I'd sooner sit through 32 hours of Congressional committee testimony about imported yarn than watch Shadowboxer again.
Comment
08/04/06
Shadowboxer (2006)
20
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:56
Fresh:11
Rotten:45
Average Rating:4/10
Consensus: With random characters and a preposterous plot, this bizarre thriller might leave you with your mouth hanging open in disbelief.
Runtime: 1 hr 33 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Hardboiled and at times incongruous, Lee Daniels's (MONSTER'S BALL) directorial debut sets out to smash stereotypes with a noirish crime thriller about loyalty, loss, love, and guilt. Cuba Gooding... [More]
Starring: Cuba Gooding, Helen Mirren, Vanessa Ferlito, Macy Gray
Director: Lee Daniels
Reviews for Shadowboxer
It tells a story that would fit perfectly in a standard Hollywood action thriller, but it tells it in the grammar and syntax of an art film. The two sensibilities make no sense together.
08/03/06
Arresting performances by Helen Mirren and Cuba Gooding Jr. are squandered on a moody thriller that has way too much mood and not nearly enough thrills.
08/03/06
The movie at heart is just a wallow in ugliness and unpleasantness in the service of nothing.
07/28/06
A ridiculous movie that starts off completely cracked and just gets crazier and crazier.
07/28/06
Daniels offers a lame attempt to do what Quentin Tarantino has frequently done better -- and with far more cinematic artistry.
07/28/06
Top CriticIt doesn't take long to figure out that Shadowboxer's Helen Mirren, as a cancer-ridden hitwoman, and Cuba Gooding Jr., as her doting stepson, are the most unconvincing team of hired assassins in movie history.
07/28/06
The storytelling is so overwrought, humorless and misguided, the film is like a noir car wreck.
07/27/06
Who says critics are useless? Now you don't have to see the movie, unless, of course, you derive some satisfaction/pleasure from graphic violence, unforgivably cliched scripts and/or repeated sightings of Gooding's bare bottom.
07/27/06
A rubbernecker's movie....There's a new Zalman King in town, and his name is Lee Daniels.
07/27/06
One of the campiest, most lushly ludicrous movies to come out in a while.
07/27/06
At worst, Lee Daniels is a poor man's Quentin Tarantino, both literally and figuratively. And that's not a bad thing; just ask Guy Ritchie.
07/21/06
This film is, as they say, close but no cigar.
07/21/06
This daring film may not completely hold together, but it has a bracing, off-kilter sensibility -- a mixture of mordant humor and melancholy -- that mostly compensates for the occasional lulls and clunky, obvious moments.
07/21/06
Billed as film noir, but because it lacks any subtlety and accentuates gratuitous violence that is more in-your-face than it is implied, the movie is about as noir-ish as Rocky.
07/21/06
Not only will you want to shower after seeing this repellent movie -- the Rose-Mikey sex scenes are especially icky -- you'll feel sorry for the cast.
07/21/06
If he earns no other accolades for his directorial debut -- a distinct likelihood -- Lee Daniels deserves some kind of award just for assembling the most bizarrely random cast of this young century.
07/21/06
A film replete with awful acting that glorifies nihilism...in your face movie-making by people with a moral compass badly askew. There's nothing remotely entertaining about this film.
07/21/06
a pleasant surprise
07/21/06
Clayton is one of those outsized movie villains. He's the sort who wears his designer shirt unbuttoned and beard slightly fuzzy, shoots his minions when they fail him, and keeps a zebra on his front lawn.
07/21/06
Latest News for Shadowboxer
July 20, 2006:
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