Perfect Stranger
Columbia Pictures | Release Date: April 13, 2007 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
31
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 31 Critic Reviews
Positive:
3
Mixed:
11
Negative:
17
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
To see Perfect Stranger is to wish for a more sophisticated vehicle for a film actress this good, but actors -- and audiences -- take what they can get. This is better than most. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
Perfect Stranger is far from Hitchcock, and Berry, although she gets an A for effort, can't do much with the half-baked characterizations. Read full review
63
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
Todd Komarnicki's screenplay relies heavily on red herrings and a host of suspects (there are more murderers swanning around Hill's sleek offices than there were aboard the Orient Express) to keep audiences distracted from what, in retrospect, is really pretty obvious. Read full review
58
Seattle Post-IntelligencerWilliam Arnold
Cliched, mostly routine and never especially satisfying. Read full review
58
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
Instead of heightening the intrigue in this psychological thriller, the labored twists and out-of-leftfield turns will leave audiences more weary than wary. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
It lacks the rutting nuttiness of "Basic Instinct," even as it recycles much of that film's kiss-or-kill premise. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
It is an acceptable enough thriller, neither the worst you've seen nor the opposite. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
The only surprise here is the real star of the show, who turns out to be not Halle Berry, not even Bruce Willis, but a flat computer screen in all its hard-driven glory. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldCarla Meyer
A rarely suspenseful thriller with a twist ending of the worst kind: It takes too much explanation. Read full review
50
New York Daily NewsElizabeth Weitzman
Think you'd be happy watching Berry do little more than look beautiful? Perfect Stranger gives you plenty of opportunity to find out. Read full review
50
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Perfect Stranger is one of those movies that two years, or two months, from now, you won't recall having seen. Ostensibly a movie about big secrets, it comes up with few that are worth keeping, or telling. Read full review
42
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
When the left-field ending finally arrives, it explains a lot, including why she's so off-putting and histrionic, but it never really explains why audiences should bother sitting through such a tangled mess. Read full review
42
Portland OregonianM. E. Russell
Joins the growing list of blandly made erotic thrillers that contain no eroticism, few thrills and fewer likable characters. Read full review
40
Village VoiceScott Foundas
Perfect Stranger derives some novelty value from its colorblind casting and from being the most ludicrously silly Hollywood f----fest since the Willis-starring "Color of Night" (minus that movie's comic self-awareness). But as a thriller, it's so by-the-numbers that it's hardly worth keeping count. Read full review
38
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
A movie so inane that it fails to rise to the level of "good trash." Read full review
38
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Perfect Stranger is the Egg MacGuffin of whodunits, a cheesy affair that casts so many baited lures that they tangle each other and don't hook you. Read full review
30
Washington PostStephen Hunter
Just another thriller, utterly disposable. Read full review
30
VarietyJohn Anderson
A disorienting cocktail of illogic and hysteria that requires an 11th-hour soliloquy just to explain what's happened. Read full review
30
The Hollywood ReporterMichael Rechtshaffen
The star wattage quickly dims in this slick-looking but ringingly hollow affair that starts off generically at best before collapsing into a convoluted heap of shrill screen cliches. Read full review
30
The New York TimesStephen Holden
The director, as he showed in movies like "After Dark, My Sweet," and "Fear," specializes in conjuring conspiratorial atmospheres in which anxiety and sexual menace hang in the air like a heavy, bitter perfume. Long after you've dismissed the movie's ridiculous, convoluted story, traces of that scent may linger. Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleSteve Davis
The fishy smell that permeates Perfect Stranger comes from all of the red herrings flopping around this absurdly plotted Hollywood thriller. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
A crappy thriller gussied up with a chrome-plated veneer. Read full review
25
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Superficial and lurid, Perfect Stranger is the cinematic equivalent of spam and should, like those trashy messages, be avoided. Read full review
25
New York PostLou Lumenick
Have you ever seen a movie without a single believable moment? Perfect Stranger, a convoluted and altogether risible thriller with Halle Berry and Bruce Willis, manages this difficult feat. Read full review
25
Boston GlobeTy Burr
After "Gothika " and "Catwoman ," a viewer has to wonder: Why does this woman keep making thrillers if she can't bring herself to be thrilled? Read full review
25
Rolling StonePeter Travers
A dull, dumb and unforgivably dated thriller, free of thrills and any kind of perfection. Read full review
20
EmpireDan Jolin
A twist-burdened techno-thriller that would be by-the-numbers if it could count. Read full review
20
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
This stupidly contrived thriller is all the more disappointing if you admire previous work by Berry and director James Foley (After Dark, My Sweet). Read full review
20
TimeRichard Schickel
The movie's central problem: a lack of alternative suspects...How the screenwriter, Todd Komarnicki, and the director, James Foley, resolve this problem is a genre travesty and an affront to their star. Read full review
10
Film ThreatMichael Ferraro
Nothing but a perfect waste of a Friday night. Or a Tuesday night. Or any night of the week for that matter. Read full review
0
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
Life is full of choices, and Halle Berry has made another bad one with Perfect Stranger, a perfectly off-putting thriller.
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