- Critic Score
- Most active
- Publication
- Most clicked
-
80The kind of drama that British television used to do so well, a well-constructed, smartly observed story of ordinary people learning how to communicate with one another.
-
80A rich drama that gradually evolves into a feel-good story.
-
75Dellal and their cast consistently hit the right notes, and the result is an uplifting tale that you don't have to be embarrassed to enjoy.
-
75Mullan makes the journey more than worthwhile, but don't go in expecting profundity.
-
75Mullan is a great choice as Frank, playing the silent guy with all kinds of baggage perfectly.
-
70Sweet-natured, if somewhat familiar, On a Clear Day features fine performances by Mullan, Blethyn and Sives. Dellal and cinematographer David Johnson paint an inviting picture of Glasgow.
-
Despite a familiar crop of lovable eccentrics and a predictably inspirational thrust, the movie resists formula just enough to achieve a surprising degree of emotional traction.
-
70By turns whimsically humorous and intelligently sentimental, but also infused with a pungent air of working-class realism.
-
70When a feelgood formula is fleshed out artfully, going along with it can feel very good indeed.
-
70Humorous touches add warmth without being cloying, but Mullan carries the film with his intelligence and rugged intensity: images of his barrel-chested physique against the craggy shore resound on such an elemental level as to be almost spiritual.
-
67Blethyn, as Frank's wife, is less high-strung than usual, which is a boon.
-
67Against all reason, this workingman's journey across the sea winds up seeming every bit as inspirational as the filmmakers intended, entirely because Mullan's grit validates every cornpone emotion. With a lesser actor, the movie would sink like a stone.
-
While On a Clear Day can claim both a surplus of heart and adequate brains, it comes up lacking in the courage department.
-
63Just as surely as the shortest distance between two points is a straight line, this domestic comedy follows a direct path through every crisis, every resolution and every sentimental heartbeat laid out in the script.
-
Unlike American movies about challenging yourself, it's all played in a minor key.
-
63If you don't mind some contrivance, On a Clear Day is a diverting underdog tale.
-
63Pleasantly inspirational on its own terms, "Clear" is no one's idea of fresh goods.
-
63Didn't we just see this movie? Over in Britain, big bad governments may be outsourcing his job and rendering him redundant, but never fear -- the plucky working-class hero has definitely found a steady gig on the silver screen.
-
58Scottish actor Peter Mullan saves a drama tangled in the seaweed of life lessons from drowning in pathos.
-
50A conventional film for an unconventional actor.
-
50It's a first feature film for both screenwriter Alex Rose and director Gaby Dellal, and their inexperience shows in Frank's underdeveloped relationships with family and friends and in the movie's sluggish pacing.
-
50On a Clear Day is in most respects "The Full Monty," only with swimming, not stripping, and no bursts into song or dance - only the usual canny sequencing of tears and laughter, interspersed here with fetching underwater photography and father-son issues up the wazoo.
-
50Gaby Dellal's cynically mushy film, like "The Full Monty" and its ilk, is best savored only by its target demo: middle-classers who see one imported film a year, the selection in question requiring working-stiff melodrama and leprechaun burrs gently and lovably mangling the English dialogue.
prev
next
Page:
- 1
User Score
tbd
No user score yet- Awaiting 1 more rating
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 2 out of 2
-
Mixed: 0 out of 2
-
Negative: 0 out of 2
-
PatC.7A little melodramatic and told in a ham-handed way, but still a fine tale of balancing obsession and priorities.
-
SteveW.10A powerful and gripping performance by Peter Mullan. A top-notch actor. I wonder what film the Chicago Sun Times critic was watching.