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100Pollock is confident, insightful work--one of the year's best films.
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91Harris genuinely seems to be at one with the character, and his movie is eerily alive.
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90What Harris extracts from himself is nothing less than a psychological nude scene, sustained across two hours.
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90Irrespective of whether Pollock, as a movie, is any good -- and it is very, very good -- it's clear that Ed Harris was born to play the lead role.
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90The result is a harrowing film, impossible to "like" in any conventional way, hypnotically impossible to turn away from.
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90Distinguished by its quiet, intelligent, admirably restrained approach and by two finely wrought performances from Harris and Marcia Gay Harden in the leading roles.
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89Pollock is that rare breed, a biopic that makes you want to learn more about its subject, as much as you can, as fast as you can.
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88Harris and Harden have real on-screen sympatico, in their nasty battles and good times alike.
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88Harris convincingly creates one "Pollock" after another over the course of the movie.
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88Like its subject, Pollock is a messy creation, but one whose depth of commitment and high attack keeps it on track.
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83The resulting film is a labor of love with all the strengths and weaknesses you might expect from such a designation.
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80As good as Harris is, though, it's Harden's performance that sticks with you long after you've seen the movie. She understands what Krasner must have known intuitively. Greatness comes not from cleaning up messes, but from allowing them to be made in the first place.
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80Ed Harris, who plays Pollock and makes his debut as a director - doing both jobs superbly, by the way - is angst incarnate.
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80The movie's best moments evoke the thrill of doing something new. Pollock convincingly retails the beauty and originality of the painter's best work -- it may not be an intellectual adventure, but it does represent one.
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80Like other aspects of this film, the image may be a little too perfect, a little too careful.
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80Stands out among creative bio-pics for an ability to show art being made in a way that's as realistic and exciting as it's ever been on screen.
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80May be the first movie about a painter to transcend the gushy clichés found in movies that try to unravel the mysteries of artistic creation.
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75The movie is enriched by its fine acting and by its creative respect for an innovator whose influence still permeates contemporary art.
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75Some of the most riveting passages of the film are Harris slathering skeins of rich color, dipped fresh from cans of house paint, onto canvases stretched out on the floor.
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75Masterful acting.
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75It is a difficult and demanding movie, one that rewards the persevering moviegoer just as Pollock's difficult and demanding paintings ultimately reward the steadfast.
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75Renders the juicy bits of the artist's life in two hours of pulsing highlights that suggest a man who never really had any emotional or psychic downtime.
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75For all the praise that has been heaped upon it, is a quasisatisfying, half realized vision.
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70Pollock can be clunky and TV-movie-ish. Still, Harris gives a fiery, convincing performance.
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70Several startling depictions of the artist at work make you forget, if only temporarily, the serious shortcomings of the script.
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63The dilemma is simple: Living, making art, and then dying does not constitute much of a story.
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63The movie falls short of achieving its apparent goal: being the "Raging Bull" of the art world.
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63Truth is, one can probably tell as much about Jackson Pollock the man by looking at his paintings than by watching this movie.
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60A reasonably entertaining -- and occasionally very moving -- picture.
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60I don't know what Pollock is supposed to be about, but as it stands—by default—it's the most blood-freezing Jewish-mother nightmare ever filmed. Pollock would give Woody Allen the willies.
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50A smart but disappointingly conventional portrait of an artist who had little use for convention.
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User score distribution:
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Positive: 8 out of 8
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Mixed: 0 out of 8
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Negative: 0 out of 8
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MichaelF.9
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RobertH.8I liked this film but don't believe that it avoided the cliches as much as several reviewers did.