Crossover 2006

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: Crossover comes with more swooshing/zapping/whamming sound effects than a year's worth of The O'Reilly Factor. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: The games and setting aren't gritty enough to let this urban sports drama crossover into something a general audience would care to see. Read more

David Hiltbrand, Philadelphia Inquirer: A lot of Crossover's manifest failings could be forgiven if the on-court action was thrilling. But Space Jam had better basketball scenes. For that matter, so did Dr. J's The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh. Read more

Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times: You can't blame Crossover for being comfortable with its own cliches. It's so blatantly formulaic that it actually grows on you if you don't dismiss it in the first five minutes. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: A couple of dramatic plot points come and go with the speed of a buzzer-beating shot. And like the style of play the film glorifies, it's all flash and no fundamentals. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: I'll believe that Kevin Federline is a Renaissance man, Mel Gibson loves matzoh and George Pataki is going to be our next president before I'll believe the premise of this movie. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: A real air ball, so poorly scripted that most of the major plot developments occur offscreen. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: I hated this movie. It's a piece of junk. Read more

Bob Townsend, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Compared to those prodigious in-your-face fakes, alley oops and slam dunks, the movie's trite, trash-talking dialogue and drippy do-the-right-thing message fall as flat as an airball. Read more

Scott Tobias, AV Club: An end-of-summer throwaway that resembles last year's Supercross in its naked ineptitude and willingness to cut corners at every turn. Read more

Bill Muller, Arizona Republic: Crossover is a movie that fouls out in the first half. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Earnest and predictable, Crossover deserves more than the horselaughs that will probably greet it in theaters -- but not a lot more. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Cross Crossover off your list of movies to see. Read more

Gregory Kirschling, Entertainment Weekly: Crossover skimps on court-level pyrotechnics (we get a game in the beginning and, of course, a big game at the end, and that's about it) in favor of dry urban melodrama. Read more

John Monaghan, Detroit Free Press: Crossover expects moviegoers to ignore the inept script and acting and root for its characters anyway. Read more

Luke Y. Thompson, L.A. Weekly: The streetball scenes offer some nifty trick plays, but the rest of Crossover features poorly dressed sets, cheap-looking costumes and locations, and silly histrionics. Read more

Gene Seymour, Newsday: The movie just flails away at a lot of plot points that are either second-hand playground hustles straight out of White Man Can't Jump -- or second-rate. Read more

Lisa Rose, Newark Star-Ledger: For a movie centered on a game without rules, Crossover is pretty formulaic. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: An inner-city drama promoting themes of friendship, loyalty and the value of a good education should be a welcome event, but writer-director Preston Whitmore's Crossover is so badly conceived and executed, its good intentions don't help. Read more

Nathan Lee, New York Times: Bling is bad and friends are good in this story of temptation, rivalry and buck-wild cheerleaders set in the world of Detroit street basketball. Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Crossover has one redeeming quality: a heart that's in the right place. It's a bad movie with a good message -- but does anyone really want to pay $10 for an ABC After School Special version of He Got Game? Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Much as they would like it to, basketball can't save the youthful inner-city players here. Nor does the ultra-fast-paced street version of the sport save this movie from predictability and tedium. Read more

Robert Koehler, Variety: The underground version of basketball known as streetball comes above ground in Crossover, but the fascinating freeform game gets screened out by a ludicrous soap opera with poor dramatic moves. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: Just a few more tweaks and Crossover could have been something special -- a truly terrible movie to savor for the ages. But nooo, this street ball movie has to settle for middle-of-the-road badness. Read more