The Bling Ring 2013

Christy Lemire, ChristyLemire.com: The sense of detachment that is a signature of Sofia Coppola's work -- the coolly distant, stylishly dreamlike way she regards her characters -- works to her detriment in The Bling Ring. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: Though the material is sensational, the film is on the blah side. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter: Perhaps even more here than in her other films, Coppola's attitude toward her subject seems equivocal, uncertain; there is perhaps a smidgen of social commentary, but she seems far too at home in the world she depicts to offer a rewarding critique of it. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Watching The Bling Ring, the audience is invited to understand the impulses of these child-woman thieves, even as Coppola stands firmly apart from their craziness and sees them for who they are. Read more

A.O. Scott, New York Times: 'The Bling Ring' occupies a vertiginous middle ground between banality and transcendence, and its refusal to commit to one or the other is both a mark of integrity and a source of frustration. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: The Bling Ring is enjoyable. And it's always easy on the eyes. Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: Is this anthropology, or simply entropy? It's partly the former and lots of the latter, with precious little insight. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: The Bling Ring is the cinematic equivalent of the vapid, superficial kids it features - all visual panache and minimal substance. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: Ultimately, though the pace is snappy, the film feels a little empty; these teens seem too soulless even for satire. Read more

William Goss, MSN Movies: Doesn't explore the who's and why's of the scenario so much as the how's and why-not's. Read more

Scott Foundas, Variety: Always adept at directing young performers, Coppola encourages fine work here from her cast of mostly newcomers, with Watson taking special relish in shedding her goody-two-shoes "Harry Potter" persona. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, AV Club: The Bling Ring isn't so much interested in provocation as sociology. Manufacturing this sort of fame is an exercise in mutual exploitation. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: It's fun while it lasts, but ultimately forgettable, kind of like the people they stole from. Read more

Jocelyn Noveck, Associated Press: It's obvious that Coppola knows this milieu, what these kids wear and the way they speak. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: What does Coppola want us to think about these beautiful young idiots? What does she think? She's too cool or too wary or too close to her subject to engage. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: The kids' story was irresistible to the media, permitting both sensationalism and easy zeitgeist commentary, and that's about as far as writer-director Sofia Coppola takes it in this big-screen dramatization. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: The stars hide; the ardent admirers seek. With a breezily nonjudgmental air, "The Bling Ring" fictionalizes this story of five seekers. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: The young actors, including Katie Chang, Israel Broussard, and a very un-Harry Potter-ish Emma Watson, are engagingly blank, and Coppola films their exploits with a smooth and slowly accumulating creepiness. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: A little cheekier than most Coppola films, its subjects fish in a barrel of barbed laughs. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: S Coppola offering a critique (a stated hope) or somehow being complicit? These questions seem to coil in on themselves, making The Bling Ring that weird yet common hybrid of tsk-tsking and celebration. Read more

David Ehrlich, Film.com: A rich (and even urgent) portrait of a society that has lost control of its culture, a place where aspirations have become the ultimate impediment to actual happiness. Read more

Wesley Morris, Grantland: It's smart and droll. Read more

Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times: Make no mistake, it is lovely to look at this celebrity bedazzled bit of L.A. crime history for a while. But the movie ultimately leaves you feeling as empty as the lives it means to portray. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: Why did Coppola make this movie? Read more

Rafer Guzman, Newsday: It would rather mock its protagonists than help us understand them. Read more

Richard Brody, New Yorker: Daring to face these often noxious, seemingly empty phenomena on aesthetic terms, and taking on a degree of their flatness and simplicity, Coppola renders them surprisingly substantial. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: Where exactly is the drama here? Why tell this story at all? Read more

Tomas Hachard, NPR: The film's best moments demonstrate just how skilled [Coppola's] become at conveying material longing, even when such yearnings have reached the realm of the perverse. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: Narratively static and morally banal. That may be par for the course, however, when half the movie is spent watching shallow kids try on other people's clothes. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Though on the surface "The Bling Ring" is slight of aim and repetitive of structure, it is actually a slam-dunk conservative critique of American culture ... Read more

Michael Sragow, Orange County Register: It starts out as an expert docu-comedy about coddled teens who burgle celebrity homes and ends up an irritating, shallow mood piece about irritating, shallow people. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: A comedy, of sorts, if what it says about our obsession with the famous and the frivolous weren't so totally depressing. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: All the characters are shallow and one-dimensional and, while one can argue that this is the point, it doesn't make for 90 minutes of engaging cinema. Read more

Richard Roeper, Richard Roeper.com: Emma Watson is comedic gold. Read more

Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, Chicago Sun-Times: Coppola neither makes a case for her characters nor places them inside of some kind of moral or critical framework; they simply pass through the frame, listing off name brands and staring at their phones. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: It could have been one of those ripped-from-the-headlines quickies you see on subpar cable. Instead, The Bling Ring plugs into the zeitgeist of trash culture and sparks like a live wire. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: A cool and intriguing cinematic journey, largely free of either editorial commentary or amateur psychology. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: If you feel outraged and a little sick watching the people in The Bling Ring, it's because Coppola wants you to feel that way. You're not reacting against the movie, but with it. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: For all its beautifully established mood, this film remained, at least for me, curiously unsatisfying-a kind of exquisitely tasteful after-school special. Read more

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: A frustrating shrug of ambivalence. Read more

Jon Frosch, The Atlantic: Eschewing the languorous rhythms and visual lyricism of her previous work, Coppola has crafted a fast-paced caper about vapid youth obsessed with wealth and notoriety. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: This is consumerism run riot without a moral compass, not the redistribution of wealth, but its pure celebration. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: It has nothing to say about kids who had nothing better to do than to thieve from the rich and famous. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: She neither explains nor excuses nor extols nor excoriates these kids, which would be fine, but she doesn't really examine them either. Read more

Cath Clarke, Time Out: This is a funny, sarky, bang-on portrayal of the freakiness of celeb obsession. The story would sound outrageous - if it wasn't true. Read more

Keith Uhlich, Time Out: An off-putting, based-on-actual-events ode to the rich and clueless. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Village Voice: The Bling Ring is the first of [Coppola's] pictures that I actively dislike -- I sense no mystery, no depth there. Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: A modern-day cautionary tale about youth run amok that, for all its ripped-from-the-headlines topicality, still exudes a dreamy, otherworldly perfume. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Deceptively shallow but ultimately fascinating. Read more