Kansas City

Fine Line Features | Release Date: August 16, 1996

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

58	METASCORE Mixed or average reviews based on 23 Critic Reviews

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Mixed:

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Critic Reviews

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100

Michael Wilmington

Kansas City is a wonderful film, done with all Altman's offbeat virtuosity, maverick humor and creative daring -- plus the acid nip that runs through all his recent works. Read full review

Sarah Kerr

Altman's grief once seemed a revelation. With this movie, it begins to look like a misanthrope's stubborn routine. Read full review

Mike Clark

Though the music is helping market the movie, it's really an omnipresent backdrop to the two intersecting stories. Audibly and visibly, Kansas City nearly equals Ed Wood for period verisimilitude. Yet it's also character-driven, in particular by the women stars. [16 Aug 1996, p.4D]

EmpireKim Newman

Many will find Kansas City unbearable, because Leigh (with a mouth full of jagged teeth and a permanent snarl) and Richardson (who totters along in a druggy stupour), give brilliant performances as extremely unpleasant characters. Furthermore, the ending is a real slap-in-the-face downer. But if you can get past that, this is the real stuff. Read full review

Roger Ebert

What he asks of the actors (those who are “soloists,” anyway) is not realism but the same kind of playful show-off performances he's getting from the musicians. And to understand the acting, it's helpful to begin with the music. Read full review

Jay Carr

Although there's nominally a lot of action, the film doesn't exactly abound in narrative pulse. But its portraits and textures take up a lot of the slack. [16 Aug 1996, p.D5]

Jack Kroll

Kansas City can be regarded as a jazz tone poem on themes of race, politics, money and the movies themselves. Read full review

Kevin Thomas

Too much of some good things and not quite enough of others, Kansas City is the kind of film you're eager to like more than you do. It could never for an instant be mistaken for anything but a Robert Altman film, and that counts for a lot. Read full review

Lisa Schwarzbaum

So much is satisfying in KC that its shortcomings are all the more discordant. Read full review

James Berardinelli

Though Kansas City has its share of arresting moments, the production as a whole is too superficial to be considered amongst the director's best work. Read full review

Mark Miller

Time and again, the story simply stops for another tune from the band. Then again, without the buoyant sounds of Moten Swing, Tickle Toe, Yeah Man and the rest, Kansas City would be an even less appealing film than it already is. [16 Aug 1996, p.D5]