The Lake House
Warner Bros. Pictures | Release Date: June 16, 2006 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
52
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
15
Mixed:
14
Negative:
5
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
What I respond to in the movie is its fundamental romantic impulse. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
Elegantly scripted by Pulitzer Prize-winner David Auburn, The Lake House never establishes any clear rules about how and when these strands of time can intertwine, but it succeeds at forging a bond between people who only know each other on the page. Read full review
75
Seattle Post-IntelligencerWilliam Arnold
Bullock has abandoned all her usual cutesy mannerisms, and Reeves is as low-key and convincing as he's been in a role. Whatever else the film is, it's a competent and enjoyable star vehicle. Read full review
75
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
Bullock and Reeves have an unusual kind of charisma, one that works best when they're apart. Though the filmmakers sometimes put them in the same frame for visual ease, they mostly occupy different times. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
An enjoyably sudsy romance starring a moody Keanu Reeves, a broody Sandra Bullock, and the titular structure - a jewel box of glass and steel perched on stilts over Lake Michigan. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
It's hard to overestimate what a job of work was accomplished here to keep this from being a catastrophe. But The Lake House, despite its dubious foundation, proves surprisingly sturdy. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
The measure of this kind of movie is its seductiveness, not its logic, nor the ways in which it exploits the supernatural angle, and The Lake House is seductive. Read full review
70
The New York TimesDana Stevens
The movie is, above all, a showcase for its stars, who seem gratifyingly comfortable in their own skin and delighted to be in each other's company again, in another deeply silly, effortlessly entertaining movie. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves are both such guarded celebrities that I have a hard time imagining them as lovers, a problem this Chicago-based romantic fantasy surmounted by isolating them from each other almost entirely. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
Deliriously stupid romantic time-travel drama. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
I am conflicted about this film. I like the fact that it takes chances. I appreciate that it's trying to do a supernatural love story without falling into the schmaltz of "Ghost." Yet I recognize that the screenplay is like Swiss cheese - riddled with hole. Read full review
63
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
The time-warp romantic fantasy The Lake House is a puzzle that is maddeningly obtuse, emotionally overstretched, and virtually absent a sense of interior logic. Read full review
63
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Screenwriter David Auburn's awkward dialogue spells out the film's themes with painful literal-mindedness. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy Burr
How deeply silly is The Lake House? As silly as a movie about two letter-writing lovers separated by a wrinkle in time can be. How much sweet, dumb fun is it? More than you might want to admit. Read full review
63
PremiereEthan Alter
Where the film falters is in Alejandro Agresti's overly deliberate direction, which threatens to drown the drama in amber sunsets and self-conscious camera framings. The film looks great, but it lacks spontaneity, an important element of the most memorable screen romances. Read full review
60
SalonStephanie Zacharek
The Lake House is an example of the way bad movies can sometimes be more interesting than merely mediocre, workmanlike ones, and of the way they sometimes compel us even against our better judgment. Read full review
60
EmpireIan Freer
A compelling idea delicately handled and neatly played, especially by Bullock. It just lacks the emotional directness to turn the good into the great. Read full review
58
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
If you haven't had enough of Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan weepies like "Sleepless in Seattle" (1993) and "You've Got Mail" (1998), The Lake House gives us Mopey in Chicago and You've Got Snail Mail. Read full review
50
VarietyRobert Koehler
Never quite sure what it wants to be -- a magical-mysterious love story, a psychodrama, a sprawling family saga, or an uneasy combination of these. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterSheri Linden
A slow-moving, never-igniting tale of calendar-crossed lovers that grows less convincing as it proceeds. Read full review
50
L.A. WeeklyElla Taylor
By herself, Bullock isn't enough to hold up this enervating movie, which lumbers along ponderously until, at the end, it takes a giant leap into the suspension of disbelief that lost me altogether. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
This is a project whose elements, from concept to script to casting, refuse to follow the usual formulas, which is good, yet they never quite cohere. Read full review
50
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
There is a germ of a good idea in the notion that an imaginary suitor can be more powerful than a real one. But director Alejandro Agresti isn't the man to pull it off. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesCarina Chocano
A chronological brain-teaser confounding enough to keep you busy trying to figure out whether those holes are in the story or in your logic. But ultimately the movie is more interested in the love part of the equation than in the whole crazy, madcap physics part. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
We also know the last time Keanu and Sandra shared the screen together. That was yesterday and Speed. This is today and Snail. I'm not betting on a tomorrow. Read full review
42
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
The only real magic in The Lake House is that Kate and Alex have never heard of e-mail. Read full review
40
Village VoiceMark Holcomb
Treading the same supernatural turf trampled by "Somewhere in Time" and "Frequency," director Alejandro Agresti's gooey, ostensibly spooky romance yarn The Lake House flounders less on its thudding familiarity than on its mood- killing dourness. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleToddy Burton
Don't try to figure out a time-travel movie, it will make your head hurt. And if the movie stars Keanu Reeves, all the more reason to just stop, slowly put common sense on the ground, and back away from your capacity for rational thought. Read full review
40
Washington PostStephen Hunter
The Lake House has the sensibility of something conceived by Stephen King after an overdose of chocolate-covered cherries and valentine cards. In other words, it's sugary sweet and based on a premise that's just -- no other word will do -- ridiculous. Read full review
38
USA TodayClaudia Puig
One of the more befuddling movies of recent years. The premise makes no sense, no matter how you turn it around in your head. Read full review
38
New York PostLou Lumenick
A glacially paced, extremely moist, terminally gloomy and cliché-laden romantic drama with a supernatural twist. Read full review
38
Miami HeraldConnie Ogle
The Lake House overflows with heart-stopping thrills, if by ''thrills'' you mean ''watching attractive people wait around for letters to be delivered by mystical forces.'' Which, come to think of it, makes this romantic melodrama sound a lot more interesting than it is. Read full review
30
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
Nothing stands up to scrutiny -- least of all the lethargic acting and the clumsy script. I was hot to trot for the exit halfway through, but a dogged sense of duty kept me stuck in an endless present.
25
Rolling StonePeter Travers
I can't believe that even the most rabid chick-flick masochists wouldn't gag on it. Read full review
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