Jodorowsky's Dune 2013

Kyle Smith, New York Post: "Flash Gordon" probably looked cool at the storyboard stage, too. If "Jodo" was such a genius, why didn't he make some other masterpiece instead? Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: A great seminar on creativity. Read more

Soren Anderson, Seattle Times: Jodorowsky is a mesmerizing presence in director Frank Pavich's engrossing picture. He was 84 when much of it was shot. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: The message to take from Jodorowsky's Dune: movies once had brains and balls, and lost them. Read more

Peter Debruge, Variety: Highly entertaining. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, AV Club: It's an ode to what it means to make a film with unbridled creativity, without limits and without concern for commercial calculation. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: It's an outstanding combination of genius and missed opportunities. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Is Alejandro Jodorowsky's "Dune" the most influential movie never made? Read more

Ben Sachs, Chicago Reader: His stories feature an impressive roster of would-be collaborators (Salvador Dali, Orson Welles, H.R. Geiger, and Pink Floyd), and some of the set pieces he describes sound pretty neat. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: "Jodorowsky's Dune" is a lovely little tribute to a major league "What if?" Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: It leaves you wondering about how many artists are working on such wild dreams these days, and hoping it's more than you think. Read more

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly: If you enjoy sci-fi, cult cinema, or messianic quests by quixotic lunatics, you will love this movie. Read more

Jordan Hoffman, Film.com: If you've got that Jodorowsky T-shirt aping the Judas Priest logo, you may as well start lining up now. Read more

Stephen Dalton, Hollywood Reporter: Director Frank Pavich's entertaining documentary makes the case for this overblown epic as a legendary lost masterpiece. Read more

Robert Abele, Los Angeles Times: We may never know if the midnight movie maestro's "Dune" would have been a game-changer or a head-scratcher. (Or both.) But the documentary about it is speculative catnip for cineastes of all stripes. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: Jodorowsky's Dune gives you a good sense of what might have been, and judging by what we see, the picture might have accomplished what the director ultimately intended: "To mutate young minds." Read more

David Thomson, The New Republic: I suspect that I would have lapsed into merciful sleep at some point in a four-hour Dune, but I had a very good time with Pavich's documentary and I believe in its magical vision. Read more

Richard Brody, New Yorker: A fascinating and depressing documentary about a visionary director and his impossible dream. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: While it overplays the poor-misunderstood-artist angle, though "Jodorowsky's Dune" does at least give the filmmaker a stage. Read more

Ian Buckwalter, NPR: For those with any interest in cult cinema or just the bizarre behind-the-scenes stories of any film production, Jodorowsky's Dune is a fascinating document of one of the most legendary films ever not made. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: Jodo, now 85, is such a magnetic, life-affirming presence, it's clear Hollywood wasn't ready for his "Dune." Read more

Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times: Cheerfully partial and unapologetically deferential to its subject's operatic self-promotion, "Jodorowsky's Dune" makes you wish that he had scraped together the final $5 million needed, we are told, to realize his dream. Read more

Michael Sragow, Orange County Register: Pavich's movie is more profound as a tribute to the imagination of visionary directors who can't realize their visions. Read more

Tirdad Derakhshani, Philadelphia Inquirer: What an extraordinary dream it could have been. Read more

Walter V. Addiego, San Francisco Chronicle: Pavich shows us many images from the storyboard, and even treats some to a simple form of animation to suggest how the movie might have looked. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Employing a mix of lively talking-head interviews and trippy animation based on Jodorowsky's sketchbooks and storyboards, Frank Pavich's documentary paints a tantalizing picture of the movie that might have been. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: This documentary version of Jodorowsky's "Dune" is probably more entertaining than what Hollywood would have done to it, with a clearer message: Our lives are like sands though an hourglass, so dream the impossible dream. Read more

Bill Stamets, Chicago Sun-Times: Frank Savich's diverting documentary lets the 85-year-old filmmaker revisit a saga from the mid-'70s: his stellar two-year failure to adapt Frank Herbert's Dune for the screen. Read more

Geoff Pevere, Globe and Mail: The best way to watch this movie is as an account of an eccentric visionary maverick who could not be stopped or influenced by reason ... Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: We get an idea of what could have been via the colossal illustrated screenplay still lovingly held by Jodorowsky, who is every bit the dreamer in his 80s that he was in his youth. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Pavich's fun documentary captures an unbowed, exuberant Jodorowsky, who recalls his team of "spiritual warriors" with the camaraderie of a battle-scarred veteran. Read more

Alan Scherstuhl, Village Voice: Fascinating and perversely uplifting ... Read more

Bilge Ebiri, New York Magazine/Vulture: Pavich is clearly in awe of Jodorowsky (who wouldn't be?), but he still treads a fine line between buying the director's notions of a spiritual quest at face value and soberly detailing said journey's particulars. Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: A deeply moving testament to single-minded, indefatigable commitment of creative vision and to an almost spiritual ability to let that vision go, thereby allowing it to exist in the world in an entirely unexpected form. Read more