Out of Sight

Universal Pictures | Release Date: June 26, 1998

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

84	METASCORE Universal acclaim based on 30 Critic Reviews

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

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Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

100

David Ansen

Lucky for us there are no ordinary circumstances in this smart, tasty adaptation of the Elmore Leonard novel and it gets quirkier, funnier and sexier as it goes. Read full review

100

Stephen Hunter

In some ways Soderbergh does a much better job than Tarantino. He handles the time shifts more adroitly, always keeping us on track; he goes easy on the violence, and when he does unleash it, it's short, fast and ugly. Read full review

100

Stanley Kauffmann

One other element helps Out of Sight tremendously: the editing. [3 Aug 1998]

100

Mick LaSalle

[Soderbergh] plays with time and narrative to reveal character, mood and longing in ways you just don't find in a mainstream crime picture. Read full review

100

New Times (L.A.)Michael Sgragow

The audience responds to Out of Sight the way Jack and Karen do to each other. Instantly we like the way it looks, moves, and sounds. Ultimately we like how it makes us feel. Read full review

100

Manohla Dargis

This isn't a profound film, or even an important one, but then it isn't trying to be. It's so diverting and so full of small satisfying pleasures, you don't realize how good it is until it's over. Read full review

100

Emanuel Levy

Reveals Soderbergh in peak form, as he endows Leonard’s postmodern yarn with a meticulously detailed mise en scene that helps each member of his terrific ensemble soar. Read full review

100

Janet Maslin

The film's sleek moodiness and visual sophistication are so effective that there's even a scene here that makes Detroit look like the most romantic city in the world. Read full review

100

Kenneth Turan

Engaging and consummately entertaining. Read full review

Keith Phipps

Works both as a great romance and a great, unconventional crime thriller. But step back from such distinctions, and it just looks like a great movie. Read full review

David Edelstein

Soderbergh contrives the perfect voice for Leonard's prose--laid-back and grooving when it needs to be, but also taut, with the eerie foreboding of violence about to erupt. Read full review

Michael O'Sullivan

Jack is just one of a dozen enormously appealing personalities in Out of Sight. Read full review

Richard Schickel

What makes this movie work is the kind of cool that made Get Shorty go so nicely: an understanding that life's little adventures rarely come in neat three-act packages, the way most movies now do, and the unruffled presentation of outrageously twisted dialogue, characters and situations as if they were the most natural things in the world. Read full review

James Berardinelli

Everything in Out of Sight is smart -- the dialogue, the characters, and the storyline. Read full review

Michael Wilmington

It's a nice mix, an elegantly smoky and dangerous cocktail -- just like the old noirs, but in a more modern, shinier glass. And since the basic brew is Elmore Leonard's, it tickles as it goes down. [26 June 1998]

Roger Ebert

The first film to build on the enormously influential "Pulp Fiction" instead of simply mimicking it. It has the games with time, the low-life dialogue, the absurd violent situations, but it also has its own texture. Read full review

Dave Kehr

When boy meets girl in Steven Soderbergh's jaunty, sexy Out of Sight, it happens with a bang.

Rick Groen

Undoubtedly, [the lead actors] both benefit hugely from the sharpness of Leonard's stock-in-trade dialogue: Put smart words in any actor's yap, and their performance will rise accordingly. Read full review

Owen Gleiberman

Lopez, for all her Latina-siren voluptuousness, has always projected a contained coolness, and this is the first movie in which it fully works for her. Read full review

Film.comTom Keogh

Soderbergh appreciates the value of having fun with a so-so script, turning its cliches into fresh experiences and infusing energy into the margins of a predictable story.

Charles Taylor

What makes "Out of Sight" a grown-up treat is that the mixture of lust and longing is as flawlessly proportioned as the ingredients in a perfect cocktail. Read full review

Film.comJohn Hartl

Quite a spicy brew.

Marc Savlov

Hardly a serious caper film, Out of Sight instead takes a lighter approach, effortlessly offering up as many unexpected chuckles as it does bullets. Read full review

Andy Seiler

The low-key approach probably gets closer to the soul of Leonard, but it lacks zip. As a result, Out of Sight sometimes runs out of gas. Read full review

Ron Wells

Clooney has finally made a GOOD movie. Read full review

TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh

Steven Soderbergh's direction conjures an understated '70s vibe, striking an apparently effortless balance between grit and glamour. Read full review

Film.comSean Means

Soderbergh and [screenwriter] Frank like these sidekicks so much that they overwhelm the leads — a fairly easy task, since Lopez has all the police presence of a Revlon ad, while Clooney again tries to skate by on his good looks and smirking charm.

Barbara Shulgasser

Out of Sight needed the energetic and stylish hand of "Get Shorty" director Barry Sonnenfeld. Instead, a sad-sackish Soderbergh ( "sex, lies and videotape") comes at this material looking as if his mind was on something else, something much, much more depressing. Read full review

David Sterritt

Much of the action seems more like warmed-over Quentin Tarantino than first-rate Steven Soderbergh. Read full review

Jonathan Rosenbaum

Out of Sight engaged me less and less, until by the end I no longer cared which of the characters lived or died. Not even the engaging Jennifer Lopez, George Clooney, Albert Brooks, Don Cheadle, and Ving Rhames or the talented secondary cast can survive the abbreviations and last-minute shoehorning their characters receive. Read full review