Critics Scoreboard
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...
Average Critic Score:
44
(32 sources)
44
(32 sources)
-
88
Baltimore Sun
Turns the kleig lights around to produce a wry and dead-on commentary on the film industry and the journalists who cover it. Read Full Review » -
80
Washington Post
Terrifically funny romantic comedy, is a slam-dunk for Julia Roberts, the Michael Jordan of cuteness. Read Full Review » -
75
New York Daily News
The result is a back-lot studio tour that's not exactly good-natured, but terrific fun and it gives the ensemble cast plenty of clowning opportunities. Read Full Review » -
75
New York Post
Surprisingly funny and sweet, despite some missed comic opportunities and curious casting choices. Read Full Review » -
67
Austin Chronicle
At its heart the film wants nothing more than to make you giggle, and at that it succeeds admirably. Read Full Review » -
67
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Though an uneven, often confused, mixed bag -- the movie gradually comes together to be a fairly hilarious inside-Hollywood farce. Read Full Review » -
63
Boston Globe
You keep waiting for it to go into orbit, to be really fizzy and outrageous, like the screwball farce it wants to be. Instead, the film settles for the merely serviceable. Read Full Review » -
63
-
63
Philadelphia Inquirer
Christopher Walken has the best moments in the whole thing, portraying the wacked-out auteur of the Gwen-and-Eddie vehicle. Sadly, he's only in America's Sweethearts a few hilarious minutes. Read Full Review » -
63
Miami Herald
For the farce it so desperately wants to be, the film often feels slack and too reliant on so-so punch lines for laughs. Read Full Review » -
63
Chicago Tribune
All these good actors and all Crystal's sass and witty candor can't bring back the heyday of Billy Wilder and Preston Sturges. Or even, most of the time, their off-days. Read Full Review » -
60
Wall Street Journal
Amusing enough, especially with its uniquely credible premise of a media fraud, to recommend. Read Full Review » -
60
Los Angeles Times
As enjoyable as this film is in parts, it's not nearly as successful as a whole. Enormously engaging in its opening segments, it's unable to sustain that good feeling over the long haul. Read Full Review » -
58
Portland Oregonian
Surprise! Crystal has given himself most of the best lines, though he also allows a Doberman to have its way with him. Read Full Review » -
50
-
50
TV Guide
While the film delivers some sharp dialogue, overall it's soft and slightly unfocused. Read Full Review » -
50
New York Magazine
Too eager to please to be truly dislikable, and Roberts and Cusack have a fine rapport. Read Full Review » -
50
-
50
Chicago Sun-Times
America's Sweethearts recycles "Singin' in the Rain" but lacks the sassy genius of that 1952 musical, which is still the best comedy ever made about Hollywood. Read Full Review » -
42
Entertainment Weekly
No excuse for the bitterness and crudity in America's Sweethearts -- a noxious combination that erodes the 1930s and '40s screwball-comedy armature on which this mirthless movie is based. Read Full Review » -
40
Variety
Begins as a smartly promising, gently farcical comedy of manners and ends as sourly and haphazardly as the lives it is poking fun at. Read Full Review » -
40
-
40
The New York Times
Like a bottle of lukewarm Champagne -- an expensive one, judging by the label -- America's Sweethearts opens with a promising burst of effervescence and quickly goes flat. Read Full Review » -
30
Salon.com
It's mostly terrible. The movie has no sparkle, no charm, nothing to sweep us off our feet. Read Full Review » -
30
-
30
Rolling Stone
Chockablock with things we're not supposed to notice: that Roberts is wasted; that she and Cusack have no characters to play, so it's virtually impossible to understand why she loves him or vice versa; that the script provides comedy without bite and romance without resonance. Read Full Review » -
30
-
25
Christian Science Monitor
Falls flat on screen, weighed down by far-fetched plot twists. Read Full Review » -
25
San Francisco Chronicle
This is the downside of Roberts' giant success and her dazzling ability to charm: Every time she goes plain, as she did in the little-seen "Mary Reilly" and "Michael Collins," our princess simply fizzles. Read Full Review » -
20
-
20
-
20
Chicago Reader
Overwritten by Billy Crystal and Peter Tolan, overdirected by Joe Roth, overplayed by most of the cast, yet typically undernourished. Read Full Review »
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