Mao's Last Dancer
ATO Pictures | Release Date: August 20, 2010 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
55
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 23 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
11
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
ObserverRex Reed
This first-cabin director returns to top form, with this revelatory film his best in years. More than that, Mao's Last Dancer is a masterpiece. Read full review
80
Boxoffice MagazinePete Hammond
Will appeal to upscale adult audiences with its mix of gorgeous Chinese locations, splendid dance sequences and compelling personal story. Read full review
75
NPRElla Taylor
Likable as this full-hearted and uplifting movie is, though, I wish that Beresford had not fallen into the familiar trap of dividing Chinese characters into two roles: brutal, ideology-spouting apparatchiki; or parable-spouting, salt-of-the-earth proletarians, the better to show off by contrast the open society of the West. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleAmy Biancolli
This is a handsome, conventional biopic, as fluent and polished as its subject matter. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
The delight of this film isn't so much in the tale as the telling. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
The film celebrates artistic freedom without preaching a sermon, and often flies when Mr. Chi is on screen. When he is on stage, spinning and leaping to the strains of magnificent music, the film soars. Read full review
70
VarietyRichard Kuipers
The story lights up when world-class performer Chi Cao leaps about as the adult Li, but is marred by lumpy melodrama when the music stops. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
Three actors portray the clumsy-but-limber Li in the years of his arduous training, when he is pulled between a teacher who's inspired by Mao and another who's inspired by bootleg videos of Mikhail Baryshnikov. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
The ballets are badly filmed. The camera shoots them often from the point of view of the patrons in the auditorium or in a way that dishonors the choreography. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
This based-on-real-life tale of artistic aspirations and international politics is packed with more corn than an Iowa silo. Read full review
63
Orlando SentinelRoger Moore
Chairman Mao wouldn't necessarily approve. And even today, China won't be showing Mao's Last Dancer. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesSheri Linden
Director Bruce Beresford ("Driving Miss Daisy") knows how to tug heartstrings but as he moves the inspirational material toward its tear-jerker finale, it's often hampered by awkward melodrama. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicRichard Nilsen
It's hard to know whether to take it to task as a film critic or as a dance critic. It isn't that it fails on either level - it's a serviceable movie - but it neither attempts nor achieves much of value. Read full review
60
MovielineMichelle Orange
The degree to which they are willing to share their bodies with the world, seeming to reach out for it with each impossible extension, drawing it in with every reeling arabesque, suggests a desire for engagement that is visceral, human, and true in all the ways this film is not. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterPeter Brunette
Like most films in this underdog genre, the emotional manipulation of the audience is constant and obvious. Read full review
50
New York PostLou Lumenick
There are nice cameos by Joan Chen and Kyle MacLachlan as Li's mother and lawyer, respectively. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
It's artless, obvious, and at times insultingly exaggerated. And yet the real-life story of Chinese ballet dancer Li Cunxin, based on his autobiography, is often dramatic enough to win its way past the silly trappings. Read full review
50
Village VoiceBrian Miller
Based on the memoirs of Li Cunxin, Mao's Last Dancer means well, but it stumbles between genres. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
A dramatic true story has been made into a diffident biopic. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
While this is hardly "Breaker Morant," it's nowhere near as mawkish or cloying as it could have been. Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
Noble but dull. Read full review
40
Time OutEric Hynes
The performance sequences feel intimate and exhilarating-but in the end, Li's journey is compelling only when he's onstage. Read full review
30
The New York TimesMike Hale
The final image - a freeze frame of a pas de deux staged to resemble a triumphal Communist poster - perfectly captures the film's overall effect: it's strenuously brainless. Read full review
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