If My Sister's Keeper feels melodramatic and contrived, it is, at least, sincerely so.
Comment
06/26/09
My Sister's Keeper (2009)
46
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:125
Fresh:58
Rotten:67
Average Rating:5.6/10
Consensus: My Sister's Keeper gets fine performances from its adult and child actors, but the director's heavy-handed approach turns a worthy emotional subject into an overly melodramatic tearjerker.
Theatrical Release:26-06-2009
Synopsis: THE NOTEBOOK's Nick Cassavetes directs another tearjerking literary adaptation with this drama based on Jodi Picoult's novel. Cameron Diaz takes a detour from comedy to play Sara, the domineering... [More]
Starring: Cameron Diaz, Abigail Breslin, Alec Baldwin, Sofia Vassilieva
Director: Nick Cassavetes
Reviews for My Sister's Keeper
My Sister's Keeper has a gutsy premise, but no guts.
06/26/09
My Sister's Keeper offers a couple of twists, one of them crucial and the other cruelly unnecessary and melodramatic.
06/26/09
Their message in My Sister's Keeper? Cancer sucks, but there's always the balm of beach scenes and an emo soundtrack.
06/26/09
Bring lots of tissue. If you don't tear up watching My Sister's Keeper, at least just a little, then your heart is made of stone.
06/26/09
Once the bizarre premise is established, all the movie can do is wait for the story to play out -- it has a beginning and end, but no middle.
06/25/09
Two straight hours of emotional torture porn that is so brutally assaultive in its determination to jerk tears from viewers that it practically leaps off the screen and into their laps in order to get to them quicker.
06/25/09
No quote available.
06/25/09
A motion picture of notable sensitivity and beauty, hamstrung emotions kept to a minimum. Tough, touchy, provocative, and exceptionally moving.
06/25/09
How far would you go to save your child's life? How far should you go? Those are the questions posed and largely ducked in this film based on the book by Jodi Picolt.
06/25/09
A moving story, but the film's overly romantic tone rings hollow.
06/25/09
Don't avoid My Sister's Keeper because it's a film about a serious issue. Avoid it because it approaches that issue like a very special episode of Grey's Anatomy -- complete with whining pop songs and all the comforts of cliche.
06/25/09
A shameless attempt at manipulation that wants but doesn't earn audience tears.
06/25/09
Keeper, striving to manipulate the audience, goes on a little longer than it should. However, the performances are so true that it's easy to forgive such unneeded, straight-to-the-heartstrings tactics.
06/25/09
You may cry at the film's designated crying times, approximately every 10 minutes, like the traffic and weather. Or you may not, and wonder instead why some high-gloss weepies treat their source material quite so shamelessly.
06/25/09
Less an exercise in catharsis than an obstacle course of premise-heavy, flashback-drenched plot points, it's an emotional flat-liner, even though virtually every character (including Alec Baldwin as the lawyer) carries some hurt or grief.
06/25/09
It's beautifully shot and skillfully acted, but My Sister's Keeper, an earnest family-faces-cancer drama, is a bit like a real-world horror film with 'heart,' right down to the trick ending.
06/25/09
This ethical drama tries to make people think about medical and family dilemmas while wringing a few tears out of them along the way.
06/25/09
A perfect example of a disease-of-the-week movie done wrong.
06/25/09
This book hasn’t been adapted, it’s been taken outside and shot.
06/25/09
Latest News for My Sister's Keeper
July 26, 2009:
Win a poster signed by Cameron Diaz
How would you like to have a poster of Cameron Diaz on your wall -- signed by the lady herself? To celebrate this week's release of Cameron's latest film, My Sister's Keeper,... More...
June 27, 2009:
Easily the most poignant picture of the year, achieved without resorting to manipulative soap opera devices. 
More...
June 25, 2009:
Critics Consensus: Transformers 2 Is Less Than Meets The Eye
This week at the movies, we've got robots in disguise (Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, starring Megan Fox and Shia LaBeouf) and a family in disrepair (My Sister's Keeper,... More...
June 25, 2009:
Box Office Guru Preview: Transformers Set to Smash Records
This summer's major artillery has taken over North American multiplexes with the mid-week launch of the action tentpole Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen which aims to become... More...
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