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OFCS Rating: 65% Fresh |
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| "As time passes, waiting for orders becomes like waiting for Godot, an absurdist tragicomedy of frustration, madness and masculinity gone awry." |
| Eye for Film |
| Anton Bitel |
| "Performances and images from 'Jarhead' will stay with you long after the houselights dim." |
| ReelTalk Movie Reviews |
| Betty Jo Tucker |
7/10 | "A meandering, confused, frustrating film about a meandering, confused, frustrating war." |
| Freeze Dried Movies |
| Brian Juergens |
C+ | "Regardless of how lush and fully realized the imagery is, Jarhead as a movie is stuck permanently in basic training." |
| FilmJerk.com |
| Brian Orndorf |
2.5/5 | "This is not a film that wrestles with itself to determine whether it's anti- or pro-war ... it doesn't even try." |
| ToxicUniverse.com |
| Chris Barsanti |
A- | "Jarhead is the most unconventional anti-war film ever made..." |
| ColeSmithey.com |
| Cole Smithey |
| "Sniper-like precision has become old-fashioned. More effective weapons only deepen the despair of war.
" |
| PopMatters |
| Cynthia Fuchs |
A- | "Spurns a war movie's expected bloody confrontations for a dry, hot exploration into the ability of the human spirit to survive, scarred but whole." |
| EDGE Boston |
| David Foucher |
3.5/4 | "...an effective, haunting new spin on a well-worn genre." |
| Reel Film Reviews |
| David Nusair |
C+ | "Too heavy-handed, muddled, and simplistic to completely succeed as either drama or in its
anti-war message." |
| Ozus' World Movie Reviews |
| Dennis Schwartz |
1.5/4 | "The tagline for Jarhead is 'Welcome to the Suck.' Truth in advertising must be making a comeback." |
| TheMovieBoy.com |
| Dustin Putman |
1.5/4 | "Given how strongly the film insists on striking its testosterone pose, Mendes might say he's too cool for political thought." |
| Slant Magazine |
| Ed Gonzalez |
A- | "A humor-tinged but ultimately haunting drama that examines the psychology of a Gulf War veteran as carefully and insightfully as any film has done." |
| EricDSnider.com |
| Eric D. Snider |
2.5/4 | "Jarhead is like the prologue of Heaven’s Gate; a long and unnecessary setup to the real meat of the story which is Three Kings." |
| eFilmCritic.com |
| Erik Childress |
B+ | "I expected detached, exacting precision from Mendes, but Jarhead is as volatile as its characters." |
| Film Blather |
| Eugene Novikov |
3/4 | "Nos muestra en forma efectiva la experiencia de un soldado humano (no una caricatura tipo Rambo) en una guerra distinta." |
| Doncinema.com |
| Flavio J. Arosemena |
| "Jarhead is one of the most reflective and meditative military melodramas to be conceived from the point of view of the weary trigger-happy Marine." |
| Movie Eye |
| Frank Ochieng |
C | "While beautifully crafted from a purely visual standpoint, the film remains structurally chaotic and emotionally remote." |
| One Guy's Opinion |
| Frank Swietek |
3/5 | "Shows in an odd and low-key way the absurdity of war and how Americans can be undone by their inability to wait." |
| Spirituality and Practice |
| Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat |
2.5/4 | "For all the interesting aspects of Jarhead, there's way too much filler for it to be more than a so-so picture." |
| eCinemaCenter.com |
| Gabe Leibowitz |
3.5/4 | "Jarhead is compelling in the way it presents a new facet of a genre that some would argue was mined out long ago." |
| ReelViews |
| James Berardinelli |
8/10 | "[Gyllenhaal's] face isn't saying war is hell -- it's saying war isn't everything it's cracked up to be." |
| Window to the Movies |
| Jeffrey Chen |
3/5 | "All talk, very little action." |
| FilmFocus |
| Joe Utichi |
| "Jarhead could have been the right movie at the right time, a mirror of the current political climate..." |
| Light Views |
| John Larsen |
7/10 | "Yet one additional reason we need to stick more magnetized yellow ribbons onto the back of our SUVs." |
| Planet Sick-Boy |
| Jon Popick |
2.5/5 | "full review in Greek" |
| Movies for the Masses |
| Joseph Proimakis |
4.5/5 | "We should all hope that our personal frustrating dead ends are directed by Sam Mendes...beautifully realized and sobering." |
| Cinerina |
| Karina Montgomery |
2/5 | "The tag line for this film is 'Welcome to the suck.' Consider this your warning." |
| 7M Pictures |
| Kevin Carr |
B- | "works on a pure entertainment level, but it is dealing with subject matter that demands more. It's about as thought provoking as an episode of M.A.S.H.
