The Lovely Bones
DreamWorks SKG | Release Date: December 11, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
42
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
7
Mixed:
19
Negative:
10
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
Time OutJoshua Rothkopf
It’s a movie that tips toward overkill--even Ronan’s voice is amplified into a weird whisper. More quiet would have helped. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderAndrea Gronvall
Hovers just this side of "Ghost Whisperer" kitsch but remains compulsively watchable thanks to its smart ensemble cast Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
A sad-but-hopeful, dramatic-but-gentle fairy tale intentionally made less upsetting for teens. Read full review
50
NewsweekDavid Ansen
How do you literalize heaven? It's a problem moviemakers have struggled with forever, and Jackson hasn't solved it. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
Jackson and his team tell a fundamentally different story. It's one that is not without its tension, humor and compelling details. But it's also a simpler, more button-pushing tale that misses the joy and heartbreak of the original. Read full review
50
The New YorkerDavid Denby
The Lovely Bones has been fashioned as a holiday family movie about murder and grief; it’s a thoroughly queasy experience. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
For all its successes, Bones remains more crafted than sincere, more meant to look achingly pretty on the screen than to resonate in the heart. Read full review
50
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
The filmmakers’ evident affection for the book expresses itself as a desperate scramble to include as much of it as possible, which leaves the movie feeling both overcrowded and thin. Read full review
50
SlateDana Stevens
If The Lovely Bones, at least for this critic, fails, it's certainly not for lack of metaphysical gumption...It's when the movie returns to earthly life, the prosaic world of suburban cul-de-sacs and family relationships, that it falters. Read full review
50
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Some books are not meant to be adapted to the big screen. Alice Sebold's best-selling The Lovely Bones falls into that category. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
By turns warmly sentimental, serial-killer sinister and science-fiction fantastical, The Lovely Bones was an unlikely book to achieve worldwide success. In the film version, those mismatched elements come back to haunt the story, so to speak, making the final product more hit-and-miss than unblemished triumph. Read full review
50
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
As the murderer, Stanley Tucci is intensely creepy but, like almost everybody else in this movie, he’s more gothic figment than flesh and blood. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
The story told by Jackson's The Lovely Bones is the same as the one related by Sebold, but it lacks the complexity and empathy evident in the book. Read full review
50
Arizona RepublicBill Goodykoontz
It's a competently made movie - in Jackson's hands it could hardly be anything but - yet rarely a moving one. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
Jackson has not cast himself well, though. He has slathered the imagery in the wrong kind of wonderment and hyperbole, both on Earth and in heaven. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
The Lovely Bones is difficult viewing, a meticulously crafted experiment that, it turns out, wasn't worth it. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
The book floats sublimely above its dark theme; the movie sinks into the ridiculous. Read full review
40
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Jackson undermines solid work from a good cast with show-offy celestial evocations that severely disrupt the emotional connections with the characters. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
I watched the film in an agitated space between engrossed and aghast. Read full review
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