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Solomon & Gaenor
Metascore
58 out of 100

Mixed or average reviews - based on 22 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 22
  2. Mixed: 8 out of 22
  3. Negative: 2 out of 22
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  1. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Lisa Schwarzbaum
    83
    A "Romeo and Juliet" tragedy of surprising power.
  2. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Stephen Hunter
    80
    Its pleasures aren't so much in the inevitable plot complications, but in the passion of the performances and the spare beauty of the elegant framing and photography.
  3. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    75
    With Solomon & Gaenor, it is hard to overlook the folly of the characters. Does it count as a tragedy when the characters get more or less what they were asking for?
  4. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Steven Rea
    75
    Nicely filmed and acted.
  5. San Francisco Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Edward Guthmann
    75
    Told so simply and powerfully that it seems to carry echoes of earlier, timeless tales.
  6. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: Stephen Holden
    70
    Does an almost dismayingly good job of conveying its characters' grim, bare-bones existence and the stultifying sexual and religious taboos that the lovers flout.
  7. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Desson Thomson
    70
    It doesn't lack for emotional intensity or persuasive, three-dimensional characters.
  8. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: Lisa Alspector
    70
    A graceful, understated sense of period allows the behavior of the characters in this love story to be unusually nuanced, making their experiences seem uncontrived as well as archetypal.
  9. Chicago Tribune
    Reviewed by: John Petrakis
    63
    Has a melodramatic glow.
  10. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Curtis Morgan
    63
    Bogs down in a deep muck of inevitability.
  11. San Francisco Examiner
    Reviewed by: Wesley Morris
    63
    The film is in the key of "Romeo and Juliet," and it's a one-note tune.
  12. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Jay Carr
    63
    It takes us nowhere we haven't been before, except geographically.
  13. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Maitland McDonagh
    60
    The performances are uniformly excellent.
  14. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: Sean Axmaker
    58
    Well-meaning portrait of intolerance concludes as grand tragic melodrama, executed with a stately beauty in somber colors.
  15. Mr. Showbiz
    Reviewed by: Michael Atkinson
    56
    Feels repetitive and impacted.
  16. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Lou Lumenick
    50
    Tepid tale of star-crossed lovers in 1910 Wales.
  17. Austin Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Kimberley Jones
    50
    The landscape and the lovers are pretty to look at, but two households divided should really pack more of a punch.
  18. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: F. X. Feeney
    50
    First-time writer-director Paul Morrison has a gift for evoking a time and place.
  19. Dallas Observer
    Reviewed by: Gregory Weinkauf
    50
    Although Morrison's drama feels increasingly forced and manipulative as the movie rolls along, the movie is competent if painfully predictable.
  20. Film.com
    Reviewed by: Jared Rapfogel
    50
    There's nothing terribly wrong with the movie, but nothing terribly right about it either.
  21. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: Jessica Winter
    30
    Paul Morrison's relentlessly unsurprising staging of a "Romeo and Juliet" story fetishizes its accelerating tragedies with morbid solemnity.
  22. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Kevin Thomas
    30
    By the time the heavy-handed Solomon & Gaenor is over, it has become such a punishing exercise in the self-evident that one is left numb and eager for escape.
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User Reviews

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User Score
8.5 out of 10

Universal acclaim- based on 10 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 4 out of 6
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 6
  3. Negative: 1 out of 6
  1. KaKaUA
    10
    Absolutely loved the movie. Unfortunately, had to watch it in Russian. But, I guess, it was actually a good thing, as I doubt I'd get the Welsh and the Yiddish :)… Full Review »
  2. rh
    0
    Really bad! boring and hard to follow.
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