Metascore
32 out of 100

Generally unfavorable - based on 30 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 5 out of 30
  2. Negative: 18 out of 30
  1. That cameraderie is bound to appeal to women looking for a howlingly trashy time.
  2. 75
    It's an extremely raunchy hybrid of "Bridget Jones's Diary."
  3. Its effects don't linger long enough to seriously detract from the raunchy good time had by all.
  4. The trick is getting from a conclusion made five minutes into a movie to an ending 90 minutes away. It can be a scary prospect. In The Sweetest Thing it is mostly a hoot.
  5. 63
    This movie is to sweet as a dog is to a hydrant. But it's little things like that that keep someone like Diaz laughing all the way to the urinal.
  6. The movie is neither good nor bad, but in its clever packaging of boy fantasy and girl fantasy, extremely cunning. As for Princess Diaz, no force on Earth can stop her now.
  7. A movie in which laughter and self-exploitation merge into jolly soft-porn ''empowerment.''
  8. Reviewed by: Claudia Puig
    50
    Aspires to be a cinematic "Sex and the City," but it's more like South Park Goes West.
  9. Pimenthal's script consists of the scantiest storyline, framed around a succession of strained Farrelly Brothers-style gags that feel as though they were peeled off the floor of the editing room for "There's Something About Mary."
  10. You walk away wishing they had more than this scant and often shoddy material with which to enjoy their rollicking and racy good time.
  11. Reviewed by: Richard Corliss
    50
    Randy and giggly, this is a femme version of "The Man Show."
  12. Reviewed by: Robert Koehler
    40
    A comedy that starts the date in a frisky mood but sours before it's time to kiss goodnight.
  13. 38
    It knows the words but not the music; while the Farrelly brothers got away with murder, The Sweetest Thing commits suicide.
  14. 38
    Lacks the meanness of so many recent gross-out comedies. With the sparkling Diaz leading the way, the lame humor is much more palatable.
  15. An awkward hybrid of genres that just doesn't work.
  16. The ads for The Sweetest Thing promise that if you loved "There's Something About Mary" and "My Best Friend's Wedding," then you can't miss this latest Cameron Diaz vehicle. Well, miss it.
  17. 38
    Has some promise as a throw-away, lighthearted romance. Unfortunately, once those elements are gone, what's left only has a running time of about 13 minutes.
  18. 30
    A sour attempt at making a Farrelly Brothers-style, down-and-dirty laugher for the female set.
  19. Christina Applegate, of Eighties white-trash pinup fame, is a comic foil par excellence, delivering a snazzy, self-assured performance that lands the biggest laughs in a movie made mostly of hollow chuckles. She, in fact, is the sweetest thing in this sour, sucky film.
  20. 30
    Diaz does what she can under adverse circumstances, but she doesn't come close to salvaging this ramshackle vehicle.
  21. Reviewed by: David Ansen
    30
    Cameron Diaz, Christina Applegate and Selma Blair are asked to humiliate themselves many times over in The Sweetest Thing, and they do it with such game good spirits that they ought to get the actor’s equivalent of a Purple Heart.
  22. The film is far too appreciative of its own jokes to let the audience discover anything on its own.
  23. This vulgar, equal-opportunity chick flick aims pretty low.
  24. Nothing but a showcase for the inherent comedic gifts of Cameron Diaz. The problem is she doesn't have any.
  25. 25
    Garners only a few chuckles, becoming, even in its short running time, boring.
  26. Reviewed by: Steve Simels
    20
    It's hard to overstate just how awful this movie is, despite the efforts of the appealing cast.
  27. 10
    So badly written, so poorly directed and performed, and so garishly visualized -- attention Kmart shoppers! -- it defies explanation.
  28. 10
    After about 20 minutes of "Thing," a concussion begins to look enormously appealing.
  29. 0
    One of the cruddiest-looking movies ever made.
  30. The dumbest thing this side of a lobotomy.
User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 39 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 14 out of 26
  2. Negative: 8 out of 26
  1. Funny. Acid. Some hilarious scenes. A good movie to laugh with friends, and obviously when you have no restrictions. It was a little forced in some scenes however it has made history in reverse, since usually in the movies who apears is the guy 'chicken' who falls in and runs back and this time the girl is who made everything. Full Review »
  2. NesK.
    1
    Never seen such a vulgar, brassy film ever. Really disgusting dirty scenes at toilets, a lot of underwear, and lousy gags. Degrading all women to sexobjects, full of men fantasy. Full Review »