Spare Parts 2015

Joe Leydon, Variety: A surprisingly effective and affecting fact-based drama, despite its reliance on several recycled elements. Read more

Jesse Hassenger, AV Club: Sequences and scenes end unceremoniously, everyone in the movie seems to know each other's backstory before they're properly introduced, and mild jokes land with uncertainty. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: "Spare Parts" is the kind of feel-good underdog movie that almost can't help getting waylaid by cliches. Happily, the real story is strong enough - and unlikely enough - to overcome most of those kinds of problems. Read more

Peter Keough, Boston Globe: Though based on a true story, "Spare Parts," like every other studio product, rehashes cliches from other movies so as not to unduly challenge the audience. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: Though based on a Wired magazine story, this sticks closely to the formulas of inspirational-teacher and sports-team dramas; distinguishing it from the pack is the fact that all four students who formed the club were undocumented. Read more

Sheri Linden, Hollywood Reporter: Despite its clunkier elements, Matsueda's screenplay is alert to details that ground the film in the day-to-day lives of young people who are American in every way but technically. Read more

Michael Rechtshaffen, Los Angeles Times: While the appropriately titled "Spare Parts" might feel like it has been assembled from bits and pieces of other inspirational movies, that doesn't mean the fact-based drama is any less effective ... Read more

Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times: [The] screenplay ... plays down intellect in favor of corn and cliche. Read more

Tirdad Derakhshani, Philadelphia Inquirer: At times, Spare Parts sails perilously close to the saccharine. But the film is a fine example of a message movie that does justice both to its important subject matter and to its characters' inner lives. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: Spare Parts tries too hard to be a based-on-a-true-story, feel-good, crowd-pleasing, triumph-of-the-underdogs movie. Read more

Thomas Lee, San Francisco Chronicle: If "Stand and Deliver" struck many as a hard-hitting look at life in the urban ghetto, "Spare Parts" seems like a Disney after-school special by comparison. Read more

Aaron Hillis, Village Voice: This blatantly big-hearted product isn't half as vibrant as the original 2005 Wired article on which it's based, and myopically neglects to address Arizona's troubling anti-immigration legislation through even a splash of hindsight. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: The characters in "Spare Parts" all go through changes that are true to many immigrants' decidedly mixed experiences in the American melting pot. Read more