The Substitute
Orion Pictures | Release Date: April 19, 1996 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
41
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 19 Critic Reviews
Positive:
6
Mixed:
8
Negative:
5
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
30
The New York TimesStephen Holden
The movie's mentality is su'med up in one cutaway shot. A split second before a man's face is about to be shoved into a boat propeller, the movie flashes to another man pushing half an orange onto the head of a squeezer. Read full review
25
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
I am so very tired of this movie. I see it at least once a month. The title changes, the actors change, and the superficial details of the story change, but it is always about exactly the same thing: heavily armed men shooting at one another. Read full review
20
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
This could have been trashy fun, if it had moved along briskly a la CLASS OF 1984. But it's self-important and dreary, marred by murky cinematography and painfully unconvincing pauses for character development. Read full review
10
Washington PostHal Hinson
The Substitute is a sour experience—bloody, ugly and exploitative. Read full review
0
Austin ChronicleJoey O'Bryan
Exploitation fans will be disappointed to see that Roy Frumkes, who wrote the incredible cult favorite Street Trash and directed the excellent documentary Document of the Dead, and Alan Ormsby, who collaborated with Bob Clark on his forgotten classics Deathdream, Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things, and Deranged, were partly responsible for The Substitute's abysmal screenplay. Read full review
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