Good Year, A

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Gorgeous photography and strong acting keep the formula from becoming stale. For those who don't mind pictures that fall into predictable rhythms, A Good Year represents a pleasant diversion.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

A shamelessly enjoyable retread, an ode to la belle vie that has been well turned on a factory spindle.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

Ridley Scott's A Good Year is a bonbon made by a mechanic, a well-intentioned diversion put together by someone who clumsily adds the right ingredients in the wrong proportions at the wrong time. But sometimes, if you get the sugar level close to right, you can do OK, and A Good Year offers some pretty basic pleasures that movies often fail to give us these days.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

Apart from the movie's moments of flesh and fantasy, it lacks the lyric impulse that would make the swank fantasy take flight.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

Because Crowe is hamstrung by his role, he never strikes the requisite sparks with Cotillard. This is quite an achievement, since her beauty is on par with Provence's.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

It's an art-house genre piece, very much in the tradition of "Enchanted April," "Shirley Valentine" and "Under the Tuscan Sun." But, a few charming scenes aside, A Good Year is in the hands of the wrong star and wrong director.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

Scott embraces the lightness of the material instead of trying to give it unnecessary weight, and even if he's far from the ideal filmmaker to choreograph bits of slapstick, A Good Year is never less than visually ravishing.

New York Post Lou Lumenick

May not be vintage stuff, but it goes down fairly smoothly.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Broad, hackneyed and stultifyingly predictable.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The scenery is glorious; you can almost feel the sunshine and smell the wine. But Crowe and Scott are bulls in Mayle's china shop. Like an assertive Burgundy served with a delicate fish, they're a classic wrong pairing.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Stephen Cole

Fans of both Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe should not be too bummed with the mild sedative that is A Good Year.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

The overall effect is one of a sumptuously laid table where the main course is overcooked.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

The plot is like a sudoku puzzle with all but one square filled in.

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub

It's difficult to ignore the fact that they've created a romantic comedy that has almost no romance and even less comedy.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias

Though he invests every ounce of his considerable charisma in the lead role, Russell Crowe still comes across as a man unworthy of the paradise offered to him.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Russell Crowe is invariably involving on screen, and Ridley Scott is a splendid director when the material is right. No film they collaborate on will be devoid of interest, but A Good Year almost is.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

There's a lot of self-conscious talk about the importance of timing, but the tony sense of entitlement tends to dampen any laughs. The movie functions best as a middle-class Euro-postcard along the lines of "Chocolat" or "Under the Tuscan Sun."

The New York Times Stephen Holden

A Good Year is a three-P movie: pleasant, pretty and predictable. One might add piddling.

Village Voice Nathan Lee

Scott can do mayhem, dystopia, and the rampaging alien (extraterrestrial, android, Somali, Demi Moore) with the best of them, but the breezy touch is not his forte.

Premiere Scott Warren

Finney, only seen in these flashbacks, is pitch perfect.

Chicago Tribune Jessica Reaves

The film, for all its pretensions of revelatory, life-altering enlightenment, is actually about as deep as a wading pool, as substantive as cotton candy.

Variety Todd McCarthy

A simple repast consisting of sometimes strained slapsticky comedy, a sweet romance and a life lesson learned, this little picnic doesn't amount to much but goes down easily enough.

The New Yorker David Denby

Even judged by the not excessively demanding standards of middle-aged renovation fantasies, A Good Year isn’t much.

Time Richard Corliss

Crowe, despite his loutish rep, is forever surprising viewers by slipping snugly into the disparate characters he plays. This time he surprises by failing. Oh, he can do engaging as smartly as he does stalwart or tortured, but he gets sabotaged by the cloying script.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Nothing more than a bad harvest.

Empire Dan Jolin

The Merlot to "Sideways" Pinot, this is one of those middling movies that, while never terrible, also never really impresses.

The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt

You sense in every frame the strain to be lighthearted. Consequently, A Good Year is at times downright clumsy. You know what the filmmakers are trying to achieve and see the labor going into the attempt, but for them to fall so short is unsettling.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

If nothing else, this adaptation of Peter Mayle's umpteenth ode to livin' la vie en Provence will make you wonder about Ridley Scott and the directorial aging process.

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

Falls as flat as a bottle of corked Bordeaux.

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

Like a fragile Provence wine left too long in the sun, Ridley Scott's romantic comedy A Good Year spoiled somewhere between the publication of Peter Mayle's novel and this cockamamie adaptation.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Russell Crowe may find himself discovering the simple joys of life in A Good Year, but audiences will be checking their watches during this joyless attempt at comedy.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe attempt light romantic comedy in A Good Year, and the results are as grindingly discordant as a punk band writing a suite of waltzes.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

There isn't a milliliter of honest feeling from start to finish, and precious little comedy or romance.