Stanley Kauffmann

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The New Republic
For 471 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 39% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 59% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 0.6 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Stanley Kauffmann's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 65
Highest review score: 100 Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Lowest review score: 0 Hulk
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 274 out of 471
  2. Mixed: 152 out of 471
  3. Negative: 45 out of 471
471 movie reviews
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    • 82 Metascore
    • 50 Stanley Kauffmann
    The Return
    Still, it never quite realizes the oneiric quality because, paradoxically, of its best achievement--the performances of the two boys. They are vital, insistent. Their beings contradict the dreaminess and make us ask the questions mentioned above.
    • 40 Metascore
    • 30 Stanley Kauffmann
    Alexander
    After the three hours--though it seemed longer--I was still bewildered. Stone is a unique and fiery talent. Why did he make this film?
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    The Tracker
    Australian "Westerns" occur. An exceptional one is The Tracker, which has the shape of an offbeat American Western and seems at first a sort of Down Under copy. But it develops characters and relationships that are indigenous.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Mountain Patrol
    Ford would probably have grumbled about some things in this picture--some moments of confusion about who is who--but he might have been pleased to see that his influence, so marked in many countries' films, had reached China and Tibet.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 30 Stanley Kauffmann
    Pushing Tin
    Not every stupid film sets out to be that way. But a furious zeal to entertain, especially to find twists, can push filmmakers past credibility, past twist, even past social decency. A dreadful example is Pushing Tin.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    Kings & Queen
    Both these stories, which of course develop further, are more engaging than they may sound, because Desplechin directs them so intelligently and because they are so well acted.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 30 Stanley Kauffmann
    Assassination Tango
    A series of disconnected scenes alternating between two story lines, neither of which is cogent or concluded. The picture is tinged with the irrational.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Pride & Prejudice
    The present film-makers have retained the essences of the plot and characters but have moved the ambience toward the next stylistic era, romanticism.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 40 Stanley Kauffmann
    Boys on the Side
    The entire film feels like the result of a market study. Tests were held (it seems) to determine which problems would have the most audience-grab, particularly when combined with two other problems. [06 Mar 1995 Pg.30]
    • The New Republic
    • 79 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Zodiac
    The picture tries hard for addictive mystery, but it is full of scenes that promise insight and don't deliver.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 40 Stanley Kauffmann
    Stealing Beauty
    Bertolucci's original story--a generous adjective--was made into a screenplay by the American novelist Susan Minot, who has an unwavering eye for the predictable and an ear for the tired phrase. [24 Jun 1996 Pg.32]
    • The New Republic
    • 87 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Russian Ark
    Substantively there is no content. Everything we see or hear engages us only as part of a directorial tour de force. That force is exceptional, but since there is not much more to the picture, it leaves us hungry.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 60 Stanley Kauffmann
    Menace II Society
    The Hughes brothers' directing compensates a good bit for the story's predictability. [5 July 1993, p.26]
    • The New Republic
    • 61 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    September 11
    Obviously the variety that was bound to result was part of Brigand's plan. The astonishment is that almost all of the assemblage is fascinating, very little is poor, and one segment is superb.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    After the Wedding
    Bier directs with a sense of motion, pleasant without pushing. Mads Mikkelsen, who plays Jacob, is an actor who absolutely belongs on the screen, a gentler sort of Jack Palance.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    The Best of Youth
    Like some wines, The Best of Youth travels well. From its earliest moments the film is intelligently seen.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Wrestling with Angels: Playwright Tony Kushner
    Especially in the moving moments, this film prods us into a kind of reproof. Kushner is now fifty, a prime writing age, and we want more.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 100 Stanley Kauffmann
    Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
    Gondry's virtuosity lifts the film far past science fiction into cinematic efflorescence. He shows us, more seductively than other directors have done, how freehand use of film can capture the flashes in our minds that slip between words.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    Nobody Knows
    There is not much progress in the film: actions are repeated and repeated...Yet the film is sustained--and, for the most part, well sustained--by the children.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Heading South
    If only Cantet and Robin Campillo (who based their screenplay on stories by Dany Lafèrriere) had balanced the sexual and political elements more acutely, the result could have been searing.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 10 Stanley Kauffmann
    House of Fools
    His (writer/director Konchalovsky's) plunge into the world of mental distortion is so garish, so exploitative, that the picture needs only a few clicks of the dial to move from the horrible to the ludicrous
    • 83 Metascore
    • 90 Stanley Kauffmann
    Spider
    Spider is not a pulse-quickening experience, but Fiennes's art makes it engrossing.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 50 Stanley Kauffmann
    Alfie
    Just a series of episodes: it has no trace of the structure that has supported drama and comedy for two millennia.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    The Woodsman
    Sympathy for a pedophile is difficult, but surely comprehension may be possible, and Bacon evokes it.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Stanley Kauffmann
    Lost Embrace
    The overall effect is of a young director treating some old problems with the cinematic lexicon of his time. So he is able to create warmth without slush.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Stanley Kauffmann
    U Turn
    The trouble, which becomes quickly and oppressively apparent, is that the screenplay has no point except its plot. No theme, no intent of anything like Oliver Stone weight, is ever manifested.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Primary Colors
    The result is glib, often funny, sometimes bumpy, and ultimately depressing.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 40 Stanley Kauffmann
    An Unfinished Life
    The film, so far as it is betrayable, is betrayed by the casting of Jean. She is played by Jennifer Lopez, a sexy star who is out of key with the picture and is presumably on hand to supply the oomph that Redford no longer provides.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Stanley Kauffmann
    Family Law
    Burman is particularly good at the tiny details that become recognition points in daily patterns.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 90 Stanley Kauffmann
    Me and You and Everyone We Know
    It seems quite possible that Me and You marks the arrival of an artist who may affect--disturbingly yet helpfully--films and audiences to come.
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