Hollywoodland 2006

Connie Ogle, Miami Herald: In this bland, ultimately dull reimagining, the question of who killed Superman turns out to be less of a mystery than a plodding attempt at what has been done so much better before. Read more

Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times: [Hollywoodland] holds interest as a whodunit that's refreshingly compassionate toward the fates of its characters. Warts and all, they're likable dreamers in a town where dreams don't always come true. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: It's not a definitive Reeves biography. It's not trying to be. Hollywoodland is after something more off-center, and more interesting. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: Reeves had an easy but peppy presence that was very likable, and Affleck's moroseness doesn't do him justice. Read more

Andrew Sarris, New York Observer: Take my word for it: Hollywoodland is well worth seeing. Read more

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader: The period details and performances are uniformly superb (Bob Hoskins is especially good as MGM executive Eddie Mannix), and the major characters are even more complex than those in Chinatown. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: The film, actually, is a little like Reeves himself: It starts promisingly and trails off into indistinctness and mystery. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: To the credit of the director, the writer and the set design team though, Hollywoodland still succeeds, I think, as a minor period piece. Read more

Bob Longino, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: We could say, Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown. But that just conjures up memories of the kind of mystery movie Hollywoodland only wishes it could be. Read more

Nathan Rabin, AV Club: Like Affleck's performance, Hollywoodland has its affecting moments. But generally, it feels like an HBO original movie, where respectable but uninspired execution mars a fascinating subject and a great cast. Read more

Bill Muller, Arizona Republic: The movie plays as an engaging jaunt into the past, which not only re-creates old Hollywood but comments on the superficial and fleeting nature of fame. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: The movie doesn't build to anything dramatic or enlightening. Read more

Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times: Hollywoodland offers three scenarios to choose from, but the mystery becomes less rather than more interesting as the film goes on. Read more

Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle: While it doesn't innovate, it does surprise. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: Hollywoodland has too many leaks. The movie is also too ambitious for its own good. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: In the noir tradition of Chandler and Hammett, little in Hollywoodland is what it appears. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: This isn't the sort of film you stand up and cheer for -- it's too subtle and dark for that. But it is a film that lingers in the mind, asking questions without answers, telling a story that has no clear ending. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: The elegant biodrama Hollywoodland presents all options in its meditation on the price of the American way of fame, a toll exacted even back when 'land' still completed the letters of the sign famously visible from high in the Hollywood Hills. Read more

Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: Hollywoodland tries way, way too hard to evoke a corrupt, L.A. Confidential-like portrait of an Eisenhower Hollywood with a dark, hidden underbelly, to the point that the mystery of Reeves' death becomes all but irrelevant. Read more

Philip Wuntch, Dallas Morning News: Hollywoodland is filled with dazzling ingredients that never fully congeal. The sparks don't always connect. Nevertheless, they do sparkle. Read more

Ella Taylor, L.A. Weekly: The film has potent things to say about the way Hollywood dreams can raise, then crush, the spirits of those with more ambition than chops. Read more

Gene Seymour, Newsday: What's gratifying about Hollywoodland, a mood-inflected autopsy of Reeves' own hopes and dreams, is that while its characters may be prone to pathos, they elude easy pity by being mostly (if merely) human. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: Want a place where everything ends nicely? Where even tragedies end in a lesson learned? Forget it, pal. It's Hollywoodland. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: A bit of a hodgepodge -- unnecessarily complicated, clumsily structured, uncertainly directed and, as a whodunit, ultimately unsatisfying. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: It's just another sordid tale from a city famous for them. But Hollywoodland explains so much about today's Hollywood, from the cozy ways the cops have always played ball with the studios and stars, to the career-killing pain of type-casting. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: The pacing is slow and deliberate, but the story never ceases to intrigue. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com: ... even though parts of the picture don't quite hold together, in the end, it sticks with you. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: Could it be that Hollywoodland is something like real life -- a muddle that goes down, down and away? Read more

Susan Walker, Toronto Star: The interplay between hard facts and the dreams that are the currency of movie actors, agents and producers that gives Hollywoodland both its glitter and its grit. Read more

Trevor Johnston, Time Out: It's worth seeing for Affleck alone, deftly communicating the distance between the put-on cardboard debonairness of this hunk-about-town and the gnawing uncertainties beneath his Superman outfit. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Hollywoodland explores an intriguing bit of Hollywood history, and through the strength of its performances keeps us engaged and entertained. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Variety: Bernbaum uses the doubt that has swirled around the circumstances of Reeves' death as a framing device that serves to enumerate the other possibilities... but that annoyingly distracts from the most flavorsome and involving matters at hand. Read more

J. Hoberman, Village Voice: Like its protagonist, Hollywoodland has an easy, sleazy appeal -- a languid descent into the mystery's murky depths. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: It's almost a good movie. Read more