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80Those who can forgive the director's pretensions will discover some fine filmmaking.
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75Solomon keeps the drama generally clear and interesting, though some touches make the film-noir plot seem too pretentious.
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75A thoughtful, almost poetic, piece that puts forth the argument that redemption is not easily achieved.
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75Thornton has made so many bad movies and become so notorious as a talk-show eccentric that it's easy to forget what a good film actor he can be.
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70The performances from the film's three stars are all top-notch.
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63A film of almost paralyzing gravity and large ambitions that, almost inevitably, it can't quite meet.
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63A meditation on guilt, remorse and redemption -- is unrelentingly heavy.
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63It's an intriguing movie, and Thornton's performance is both fascinating and maddening.
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60Solomon handles their crises of conscience with a studied compassion that hangs over scenes like a lead weight, though the actors (particularly Dunst) do their best to bring more range to his gray palette.
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60Nobody can convey more while doing nothing than Thornton. And while his minimalist style is appropriate for the ironically named Levity, what is conveyed never quite generates the emotional charge of "Monster's Ball."
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60About as well-meaning as a movie can get, but that's never enough to ensure it comes alive on the screen, which is sadly the case here.
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60Despite an effectively low-key performance by Billy Bob Thornton in the leading role, pic is no more spiritually insightful or illuminating than Sunday School instructional story, and a lot less dramatically coherent.
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50Where's the levity, you ask? There is none, or rather, there is none that Manuel can perceive.
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50Saddest, most hang-dog, most depressing movie possible.
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50Freeman and Hunter are both overqualified for material this ponderous, but she plays along, while he appears to have made a minimal emotional investment in the oncoming avalanche of coincidences and cliches.
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50A redemption allegory so poker-faced you might forget that redemption is supposed to be a good thing.
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50First-time director Ed Solomon, a comedy writer (MIB, both Bill and Ted movies), clots up Levity with symbols -- empty chairs, reflections, winter slush -- and achy, tastefully drawn characters.
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50The actors, too, bring more realism -- more gravity, if you will -- to the film than its wobbly premise deserves.
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40It's hard not to feel sorry for the high-profile cast, obviously working for brownie points in heaven -- they're so good, yet nothing they do can make the movie fly.
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40For all its seriousness, though, Levity struck me as pretentious and intractably lifeless.
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40Haven't we seen this already?
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38An earnest but hopeless attempt to tell a parable about a man's search for redemption. By the end of his journey, we don't care if he finds redemption, if only he finds wakefulness.
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38The actors are their usual reliable selves; you can't really blame them for the unlikely mess Levity becomes.
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38First-time director Ed Solomon has corralled a stellar cast for his indie drama Levity -- and then put them through paces as plodding as a draft horse's.
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30The movie wants to trade on atmosphere more than plot, but even the atmosphere rings false.
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30So solemnly paced and deliberately performed that it seems to solidify before your very eyes.
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25A dreary film that's damn near torture to sit through.
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20Suffocates under its own good intentions and inexorable sense of doom.
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16Ponderous, pretentious and boring, Levity becomes ironic on top of itself. You won't pity these people. You'll start laughing at them. Like a clown.
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