Color Me Kubrick
Magnolia Pictures | Release Date: March 23, 2007 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
57
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 21 Critic Reviews
Positive:
14
Mixed:
3
Negative:
4
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
Color Me Kubrick is a far more modest movie, but in some ways is more successful than "The Hoax" in conveying how deeply people want to believe something is true against all evidence. Read full review
80
VarietyLisa Nesselson
A sly, enormously entertaining romp based on the antics of real-life Brit conman Alan Conway who rooked his way around '90s London posing as Stanley Kubrick. Read full review
80
Washington PostStephen Hunter
Color Me Kubrick is like a nice, deep, clear cocktail of ammonia on the rocks: bracing, comic, astonishing, all of which hide its poison center. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
The film reveals, rather delectably, how potent the power of suggestion can be in a world gone madly groupie. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
In Color Me Kubrick, John Malkovich has one of the roles of his life, and he acts it up like a haughty gourmet who's just picked up a succulent treat. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleRuthe Stein
The filmmakers have wisely turned it into a comedy, and a wickedly entertaining one at that. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesEd Gonzalez
Scarcely an insightful biographical portrait, Color Me Kubrick is still interesting, perhaps even intimidating, as a study of the way fandom can so readily be turned against itself. Read full review
70
The New York TimesStephen Holden
Even if it doesn't add up to more than a fitfully amusing collection of comic sketches, Color Me Kubrick is a platform for John Malkovich to burst into lurid purple flame. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
This 2005 British feature by writer Anthony Frewin and director Brian Cook, both former Kubrick assistants, uses Conway's unlikely saga to mount an appreciative send-up of a certain style of gay extravagance. Read full review
67
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
It's entertaining if not exactly enlightening. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarrit Ingman
A playground for Malkovich – enjoyable enough but not terribly deep. Read full review
63
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Malkovich pulls out all the gaudy stops. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy Burr
Color Me Kubrick digs all sorts of devilish ironies out of this "true...ish story," and it's a fine dark farce before turning sad and, worse, monotonous. The con wears off before the movie does, but while it's in the air, "Kubrick" spins with bogus cheer. Read full review
63
PremiereAaron Hillis
Best appreciated as a rather amusing farce called The John Malkovich Show, the movie's every scene is anchored, then stolen, by the commanding thespian's Alan act. Read full review
50
Rolling StonePeter Travers
If you can't watch John Malkovich being John Malkovich, it's still a kick watching him play Alan Conway, a gay Brit who pretended to be the legendary and reclusive director Stanley Kubrick during the 1990s. Read full review
50
New York PostLou Lumenick
Great fun for the first 20 minutes - which include Kubrickian tracking shots and music from "2001" and "A Clockwork Orange" - but seems long at 86. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
The film makes funny use of music (particularly Lionel Richie's "Hello") and excellent use of Malkovich, but it literally only has one idea in its head, and when that idea runs dry, it's as lost as Conway is without his plethora of Kubrick masks. Read full review
30
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
The movie is endless even at less than 90 minutes. You could use it, "A Clockwork Orange" style, as aversion therapy for seemingly incorrigible con artists. Read full review
30
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
Director Cook and screenwriter Anthony Frewin were both intimates of the real Kubrick, which I guess counts for something. But for what, exactly? Does it uniquely qualify them to make a mean-spirited, trashy and intermittently funny film about a guy who wasn't Kubrick? Read full review
30
Village VoiceNathan Lee
I find it hard to believe that Conway bamboozled half of London simply by announcing his name, and it's regrettable that the filmmakers premise their picture on such improbable gullibility. The real Conway was assuredly slier than his bio-pic incarnation; he ought to have been played by Sacha Baron Cohen. Read full review
30
The Hollywood ReporterMichael Rechtshaffen
At best a kitschy "Catch Me If You Can" and at worst a tedious comedy that grows more tiresome by every self-consciously irreverent minute. Read full review
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