| 75 |
Miami Herald
A competent but not extraordinary action-comedy.
|
| 75 |
Chicago Sun-Times
It's over the top, an exercise in action comedy that cuts loose from logic and enjoys itself.
|
| 67 |
Portland Oregonian
A genial and watchable film.
|
| 63 |
Chicago Tribune
It's another slick-and-quick muscle car of a movie, racing along for a couple of hours, taking you nowhere as fast as it can.
|
| 60 |
Variety
A B movie in A-grade clothing.
|
| 60 |
LA Weekly
Though the film overall is as disposable as a hot dog, it is just as enjoyable.
|
| 58 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
A perfectly competent, if undistinguished, action film that smoothes over all the most interesting bumps in the drama.
|
| 50 |
Salon.com
It's long. Long movies almost always mean the audience member has time to think, and in this context that's not a good thing.
|
| 50 |
San Francisco Examiner
Too much of nothing and far from the potentially star-making material that Foxx deserves.
|
| 50 |
San Francisco Chronicle
The action is difficult to follow.
|
| 50 |
Christian Science Monitor
The comically tinged action is as lively as it is brainless, and it revels in violence a bit less eagerly than many thrillers of its ilk.
|
| 50 |
USA Today
Has less substance and depth than its title.
|
| 50 |
Film.com
He's hilarious, but through the jokes, you get the sense Foxx knows he deserves better.
|
| 50 |
New York Daily News
It may be a dismal comedy thriller, but Antoine Fuqua's Bait has one piece of bait that's definitely appealing: Jamie Foxx.
|
| 50 |
Boston Globe
Bait ends up seeming pretty wormy.
|
| 50 |
TNT RoughCut
It more or less makes sense and it's not dull -- more than can be said for many similar attempts.
|
| 40 |
Film.com
The plot is convoluted.
|
| 40 |
Washington Post
It's just respectable trash, and a dress rehearsal for better things ahead.
|
| 40 |
TV Guide
Foxx is a charmer, and he makes Alvin's unlikely evolution from relentless hustler to reasonably solid citizen believable, and even rather touching.
|
| 40 |
Mr. Showbiz
Even Foxx's lively comedy is lost in the noise.
|
| 38 |
New York Post
One of those thriller-comedy combos that never get the balance quite right.
|
| 33 |
Entertainment Weekly
Steve Daly
A tired action thriller determined to play the race card every which way for every which kind of viewer, seems hopelessly behind the curve.
|
| 30 |
Austin Chronicle
Bait equals bad.
|
| 30 |
Chicago Reader
This comedy-thriller that has no particular motive for changing tones.
|
| 30 |
Dallas Observer
So convoluted and half-assed it's tempting to dismiss it as unfinished; it feels like six different movies cut together by a blind editor.
|
| 20 |
Los Angeles Times
But what little humor there is in the movie becomes subservient to the grisly violence, gratuitous cruelty and ugly car chases.
|
| 20 |
Washington Post
Ought to be called "Hook, Line and Stinker."
|
| 10 |
The New York Times
Why Mr. Foxx, who was so impressive in "Any Given Sunday," chose to make a movie so boring and idiotic that it barely meets minimal standards of lowest- common-denominator entertainment.
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