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Year One
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
I Am Sam

Generally unfavorable reviews
Based on 33 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 49 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info
Genre(s): Drama
Written by:
Kristine Johnson
Jessie Nelson
Directed by: Jessie Nelson
Release Date:
Theatrical: December 28, 2001
DVD: June 18, 2002
Running Time: 132 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for language
Starring Sean Penn, Michelle Pfeiffer, Dakota Fanning, Doug Hutchison, Stanley DeSantis, Brad Silverman, Loretta Devine, and Laura Dern
The compelling story of Sam Dawson (Penn), a mentally challenged father raising his daughter Lucy with the help of an extraordinary group of friends. When a social worker suggests that Lucy should be placed in foster care, Sam forms an unlikely alliance with a high-powered attorney (Pfeiffer). Together they struggle to convince the system that Sam deserves to get his daughter back and, in the process, fuse a bond that results in a unique testament to the power of unconditional love. (New Line Cinema)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
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...
San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Not about the justice or injustice of the legal system. Rather it's about the tragedy of Sam's predicament.
Read Full Review >New York Post Lou Lumenick
Penn makes us take the leap required by Kristine Johnson and Jessie Nelson's screenplay -- you end up deeply caring about Sam and Lucy.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Frank Lovece
Penn's stark and unvarnished portrait of the challenged Sam makes even the hardest-to-swallow plot acceptable.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington
The role sounds like a sentimental trap, but Penn doesn't fall into it. It's a sensational performance, and he illumines a movie that sometimes seems in danger of descending into modish Hollywood political correctness.
Read Full Review >Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman
The cancer of dishonesty begins to grow half an hour into the film, and it riddles the picture by the end.
Read Full Review >Slate David Edelstein
Just don't believe the anti-hype. There are lots of reasons to have a good cry these days -- here's a nice, warm place to get squeezed.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
The kind of performance Penn delivers in I Am Sam, which may look hard, is easy, compared, say, to his amazing work in Woody Allen's "Sweet and Lowdown."
Read Full Review >Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker
I can imagine the pitch meeting: "It's 'Kramer vs. Kramer' meets 'Forrest Gump.' No, wait, 'Rainman' has a baby!"
Read Full Review >The New York Times Dana Stevens
Not a bad movie, and its intentions are unimpeachable. But its sentimentality is so relentless and its narrative so predictable that the life is very nearly squeezed out of it.
Read Full Review >Time Richard Corliss
As the director of this noble weepie, Nelson so overuses visual tricks -- zooms, zip pans and multiple perspectives on a simple scene -- that she turns the viewer into an exasperated parent; this is a directorial style in need of a spanking.
LA Weekly F. X. Feeney
By-the-numbers Oscar bait -- but Penn does manage, against such odds, to make us see Sam as a person, not a performance.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Connie Ogle
There's only one excuse for the sentimental and ham-handed I Am Sam, and it's not to tout the rights of the mentally disabled.
Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
The film's one realistic performance is that of Dakota Fanning as Lucy, whose child's shame, fear and resourcefulness ground the movie in recognizable behavior. She breathes air into this suffocating enterprise.
Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy
This isn't an ordinary film built on a remarkable performance; it's a poor one with a gem at its core. Penn can elevate it to mediocrity, but he cannot make it fly.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine Peter Rainer
I Am Sam is about as connected to the real world as Dr. Seuss's Green Eggs and Ham, from which its title is derived -- in fact, in the realism department, Seuss may have the edge.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Lisa Alspector
It’s a heart-tugging scenario undermined by a striking hypocrisy: obscuring a hot-button issue in casting, some actors with Down's syndrome have minor roles, while Penn plays the lead -- and chews the scenery.
Read Full Review >The New Yorker David Denby
Pfeiffer, enormously likable in the role, almost saves the movie. [28 Jan 2002, p. 90]
Rolling Stone Peter Travers
Contrived, manipulative and shamelessly sentimental, this film is notable for the courageous reach of Sean Penn, who gives a bold, heartfelt performance.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Jami Bernard
It's a difficult issue, one that is not well served by a hollow confection like I Am Sam.
Read Full Review >Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt
The film means well, but each scene gets clobbered by sappy screenwriting.
Read Full Review >USA Today Mike Clark
Drawn out and dishonest in equal measure, Sam fights it out with "The Majestic" for the title of worst "important" movie of the year.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
The film is so busy that every minute is exhausting. It's as if the filmmakers were idealistic teen-agers afflicted with a group case of Attention Deficit Disorder.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
The movie that Disney uses to explore this premise drips with so much corporate good-neighbor syrup, you might want to wear something waterproof. And Penn's performance is, at best, ripe for discussion.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Ron Wells
Is this what Sean Penn has come to in his 40s? He hasn't appeared this retarded since he was married to Madonna.
Read Full Review >Variety Robert Koehler
An especially insipid example of the Hollywood message movie.
Read Full Review >New Times (L.A.) Robert Wilonsky
In one of the year's most woefully manipulative and oppressively pandering offerings: I Am Sam, a dolled-up TV movie-of-the-week masquerading as profound cinema.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Michael Atkinson
Actual concussive cranial abuse would be preferable to Jessie Nelson's I Am Sam.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Charles Taylor
Penn's portrayal strikes me as equally insensitive. It's the nightmare performance of 2001.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 8.0 (out of 10) based on 49 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Sarai V. gave it a10:
This is the best movie ever!
Bill H. gave it a10:
This is the best movie that I have ever seen, it made you sad,it made you happy, and filled you with unbelievable joy at the same time.
nicki c. gave it an8:
Loveable, and just the kind of movie with enough heart that you wish it could be so. Really liked the characters and the music. Have bought the soundtrack and listened to it often. Don't know what the critics are thinking!
[Anonymous] gave it a7:
Underrated...Sean Penn's performance deserves much more respect. The ending is a little too ideal and too happy, but enchanting altogether. Sure, things see-saw too much in the middle, but Penn does bring out the feelings and mentality of his character.
Beercan gave it a4:
I Am Sam is so focused on drawing audience tears and hitting them with a "message" that it forgets to become a real movie. As the retarded father trying to raise his daughter, Sean Penn is somehow both magnetic and utterly excruciating. So's the movie.
Ian K. gave it a9:
Are the friggin' critics serious? From Simon Birch to I Am Sam...they are passing these movies along like there bad! This and Simon Birch are two of the greatest movies i've ever seen! And yet you give snoozers like About Schmidt good reviews!
Juls P. gave it a 10:
Very marvelous movie!!!!!! those who rated this film below 1 are like stones!!!!!!
