GAMES: GameSpot | GameFAQs MUSIC: Last.fm | MP3.com MOVIES: Metacritic | Movietome TV: TV.com
Home | About Metacritic | About Metascores | What's New | Wireless Versions | Discussion Forums | Advertising Inquiries | Contact Us | RSS
Metacritic.com: We Deal With Criticism
     Help
> Switch to Advanced Search  
Film Video/DVD Music Games TV

DVD and Video

Upcoming Release Calendar
Awards & Bests By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
How Metascores Are Calculated
Discuss Film In Our Forums

 



 

Printer-Friendly Version Email This Page Discuss In Our Forums

Off the Black
ThinkFilm

Off the Black reviews
Critic Score
Metascore: 62 Metascore out of 100
User Score  
9.2 out of 10
based on 20 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
based on 4 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

MPAA RATING: R for a crude sexual remark

Starring Trevor Morgan, Nick Nolte, Timothy Hutton, Sally Kirkland, Sonia Feigelson, and Rosemarie DeWitt

Off the Black is a coming-of-age story of teenager Dave Tibbel (Morgan) who copes with his own distant father (Hutton) by forming an unlikely friendship with a disheveled, irascible high school umpire, Ray Cooke (Nolte). As they grow more dependent on each other, Ray asks Dave to go to his 40th high school reunion and pretend to be his son, a benevolent act of deception that winds up opening unexpected dimensions in the two men. (ThinkFilm)


GENRE(S): Drama  
WRITTEN BY: James Ponsoldt  
DIRECTED BY: James Ponsoldt  
RELEASE DATE: DVD: April 17, 2007 
Theatrical: December 8, 2006 
RUNNING TIME: 90 minutes, Color 
ORIGIN: USA 

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...

90
The Hollywood Reporter Duane Byrge
Like a good pitcher, Trevor Morgan varies his emotions and perfectly grooves his role as the high-school star. Huffing and puffing, Nolte plops around with brilliant finesse, smartly exposing this frustrated old ballplayer's inside strength and fears.
Read Full Review
83
Entertainment Weekly Gregory Kirshling
Sucking at the top of many a can, and greedily slurping the sides of an overflowing bottle, Nolte gives a master class in how to drink a beer on screen. The rest of his work here is sad, understated, and worth seeking out.
Read Full Review
75
New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman
As good as Nolte is, the relatively unknown Morgan matches him scene for scene. And he's not the only impressive newcomer. Remarkably, this confident indie is the first feature from writer-director Ponsoldt, who shuns any slickness to embrace the rough edges of his low-budget, bare-bones story.
Read Full Review
75
TV Guide Ken Fox
Writer-director James Ponsoldt's first feature is a small, modest movie structured around a fairly simple situation that leaves plenty of room for some fine performances.
Read Full Review
75
Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
There's something very right with Off the Black in terms of pure emotion and performance craft.
Read Full Review
75
San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub
There's nothing too small about Nolte's performance. He's the perfect companion for a rookie feature film director looking to make a good first impression.
Read Full Review
75
Boston Globe Ty Burr
Off the Black is a small, dry, emotionally loaded short story that has been carried to film like baked fish to a platter.
Read Full Review
70
Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust
Off the Black is a modest, bittersweet character study that hits its mark.
Read Full Review
70
The New York Times Stephen Holden
Off the Black is so much Mr. Nolte’s movie that it couldn’t exist without him. His character is the latest in a long line of Hemingway-esque ruins, marinated in beer and testosterone, who have become Mr. Nolte’s specialty.
Read Full Review
70
Variety Justin Chang
Anchored by a terrific performance from Nick Nolte as a grizzled umpire who gets an unexpected second chance at fatherhood, this easygoing comedy-drama plays out slowly but assuredly, infusing a conventional story about a blossoming relationship with welcome reserves of honesty and humor.
Read Full Review
70
Village Voice Rob Nelson
A disarmingly droll and insightful indie.
Read Full Review
70
Film Threat Eric Campos
It's a touching story of father and son type male bonding -- male bonding with Nick Nolte no less -- that's bound to find some audience members blubbering by film's end.
Read Full Review
63
ReelViews James Berardinelli
I appreciate that Ponsoldt doesn't go for cheap tears through over-sentimentality, but his detached, low-key approach distances viewers from the characters. I watched the drama unfold from afar but was never involved on an emotional level.
Read Full Review
60
LA Weekly Tim Grierson
Off the Black gradually establishes its own peculiar cranky rhythm, fighting to resist the usual male-bonding sentimentality. But despite some nice touches, this is the sort of too-precious indie film that gives its characters unnecessary quirks.
Read Full Review
60
Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
I think the movie is so restrained, and holds back so much on conventional plot and characterization, that its emotional impact is severely blunted. Nolte is excellent, I suppose, but we've seen this damaged-American-dude shtick from him before.
Read Full Review
60
Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
The leads are good, and Timothy Hutton is memorably off-putting as the pitcher's disengaged dad. But having created the aching umpire, Ponsoldt occupies him with some fairly shopworn situations.
Read Full Review
58
Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer
Playing a cantankerous, beer-swigging human wreck of a man for the umpteenth time, Nolte is very good but very familiar.
Read Full Review
50
Washington Post Desson Thomson
Writer-director James Ponsoldt's film treats big subjects -- loneliness, coming-of-age and father-son relationships -- with such half-baked conviction, it's a wonder the screen doesn't redden with embarrassment. Which makes it all the more gratifying to watch Nolte pulverize the dramatic banality around him.
Read Full Review
50
The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray
Nolte almost makes it work.
Read Full Review
25
New York Post Kyle Smith
If your film is as downbeat and deflated as this one, you had better be leading up to a more interesting insight than, "The older I get, the more I know that I don't know anyone."
Read Full Review

