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School of Rock
Paramount Pictures
FILM:
MUSIC:
MPAA RATING: PG-13 for some rude humor and drug references
Starring
Jack Black,
Joan Cusack,
Mike White,
Sarah Silverman,
Joey Gaydos,
Maryam Hassan,
Kevin Alexander Clark,
and
Rebecca Brown
Hell raising guitarist with delusions of grandeur Dewey Finn (Black) has been kicked out of his band. Desperate for work, he impersonates a substitute teacher and turns a class of fifth grade high-achievers into high-voltage rock and rollers. (Paramount)
| GENRE(S): |
Comedy
|
Musical
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
Mike White
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
Richard Linklater
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: March 2, 2004
Video: March 2, 2004
Theatrical: October 3, 2003
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
108 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
USA |
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...
100
Entertainment Weekly
Owen Gleiberman
The School of Rock was made by gifted veterans of the American indie scene, but it's still the most unlikely great movie of the year.
100
Newsweek
David Ansen
It's a bravura, all-stops-out, inexhaustibly inventive performance. I don't know how much was improvised, and how much comes from White's sharp screenplay, but Black may never again get a part that displays his mad-dog comic ferocity to such brilliant effect. He, and the movie, kick ass.
100
Time
Richard Corliss
Three of the hippest indie film princes make a perfect commercial comedy.
100
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
First and foremost a very funny film, and a very pleasant one that doesn't really have a villain. Credit for its hilarity goes largely to Black, who gives the performance of his career as a character who might have seemed merely coarse and crude in less gifted hands.
100
Wall Street Journal
Joe Morgenstern
This joyous farce is a big, big deal, and Jack Black is nothing less than majestic as a scruffy, irreverent rocker passing himself off as a pedagogue in a private school.
100
Washington Post
Ann Hornaday
An exuberant, raucous and thoroughly endearing comedy
100
San Francisco Chronicle
Peter Hartlaub
All Black, all the time, and could easily have been an exhausting mess. But the movie is coherent, hilarious and surprisingly sweet.
91
Portland Oregonian
Shawn Levy
Crowd-pleasing, feel-good stuff.
90
Slate
David Edelstein
For all its slickness, School of Rock has a let's-put-on-a-show quality that touches you in the most direct way a movie can. It's as if the filmmakers had said, "I'd like to teach the world to kick butt--in perfect harmony."
90
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
A movie for almost everyone, from boomer parents (who remember their teens and twenties) to their teenage kids (who can't wait to get started with same). And if there's anyone who can bring so many into the same mosh pit, it's Black, who so occupies the role you can't believe he's acting.
90
New York Magazine
Peter Rainer
Linklater, whose previous movies include "Slacker," "Before Sunrise," and "Waking Life," may be the most versatile director of his generation. School of Rock is his most unabashedly mainstream movie by far, and yet it’s commercial in the best way.
90
Film Threat
K.J. Doughton
School of Rock kicks ass. It's one movie that definitely goes to eleven.
89
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
As far from "Slacker" as you could possibly get and still be using a motion-picture camera, The School of Rock is nonetheless pure Linklater, pure rock & roll, and pure fun. Gabba, gabba, hey!
88
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
If quirky, independent, grown-up outsider filmmakers set out to make a family movie, this is the kind of movie they would make. And they did.
88
USA Today
Mike Clark
It plays even more like a bent version of Meredith Willson's "The Music Man" for the new millennium. Slinging a line of bull but displaying genuine affection for the youngsters he's bamboozling.
88
Premiere
Kelly Borgeson
An unexpectedly exuberant, only mildly subversive celebration of music, learning, and going all out for what you love.
88
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
School of Rock may be to Black what "The Nutty Professor" was to Jerry Lewis, or "Groundhog Day" was to Bill Murray - that rare, perfectly tailored opportunity to play against one's broadest impulses. Not to neutralize them, necessarily, but to tame them and turn them into something very human and charming.
88
Boston Globe
Ty Burr
Utterly adorable.
