- Network: HBO
- Series Premiere Date: Oct 20, 2012
Critic Reviews
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[The best way] to view The Girl as an exquisitely lurid morality play in the Hitchcock style.
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The way the movie unfolds is fascinating, featuring the best work of Miller's career, and Jones so inhabiting Hitchcock--trapped within his grotesque frame--as to quickly get past impersonation to a darker portrayal of genius.
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The Girl ensures you'll never watch "The Birds" the same way again.
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Film lovers will--possibly against their better judgment--love Jones' Hitch.
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The Girl, directed by Julian Jarrold, impeccably re-creates the film technology of the time. It also delivers a psychologically astute reading of one of Hollywood's more bizarre entanglements.
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Superb performances by Toby Jones as Hitchcock and Sienna Miller as Hedren keep the story alive and moving.
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Real truths invariably come out, and this is a film that convincingly rings with them.
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Graced by strong performances from Sienna Miller and Toby Jones as Tippi Hedren and Alfred Hitchcock, this backstage story of Hollywood sexual obsession is never less than enjoyable.
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Sienna Miller [is] halfway believable but missing what Hitchcock called "the volcano inside." Jones, however, is spectacular.
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The Girl doesn't aim to match Hitchcock's thrills or entertainment value, and its psychological insights are never truly cathartic. As a solidly well-measured portrait of a caged and ambitious young actress, however, it has a way of staying with you, especially the parts you'd rather erase.
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If you approach The Girl as a sliver, and don't expect a full serving, you are more apt to appreciate it.
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At just 90 minutes, The Girl can feel rushed and only occasionally convinces us that an actual movie is being made--this is so focused on Hitch-and-Tippi you'd think The Birds was a one-woman show.
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This TV movie directed by Julian Jarrold focuses on the making of The Birds and Marnie, not two of the filmmaker's finest, and depicts Hitch as a self-pitying lecher. He might have been, though here, he's a dull one.
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This HBO original [is] clean and smart and dull.
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It's disappointing that this is a diverting curio rather than a deep plunge into the cold waters of obsession.
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Neither the script nor the production is substantial enough to make the story quite stand on its own.
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It's a small character study about a large man who comes off as a terrorizing buffoon.
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The music, costumes, lighting and even some camera shots--a shower head, a spiral staircase--all evoke classic Hitchcock movies like "Psycho," "Spellbound" and "Vertigo." But the film loses steam as soon as Hitchcock acts on his passion.
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Miller is believably blonde, and that's about it. [22 Oct 3012, p.42]
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It plays more like a lavishly funded Lifetime movie.
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It creeps and creeps in a very petty pace until it puts itself out of its misery, and ours.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 3 out of 4
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Mixed: 0 out of 4
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Negative: 1 out of 4
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Dec 27, 2012