This Boy's Life
Warner Bros. Pictures | Release Date: April 9, 1993 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
60
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 16 Critic Reviews
Positive:
6
Mixed:
10
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
The New YorkerTerrence Rafferty
Barkin and DiCaprio are sensational. Every time De Niro threatens to take over the picture, they snatch our attention right back, and always with something casual: a look or a gesture that conveys how thoroughly this mother and son understand each other. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The movie is successful largely because [DiCaprio] is a good enough actor to hold his own in his scenes with De Niro, so that the movie remains his story, and isn't upstaged by the loathsome but colorful Dwight. Read full review
88
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
In capturing the compelling battle between a boy and his abusive stepfather, director Michael Caton-Jones cannily avoids obvious sentimentality, opting to let a rather brutal story tell itself. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
He [Caton-Jones] has made the film all of a piece, making sure that the three lead performances complement rather than overwhelm each other. [9 Apr 1993, p.F1]
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
The film is well-paced and expertly edited, allowing scenes to flow naturally into one another. Read full review
70
Washington PostRita Kempley
Barkin's succulence and De Niro's showboating lend sizzle and ferocity to the proceedings, but the film draws its poignancy from 18-year-old DiCaprio's performance. Read full review
60
The New York TimesVincent Canby
The film recreates Toby and Caroline's aimlessness, but without appearing to understand it enough to make it as moving and important as it ought to be. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
The leads work overtime to make their characters and their relationships pungent, believable, and moving (though with regard to the rest of the cast, the movie seems less focused and confident). Read full review
60
EmpireAngie Errigo
Despite its admirable strengths and the fact of it being a true story, there is somehow a failure to completely connect with the fierce boy, giving his unhappy and alienating youth an unfortunate air of unreality. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Director Caton-Jones ("Scandal", "Memphis Belle") once again shows his flair for period detail though he never here exerts his grip on the human drama. Read full review
50
Rolling StonePeter Travers
De Niro's decision to make Dwight a loony from the get-go throws the delicate symmetry of the story out of whack. Read full review
50
Washington PostDesson Thomson
It never attains full dimension. It pursues the De Niro-DiCaprio war so singlemindedly, everything else is left high and dry. Read full review
50
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
For This Boy's Life to work as ominous domestic drama, it's essential that we see Dwight as a flesh-and-blood monster. De Niro, unfortunately, just seems to be reveling in the chance to play another viciously demented freak, like Cape Fear's Max Cady. Read full review
50
TimeRichard Schickel
De Niro's is a domineering performance, a star turn that is both comic and menacing, but it unbalances Wolff's story. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
The process of remembering that drives the book is gone from the film, boiled away until all that's left is the mundane residue of memory - mere incidents strung together as plot. Read full review
50
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Unfortunately, after a relatively promising warmup, pic actually proceeds to flatten out the characters in the latter sections and to make them less dimensional and interesting than they initially seemed. Read full review
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