| 100 |
ReelViews
Represents the director at his best -- unsentimental yet powerful, funny and poignant, and, in the end, undeniably satisfying.
|
| 100 |
Washington Post
Reveals itself detail by searing detail.
|
| 100 |
USA Today
Blethyn is so astonishing that you forget you're seeing a performance.
|
| 100 |
Chicago Tribune
Leigh is an artist not at all blind to the world's darkness and pain. But the generosity and togetherness he and his company show in Secrets and Lies is something the movies -- and the world -- truly need. [25 October 1996, Friday, p.A]
|
| 100 |
The New Republic
Leigh, the writer, ties up things somewhat neatly and is a touch homiletic. Leigh, the director of cast and camera, is masterly. [Sept. 30, 1996]
|
| 100 |
Los Angeles Times
If film means anything to you, if emotional truth is a quality you care about, this is an event that ought not be missed.
|
| 100 |
Chicago Sun-Times
It moves us on a human level, it keeps us guessing during scenes as unpredictable as life, and it shows us how ordinary people have a chance of somehow coping with their problems, which are rather ordinary, too.
|
| 100 |
San Francisco Chronicle
Leigh goes right to the core of his character's lives and mines the place where we're weakest, most alone and sometimes the cruelest.
|
| 100 |
TNT RoughCut
Jason Puskar
A masterful mix of wit and humor, sympathy and sadness.
|
| 100 |
Washington Post
A magnificent melodrama that draws both tears and laughter from the everyday give-and-take of seemingly ordinary souls.
|
| 90 |
The Onion (A.V. Club)
There's not a weak performance in Secrets And Lies, a fact made more notable by the seeming ease with which the cast performs as an ensemble.
|
| 90 |
Film.com
By creating characters from emotional wellsprings rather than concepts, Leigh thrills us with the possibilities that emerge when people are merely in the same room.
|
| 90 |
TV Guide
A radiant, heartbreaking film.
|
| 90 |
Chicago Reader
The acting is so strong--with Spall a particular standout--that you're carried along as by a tidal wave.
|
| 90 |
Film.com
Breathtaking, heartbreaking.
|
| 90 |
Time
Rich in humor, pained or frolicking.
|
| 90 |
Mr. Showbiz
The ride is remarkable.
|
| 90 |
The New York Times
Unfolds beautifully, with a rueful, knowing intelligence that rises above easy assumptions. [27 September 1996, p.C1]
|
| 90 |
Newsweek
The results are wondrous, wrenching and crazily funny to behold.
|
| 88 |
San Francisco Examiner
Leigh has a gift for demonstrating character from the outside in.
|
| 80 |
Film.com
So meticulously acted that you feel you're reading the characters' minds.
|
| 80 |
Dallas Observer
Arnold Wayne Jones
Secrets & Lies is all about wounds and our tendency to embrace placebos rather than the harder courses of treatment.
|
| 75 |
Entertainment Weekly
A crowd-pleaser, all right, but, for all its appeal, a naggingly sanctimonious one.
|
| 75 |
Baltimore Sun
Crammed, cheek to jowl, with bleak moments, high hopes, sweetness and naked emotion.
|
| 70 |
Slate
Sarah Kett
Leigh at his best is a renderer of moments--the wisest and deepest observer, probably, among living directors.
|
| 67 |
Austin Chronicle
Secrets & Lies, despite my dwelling on its problems, is a really solid and enjoyable movie. It's just not what I would call "best of the fest."
|
| 60 |
Variety
Staff [not credited]
Unquestionably a finely observed, deeply felt work, though with some nagging problems in pacing and structure.
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