| 80 |
Los Angeles Times
A wonderfully entertaining, raunchy, hilarious and savage foray into the lives of a couple of beat-up middle-weight boxers who get a second chance.
|
| 75 |
San Francisco Chronicle
Either Shelton knows this world well, or he's such a great bluffer it doesn't matter.
|
| 75 |
USA Today
Another invigorating, extremely raunchy sports movie from Ron Shelton .
|
| 70 |
LA Weekly
Throws us directly into the ring for one of the most brutal fight scenes in American film.
|
| 63 |
San Francisco Examiner
Edvins Beitiks
A wicked, light-headed first half dissolves into a bloody, head-bashing second half . The previews make it seem like a comedy. It isn't.
|
| 63 |
Chicago Tribune
Fghting your heart out at the end of this movie can't win the prize or the crowd.
|
| 58 |
Entertainment Weekly
A boxing film with no conflictual punch.
|
| 58 |
Portland Oregonian
The film is nothing much to look at and has trouble swallowing its own clichs and implausibilities.
|
| 50 |
Baltimore Sun
Benefits from an amiable chemistry between Harrelson and Banderas, and Davidovich always makes a good tough-as-nails dame with more smarts than any man will give her credit for.
|
| 50 |
Film.com
This is still Ron Shelton in good -- not great, but good -- form here, and the rewards are plentiful.
|
| 50 |
TV Guide
Vince and Cesar have been written to evoke equal audience sympathy, so there's no suspense whatsover in the outcome of their climactic match-up, the brutal realism of Shelton's staging notwithstanding.
|
| 50 |
Chicago Reader
Even when his work is at its most contrived, which it certainly is here, writer-director Ron Shelton is the best purveyor of jock humor around.
|
| 40 |
Rolling Stone
(Shelton) knows how to write pungent dialogue that covers a multitude of sins when the film goes off the rails.
|
| 38 |
Philadelphia Inquirer
This is no "Raging Bull."
|
| 38 |
New York Daily News
Ron Shelton's boxing pic is long on road work but strictly a flyweight.
|
| 38 |
Chicago Sun-Times
The movie doesn't know how odd it seems to cut from the bloodshed in the ring to the dialogue of the supporting players, who still think they're in a comedy.
|
| 38 |
Boston Globe
Isn't going to be a contender
|
| 38 |
Charlotte Observer
A punch-drunk lightweight. Inside the ring, it lands some forceful punches. Outside the ring, it stumbles around, swinging wildly at nothing, until it collapses.
|
| 38 |
New York Post
It's bone tired.
|
| 32 |
Mr. Showbiz
Shelton attempts to fashion a kind of road movie-love triangle-sports flick. He fails on all three counts.
|
| 30 |
Newsweek
Kevin Stuart
A half-hearted comedy whose jokes are far from a knockout.
|
| 25 |
Christian Science Monitor
As dopey as its heroes, and the cast's admirable energy isn't enough to keep the story punching through the final round.
|
| 25 |
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
In this movie, he (Shelton) falls so hard he becomes, for the first time in his career, genuinely offensive.
|
| 25 |
Miami Herald
If you really love "Bull Durham," don't go near Play It to the Bone. It will break your heart.
|
| 20 |
Time
Never achieves more than feckless amiability.
|
| 20 |
Variety
A woefully under-realized story of small-time boxers enjoying perhaps their last moment in the spotlight.
|
| 20 |
Austin Chronicle
Does not live up to its name. It's more like White Men Can't Box, Either.
|
| 20 |
Washington Post
As dull as the decor in a Motel 6.
|
| 20 |
The New York Times
Are they fools or heroes? Because the movie can't decide, neither can we. And without an emotional payoff, Play It to the Bone ends up stranded in serio-comic limbo.
|
| 10 |
Village Voice
The journey is a yawn -- an outpouring of backstory, punctuated by cute episodic diversions and ill-advised running gags.
|
| 10 |
Dallas Observer
David Ehrenstein
A road movie trapped in a cul-de-sac.
|
| 10 |
Salon.com
Doesn't quite have the goods.
|
| 10 |
TNT RoughCut
Kellam Eanes
Despite some redeemable comic dialog between Banderas and Harrelson, most of the movie is TKO.
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