Me Without You
Fireworks Pictures | Release Date: July 5, 2002 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
67
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 25 Critic Reviews
Positive:
16
Mixed:
8
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
SlateDavid Edelstein
Rich, finely judged, gorgeously acted movie. Read full review
90
Washington PostStephen Hunter
Friendship matters to those of us who still claim membership in the human race, and Goldbacher's merciless autopsy on it is both illuminating and dispiriting. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Has a bracing truth that's refreshing after the phoniness of female-bonding pictures like "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood." Read full review
80
SalonStephanie Zacharek
This film's intelligence and forthrightness about the things women sometimes do to one another -- and its resoluteness about where the line should be drawn in terms of selflessness between friends -- set it head and shoulders above most contemporary movies that deal with friendships between women. Read full review
80
Washington PostMichael O'Sullivan
Michelle Williams turns in a performance that is seamless, canny and artistically mature. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
A chick movie? Well, yes, but it's a whole lot cooler than that one with the "Ya-Ya's" in the title. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleCarla Meyer
A powerful new film from British writer-director Sandra Goldbacher. Read full review
75
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
You won't want to miss it if you care about movies that dare to chart intimacies in our age of spectacle, or about up-and-coming female performers and underused male veterans finding roles worthy of their gifts. Read full review
75
Seattle Post-IntelligencerPaula Nechak
Love. Lust. Recrimination. Jealousy. Resolution. This British female friendship melodrama has them all. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Offers a clear-eyed chronicle of a female friendship that is more complex and honest than anything represented in a Hollywood film. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneLou Carlozo
The only the bum steer in Me Without You comes in the person of Daniel, played by Kyle MacLachlan of "Twin Peaks" fame. It's hard to tell whether MacLachlan was dealt a bum hand in an otherwise fine screenplay or acted on auto-pilot. Read full review
70
The New York TimesStephen Holden
Under its drab contemporary trappings, the movie, is really a Jane Austen-like moral parable in which goodness is rewarded and selfishness punished. Read full review
70
VarietyDavid Rooney
The two appealingly played central characters and the film's enjoyable evocation of the 1970s and '80s keep it buoyant and diverting. Read full review
70
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Anchored by Friel and Williams's exceptional performances, the film's power lies in its complexity. Nothing is black and white, starting with the girls' complicated relationships with their parents, which are simultaneously nurturing and fraught with psychological peril. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
An engaging, straightforward narrative about two childhood playmates and the stages of their friendship from 1973 to 2001. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy Burr
More predictable than it ought to be - you can set your watch by the appearance of the mournful Nick Drake song on the soundtrack. Read full review
60
Film ThreatKJ Doughton
A sum greater than its parts. The viewer is taken on a journey spanning nearly three decades of bittersweet camaraderie and history, in which we feel that we truly know what makes Holly and Marina tick, and our hearts go out to them as both continue to negotiate their imperfect, love-hate relationship. Read full review
60
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
Aided by raw, committed performances from her two leads, Goldbacher makes them tough company for themselves and anyone else around them, on or off the screen. Read full review
60
Village VoiceDennis Lim
Essentially humorless, Me Without You manages some pleasing textures all the same. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
This British drama is so overplotted it smothers the two main characters as much as they do each other. Read full review
60
L.A. WeeklyHazel-Dawn Dumpert
Me Without You is at its truest and most affecting when it steps back from the gig gling, bitching and nail biting to reveal how the compulsion to control and appropriate can be born of simple love and admiration. Read full review
50
Portland OregonianKim Morgan
A slight, smartly dressed bit of melodrama that thinks it's gritty when it's really a bit of puff. Read full review
50
Film ThreatMerle Bertrand
Not enough to hold the audience's interest, especially with such shallow simpletons as these two women in the leads. Read full review
50
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
Tough, unsentimental British film. Read full review
38
New York PostLou Lumenick
Though it boasts excellent performances by Anna Friel and Michelle Williams as bosom buddies whose lives meander over three decades, it plods on with a wearying predictability and some truly terrible dialogue. Read full review
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