Transamerica
IFC Films | Release Date: December 2, 2005 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
66
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 37 Critic Reviews
Positive:
27
Mixed:
10
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
Until it detours into dysfunctional-family comedy-drama, Transamerica rides cross-country without ever running low on bracing, cactus-spined surprises. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterSheri Linden
Impressively realized on all levels, this transgender spin on the road trip boasts an extraordinary central performance. Read full review
80
VarietyEddie Cockrell
Laugh-out-loud funny, tartly off-color and ultimately touching. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
This debut feature left me in a state of movie euphoria. Who could have guessed that such a discomfiting premise would blossom into a deadpan-hilarious and yet deeply affecting story about a singular glitch in the human condition?
80
TimeJoel Stein
But the most impressive thing is how, a few minutes into the film, you stop noticing Huffman's external transformations and start to focus on the character. Not that the external stuff isn't impressive. Read full review
80
Film ThreatElias Savada
Transamerica is a modern-day Sullivan's Travels. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter Travers
The movie's soul is with Huffman. Speaking in a low voice, her posture as stiff as her vocabulary, her eyes a pool of sadness and hope, she turns this small, resonant film into a cry from the heart. Read full review
75
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
A flawed but nevertheless endearing father-son road trip with a distinctive twist. Read full review
75
New York Daily NewsJami Bernard
This drama offers a chuckle at every turn. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Transamerica provides the frame and the occasion for one of the year's best performances, Felicity Huffman's as a woman trapped in a man's body who's passing for female while awaiting a sex-change operation. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
What a fine, tender, delicate, funny, gender-bending-and-rebending performance this is. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
What Felicity Huffman brings to Bree is the newness of a Jane Austen heroine. She has been waiting a long time to be an ingenue, and what an irony that she must begin as a mother. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
It's debatable whether watching Huffman get dressed, take hormones, and learn to use a more feminine diction could sustain an entire movie, but the character is certainly a creation more original than a lot of the film itself. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
A perfect example of an ordinary movie made unique by the powerhouse performance of its lead. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldConnie Ogle
Despite its subject matter, Transamerica is a surprisingly funny movie, because Tucker never lets the pathos overwhelm his sense of humor. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
It's a farce with heart, a meditation on identity, family and gender politics that has real faith in its characters - even when the characters themselves lack it. Read full review
70
L.A. WeeklyElla Taylor
Transamerica is about as sexual as "The Brady Bunch." It's about an intelligent woman in excruciating transition to a new body that will line up with an identity she's held all along. Read full review
70
The New York TimesDana Stevens
Transamerica itself does not always live up to its star, but it is touching and sometimes funny, despite its overall air of indie earnestness. Read full review
70
SlateDavid Edelstein
Farce born of sadly irreconcilable impulses: Bravo! Read full review
70
The New RepublicStanley Kauffmann
The real success of Duncan Tucker, who wrote and directed this debut feature, is that, through credible dialogue and sensitive performances, the basic idea overcomes its cleverness and is affecting. Read full review
70
Dallas ObserverBill Gallo
You might feel constrained when it comes to a standing ovation, but there's certainly enough substance and yuk here to go along for the ride. Read full review
70
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
If Tucker's road map often feels a little too confining and the screwball comedy too contrived, he can take credit for introducing viewers to a character they have almost certainly never met before. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
The unintended effect of all the melodramatic complications in Transamerica is, oddly, to distract attention from an understanding of exactly what that courage really costs. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
The best, and perhaps the only, reason to see Duncan Tucker's Transamerica is for Felicity Huffman's touching, shape-shifting performance. Read full review
67
Seattle Post-IntelligencerPaula Nechak
It may not exactly be a traditional love letter to his wife but actor-turned-executive producer William H. Macy has given her a plum part as Bree in screenwriter-director Duncan Tucker's offbeat road movie. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Huffman is a woman playing a man playing a woman, which is easily the year's most complicated turn. She does a fine, nuanced job in bringing to life a character that could have become a caricature. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
As much heralded, "edgy" movies go, Transamerica fails to live up to expectations. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderMartin Rubin
An occasionally touching, more often clumsy variation on the formula of crusty oldster and problem child bonding on a road trip. The main reason to see it is "Desperate Housewives" star Felicity Huffman. Read full review
60
Village VoiceBen Kenigsberg
Pleasant even without reaching much of a destination, Transamerica leaves the basic impression that it's not as self-satisfied as it could have been. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
Felicity Huffman is such a wonder, at once funny and brave, playing a pre-op male-to-female transsexual in the uneven comedy Transamerica that she sustains several lapses that might otherwise have sunk it. Read full review
60
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Never lets us forget that it's a nonmainstream story about a nonmainstream subject, when ideally, it should simply be a story about a person. The picture too often feels like a lesson in tolerance. Read full review
60
EmpireOlly Richards
This is actually a very middle-of-the-road movie. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle Smith
Like a preoperative transsexual, Transamerica is neither one thing nor the other. It yanks at the heartstrings too much to qualify as an edgy comedy-drama, but it's far too bawdy to make it to the Hallmark Channel. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
Huffman intermittently rescues Transamerica from bathos with her brusque wit, swatting away the victimization elements that figure into most films about transsexuals. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
At its best, Transamerica made me laugh and feel for Bree. At its worst, it made me cringe at the potential creepiness of its central relationship. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Writer-director Duncan Tucker does little to develop his narrative setup beyond the basic and obvious, and his film begins to feel more like an exercise than a fully realized story. Read full review
50
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
By the way, the other thing that keeps Transamerica from being a mainstream movie is its obsession with penises: showing them, talking about them, placing us in bathrooms and trailers when they're in use. Read full review
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