Renaissance Man

TV Guide Staff (Not Credited)

Renaissance Man is an exceptionally unoriginal comedy with a heart-tugging streak as big as Fort Bragg, but it succeeds perfectly well on its own unambitious terms.

Boston Globe Jay Carr

It's a little too long, a little too corny, a little too packaged, but its warmth and regenerative energies make it a winner. [03 Jun 1994]

Chicago Tribune Gene Siskel

We know exactly where this picture is going at all times. Holding our attention, however, is a cast of fresh talent among the trainees. [03 Jun 1994]

The New York Times Janet Maslin

Inherently condescending, and finally awash in warm-bath sentimentality, this setup never goes out of style.

Portland Oregonian Kristi Turnquist

It's a sweet-natured trifle that sneaks in some social commentary about the modern military and the failings of the American educational system, and it takes a wide swipe at advertising for good measure. [03 Jun 1994]

San Francisco Chronicle Peter Stack

At least it can be said that Renaissance Man, the new Penny Marshall film arriving at theaters today, has its heart in the right place and that star Danny DeVito comes across as thoughtful, intelligent, even sweet. [03 Jun 1994]

USA Today Susan Wloszczyna

Warm, squishy and manipulative, like being slobbered on by a mongrel pup that's begging for more Snausages.[03 Jun 1994]

Wall Street Journal Julie Salamon

The director Penny Marshall has a gently persuasive touch that keeps the movie's most brazen manipulations from being too offensive. [02 Jun 1994]

Washington Post Desson Howe

This is not brilliant emotional manipulation.

Washington Post Hal Hinson

A movie that celebrates the life of the mind and the uniqueness of the individual but does so in glib slogans and is, itself, a sort of knockoff.

Baltimore Sun Stephen Hunter

The film is achingly conventional. [03 Jun 1994]

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

The big underachiever turns out to be DeVito, who is incapable of exhibiting believable warmth and complexity, or, indeed, of playing anyone who is not a cartoon.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Renaissance Man is a movie of moments, too many of which are mediocre or unfulfilling.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

From the ad campaign, we pretty much know how things are going to turn out, and her pedestrian attempts at subplots are even more transparent than those in "Awakenings."

Time Richard Corliss

Warm-hearted humanism is glopped all over Renaissance Man in the hopes that we won't notice that the story makes no sense.

Variety Brian Lowry

Marshall has tried to do too much, dealing with certain subplots too sparingly to deliver on their promise.

Los Angeles Times Peter Rainer

Marshall doesn't have the gift for shamelessness, and that's why the film, with its pileup of sentimentalities, seems so processed. [04 Jun 1994]

Empire Kim Newman

This is a feel good movie which is too mechanically put together to make you feel anything.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

It transforms that bottom line into a saccharine border, framing the picture with enough faux inspiration to keep Hallmark in cards for a month of Mother's Days. [03 Jun 1994]

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Renaissance Man is a labored, unconvincing comedy that seems cobbled together out of the half-understood remnants of its betters.