The New Guy
Metascore
24 out of 100

Generally unfavorable reviews - based on 23 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2 out of 23
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 23
  3. Negative: 15 out of 23
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  1. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Elizabeth Weitzman
    38
    Tries everything possible to win you over -- satire, gross-out comedy, even earnest romance. But as any high-schooler can tell you, the harder you try, the bigger you fall.
    All this critic's reviews
  2. Chicago Tribune
    Reviewed by: Michael Wilmington
    25
    You have to have faith that kids will recognize a bad movie when it's foisted on them -- and they don't get much worse than The New Guy.
  3. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Charles Savage
    25
    Anyone who wants to enjoy himself at a good movie about a high school geek who undergoes a transformation should go see "'Spider-Man" again instead.
  4. San Francisco Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Carla Meyer
    25
    Lame, haphazard teen comedy.
  5. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Renee Graham
    25
    Probably would have worked better as a slamming soundtrack than as a muddle-headed movie.
  6. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: Sean Axmaker
    25
    The slapdash comic flailing of screenwriter and TV scribe-turned-director Ed Decter is only compounded by a script so disconnected you have to wonder if pages were lost on the way to the set.
  7. TV Guide
    Reviewed by: Maitland McDonagh
    20
    Lame, derivative comedy.
  8. Austin Chronicle
    Reviewed by: Marjorie Baumgarten
    20
    In an inspired bit of casting, Lyle Lovett plays the dad of the goofy-looking Diz/Gil. That these two could be related might be the only believable touch in this whole misfired thing.
  9. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: Mark Olsen
    20
    Various actors deserving of better (including Zooey Deschanel, Eddie Griffin and Lyle Lovett) suffer through the undercooked material, while love interest Eliza Dushku gamely gets through both a bikini-modeling montage and a mechanical bull ride, but none of their efforts can save this film.
  10. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Steven Rea
    12
    Reaches breathtaking lows of incoherence, sexism, racial stereotyping, and -- did I say incoherence?
  11. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Gene Seymour
    10
    An unintentional parody of every teen movie made in the last five years. Which can be the only rational explanation for making such a mess all over the screen.
  12. Variety
    Reviewed by: Robert Koehler
    10
    Overall aroma of movie junk food.
  13. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Desson Thomson
    10
    Feckless and crude without any particularly funny redeeming value. If there's anything more to this poor excuse of a movie than immediately meets the eye, I'll get back to you.
  14. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Ann Hornaday
    0
    A particularly loathsome piece of cultural detritus, a trashy, crass piece of work that panders to the anxieties and desires of adolescents without a scintilla of sympathy or coherence.
  15. New Times (L.A.)
    Reviewed by: Robert Wilonsky
    0
    An ugly-duckling tale so hideously and clumsily told it feels accidental. Surely, no one PLANNED something this disastrously unfunny.

User Reviews

All reviews »
User Score
6.2 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 49 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 24 out of 34
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 34
  3. Negative: 9 out of 34
  1. TTW107
    5
    This movie came out when I was 11 and I bet I would've totally enjoyed the hell out of it at that age but I'm 20 now and I just saw it. It's just dumb but i do applaud it for it's over-the-topness, it's like a dumb comic book made into a movie.… Full Review »
  2. shamusolarry
    7
    A loveable high school comedy. It's not the funniest movie in the world, but it does make you laugh. I'm a sucker for good cameos, and this movie is chock full of them. My biggest complaint is the scene where the actors are miming to a funk song, and it shows the guitar pretend playing the bassline. Other than that, it is totally worth a watch.… Full Review »
  3. EnzoP.
    0
    Sure this movie was a huge laugh out loud but it was so stupid so I have to give it a big flat old zero.
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