Pathfinder 2007

Jeff Shannon, Seattle Times: The official Pathfinder Web site is far more interesting than the movie itself, and you'll get better history lessons from the Vikings of Minnesota. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: The movie takes us on a journey to an ugly, contentious period in our misty, ancient past -- all the way back to four months ago, when Apocalypto came out. Read more

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune: Though you can't say Pathfinder doesn't deliver the goods, action-wise, the movie often has trouble sticking to its story between battles or involving us with its characters and its self-consciously mythic hero. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: No more than a minute into this, and it becomes obvious that the next 98 are going to be trouble. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: The movie is part Apocalypto (warriors, threat of hostile takeover, violence!) and part 300 (warriors, threat of hostile takeover, violence!), but with the commercial misfortune of being neither. Read more

Michael Ordona, Los Angeles Times: This one is an instant Mystery Science Theatre 3000 classic, ideal for watching on TV with loud friends. Read more

Bruce Westbrook, Houston Chronicle: Dialogue is a low priority in this film, which has less plot than most video games. Read more

Michael Booth, Denver Post: Here's hoping Pathfinder II is a straight-to-video- game release. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Filled with foggy shots stolen from LOTR and laden with decapitations, Pathfinder is faux-period gore trash with no redeeming qualities and a high dullness factor. Find another path. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: Pathfinder's moody, muddy look is courtesy of music-video director Marcus Nispel, who doesn't distinguish between people and tree trunks when it comes to emotional content. Read more

Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: Though Pathfinder was completed before 300 and the equally artful and brutal Apocalypto, it can still do nothing but slog along in their footprints. Read more

Jessica Grose, L.A. Weekly: Director Marcus Nispel continues in Pathfinder the gory/lame tradition he began with his Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake. Read more

Robert Dominguez, New York Daily News: After the first 1,000 or so beheadings, impalements and severed limbs, Pathfinder's slash may just induce sleep. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: The design, the limited, primitive color palette and the breathless, primal violence make Pathfinder work about as well as any movie with this director and this cast and villains who speak Norwegian was going to work. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: The movie is filmed in a way that makes it seem like the camera has epilepsy and the color desaturation renders everything murky. Someone should remind director Marcus Nispel that there's a difference between making a music video and a feature film. Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: There's a fan's sincere hokeyness about Pathfinder that makes the experience relatively painless, in spite of the number of people who get tortured, decapitated or dismembered. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: As dim and dank as a power failure in a peepshow, Pathfinder is Apocalypto without the laughs or 300 without the muscular visuals and elevating dialogue. Read more

Joshua Land, Time Out: Pathfinder's main appeal will be to connoisseurs of gore, who will find no shortage of graphically rendered stabbings, shootings, smashings, severings and slicings. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: All cinematic creativity seems to have focused on devising the most repellent ways to maim and murder. Read more

Peter Debruge, Variety: This latest bit of historical balder-dash stands in direct defiance of proven action-movie formulas, trusting its brutal concept and striking visuals to overcome a lack of star power. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: The story makes Conan the Barbarian seem like Dostoyevsky in its complexity. Read more