What Our Users Said

Vote Now!The average user rating for this movie is 9.2 (out of 10) based on 4 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Danielle R. gave it a10:
It made me laugh and cry.

Matt gave it a9:
Great movie. Nolte's crazy-brilliant!

Chad S. gave it an8:
A post-it near the beer, in the refrigerator that holds the beer, reminds Ray(Nick Nolte), who is always engaged in full-hangover mode, how he self-imposed on himself a three-beer limit. Our assumption is that he means per-day, but by the looks of this ramshackle umpire, per-hour seems just as likely. "Off the Black" is about an off-the-field friendship between a young man and an ump, fraught with the vaguest sexual tension lurking beneath its father-son dynamic. Ray isn't the Brian Cox character from Michael Cuesta's "L.I.E.", and yet "Off the Black" surprises us with its relevation about the receiver of his homemade movies. And then there's Dave(Trevor Morgan), who reveals himself as having an ambiguous sexual orientation, in a pivotal scene, where he registers not the slightest interest in a girl seated next to him during class(she's pretty enough, and he pays her no mind). But most crucial of all, look closely at Dave as he learns about the buried particulars in Ray's past at the umpire's class reunion. Is Dave hurt? If you want, "Off the Black" can simply be just a heartwarming motion picture about a lonely, old man and his younger charge, who both strike up a symbiotic relationship that is advantageous, yet unethical, as it pertains to the integrity of baseball(ask any fan, it's wrong). But what "Off the Black" really wants to say lies in its gay subtext(that is, if you think it exists), which states(with three snaps in a zig-zag motion): if you don't think there are any gay athletes in sports, think again. When Ray throws Dave out at his home; that their relationship has come to an impasse, he tells his fake boy, "Any father would be proud to have a son like you." This line is either heartbreaking(to Dave if he's gay, and Ray is clueless), or poignant(if Ray knows and loves him like a son anyway). Nolte, looking like he's in a perpetual alcoholic haze, makes gauging the implicit meaning of his complement impossible.

Discuss this movie in our forums

Return to top of page
Home | FILM | DVD/VIDEO | MUSIC | GAMES | TV | Forums | About Metacritic metacritic.com

Popular on CBS sites: iPhone 3G | Fantasy Football | Moneywatch | Antivirus Software | Recipes | E3 2009

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use