Cocktail 1988

Dave Kehr, Chicago Tribune: Cocktail is a meandering, shapeless film, without the force of character to resist any of the cliches that come its way. Read more

Gene Siskel, Chicago Tribune: Cruise is beguiling with his smile and his swagger, but the script doesn't take us anywhere fresh when it leaves the barroom. Read more

Sheila Benson, Los Angeles Times: The pairing of old-hand Brown and young-hand Cruise may have been meant to remind us of Cruise and Paul Newman; if so, think of this as The Color of Counterfeit Money. Read more

Jay Boyar, Orlando Sentinel: This vacant, misshapen film is basically an extended beer commercial that presents the world as a ludicrous place populated by sex-and-cash-and-booze-crazed zomboids. Cruise, meanwhile, comes off as a somewhat taller Spuds MacKenzie. Read more

Carrie Rickey, Philadelphia Inquirer: It may not be a megaton bomb, but Cocktail is definitely of the Molotov type. Read more

Vincent Canby, New York Times: It is an inane romantic drama that only a very young, very naive bartender could love. How it got that way is difficult to understand. Read more

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader: Very, very stupid. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: The more you think about what really happens in Cocktail, the more you realize how empty and fabricated it really is. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: Cocktail is a bottle of rotgut in a Dom Perignon box. Read more

Rupert Smith, Time Out: If a visitor from Mars needed a crash course in sexism, this would serve. Read more

Variety Staff, Variety: Contains nary a surprise. Read more

Rita Kempley, Washington Post: Cocktail is mud in your eye. Read more