Brave and admirable for the trust that it puts in a viewer's intuition and willingness in going along with it right through to its rewarding finish.

One glance at the cast should be enough of a recommendation for any film lover -- it's Winger's first time on the screen in seven years, and Howard deserves a nod or two if only for getting his wife back in front of the camera where she so clearly belongs.

Too long (and it sure ain't taut), but it brims with passion.

It's messy, but in the end satisfying, a film worth making, a journey worth taking.

There's a sass and bite to Winger's acting, a grinning intelligence, unabashed sexiness and total immersion that make her one of the movies' few hipster female stars.

It's an impressive movie, pointing to Howard as a promising new director.

It's made with an accurate and loving, but also wary and squinty-eyed, view of the South. If only the movie hung together better overall.

Constantly touching, surprisingly funny, semi-surrealist exploration of the creative act.

It's frustrating and still oddly likable.

A flawed and overlong but ultimately affecting account of one man's struggle to regain control of his life.

Held together by the blues -- Brown's prose and Howard's performance, Big Bad Love is a mess, but it's a sincere mess, beautifully shot by Paul Ryan and faithfully adapted by screenwriter James Howard.

Howard luxuriates in writerly misery as Barlow, and the participation of the filmmaker's real-life wife, Debra Winger, as Barlow's ex gives the scenes between the two of them an unfakeable erotic charge.

Beneath its stylistic and structural quirks, Big Bad Love -- is a self-indulgent celebration of self-indulgence.

Brown, is a good enough actor and director to keep the film afloat for long stretches.