Rules of Attraction, The

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

The cast is a pitch-perfect assemblage of pretty young things, but James Van Der Beek, as a slit-eyed dorm stud, proves that he can be an actor of cruel force.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Rules needs that dose of hilarity. Ellis' satire, filtered through Avary's harsh lens, is hard to stomach, harder to ignore.

Time Richard Corliss

Sex, drugs and rack 'n' ruin; pretty people doing nasty things to one another...honestly, what more could you want in a movie?

LA Weekly Mark Olsen

It's so playful, wicked and unseemly, by the time you realize that the actual plot of this brilliantly sordid satire hasn't started, the party is already over.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Propelled by a fine Tomandandy score and a savvy assortment of seductive new-wave hits, Attraction is top-notch trash, a guilty pleasure designed for the decadent 14-year-old in everyone.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

At times darkly funny and at other times depressingly tragic. It's safe to say there aren't any movies out there quite like this one.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Further proof that so-so books often make better movies than good ones.

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Oddly compelling.

Dallas Observer Robert Wilonsky

For all its kinetic energy, for all its camera tricks, for all its dark humor, there's still something a bit off about these Rules, and it's not really Avary's fault.

Washington Post Stephen Hunter

The movie feels more like a walk across campus than a movie. That's so depressing. On the other hand, each of these lost children is really looking for the same thing, ol' Mr. Love.

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Roger Avary's crisp adaptation imbues the copious bad sex and general befuddlement of Bret Easton Ellis's solemn, echt '80s Bennington novel with a playfully obnoxious energy that is often funny and -- almost fun.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Actually I quite enjoyed the film -- but how do I get rid of this awful discharge?

Boston Globe Ty Burr

If there's one thing Avary gets right, it's the brutal use-or-be-used approach to interpersonal relations that Ellis laid out with numbing detail, and James Van Der Beek is down to the challenge as Sean Bateman: horndog, cokehead, ceramics major, and all-around jerk.

Variety Scott Foundas

Gets an ambitious, sometimes inspired but ultimately less than satisfying screen treatment from Roger Avary.

Chicago Tribune Mark Caro

Some of its parts are nifty, but the sum of these parts is nothing.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

Although it would be understatement to call their characters unsympathetic, Van Der Beek and Sossamon play their parts with such doomed passion that they have some affecting moments.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

Hollow and pointless.

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

There is no entry portal in The Rules of Attraction, and I spent most of the movie feeling depressed by the shallow, selfish, greedy characters. I wanted to be at another party.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

Opens on a display of humiliation and human degradation at its worst and then rewinds, like a video surfer zipping back to replay a favorite scene, to the nominal beginning of the spiral.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

It's a small-minded and jejune film, and it feels strangely out-of-date considering how loaded it is with right-here-right-now signifiers.

Film Threat Todd Levin

The big screen has a very difficult time capturing the talent of James Van Der Beek - literally. The aspect ratio of projected film simply cannot accommodate the full breadth of his enormous melon head.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

The harder the movie tries to shock, the shriller it rings.

New York Daily News Jami Bernard

Juices up the visuals with fancy camerawork and split screens, but it can't distract enough from the vulgarity of the material.

Los Angeles Times Manohla Dargis

Most of the characters are one-dimensional, and Avary's over-the-top directing doesn't make them interesting for more than a few isolated moments.

San Francisco Chronicle Carla Meyer

Nearly every bodily fluid makes an appearance in "Rules," a mean-spirited paean to hedonism set at an East Coast college where students attend class only occasionally, and then only to perform oral sex on instructors.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

Some movies just bring out your inner Matlock: a desire to grab young punks by the lapels, smack them against a wall, knock their cigarettes to the ground and wipe the sneers off their faces. Such is the case with the callow and cynical The Rules of Attraction.

Christian Science Monitor David Sterritt

Most of the characters are one-dimensional, and Avary's over-the-top directing doesn't make them interesting for more than a few isolated moments.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

Avary has taken a pig's ear of a book and turned it into a pig's ear of a movie.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

And what of Roger Avary, the writer who shared the Academy Award for writing with Tarantino? He continues to plummet toward oblivion with The Rules of Attraction, which ranks with the Great Pyramid of Khufu as a monument to self-indulgence.

New York Post Jonathan Foreman

Looks and feels like a bad imitation of "Trainspotting" without any of that film's wit or charm.

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Ugh. The Rules of Attraction is the kind of movie that leaves vague impressions and a nasty aftertaste.