Bobby Jones, Stroke of Genius 2004

John Monaghan, Detroit Free Press: If Bobby Jones was a more complex individual, you'd never guess it from the film, which mines an endless string of sports cliches and passages from literature. Read more

Connie Ogle, Miami Herald: Maybe golf films don't have to be comedies to succeed, but frankly, we'd all be better off renting Caddyshack again. Read more

Rick Kogan, Chicago Tribune: Less movie than fawning infomercial. Read more

Ted Fry, Seattle Times: As happens occasionally on the putting green, there are brief flashes of tension and drama, but more often it's a long slog to the 18th hole as thoughts drift to that icy martini waiting in the clubhouse. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: [T]here's just not that much thrill in watching that little ball rolling toward the hole. Read more

Eleanor Ringel Gillespie, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Flawed as it may be, it respectfully honors a man who deserves to be honored. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Amazingly, it engages your attention and even respect while trotting out every clubhouse cliche in the book. Read more

Kevin Crust, Los Angeles Times: Long on craft but short on drama, leaving it far short of the green. Read more

Houston Chronicle: Read more

Michael Booth, Denver Post: Bobby Jones had a golf swing remembered as sheer poetry in motion, and much of the movie about him demonstrates the same grace. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Proof that when a movie is nothing but inspirational, it can sink and disappear into a field of dreams. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: Mr. Caviezel's naturalness provides this movie's artistic salvation. Read more

John Patterson, L.A. Weekly: Relaxed, leisurely and unforced, exactly the way a pleasant round of golf ought to be. Read more

Jan Stuart, Newsday: This creaky, slow-chugging jalopy of a movie grows on you. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: What's the drama in seeing a perfect man play a perfect game? Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: I found this to be among the most boring, flat and cliched sports movies I've ever seen. Read more

Stephen Holden, New York Times: A high-minded, lethally dull biography of the legendary golfer Bobby Jones. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: It's not a bad film so much as a frustrating one. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: No doubt we should be grateful that Jones' story isn't churned up into soap opera and hyped with false crises and climaxes; it is the story of a golfer, and it contains a lot of golf. Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Was Bobby Jones really this great a guy? Who knows? But after watching the greed that has consumed sports and the anti-heroes that have consumed modern films, finding someone to clap for is an OK way to pass the time. Read more

Jeff Strickler, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Perhaps golf is just too internalized to make great drama. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

David Rooney, Variety: While it's somewhat bloated and intermittently dull at two hours-plus, the polished visual treatment and Caviezel's sober performance lift this above the standard network movie-of-the-week level that might otherwise have been its natural domain. Read more

Mark Holcomb, Village Voice: Sports biopics and dewy-eyed nostalgia go together like golf and soul-withering tedium, no more so than in this earnest hagiography. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: Even the staunchest of golfheads must know they're watching a cut-and-trite accounting, rather than a fanciful evocation. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: Delivers nothing more and nothing less than one would expect from a boilerplate sports biography, which is to say, the standard triumph against a litany of standard obstacles. Read more