Noruwei no mori 2010

Stephen Holden, New York Times: "Norwegian Wood" registers less as a coherent narrative than as a tortuous reverie steeped in mournful yearning. Read more

David Fear, Time Out: The film is perilously close to being an exercise in tactile but touchy-feely passive-aggression. Read more

Sam Adams, AV Club: Norwegian Wood is a beauteous, lukewarm bore. Read more

Richard Nilsen, Arizona Republic: We cover years at a bound, but when we light, we tend to spend long, lingering moments through the camera's loving eye. This is a beautiful film to see. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: This lush, eventually torpid adaptation of Haruki Murakami's more nuanced 1987 cult-favorite novel considers youthful love, loss, and eros... Read more

Deborah Young, Hollywood Reporter: [A] long, elegantly shot, sporadically involving Japanese film. Read more

Stanley Kauffmann, The New Republic: The acting in the film is key. Every moment by Ken'ichi Matsuyama as Watanabe and Rinko Kikuchi as Naoko is valid yet seems distilled by memory rather than presented raw. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: The gently diffuse light and color and the compositions by cinematographer Mark Lee Ping Bin, create a delicate, almost watercolored world, fading like a memory. Read more

Mark Jenkins, NPR: The truth is knotty in Norwegian Wood, deftly adapted by Franco-Vietnamese writer-director Tran Anh Hung from Haruki Murakami's most popular novel. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: Tran seems to realize that the best a filmmaker can do under these circumstances may be to substitute visual for linguistic beauty. And he has created stunning tableaux, before which the saddest of stories unfolds. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Even for a film set in a land that considers paper folding an exciting activity, this is dull stuff. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: It's sweet all the way up, wavers in dread and slides down to doom. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Maybe this was the project Tran has been waiting for. I rate this the best film of his non-prolific career by far. Read more

G. Allen Johnson, San Francisco Chronicle: A master of mood and visuals, Tran proves an inspired choice. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: Tran has drained the life right out of the novel. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: A visually stunning and moving piece of storytelling bolstered by searing performances and a standout score by Jonny Greenwood. Read more

David Jenkins, Time Out: The performances of the young cast attain an affecting blend of reticence and hope, but it's Tran's fastidious technique that nudges the film into the realms of greatness. Read more

Bruce Demara, Toronto Star: It becomes a film that, like its characters, remains elusive in its motivations and therefore detached from its audience. Read more

Justin Chang, Variety: While this beautiful-looking film at times succeeds in capturing its source material's delicate emo spirit, it's far less attentive to the richness of Murakami's characters. Read more

Mark Holcomb, Village Voice: Two and a half hours that offer barely a hint of the beloved 1987 cult novel's true flavor. Read more

Stephanie Merry, Washington Post: "Norwegian Wood" is a restrained portrait of liminal moments, a coming-of-age tale that feels more like a moody ghost story than a neatly contained chronicle of beginnings. Read more