| 75 |
USA Today
An occasionally schmaltzy but likable story of healing and redemption.
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| 75 |
Charlotte Observer
And in the end, maybe the question of Dennis' origin is irrelevant. He tells David he's come to Earth to try to understand human beings, and that quest is worth a lifetime's effort -- whatever planet you call home.
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| 75 |
Miami Herald
Cusack, of course, is the perfect Anti-Schmaltz. His rapid-fire delivery makes everything he says sound like it's just pouring from his brain to his mouth, so that even the sappiest dialogue is rendered sincere.
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| 70 |
Variety
Knockout performances by John Cusack and child actor Bobby Coleman help legitimize a whimsical but sententiously moralizing script.
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| 70 |
The Hollywood Reporter
Those who stick with Martian Child won't entirely avoid mush, but they will find terrific performances.
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| 67 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Amanda Peet exudes her patented mix of charm, beauty, humor and smarts as the best friend who may become more than a friend.
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| 63 |
Chicago Tribune
Tasha Robinson
The film plot about the needy kid who redeems a male loner has been done to death, and on the surface, Martian Child just looks like another entry in the genre, a close follower to “About A Boy.”
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| 63 |
New York Post
Cusack shows that he can still play the sensitive-but-fun guy until the ladies sigh and the men take notes.
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| 63 |
Boston Globe
One soggy slab of sentimental uplift, but it doesn't pretend to be anything else, and there's some honor in that.
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| 58 |
The Onion (A.V. Club)
It's hard to say what, aside from novelty, is gained by having the boy believe he's from Mars, because the core emotion in the film comes from the simple, common premise of an adoptive father and son trying to forge a life together.
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| 58 |
Entertainment Weekly
Gregory Kirschling
The problem with Martian Child is that it wants to be a story about outcasts, but Dennis doesn't come off as a cute little rebel.
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| 50 |
Village Voice
Robert Wilonsky
Martian Child certainly isn't much fun, unless you were desperately awaiting K-PAX with a kid instead of Kevin Spacey.
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| 50 |
Washington Post
In drama, and just about everything else, almost is never enough. Which is why Martian Child, about the growing bond between an adult and child, never reaches us.
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| 50 |
TV Guide
Cusack makes a half-hearted attempt to connect with Coleman, but chemistry is fatally absent and small wonder: Dennis is a unsettlingly strange creature who could well be from another planet.
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| 50 |
ReelViews
Martian Child wants to make us cry. It nearly made me gag. This is an exercise in shameless and inept emotional manipulation.
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| 50 |
Chicago Sun-Times
The movie leaves no heartstring untugged. It even has a beloved old dog, and you know what happens to beloved old dogs in movies like this. Or if you don't, I don't have the heart to tell you.
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| 50 |
Salon.com
Before long, the story's conceit -- a loud-and-clear metaphor for the ways in which we all sometimes feel alien when it comes to human relationships -- just becomes wearying.
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| 50 |
Chicago Reader
The two characters' pasts are so sketchy here that the drama lacks any serious emotional underpinning.
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| 50 |
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Whatever glimmers of cleverness Martian Child offers, it all comes to Earth with a thud in the shamelessly manipulative climax.
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| 50 |
New York Daily News
The entire cast is fully committed to this squishily sentimental tale, which is especially impressive given that it's the kind of generic dramedy you'll swear you've seen a thousand times before.
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| 42 |
Portland Oregonian
At the end of Martian Child, we're told the movie is "inspired by actual events." But the movie isn't even fully inspired by David Gerrold's source novel that was inspired by actual events.
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| 40 |
Austin Chronicle
Toddy Burton
Only in Hollywood can a movie about alien children be boring. Even if the kid isn’t really an alien (no spoilers), there’s still opportunity galore for the wild and the weird.
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| 30 |
The New York Times
100 percent goo.
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| 30 |
Los Angeles Times
Martian Child would like to be "About a Boy (Who Thinks He's a Martian)", but, disappointingly, it doesn't even come close.
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| 25 |
San Francisco Chronicle
It's off in many directions - false in its details, false in its relationships, false in its emotions - but probably the first and worst thing that needs to be said about it is that it's also overlong and dull.
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| 25 |
Premiere
Filmed in 2005, the first of two Cusack widower flicks this season (the weepier and more indie "Grace is Gone" hits theaters in December) Martian Child is also a Franken-schmaltz monster of cobbled-together Cusack movie parts.
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