Basic
Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) | Release Date: March 28, 2003 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
34
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 33 Critic Reviews
Positive:
4
Mixed:
14
Negative:
15
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
Buy your ticket, sit yourself down, and let ol' John take you for a ride. You'll have a blast. Read full review
70
VarietyTodd McCarthy
The teasing tale is told with such dispatch it will carry willing audiences along; genre staples of action, macho attitude and corruption through the ranks are delivered intact. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
This effective, well-paced antimilitary thriller has more conflicting flashbacks than you can shake a stick at. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
The movie, one of those surprise-twist detective stories, doesn't really stand up to scrutiny in the cold light of the theater lobby. Read full review
58
Portland OregonianKim Morgan
Basic essentially is a fun movie, surprise ending and all. To take it too seriously is to miss the point. Travolta is charming, his performance recapturing the old charisma. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Just not worth revisiting, unless one wants to tie one's brain into a knot for no discernible reward. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Basically, it's a muddle. Read full review
50
USA TodayMike Clark
The tepid result is like "Courage Under Fire" without the compelling Meg Ryan angle, or Travolta's 1999 "The General's Daughter" without the sexual squalor. It all feels a little moldy. Read full review
50
Washington PostDesson Thomson
Entertainment more suitable for the living room than the movie theater. Read full review
50
Rolling StonePeter Travers
Their (Travolta/Jackson) teamwork was classic. Basic breaks up the team. What's up with that? Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
So unashamedly confusing, so intent on piling twist upon twist upon twist, it makes your head hurt just trying to figure out what's happened. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Comes across as a cheesy, fundamentally unsatisfying experience. Read full review
50
New York PostMegan Lehmann
Chases its tail for so long, it morphs from a whodunit into a who-cares. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
Confused, and confusing. Read full review
40
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
As the mismatched interrogators, Travolta and Nielson seem to be in two different and incompatible movies. Read full review
40
Film ThreatKevin Carr
Travolta’s performance in Basic is irritatingly familiar to his overacted, spastic performance in "The General’s Daughter." Either that, or he’s channeling Nicholas Cage from “Face Off” again. Read full review
40
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
For twists to work, viewers have to feel like they're being led along, not jerked around, and James Vanderbilt's script eventually devolves into little more than a series of jerks, stopping short only of introducing evil twins and alien interlopers. Read full review
40
L.A. WeeklyChuck Wilson
Those expecting a reunion with Jackson, Travolta's “Pulp Fiction” co-star, should be prepared: They don't interact at all, which is a bit like casting Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers and not letting them dance together. Read full review
38
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
When the film stumbles to its last and silliest conclusion, you realize much of the plot line was unnecessary -- or couldn't have happened at all! Read full review
38
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
Travolta is the least of the film's problems. With a script by James Vanderbilt, whose first credit was for a movie about the tooth fairy ("Darkness Falls"), and directed by John McTiernan, last seen struggling with "Rollerball," Basic is a fundamental failure. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeJanice Page
Falls flat on two fronts: It's neither deep and interesting enough to be a brainteaser nor sufficiently thrilling to count as a mindless diversion. Read full review
38
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
An overly convoluted, tiresome mystery that exists primarily to antagonize the audience, Basic consists almost entirely of dense exposition, then concludes by laughing at anyone who tried to pay attention. Read full review
30
Washington PostStephen Hunter
They made a movie without one basic ingredient: the story. Read full review
25
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
With style and energy from the actors, with every sign of self-confidence from the director, with pictures that were in focus and dialogue that you could hear, the movie descended into a morass of narrative quicksand. By the end, I wanted to do cruel and vicious things to the screenplay. Read full review
25
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
Travolta and Jackson have some effective scenes, but Nielsen is lacking in charisma, and James Vanderbilt's screenplay ought to be court-martialed. Read full review
25
Seattle Post-IntelligencerWilliam Arnold
Insipid, overcooked and dull. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
Another depressingly empty action thriller. Read full review
20
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
You might be tempted to say, "Huh?" Or, if you're in the theater, to leave. But wait -- there's less. Read full review
20
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Watching a movie should never be such torture. Read full review
20
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
It begins in a muddle and ends in confusion. Read full review
10
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
I must confess that I was outsmarted by the ending, but by that time my brain had been bludgeoned into a state just north of stupor.
10
Village VoiceEd Park
Such confusion makes the script-flipping finale something of a respite, as it gives one an excuse to forget everything that's happened. Read full review
0
Dallas ObserverRobert Wilonsky
Basic really brings to mind a Travolta film from 2000, "Battlefield Earth," in that it's so astonishingly awful it becomes a sort of kinky pleasure; just when you think Travolta has fallen to the bottom of the barrel, he pulls out a shovel and dons his miner's helmet to see what lies beneath. Read full review
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