Bride Flight
Music Box Films | Release Date: June 10, 2011 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
60
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 19 Critic Reviews
Positive:
10
Mixed:
8
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleJun 9, 2011
Bride Flight gives a panoramic sweep of lives as they're lived, as there is a lot of beauty in it. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertJun 30, 2011
Bride Flight takes this melodrama and adds details of period, of behavior, of personality, to somewhat redeem its rather inevitable conclusion. Read full review
75
New York PostLou LumenickJun 10, 2011
The kind of lush, epic romantic weepie that Hollywood used to deliver on a regular basis for packed matinees at Radio City Music Hall. Read full review
70
The New York TimesStephen HoldenJun 9, 2011
Best enjoyed as a lavish period travelogue whose story is dwarfed by its panoramic overview. Read full review
70
Village VoiceMichelle OrangeJun 7, 2011
The flashbacks dominate, playing like wet-inked storyboards: pioneer women forced into patriarch games; a baby born in secrecy and raised in deceit; Jewish legacy lost and found. When the men are all dead, the women speak freely, wrapping up two florid hours with a pickled sentence or two. Read full review
70
VarietyBoyd Van HoeijApr 25, 2011
A devil-may-care adventurer and three vastly different gals emigrate from the Low Countries to New Zealand in the romantic epic Bride Flight, a glossy European meller that switches between the '50s, the '60s and the present Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerJun 10, 2011
Switching between the 1950s, the '60s, and the present, it's compelling in a middling miniseries kind of way – expansive but not terribly deep. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsJun 24, 2011
A tearjerking romance that belongs to another era, when female moviegoers wanted to be transported, not grounded in grim realities. Read full review
63
Washington PostStephanie MerryJun 23, 2011
Lovely scenery and historical context elevate the sentimental story lines above the soap opera domain. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie RickeyJun 16, 2011
The beauty of the actors and the ravishing landscape of New Zealand goes a long way to make Ben Sombogaart's sudsy film so eminently watchable. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicRichard NilsenJul 14, 2011
None of the characters, save Ada, is interesting enough to sustain the creaky joints of the convention of the story mechanism. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanJun 10, 2011
The plotlines are clichéd and the score overbearing, but uniformly strong turns go a long way towards shaping the lush, nostalgic atmosphere. Don't forget to bring tissues. Read full review
60
Time OutAlison WillmoreJun 7, 2011
Trauma from WWII haunts each character, but even the historical foregrounding doesn't keep Ben Sombogaart's weepie from being more soapy than serious. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezJul 7, 2011
Aside from its period New Zealand setting, there is little to distinguish Bride Flight from something you might watch briefly on Lifetime, then change the channel. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeMark FeeneyJun 16, 2011
Bride Flight is pretty predictable once the basic situation gets established. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckJun 11, 2011
The sort of sweeping romantic saga rarely attempted on our shores these days, Bride Flight should well please art house audiences, especially of older females, starved for this sort of old-fashioned fare. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubSam AdamsJun 9, 2011
The subtitles and period setting conjure a smattering of respectability, but in essence, this is arthouse pap, particularly for older audiences, turning the past into a concatenation of worn-out tropes that comforts as it distorts. Think of it as instant mashed potatoes for the soul. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineAndrew SchenkerJun 5, 2011
It's all very tastefully handled by Ben Sombogaart, shot in plenty of staid compositions whose denuded color scheme suggests a historical remove, but it rarely generates any heat, even during a pair of graphic, but not particularly erotic sex scenes. Read full review
30
Chicago ReaderBen SachsJun 30, 2011
Smug and unconvincing. Read full review
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