The Best and the Brightest
"DIA" Productions GmbH & Co. KG | Release Date: June 24, 2011 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
26
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 14 Critic Reviews
Positive:
1
Mixed:
5
Negative:
8
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
65
MovielineMichelle OrangeJun 23, 2011
The goof on New York's awful elite only gets grimmer and less viable as the film goes on. Read full review
60
Time OutNick SchagerJun 21, 2011
The Best and the Brightest's sharp one-liners and strong cast, especially McDonald's gleefully lecherous performance as an unabashed Republican pervert, help make it a sturdy bit of subculture-tweaking silliness. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldConnie OgleJun 23, 2011
Amusing at times but never more than a modest diversion, lacking the cleverness and imagination required to turn it into more than a one-joke movie. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubScott TobiasJun 23, 2011
The farce withers away when it should be expanding. Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierJun 24, 2011
Riding in to save almost every scene, though, are recent Tony Awards host Harris and the wild and woolly Sedaris, who goes too far, but in a good way. Shelov could learn from them. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinJun 23, 2011
Unfortunately, writer-director Josh Shelov's sendup of the Manhattan private school culture flies off its comic rails after an engaging start, never to land back on solid ground. Read full review
38
New York PostLou LumenickJun 24, 2011
Amy Sedaris, channeling her inner Frances McDormand as a hyper admissions coach, gets most of the laughs. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineEric HendersonJun 22, 2011
Writer-director Josh Shelov (working with co-writer Michael Jaeger) is trolling in fertile, easy territory, but rather than mine the subject for what it's worth, he resorts to depressingly cheap mistaken-identity shenanigans and raunchy "he-milk" gags. Read full review
30
VarietyAndrew BarkerJun 21, 2011
Offering a fitfully funny sitcom plot clumsily stretched to 90 minutes, then goosed with increasingly tiresome doses of smuttiness and political incorrectness, The Best and the Brightest is neither. Read full review
30
Boxoffice MagazineJohn P. McCarthyJun 21, 2011
All you need to know about this low-budget farce is that Amy Sedaris costars (yippee!) and New York pol Anthony Weiner would feel right at home with the sexting subplot (eeeuw!). Read full review
20
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeJun 24, 2011
Manages to be simultaneously offensive and bland. Read full review
10
Village VoiceAaron HillisJun 21, 2011
Drearily shot with cheesy skyline pans, oppressively scored with Hallmark cutesiness, and oddly filled with filthy one-liners. Read full review
0
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisJun 24, 2011
If you are going to be this mean-spirited, you had better deliver the jokes, but the film's attacks on pretentious parents - not to mention put-downs of hardworking immigrants - consistently come off as more hateful than humorous. Read full review
0
ObserverRex ReedJun 21, 2011
Cheap, preposterous and mind-bendingly dreadful. Read full review
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