" |
| Reeling Reviews |
| Laura Clifford |
3/4 | "So many films have concentrated on the horrors of war, but none in my recent memory has dealt with the tedium." |
| Mark Reviews Movies |
| Mark Dujsik |
B | "Jarhead gives voice to the humor and horror of military service during wartime, the things that those who served will not and cannot convey to civilians." |
| Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema |
| Mark Pfeiffer |
2/4 | "I came. I saw. I didn't do anything. I went back home." |
| Movie Habit |
| Marty Mapes |
| "Jake Gyllenhaal, after a string of astonishingly mature portrayals of adolescents, turns in his first great adult performance as Swofford..." |
| Flick Filosopher |
| MaryAnn Johanson |
2.5/5 | "It uses [its] influences as thematic shorthand, not adding anything of its own, and it doesn't stick to any of them long enough or consistently enough to really draw you in." |
| Goatdog's Movies |
| Michael W. Phillips, Jr. |
3.5/4 | "Jarhead is a powerful, darkly funny look at the toll that comes when preparedness collides head-on with boredom." |
| Aisle Seat |
| Mike McGranaghan |
B+ | "From nightmare landscapes of endless oil-soaked sand and charred bodies to the small confines of a testosterone- and liquor-soaked Christmas party in the tent." |
| Movie Mom at Yahoo! Movies |
| Nell Minow |
C+ | "Never comes close to expressing the insanity of war itself." |
| Lessons of Darkness |
| Nick Schager |
4/5 | "Perigosamente dúbio do ponto de vista ideológico. Se viesse com bula, este filme deveria trazer o aviso 'Deve ser mantido fora do alcance de crianças e de pessoas imaturas'." |
| Cinema em Cena |
| Pablo Villaca |
3.5/5 | "For those bemoaning the lack of 'action,' I’m sure whatever flicks come out after the end of the current Iraq War...will be much more, uh, 'entertaining.'" |
| Film Threat |
| Pete Vonder Haar |
4/5 | "Atrikingly visual and thematically stirring, but it doesn't say anything terribly revealing." |
| Shadows on the Wall |
| Rich Cline |
5/5 | "As a depressive riff on Generation X's first war...it's exceptionally well-crafted." |
| eFilmCritic.com |
| Rob Gonsalves |
C+ | "Beautiful tedium is still tedium." |
| Flipside Movie Emporium |
| Rob Vaux |
B | "Not about war, but about training, camaraderie and the awful psychological toll on the men as they wait for war." |
| Laramie Movie Scope |
| Robert Roten |
B | "[Jarhead] is interesting, entertaining and sobering as it shows a war where the men fighting and dying didn’t have a clue as to why" |
| Reeling Reviews |
| Robin Clifford |
2.5/4 | "The worst recruitment tool the Marines could have hoped for." |
| Charlotte Weekly |
| Sean O'Connell |
| "As hard as the actors work, Jarhead feels false right down to its seductive visuals." |
| Salon.com |
| Stephanie Zacharek |
6/10 | "When you make a film about the tedium of war, you run the risk of making a boring film - and Sam Mendes falls into that trap." |
| Modamag.com |
| Susan Granger |
2/4 | "A voice-over'd, meticulously- bleached and postured still-life." |
| Film Freak Central |
| Walter Chaw |
3/5 | Read review |
| Q Network Film Desk |
| James Kendrick |
7/10 | Read review |
| JoBlo's Movie Emporium |
| JoBlo |
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OFCS Rating: 65% Fresh |
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