Chop Shop 2008

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: It's a sharp mixture of neorealist grit and lyricism. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: Tells the kind of New York story too often overlooked. Read more

Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times: Bahrani blurs the line between New York reality and fiction so effectively that his scripted films feel vibrantly authentic, as if Bahrani had simply discovered his characters and allowed their lives to proceed with a minimum of directorial intrusion. Read more

Noel Murray, AV Club: All these low-level criminal enterprises and idle dreams aren't happening in Mexico City or Kandahar; they're just outside Queens. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: It's exciting watching Bahrani explore the possibilities of neo-realism to dramatize penury and disenfranchisement among the service-class in this country. Read more

Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times: Bahrani celebrates those who never give up, no matter how badly their dreams are shattered. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: Bahrani deftly walks a tightrope toward insight, never falling into safety nets of judgment or unearned sentiment. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: As he did in his striking 2005 first feature film, Man Push Cart, about a Pakistani street vendor in New York, perceptive indie filmmaker Ramin Bahrani looks at what others overlook and finds drama in everyday details. Read more

Amy Nicholson, I.E. Weekly: Ramin Bahrani's patient, perfectly-scripted verite drama doesn't have many plot points, but we're so absorbed in their world that each upset leaves us frustrated and furious. Read more

Jan Stuart, Newsday: It's already been compared to Brazilian classics City of God and Pixote. But Chop Shop is both more hopeful and less punishing than those films, in no small measure owing to the synergy between first-time actors Polanco and Gonzales. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: Ramin Bahrani's Chop Shop is a low-budget verite triumph. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: Iranian-American filmmaker Ramin Bahrani showed great compassion for New York's underclass with his first feature, Man Push Cart, and his storytelling skill has only sharpened with this riveting followup. Read more

Lou Lumenick, New York Post: [Rahman] Bahrani's unsentimental film is perhaps most interesting as a look at a colorful, little-known world that has recently been targeted for urban renewal. Read more

Andrew Sarris, New York Observer: Chop Shop depicts a Third World existence in a land of supposedly unlimited opportunity. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Beautifully observed, and beautifully acted by the novice thespian Polanco (culled from a New York City public school), Chop Shop is at once a heartbreaker and a story of hope and the American Dream. Read more

Jim Emerson, Chicago Sun-Times: Three shots into Rahmin Bahrani's Chop Shop, and you're already pulled into its world with an effortless economy and precision that leave you no doubt you're in the best of cinematic hands. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: It's a near-masterwork of low-budget precision and improvisation, constructed and rehearsed over many months in collaboration with the actors and the entire Willets Point community. Read more

Steven Winn, San Francisco Chronicle: In this clear-eyed, quietly absorbing film, director Ramin Bahrani opens up a wedge of Third World America that operates, all but invisibly, in plain sight. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, Time Out: Read more

David Fear, Time Out: Read more

Todd McCarthy, Variety: The third feature by Iranian emigre Ramin Bahrani follows the lead of his last pic, Man Push Cart, in tightly observing a protag on the most invisible margins of U.S. life. Read more

John Anderson, Washington Post: The director has created a not-to-miss gem for the discriminating viewer. Read more