RocknRolla 2008

Critics score:
59 / 100

Reviews provided by RottenTomatoes

Ben Lyons, At the Movies: Guns, gangsters, and Richie's unique style and tone make his latest picture just plain fun. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: Ritchie, who shoots and cuts everything in RocknRolla like an ad for a particularly greasy brand of fragrance for men, delivers the beatings and killings in his trademark atmosphere of morally weightless flash. Read more

Andrea Gronvall, Chicago Reader: For all its hipster posturing, fast cutting, and camera tricks, this tale of chicanery is peculiarly arid and brittle, without a single character worth caring about. Read more

Ted Fry, Seattle Times: RocknRolla is a recovery from the knockout blows of his past two films but Ritchie is certainly retreading familiar thematic territory. Read more

Noel Murray, AV Club: Perhaps Ritchie has improved over the past 10 years -- or perhaps any movie would look good after the execrable Swept Away and Revolver -- because Ritchie's latest gangland comedy RocknRolla is far and away his best work. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: RocknRolla, though not the most original movie ever made, is a blast, an adrenaline rush of punked-out rock-and-roll-fueled action and crime. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: This is the first of his cartoons to work better as a movie than as a fashion spread. Read more

Sam Adams, Los Angeles Times: Ritchie whisks you along on a whirlwind tour, but he's not averse to putting on the brakes long enough to admire some of his favorite attractions. Read more

Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle: Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: A handsome ensemble of blokes and one high-heeled accountant who propel this slam-bang romp about the collision of criminal styles in the age of globalization and real estate speculation. Read more

Adam Graham, Detroit News: Flashy but assured, the film is a controlled exercise in style that toes the line but never feels over-the-top. In a word, RocknRolla rocks. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Ritchie concocts a crime-jungle demimonde that's organically linked to the real world, and it's a damn fun one to visit. Read more

Laremy Legel, Film.com: Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: If, as his critics contend, Ritchie is just making the same movie over and over again, at least he's getting better at it. Read more

Rafer Guzman, Newsday: RocknRolla marks a pulpy return to form for Ritchie. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: Ritchie is back on comfortable, familiar footing here with this story of British gangsters who are so busy trying to screw each other over, they don't realize that they're in over their heads. Read more

Anthony Lane, New Yorker: If RocknRolla clings to the company of ne'er-do-wells, it's not because they bristle with the frustrations of society, but purely because Ritchie wants to borrow their cheeky charm -- a virtue that, in reality, none of them possess. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: The actual plot is so uselessly convoluted you'd get a headache just reading it -- but you might want to pull out the Advil anyway, given Ritchie's reliance on flashy editing, a blasting soundtrack and fetishized gunplay. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: A sharp comedy as well as a punk-pulp spree. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: RocknRolla reminds us of how cool Ritchie was before Madonna doused his fire. Pity he makes us wait so long. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: RocknRolla often feels more like a parody of a Guy Ritchie film than a real movie. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: RocknRolla isn't as jammed with visual pyrotechnics as Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Smoking Barrel (1998), but that's OK, because with anything more happening, the movie could induce motion sickness. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com: It's like a lumpy, overworked, useless 'objet' that someone who doesn't know you very well might give you as a gift, a thing that sits around the house serving no unearthly purpose other than reminding you, none too subtly, that it's completely hollow. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: As in other Ritchie films, RocknRolla attempts to depict a world of ever-expanding chaos. But the chaos is only in the way the story is told. The actual vision Ritchie offers is pedestrian and tame. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: It's a sad experience to watch RocknRolla, the obituary for the Guy Ritchie brand of English gangster flicks. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: Sometimes it amounts to a laugh or two. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: The good news about RockNRolla is that it more or less erases the tainted memories of Swept Away, and the nearly incoherent Revolver, and marks Ritchie's return to the form of the 1998 Lock, Stock and its 2000 follow-up Snatch. Read more

Wally Hammond, Time Out: Ritchie's film is arguably his most entertaining to date. With its cheeky wit, non-PC provocations, cock-eyed class-consciousness and cheerful irreverence it could be the closest thing to Ealing comedy we're offered these days. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: RocknRolla is a well-acted and attitudinal action movie, a return to Ritchie's trademark 'Mockney' style, which takes amusing and twisted turns. Read more

Phil Gallo, Variety: Read more

Joe Leydon, Variety: Guy Ritchie bounces back to top form with RocknRolla, a cleverly constructed, sensationally stylish and often darkly hilarious seriocomic caper. Read more

Nick Pinkerton, Village Voice: What do you have to do to get your career revoked in England, short of being Gary Glitter? Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: Style is what RocknRolla is all about. And it has it in spades, from the cockney Pulp Fiction dialogue to the music-video editing of the rambling narrative. Read more