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100If "Henry V," the first film [Branaugh] directed and starred in, caused people to compare him to Olivier, "Dead Again" will inspire comparisons to Welles and Hitchcock - and the Olivier of Hitchcock's "Rebecca."
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100Deliciously witty and entertaining… A first-rate thriller, one that's likely to generate as much word-of-mouth as “Alien,'' “Carrie'' and “Psycho'' did in their time. [23 Aug 1991, Daily Notebook, p.F1]
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100Dead Again does not come across as a Hitchcock knock-off, but as a motion picture that incorporates familiar themes and approaches while maintaining its own integrity and identity. Not once during the entire production is there an obviously stolen scene or camera angle replication.
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With its stylized black-and-white sequences and fast-paced melodramatic plot, this homage to film noir is both intense and purposely self-conscious.
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90Branagh has mastered the tricky high-wire act of simultaneously kidding the conventions he is being absolutely faithful to, allowing us to squeal with both fright and knowing laughter. His is a film lover's film [23 Aug 1991, Calendar, p.F1]
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80A big, convoluted, entertainingly dizzy romantic mystery melodrama.
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80Yet despite all that boring talk, Dead Again is a hit, the late-blooming rose of a movie summer that was mostly mulch. [23 Sept 1991, p.73]
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80Engaging film style is buoyed by an infectious sense of fun and punctuated by wild and woolly character turns.
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80Even if this film were more gripping than it is, and it grips somewhat, it would be a bit disappointing because it aims so low. Let's hope that Branagh now has the Hollywood adoration out of his system. [16 Dec 1991, p.30]
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75The cinematic equivalent of a "good read" - pick it up and you can't put it down; put it down and it's gone forever.
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70Loads of fun even if it's ultimately strangled by its excesses.
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67Hopelessly muddled but doggedly entertaining.
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60However unlikely the twists and turns in this mystery, Dead Again moves briskly forward, never weighed down by any sense of seriousness.
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50Emerges as cutty, indistinct and confused, full of shots that don't match and spatial conceptions that would look flat even on TV. The more Branagh strains to appear “cinematic,'' the more he looks like a man of the theater. [23 Aug 1991, Friday, p.B]
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50It's fun to see somebody revive the amnesia genre - how long has it been? - but the conceit quickly grows irksome. Only Thompson, who manages to be appealing in both of her roles, will likely reap much from this DOA folly. [23 Aug 1991, Life, p.4D]
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50Directing with an eye to "Rebecca," Branagh brings more mood than suspense to this apparent hommage to Hitchcock. Still, he raises no goose bumps.
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40The ambitious, initially intriguing Dead Again fails so spectacularly it may well become the fetish of a camp cult.
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When it's time to wrap up the mystery, the movie leaves too many of the plot's enigmas unresolved, and Branagh's insouciance loses its charm.
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25A two-hour search for a pulse... A miscalculation from a prodigious talent who has forgotten that you squeeze the life out of romance when you don't give it space to breathe.