|

New This Week
Critics & Publications
Archives: A-Z Index
Advanced Search
Upcoming Release Calendar
Awards & Bests By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
|
Deterrence
Paramount Classics
FILM:
MPAA RATING: R for language and violence
Starring
Kevin Pollak,
Timothy Hutton,
Sheryl Lee Ralph,
and
Sean Astin
While snowed in at a diner in Colorado during a freak snowstorm, the President (Pollak) of 2006 must deal with an international military crisis.
| GENRE(S): |
Suspense/Thriller
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Rod Lurie
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Rod Lurie
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: August 29, 2000
Video: February 6, 2001
Theatrical: March 10, 2000
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
101 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
USA / France |

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
92
Mr. Showbiz
F. X. Feeney
I've not stopped thinking about it -- weighing might-have-beens and alternative courses of action, as though remembering an actual event rather than a nimble, superbly-realized fantasy. That's a first-rate achievement.
88
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
A taut, consistently surprising political thriller with a sting in its tail.
88
New York Post
Lou Lumenick
A triumph of low-budget filmmaking.
75
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
The kind of movie that leaves you with fundamental objections. But that's after it's over. While it's playing, it's surprisingly good.

75
New York Daily News
Robert Dominguez
A taut and thought-provoking thriller .

75
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
One of the pleasures of Deterrence is that it does not tell the audience what to think.

75
Boston Globe
Jim Sullivan
There is a palpable edge-of-the-seat tension and a number of complex ethnic issues that linger after the movie ends.

70
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
A surprisingly gripping experience.

63
Baltimore Sun
Ann Hornaday
A carefully conceived and earnest movie that announces its many points just a bit too carefully and earnestly.
60
Los Angeles Times
Jan Stuart
Lurie undermines his high-wire act with the melodramatic carryings-on of the diner patrons.

60
Chicago Reader
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Foreigners who argue that Americans are Neanderthal savages can point to this movie as persuasive evidence.

50
TV Guide
Ken Fox
A tense geopolitical thriller that leaves a curiously bad aftertaste.

50
LA Weekly
Steven Mikulan
Ultimately this is a radio drama made into a movie with a single set.

50
The New York Times
Stephen Holden
Probably serves some useful purpose, despite its ham-fisted preachiness and mediocre acting.

50
USA Today
Mike Clark
There's nothing super about the movie, aside from a loopiness that affords it a certain guilty-pleasure cachet.
50
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
The setting is cramped and the story is illogical, but it's suspenseful as long as you don't think about it very hard.

50
Village Voice
Jessica Winter
Begins and ends with footage of FDR intoning "I hate war," something the film takes two interminable hours to say.

40
Film.com
Ernest Hardy
Steadfastly conventional.

33
Portland Oregonian
Shawn Levy
A new political thriller, has an ending so egregiously stupid that not to reveal it would be a disservice to moviegoers.
25
Entertainment Weekly
Steve Daly
The plot twists fall about as weightily as the fake snow.

25
San Francisco Examiner
Wesley Morris
Ludicrously written and appallingly directed by ex-film critic Rod Lurie, seems to pride itself on the fact that it never (ever) leaves the greasy-spoon milieu in which the president and his staff are trapped by heavy snowfall.
25
Chicago Tribune
Michael Wilmington
To say this movie's premise is bonkers is putting it mildly.
20
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
Well-intentioned but hardly well-executed.

10
Dallas Observer
Bill Gallo
In short, let nothing deter you from staying home.


The average user rating for this movie is 0.0 (out of 10) based on 0 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Discuss this movie in our forums |
|