Tadpole
Miramax Films | Release Date: July 19, 2002 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
71
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 31 Critic Reviews
Positive:
23
Mixed:
8
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
It's a funny, fearless, poignant, spectacular performance. Come to think of it, those words could well apply to the entirety of Tadpole. Read full review
100
Washington PostDesson Thomson
Doesn't need the passage of time to become a classic. It's one already. Read full review
100
New York PostLou Lumenick
Short and sweet, small and smart, Tadpole is the oasis in the desert of dopey summer blockbusters - an uproarious, sophisticated coming-of-age comedy so flawlessly written, acted and directed it seems practically miraculous. Read full review
90
VarietyTodd McCarthy
A smart sex comedy that successfully swims upstream to spawn and score. Read full review
90
Rolling StonePeter Travers
Tadpole may be small, but it's something special -- a cheeky comedy knockout. Read full review
88
USA TodayClaudia Puig
An irreverent and witty comedy in which the events aren't predictable but are well paced. Read full review
88
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
Has nearly perfect pitch. Read full review
83
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
It's an appealing mix of an old Hollywood movie world of Upper East Side sophisticates with the character-driven spontaneity of a modern American indie, all very slight and light but deftly done. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
Where ''Rushmore'' surprises and delights with its spiky depiction of sprawling American idiosyncrasy, Tadpole's more urbane, less complicated charms are specifically made in New York City. Read full review
80
The New York TimesStephen Holden
Shot in just two weeks with a hand-held digital camera, the movie often looks frayed around the edges. Yet it has a soulful heart and a clear grasp of its rarefied milieu (Manhattan upper-level moneyed academia). Read full review
80
Village VoiceJessica Winter
As sweet and unassuming a film as they come, embraces both perspectives -- it's sympathetic to the batty throes of a first infatuation, but affably demurs at indulging them. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Witty, adult treatment of an offbeat subject: a pubescent boy's infatuation with an older woman. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Stanford and Neuwirth are performers of such nuance that a mere glimpse of his body language and her bawdy language speak volumes about the difference between love and sex, the ideal and the real. Read full review
75
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
Neuwirth vamps up a storm: She's like some silent-screen hellion sending lust rays out of bemused eyes. Read full review
75
New York Daily NewsJami Bernard
Armed with a witty script, Winick and the actors so confidently ply the Oedipal waters that the comedy seems sweetly chaste. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Oscar's life has the potential to become a Greek tragedy, but Winick keeps things light enough that it resolutely stays a comedy. Read full review
70
Film ThreatRon Wells
Not a film that will change your life. It instead proves that shooting your movie with cheap technology doesn't mean it can't be fun or entertaining. In the end, that's enough. Read full review
70
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
Though sloppily structured and sometimes dangerously flimsy (not to mention truncated at a mere 78 minutes), Tadpole has an unforced charm that compensates for the absence of more traditional cinematic virtues. Read full review
70
New Times (L.A.)Luke Y. Thompson
Overcomes its visual hideousness with a sharp script and strong performances.
70
L.A. WeeklyHazel-Dawn Dumpert
It requires nothing more of a viewer than quiet complaisance, which is rewarded in turn by pleasant scenery, a few mild laughs, and the dependably involving presence of Weaver and, especially, Neuwirth. Read full review
70
The New YorkerAnthony Lane
The great Bebe Neuwirth should apply for a patent on her slow and dirty smile. The scene in which she introduces her new conquest to her girlfriends over tea, and pretty well pimps him to any takers, is worth the price of a ticket. [29 July 2002, p. 92]
63
Chicago TribuneLoren King
But as likable as it is, Tadpole is hardly a maturing woman's revenge movie, but another male fantasy -- that of the sexually nurturing mother figure. If only all coming-of-age sexual experiences could be as healthy and wholesome. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Smart and sophisticated entertainment, whatever its shortcomings, and it deserves to be encouraged. Not the behaviour it portrays, of course; but the worldly common sense of knowing that most people have a secretly ambiguous view of sexual prohibitions, and that this is the fertile ground of great comedy. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderJoshua Rothkopf
Both Stanford and Neuwirth are excellent in tricky parts, yet screenwriters Heather McGowan and Niels Mueller abruptly end the story just as the characters are arriving at some uncomfortable showdowns. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
The witty coming-of-age film is marred by an uneven, digitally shot look, a disservice to its first-rate cast. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
Written in wisps and watery double-entendres by Heather McGowan and Niels Mueller, and the movie is so benign that its proceedings are beside the point. Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
I praised "Lovely & Amazing," which also features a romance between an adult woman and a teenage boy. But "Lovely & Amazing" is about events that happen in a plausible world (the adult is actually arrested). Tadpole wants only to be a low-rent "Graduate" clone. Read full review
50
SalonStephanie Zacharek
The big problem with it is that the setup is treated as just that, a scheme around which many things that are intended to be funny (but aren't very) are packed like ice around a fish. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Tadpole was shot on digital video, and the images often look smeary and blurry, to the point of distraction. Then again, in a better movie, you might not have noticed. Read full review
50
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
This breezy romantic trifle isn't nearly as clever as it imagines itself to be, but it's smart enough not to take itself too seriously. Read full review
40
TimeRichard Schickel
This is, alas, one weary ride--77 minutes that sometimes feel like that many hours. Read full review
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