| 75 |
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
This is an amazingly ambitious movie, not so much because of the time and space it covers (a lot), but because Potter trusts us to follow her heroine through one damn thing after another.
|
| 75 |
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
It feels both big and little, concentrating as it does on the small movements in people's lives and the huge tides of history.
|
| 75 |
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
Melodramatic and strangely moving.
|
| 75 |
Chicago Tribune
Michael Wilmington
Though the film falls short of its aspirations, there's something magical about it. It's a poetic look at transience, betrayal, loss and doom.
|
| 63 |
USA Today
Andy Seiler
A curious but intriguing movie that leaves you bemused and more than a little confused.
|
| 50 |
TV Guide
Maitland McDonagh
Ricci brings her trademark gravity to the wary Suzie, but Blanchett's role is the dazzler.
|
| 50 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
William Arnold
It's a strange and strangely unaffecting little drama -- but played very flat, with no particular emotional impact sought or achieved.
|
| 50 |
Boston Globe
Jay Carr
The imagery is lush, but the story is pretty cornball, with an ending that can only be called pure Hollywood. Only the marvelous Cate Blanchett transcends stereotype.
|
| 50 |
Film.com
Tom Keogh
While we may like what we see, it's impossible to comprehend what much of it means or why we should care.
|
| 50 |
New Times (L.A.)
Luke Y. Thompson
There's nothing particularly wrong with this whole setup; it's just very by-the-numbers.
|
| 50 |
Entertainment Weekly
Owen Gleiberman
There's only one performer in the movie who looks completely at ease with what he's doing: the horse.
|
| 40 |
The New York Times
A.O. Scott
It's hard to be drawn into a movie if you're never entirely sure what it's supposed to be about, other than about 100 minutes.
|
| 40 |
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
A thing of beauty. But then so is a cloud and I wouldn't want to stare at one of those for an hour and half.
|
| 40 |
Village Voice
J. Hoberman
The Man Who Cried is like a Yiddish generational tearjerker told from the perspective of the lost child rather than that of the bereaved parent.
|
| 40 |
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Potter gets the period details right, but the film itself has long since flown off the rails, miring good intentions in rank soap opera.
|
| 38 |
New York Post
Jonathan Foreman
It's a thinly disguised lecture about intolerance, spotted with historical inaccuracies and groaning with dialogue so dreadful that it makes a fine cast look ridiculous again and again.
|
| 38 |
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
The result is a movie that talks big, even walks big, but has no scale whatsoever.
|
| 30 |
Variety
Deborah Young
Sally Potter, who leapt to critical attention with her 1992 adaptation of Virginia Woolf's "Orlando" -- makes a serious misstep with The Man Who Cried.
|
| 30 |
Los Angeles Times
Jan Stuart
There is even less going on between Ricci and Depp here than there was in "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," mostly because Potter gives them nothing to play.
|
| 20 |
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
The driving drama of such a desperate situation is lost in the movie's casting silliness.
|
| 20 |
LA Weekly
Ella Taylor
A star ensemble is preposterously miscast.
|
| 20 |
Mr. Showbiz
Kevin Maynard
The film's a vacuous bore.
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