," but the acting is excellent and the screenplay offers some hearty laughs if you can stand bursts of violence and language as foul as a Mafioso's business agenda.
  22. Reviewed by: Tom Meek
    50
    Analyze This plays "The Godfather" bit, fast and funny, it just picked a framework it should have refused.
  23. 50
    Enjoyable but slight— an intermittently funny, one-joke vaudeville.
  24. Reviewed by: Todd McCarthy
    50
    The gradual dilution of fresh humor is further undercut by a queasy sense that the picture, in the end, is quietly endorsing all the psychoanalytical mumbo jumbo that it has been poking fun at all along.
  25. Reviewed by: Sean Means
    40
    As the movie plods on, the jokes start to fall flat...Worst of all is a centerpiece scene, when Ben has to pretend to be a mafioso (but sounds more like a cross between Martin and Lewis), when Crystal is so unfunny that you almost feel sorry for him.
  26. Both too unfocused and overly familiar. It has enough comic energy to generate some chuckles, but even when we laugh we're always wondering why the jokes aren't funnier. [5 Mar 1999]
  27. 30
    I can't imagine why De Niro, who is a fine comedian, is still coasting on his gangster act, and surely Crystal can do something other than play himself...it feels a little like an exercise in laziness.
  28. A pretty woeful affair...a sitcom disguised as a movie.
  29. 10
    Watching Ramis struggle with his two stars is like watching someone try to juggle lead weights.
  30. 10
    This blunt comedy suffers from poor pacing, colorless dialogue, and subpar performances by the two leads that reveal just how much a director contributes to our perception of what a star is.
User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 30 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5 out of 6
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 6
  3. Negative: 1 out of 6
  1. Robert De Niro hams it up as a gang boss with a few in jokes here & there. Nice to see him taking the piss out of himself.
    Billy Crystal plays
    the straight man &, despite it being a bit weak at the end, a pretty funny film. Full Review »
  2. TonyB
    2
    What a waste of time this overly praised claptrap is. If there's any genuine humor to be found here, I'm afraid it eluded me. Every now and then DeNiro and Crystal stop playing DeNiro and Crystal. Alas, this is not one of those times. Full Review »