Love! Valour! Compassion!
Fine Line Features | Release Date: May 16, 1997 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
59
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 20 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
7
Negative:
2

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
The New York TimesStephen Holden
One reason the film version of Terrence McNally's play Love! Valour! Compassion! is so moving is that this complicated group portrait never loses its slippery emotional footing. Read full review
90
Film ThreatRon Wells
The best thing the filmmakers did was to pull a cast out of the stage productions. Importantly, the actors convey a sense of history and comfort with each other. Read full review
80
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
While director Joe Mantello (who also helmed the stage production) often uses the opened-up space of the movie well, he doesn't always avoid some of the common pitfalls that come with adapting plays. Read full review
80
L.A. WeeklyElla Taylor
Yet the pride and sympathy McNally brings to his characters reminds us how far gay film has progressed from the long, self-lacerating whine of "The Boys in the Band". Read full review
80
VarietyEmanuel Levy
It is so sharply written and entertaining that in its stage-to-screen transfer the material easily overcomes its theatrical sensibility and the static direction of Joe Mantello, who also staged the Broadway production. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
It's rare for homosexuals in mainstream motion pictures to be presented as individuals rather than icons; Love! Valour! Compassion! defies tradition by proffering its characters as real people with believable problems. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Yet Love! Valour! Compassion! has power and insight, and perhaps what makes it strong is its disinterest in technical experiments: It is about characters and dialogue, expressed through good acting--the very definition of the "well-made play." Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleRuthe Stein
McNally adapted his Tony-award winning play for the screen, and for once a movie is an improvement on the stage version. Read full review
75
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
There are endearing and powerful moments which thankfully overshadow the occasional clichéd passages. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
But the great revelation in this version is the terrific, beautifully controlled work of Alexander -- Seinfeld's most gifted actor, whose recent movie roles have not allowed him to show his range. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
Most of the cast (along with director Joe Mantello) have been recruited from the stage play, and they all do a fine job of trimming their performances for the screen. Read full review
60
EmpireGiala Murray
Potentially horribly worthy, or even irritatingly superficial, the film succeeds simply by not trying to be too clever or too intense. Read full review
60
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
It's all about as white and bourgeois as you can get, but the film does take a few risks, and some actually pay off. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Yet, the problem goes beyond the film's staginess (although there's plenty of that to go around). It could even have something to do with the delicate difficulties involved in the successful transfer of stage camp to the more intimate level of film. Read full review
50
San Francisco ExaminerBarbara Shulgasser
But what McNally, director Joe Mantello and a cast brought straight from the original New York stage production all accomplish is the creation of an honest, clever, poignant work about men who also happen to be gay, rather than a self-conscious polemic about gays who it turns out just happen also to be men. Read full review
50
The New RepublicStanley Kauffmann
Candor about homosexuality is now so widely accepted as part of theater-film possibilities that plays and films offering not much more than such candor seem dated. In that sense Love! Valour! Compassion! is an important, if dull, milestone. [09Jun1997 Pg 30]
50
USA TodayMike Clark
Even the nasty zingers here seem tiresomely windy. [16May1997 Pg 02.D]
40
Los Angeles TimesJohn Anderson
That this is the first film for director Joe Mantello, who was nominated for a Tony for directing the stage version, may be compounding the problem. But frankly, if someone wanted to do a parody of a gay film like this, it's hard to imagine the sloganeering being much different. Read full review
30
Dallas ObserverMichael Sragow
Terrence McNally's Tony Award-winning work has been called "one of the major plays of our time." Moviegoers who aren't stage-struck may wonder, "What's the fuss?" Read full review
10
Washington PostDesson Thomson
Love! Valour! Compassion!, an adaptation of Terrence McNally's Tony Award-winning play, which has piano music and exclamation points to spare, is excruciatingly predictable, creatively inane and almost offensive in its depiction of gay characters. Read full review
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