Rollerball

Washington Post Michael O'Sullivan

A turbo-charged remake that should alienate no fans of the adrenalized 1975 original.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

The game itself is meaningless, and the movie, much the same way, likes it like that.

Entertainment Weekly Staff (Not Credited)

Rollerball was trash even back in 1975, but in some small way it was ahead of its time. The new version just makes you feel like you've been watching a lame late-night rerun while stuck in a thunderdome.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Once LL Cool J, easily the film's most magnetic presence, is out of the game, the whole thing falls apart in a hazy, confusing mess.

Boston Globe Jay Carr

Meretricious without being entertaining, it's an easy game -- and an easier film -- to sit out.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

What's up with director John McTiernan? The man has got to get a career of his own -- sponging off the pale leavings of Norman Jewison just won't do.

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Some movies should never have been made, and high on that list is the addled new remake of Rollerball.

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Gets stupider as it moves along. By the end, you just don't care whether that cold-hearted snake Petrovich (that would be Reno) gets his comeuppance. Just bring on the Battle Bots, please!

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

It's too bad this Rollerball veered off-track so swiftly, derailed by bad writing and possibly also by some of that extensive post-production reworking.

New York Post Jonathan Foreman

This oddly scrambled new version eventually falls apart so badly you feel embarrassed for the people who made it.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

There's something junior varsity about the whole sensibility that makes the new version seem more dated than the old one.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

Coupled with the flavorless dialogue of the inane script and a leading man who registers all the glow of a black hole, there's nothing to anchor this mindless mess of a film.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

The most depressing thing about this movie is not that it's such a complete waste of time, but that there are people in Hollywood who think this kind of thing is what American movie-goers are interested in seeing.

USA Today Mike Clark

The word on Rollerball is "troubled," though troubled is what you call a high school junior with 50 snakes under his bed. Catastrophe is more like it.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Keith Phipps

Only those attracted to "Waterworld" or "Last Action Hero" level big-budget disasters need bother with this one.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

The current version, however, like its predecessor, fails as entertainment. Mr. McTiernan's remake may be lighter on its feet -- the sober-minded original was as graceful as a tap-dancing rhino -- but it is just as boring and as obvious.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

An incoherent mess, a jumble of footage in search of plot, meaning, rhythm and sense.

Film Threat Chris Gore

Will surely end up as one of this year’s worst films.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

It has no moments of athletic grace amid the chaos, no apparent sense of strategy. It's basically just mayhem set to rock music.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Say this for the soundtrack, it drowns out the lousy dialogue.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Bad and baffling from the get-go, probably the only good thing to come out of this Rollerball is the boon it gives the porn industry in terms of another ready-made title to spoof.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Remarkably empty, remarkably noisy, remarkably pleasureless. It's unwatchable.

New Times (L.A.) Gregory Weinkauf

As in the comparatively quaint original film, there are whiffs of greed, carnage, social upheaval and the triumph of the numskull, but it's all rendered noxious nonsense by zooming hot rods, vague T&A, irritating jump-cuts and a bunch of dipshit Power Ranger wannabes slamming in hell's moshpit.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

A movie of such rank stupidity and appalling taste.

LA Weekly Paul Malcolm

Rollerball pushes the Hollywood action movie to stratospheric new levels of incoherence; pounding at the senses, it's mashed story, character, time and space into a chunky hash.

Village Voice Mark Holcomb

McTiernan's Rollerball is a movie masochist's delight.

Miami Herald Connie Ogle

Plentiful helpings of dreadful acting, confusing action cinematography, choppy editing and embarrassing dialogue, with the added bonus of a plot almost as dumb as that of the original film.

Variety Robert Koehler

Sheer chaos on wheels, a hysterically edited jumble that defies belief at nearly every juncture.