The Doors 1991

Dave Kehr, Chicago Tribune: Hysteria, however skillfully maintained, should never be mistaken for art -- a caution that applies equally to Stone and his subject. Read more

Gene Siskel, Chicago Tribune: Both a vibrant tribute to rock cult figure Jim Morrison and to the decade in which he flourished. Read more

Michael Wilmington, Los Angeles Times: The whole movie is white hot, lapped in honeyed golds, evilly blue and black or drenched in those swoony, fiery reds. The Doors blasts your ears and scorches your eyes. Read more

Jay Boyar, Orlando Sentinel: After the first hour or so of The Doors, the only door I wanted to see was the one marked ''EXIT.'' Read more

Carrie Rickey, Philadelphia Inquirer: While it has its moments, taken by itself, The Doors amounts to little more than an impressionistic look at a boy and his death wish. Read more

John Hartl, Seattle Times: Insidiously funny and remarkably truthful about the psychedelic rock scene in the late 1960. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: I can't recall a film that evokes the myth of the Sixties more potently. Read more

Caryn James, New York Times: It is made by a Morrison groupie for other groupies, a film that leaves the rest of us locked outside wondering what the fuss is about. Read more

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader: The movie does a pretty good job with period ambience. But it's a long haul waiting for the hero to keel over. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: Whatever reservations one may have about this exhausting, dark-side-of-the-'60s epic, there can be little doubt that Stone has captured a particular, bombs-away brand of rock & roll excess with definitive candor. Read more

Terrence Rafferty, New Yorker: For a while, the obviousness and flat-out vulgarity are sort of entertaining, and it might be possible to enjoy the movie as a camp classic if you could ignore the mean-spiritedness that keeps breaking through. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: Watching the movie is like being stuck in a bar with an obnoxious drunk, when you're not drinking. Read more

Richard Schickel, TIME Magazine: The film really proves only that Jim was a bad drunk and a worse friend, and that in no way was his life exemplary. Read more

Steve Grant, Time Out: Stone sometimes loads the narrative with too much sub-Freudian baggage about Morrison's childhood, but the music, the excess and the excitement come across well. Read more

Variety Staff, Variety: Kilmer is convincing in the lead role, although he never allows the viewer to share any emotions. Read more

Joe Brown, Washington Post: You get a buzz, all right, but you're left woozy and hung over, and probably won't remember much of what you've seen. Read more

Hal Hinson, Washington Post: The film is an absurdity -- muddled, self-serious, alienating, a stone drag. Read more