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03/04/03
The Life of David Gale (2003)
20
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:152
Fresh:30
Rotten:122
Average Rating:4.3/10
Consensus: Instead of offering a convincing argument against the death penalty, this implausible, convoluted thriller pounds the viewer over the head with its message.
Runtime: 2 hrs 11 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Gale (Kevin Spacey) is a Texas professor and anti-death penalty activist who, ironically enough, winds up on death row for the rape and murder of a colleague. Kate Winslet plays Bitsey Bloom, the... [More]
Starring: Kevin Spacey, Laura Linney, Kate Winslet, Gabriel Mann
Director: Alan Parker
Reviews for The Life of David Gale
a serviceable thriller, albeit one with some serious logic gaps and narrative loopholes
03/04/03
The type of preaching the choir would walk out on.
03/02/03
Any dialectic concerning the ethical-moral issues of execution is overridden and undermined when the Hollywood murder-mystery formula takes the front seat.
03/02/03
Low thrills and high dudgeon are a bad mix.
03/02/03
I don’t like being lied to. I don’t like being cheated. I don’t like being manipulated by a filmmaker willing to negate his entire story for the sake of cleverness or a cheap thrill. It should come as no surprise that I didn’t like 'The Life of David Gal
03/01/03
A movie that keeps telling you that you are supposed to respect it that fails miserably at almost ever turn.
03/01/03
The difference here is that “Gale” addresses death without bringing anything new or interesting to the discussion. It is shocking when it should be insightful, time and again turning to its idiotic thriller subplot before its philosophical debate gets int
02/28/03
First-time screenwriter Charles Randolph has figured out a way to combine his message movie with a more generic race-against-time thriller. And while the combination provides a kind of novelty that works for a while, it ultimately falls apart.
02/27/03
We can’t trust [Spacey], not with that Verbal Kint glint in his eye.
02/27/03
Turns out to be not much more than a high-concept question padded out to feature length.
02/27/03
It's far too contrived and implausible a house of cards.
02/27/03
...a mundane and manipulative crime thriller that doesn’t have anything new to say...Parker doesn’t know when to appropriately distribute or neutralize the tension of his toxic storyline in subtle, heartfelt strokes
02/26/03
It's a pleasure to watch these excellent actors politely unfold the origami tale.
02/26/03
It's hard to explain why "The Life of David Gale" is so bad...
02/26/03
It's lazy filmmaking for a lazy audience, and it's truly shameful.
02/26/03
The movie shoots itself not only in the foot but in the bleeding heart as well, offering a series of (mostly predictable) plot twists that undermine every point that Parker and his posse were trying to make.
02/26/03
[It] requires an audience capable of overlooking its preachy manipulations, non-descript filmmaking, and senseless ending all because they find its ideology reasonable.
02/25/03
Bad movies are easy to make, but as this overheated and self-defeating propaganda piece shows, it takes a genuinely talented group of people to come up with the most astonishing botch jobs.
02/25/03
As a thriller -- despite its implausibilities -- it's really a pretty darn good movie. Parker's signature atmosphere and his uncanny precision in editing are very much in evidence.
02/25/03
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