Down with Love
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation | Release Date: May 9, 2003 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
52
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 39 Critic Reviews
Positive:
15
Mixed:
17
Negative:
7
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
A very smart, very shrewd movie, and the smartest, shrewdest thing about it is the way it masquerades as just a fluffy comedy, a diversion, a trifle. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleKimberley Jones
Sexy, sophisticated comedy that only occasionally falls short of its admirable ambition: that is, to be a fun, fizzy, razzle-dazzle thing. Straight to the moon, indeed. Read full review
88
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
A postfeminist valentine to the Paleolithic days of Woman Power when dinosaurs walked Manhattan in heels with matching handbags. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
it's so much fun because, like Haynes' film, it's made by people with a genuine love for the entertainment they're bringing back to life. You'd have to be a real prude not to go for it. Read full review
80
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
May register most immediately as a snappy whirl of visual gags, double entendres, overheated romance, and comically oversized living quarters, but beneath the exuberance of this fond counterfeit is a heartbeat as powerful as that of any film anchored in the present. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
No better or worse than the movies that inspired it, but that is a compliment, I think. Read full review
75
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
Doesn't so much crackle as pop. It has enough double entendres to fill a D-cup, but it has a premise that would have burned a hole in the screen in 1962, when its story is set. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
Could have used more of the shimmering elegance of the Day-Hudson comedies. Those movies had a true sparkle. This one's a likable piece of costume jewelry. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Light, funny, and clever. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy Burr
This is all far beyond silly, of course - the most inconsequential sort of winking, meta-movie in-joke. Read full review
70
Film ThreatBrad Slager
Doesn’t so much immerse itself in the movies from that period as it submerges, and does so with pure adulation. Read full review
70
The New York TimesDana Stevens
Works hard to earn it and is, for the most part, intelligent and amusing, even if it never achieves the full-tilt zany desperation of Delbert Mann's "Lover Come Back," the best of the real Hudson-Day movies. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Ray Conlogue
A bit like having a detached retina. One keeps blinking and trying to get it into focus, but it never quite does. What, one wonders, is this movie doing here? Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Dragging on too long is a more serious flaw in a romantic comedy than it might be in a complex drama. We don't ask much of a movie like this, but we do require it to be snappy, clever and quick. Read full review
63
New York PostMegan Lehmann
The problem lies with the paucity of sizzle between the romantic leads, Renée Zellweger and Ewan McGregor. They just don't look like they're having any fun together, particularly the bony Zellweger, who has trouble filling out the wow-worthy ensembles and perpetually looks like she's sucking on a lemon. Read full review
60
Village VoiceLaura Sinagra
Unfortunately, during the inevitable "what every woman wants" breakdown, Zellweger can't muster Doris Day's detached fume. Read full review
60
Washington PostStephen Hunter
It's like a "Saturday Night Live" sketch on a $60 million budget. Read full review
60
The New YorkerAnthony Lane
Both of them (Zellweger and McGregor) are set adrift by the movie's discomforting demands, and only in the closing credits (this really is a top-and-tail movie) do they get to do what people do most fruitfully instead of sex, which is to make a song and dance about it. Who needs love? [26 May 2003, p. 102]
58
Seattle Post-IntelligencerWilliam Arnold
Zellweger is a gifted comedienne and her wonky persona sparks here and there, but the humor is so broad that the film is a poor stage for her subtle comedic skills, and she's not photographed well: her face has to be lit just so or it tends to looks strangely distorted. McGregor is terrible casting. Read full review
50
Rolling StonePeter Travers
What starts as freshly spun cotton candy ends as something pink, sticky and indigestible. You leave the theater wanting to puke it up. Read full review
50
SalonStephanie Zacharek
The fatal flaw of Down With Love... is that in mining what's kitschily amusing about those movies, it also re-creates far too faithfully everything that's unbearable about them. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
An irritation, more fizzle than sizzle. Read full review
50
PremiereHoward Karren
The period sets and costumes and the arch dialogue are exaggerated as if to underline the movie’s satirical intent—but in fact it has none. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesManohla Dargis
Director Peyton Reed gets the film's look and, in moments, its disingenuous innocence, but you have to wonder what he and the screenwriters, Eve Ahlert and Dennis Drake, thought they were parodying. The actors clearly haven't a clue. Read full review
50
VarietyDavid Rooney
Stars Zellweger and McGregor are too knowingly nudge-wink in their performances, too much contrived constructs to become real characters, let alone fuel the romantic comedy engine and make an audience care much whether they end up together. Read full review
50
TimeRichard Corliss
The new film is conflicted about its subject -- it both derides and adores what it means to parody -- and it's miscast at the top. Still, the Eve Ahlert -- Dennis Drake script has a gentle heart to humanize its sharp sitcom wit. Read full review
50
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
The film is juvenile when it should be adult, coarse when it ought to be bubbly, and upfront when witty circumspection is indicated. The result feels a bit like a drag show, a camp blend of pitch-perfect mimicry and anachronistic raunch. Read full review
50
SlateDavid Edelstein
The chief casualties are the good actors, who are forced to turn themselves into cartoons. Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)Peter Rainer
It’s all strenuously camp. Read full review
40
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
You can't set the comedy bar much lower than spoofing the old Rock Hudson-Doris Day romances. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
Jeff Cronenweth did the lovely cinematography. It's the only element that improves on the original material.
40
Dallas ObserverRobert Wilonsky
Hunter's movies never condescended to the audience; they never winked, never pretended to be a mere Playboy party joke. Which is precisely why Down With Love, which strives to be to "Pillow Talk" what "Far From Heaven" was to "All That Heaven Allows," is such a disaster: It winks so hard it lapses right into a coma. Read full review
38
Miami HeraldConnie Ogle
Explicitly invites us to mock its artificiality and giggly cluelessness, but beyond its attractive shell the film rings hollow. These days, even a comedy has got to have a heart. Read full review
38
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
The film is hapless. The gap between the moviemakers' ambition and their wit is dizzying. It's as if they thought they were filming The Importance of Being Unimportant. Read full review
30
L.A. WeeklyDavid Chute
This brittle little confection from director Peyton Reed (Bring It On) may drive you up the wall -- unless you're willing to settle for great frocks, stylish production design and wicked opening credits. Read full review
30
Washington PostMichael O'Sullivan
The parodistic romantic comedy makes the fatal mistake of so much middlebrow satire: It becomes that which it mocks. Read full review
25
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
A total lack of chemistry between the stars -- neither of whom is particularly good at romantic comedy in the first place -- and you have a promising package that grows steadily less lovable as it goes along. Down with this movie! Read full review
25
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
The plot's as thin as a debutante's cigarette case. Read full review
10
Film ThreatRick Kisonak
Down With Love has little to offer besides hip sixties references better films have already made and made infinitely more hip. Read full review
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