Shawn Levy

Burstyn is astonishing, forsaking all vanity to make silly biddy Sara a fully dimensioned human being.

Three impeccably cast actors are fully engaged in something like a psychological thriller that has much of the crushing weight and lingering pain of grown-up life on this Earth.

It IS a film that deflates you too often, despite its efforts to impart a sense of soaring. In the end, where the Wild Things are is in your imagination and in Sendak’s pages, not in this big-hearted but ultimately faint simulation.

There's a lot of pleasure in seeing a mature filmmaker put together something so intricate with what seems like so little strain.

A draggy affair livened occasionally by bursts of color or raw emotion, but just as often convoluted and hackneyed. It's a case of a film taking on, admirably, more than it can chew.

It's a little depressing to see such a thrilling talent deployed in such an ordinary and sordid movie. Training Day isn't awful, but it's absolutely nothing special.

The best thing about the film is the acting of the guys.

It's fast, it's sure, it's violent and it's fun, even as it sometimes pushes the limits of ready coherence or dramatic plausibility.

The storytelling -- the script is co-written by Verhoeven's old collaborator Gerard Soeteman -- is messy, and the result never feels real or human or vital.

The film may have its troubled spots, but its poignant depiction of human tenderness more than compensates for them. [18 Nov 1994, p.17]

So filled with riches that it seems a bit unfair to single out Szabo and Fiennes, no matter how outstanding their work.

The film is big and sprawling and moves with fiery energy -- there's little or no exposition or explanation between scenes or episodes, yielding a breakneck pace.

It's witty, gripping good fun.

The picture is Logue's entirely, and without him, it might not be worth a visit.

An old-fashioned romantic adventure film strongly acted, ably directed and written with stolid sobriety, the film feels, save for a few moments of verbal or physical intensity, as if it could have been made 60 years ago with Ingrid Bergman in the lead.