Jonathan Rosenbaum

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Chicago Reader
For 1,935 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 42% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 56% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 4.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Jonathan Rosenbaum's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 62
Highest review score: 100 Breathless
Lowest review score: 0 Bad Boys
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 961 out of 1935
  2. Mixed: 744 out of 1935
  3. Negative: 230 out of 1935
1935 movie reviews
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    • 45 Metascore
    • 50 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Jefferson in Paris
    By the time [James Ivory and Ruth Prawer Jhabvala] get around to articulating a story, the inhibitions imposed by their "good taste" begin to seem more like gutlessness, and what initially promises to be an exposure of American liberal doublethink about slavery winds up as a querulous wimp out on a subject that the underrated "Mandingo" is better equipped to deal with.
    • 94 Metascore
    • 70 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Sideways
    Payne's entertaining but familiar comedy lacks the insolence of his "Election" and the freshness of his work with Kathy Bates in "About Schmidt."
    • 94 Metascore
    • 40 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Apartment
    I wouldn't call this 1960 picture one of Billy Wilder's best comedies—it's drab, sappy, and overlong at 125 minutes.
    • 94 Metascore
    • 88 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Gunfighter
    One of the earliest and best antiwesterns, made before the subgenre became self-conscious about critiquing the standard myths. Some that followed are merely contrary; this has the ring of truth.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Magnificent Ambersons
    For the most part, this is a very close adaptation of Booth Tarkington's underrated novel about the relentless decline of a wealthy midwestern family through the rise of industrialization, though Welles makes the story even more powerful through his extraordinary mise en scene and some of the finest acting to be found in American movies.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Reversal of Fortune
    The juxtaposition of liberal Jewish attorney Dershowitz (Silver) and von Bulow working together on the latter's defense makes for some engagingly offbeat drama, with some interesting insights into the legal process.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
    Frightening, funny, profound, and mysterious.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Best Years of Our Lives
    The best American movie about returning soldiers I've ever seen—the most moving and the most deeply felt. It bears witness to its times and contemporaries like few other Hollywood features, and Gregg Toland's deep-focus cinematography is one of the best things he ever did.
    • 34 Metascore
    • 20 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Isn't She Great
    A major washout.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Band of Outsiders
    What seems most striking today, in spite of the many moments of comedy and elation, is how painfully candid and personal it is in its despair and disillusionment.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Days of Being Wild (re-release)
    Wong Kar-wai's idiosyncratic style first became apparent in this gorgeously moody second feature.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 70 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    There Will Be Blood
    This has loads of swagger, but for stylistic audacity I prefer Anderson's more scattershot "Magnolia."
    • 93 Metascore
    • 80 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Do the Right Thing
    This is a powerful and persuasive look at an ethnic community and what makes it tick.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Crumb
    Zwigoff not only presents a complex human being and the range of his art but also guides us through a profound and unsettling consideration of what it means to be an American artist. Essential viewing.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 90 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    8½
    It's Fellini's last black-and-white picture and conceivably the most gorgeous and inventive thing he ever did—certainly more fun than anything he made after it.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 90 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Solaris (1972)
    Tarkovsky's eerie mystic parable is given substance by the filmmaker's boldly original grasp of film language and the remarkable performances by all the principals.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Close-Up
    A dense and subtle masterpiece.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 50 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    No Country for Old Men
    A very well-made genre exercise, but I can’t understand why it’s been accorded so much importance, unless it’s because it strokes some ideological impulse.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Umberto D (re-release)
    This is truly a great film, recently celebrated at length in "My Voyage to Italy," Martin Scorsese's documentary about Italian cinema.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 20 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Hollywood Ending
    I only laughed once here, at a Treat Williams reaction shot; the rest of the time I was trying to figure out why Allen made this movie.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 90 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Secrets & Lies
    The acting is so strong--with Spall a particular standout--that you're carried along as by a tidal wave.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 90 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Apocalypse Now Redux
    Better in certain ways than the original Apocalypse Now, though the flaws are also magnified.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 60 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
    It's full of scenic splendors with a fine sense of scale, but its narrative thrust seems relatively pro forma, and I was bored by the battle scenes.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 80 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Quiz Show
    Robert Redford's best and richest directorial effort.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 80 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Goodfellas
    Stylistically, it's a remarkable effort -- with a continuous sense of gliding motion -- and the film is entertaining and gripping throughout.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Moolaadé
    This is a masterwork by Ousmane Sembene, the 81-year-old father of African cinema and one of Senegal's greatest novelists.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 90 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner
    Exciting not as ethnography but as storytelling, as drama, and as filmmaking.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 100 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    The Killing
    Orson Welles was so taken with this film that after seeing it he declared Kubrick could do no wrong; not to be missed.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 70 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    Lost in Translation
    Coppola does a fair job of capturing the fish-tank ambience of nocturnal, upscale Tokyo and showing how it feels to be a stranger in that world, and an excellent job of getting the most from her lead actors. Unfortunately, I'm not sure she accomplishes anything else.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 80 Jonathan Rosenbaum
    After Life
    Though it comes across as labored in spots, it also yields a good many beautiful and suggestive moments, and an overall film experience of striking originality.
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