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Reviews provided by RottenTomatoes
Jessica Reaves, Chicago Tribune: Visually, this is one of the most arresting sports documentaries in years, and it doesn't skimp on the visceral thrills, either. Read more
Tom Keogh, Seattle Times: It doesn't get gnarlier than this. Read more
Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: They're amazing athletes. Read more
Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: Read more
Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times: What should have been a thrilling 90-minute sport adventure runs on for 20 more repetitive minutes. First Descent is exciting, but less would surely have been more. Read more
Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: The hardy fools -- I mean, visionary pioneers -- in this movie are so gravity-defying that I had to look at the press notes afterward just to make sure no computerized special effects were used. Read more
Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: A sports documentary that occasionally veers toward becoming a lovesick advertisement for a popular sport but winds up celebrating with sweet earnestness the headstrong individual and his or her community of likeminded renegades. Read more
Tom Long, Detroit News: There's probably a good snowboarding movie coming some day. This isn't it. Read more
Gregory Kirschling, Entertainment Weekly: [A] sometimes thrilling extreme-sports doc. Read more
James C. Taylor, L.A. Weekly: Hardcore fans will appreciate the handful of genuinely gnarly aerial sequences, but these gravity-defying stunts, which can be thrilling as part of a five-minute James Bond pre-credit sequence, grow very tedious when repeated over almost two hours. Read more
Gene Seymour, Newsday: There's so much intriguing information about the way snowboarding morphed in the last 40 years from outlaw avocation to Olympic competition that you sometimes wish the movie would jettison its central narrative thread. Read more
Jami Bernard, New York Daily News: Adrenaline rules, dude. If only the movie would give the audience more of it. Read more
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: First Descent is boring, repetitive and maddening about a subject you'd think would be fairly interesting. Read more
Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: At almost two hours, First Descent still moves along briskly, offering something for everyone, including the skeptical crowd that still thinks all snowboarders smoke pot and listen to Black Flag. Read more
Jeff Strickler, Minneapolis Star Tribune: For nonsnowboarders, it's hard to figure out what those fans are so excited about. Read more
Mike Clark, USA Today: An adequate if slightly overlong history of the sport, Descent adheres to the same storytelling trajectory as documentary predecessors on surfing and skateboarding. Read more
Robert Koehler, Variety: Pic displays filmmakers Kevin Harrison's and Kemp Curley's love of snowboarding, but suffers from an unjustifiably long running time, considerable repetition and a generally awkward structure. Read more
Mark Holcomb, Village Voice: First Descent comes off as an overlong, overstuffed promo for an 'industry' that hasn't needed promoting since the movie's target audience was in diapers. Read more
Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: Curley and Harrison have created a surprisingly tedious, overblown defense of a sport that, while ushering in the era of "extreme" games, doesn't boast the cinematic potential or charismatic stars of its cousins on the asphalt and aquatic waves. Read more