88
Chicago Tribune
Mark Caro
The movie is the cinematic equivalent of a near-perfect three-minute pop song. It makes you laugh, smile and tap your toes over a brisk 88 minutes, and when it's finished, you're ready to hit repeat.
80
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Scott Tobias
Though tagged as the director's bid for commercial success, School Of Rock is as philosophical in its own way as "Slacker" or "Waking Life." It was made by people who not only know the music well enough to create magnificent flowcharts around it, but also understand how a simple, soul-stirring rock song can seem revolutionary.
80
Los Angeles Times
Kenneth Turan
Takes a clever premise and Black's unflagging manic energy and comes up with a pleasing mainstream comedy that uses new people and attitudes to entertain in old-fashioned ways.
80
The Hollywood Reporter
Kirk Honeycutt
The film hits another comic mother lode in the byplay between Black and Cusack.
80
Village Voice
J. Hoberman
Jack Black is consistently hilarious--and not just in his dreams of moshpit glory.
80
Chicago Reader
Jonathan Rosenbaum
The kids, all real musicians performing, are wonderful, and so is Black; Joan Cusack is both charming and funny as the principal.
80
The New York Times
Stephen Holden
A very funny for-kids-of-all-ages delight that should catapult Mr. Black straight to the top of the A-list of Hollywood funnymen.
80
Salon.com
Andrew O'Hehir
In its cornball "Let's put on a show!" crudeness, its Cuisinart collapsing of rock history, and its reduction of the ambiguous, libidinal revolt led by Elvis and Mick and Johnny Rotten and Kurt Cobain to the level of pampered middle-school posturing, School of Rock is a clever and sometimes a beautiful thing.
80
Empire
Chris Hewitt
The feel-good hit of the year thus far. Be warned, though: if you think a little Jack Black goes a long way, then this isn’t for you.
75
New York Post
Lou Lumenick
One of the year's most consistently entertaining and ingratiating movies, building to an inspirational climax that's as rousing as it is predictable.
75
Rolling Stone
Peter Travers
Even education can't kill the demon of fun in Black. Enroll in his class and you won't stop laughing.
75
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Sean Axmaker
Linklater powers the film with the energy and attitude and beat of his soundtrack.
75
Miami Herald
Rene Rodriguez
The movie is a polished (and irresistible) piece of crowd-pleasing formula and deserves to become a monster hit. But it is also a perfect showcase for the volcanic talents of the rotund comedian/musician/all-around wildman.
75
Philadelphia Inquirer
Steven Rea
It's one of the great have-your-cake-and-eat-it-too performances of the year.
70
Dallas Observer
Robert Wilonsky
School of Rock, populated by bright-shiny faces given a "Revenge of the Nerds" happy ending, is light and meaningless but never worthless. It merely aspires to be a good time and is just that and nothing more, a grin-worthy buzz that wears off in the parking lot.
70
LA Weekly
Hazel-Dawn Dumpert
Still, the big-show musical payoff is good fun, and Black and his little doppelgangers have it all over "Daddy Day Care."
70
Variety
Dennis Harvey
Combined with hilarious physical business and perfectly overearnest delivery of pseudocool lines like, "Let your fingers do the rocking!," he (Black) pretty much single-handedly keeps the formulaic progress funny.
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Rick Groen
A picture with pop's delicious energy yet none of its attendant risk, a flick that no one will love but everyone will like.
63
Baltimore Sun
Chris Kaltenbach
Like the particular brand of music Dewey espouses, this is a movie more concerned with exploiting rock than understanding it.
60
Film Threat
Rick Kisonak
Anyone who loves rock music will appreciate the script's insights into the form and its history.
60
TV Guide
Angel Cohn
The kids -- most of them first-timers cast for natural charisma and musical ability -- steal the show, and a talented supporting cast helps take the edge off Black's manic antics.
50
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
Feel-good tripe: a string of clichés lashed together by a formulaic plot that features underwritten characters and sit-com style humor.
50
Charlotte Observer
Lawrence Toppman
Somewhere inside "School" lurks a heartwarming or hilarious movie, perhaps both.
 The average user rating for this movie is 9.3 (out of 10) based on 335 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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