The Hot Flashes 2013

Stephen Holden, New York Times: In critical ways, the movie is a mess. The basketball scenes are so sloppy and haphazard that the would-be slapstick registers as confusion. But away from the court, the actors bring their caricatures to folksy comic life. Read more

Scott Bowles, USA Today: This comedy deserves credit for taking a decided viewpoint - and delivering a heartfelt if occasionally misguided message. Read more

Justin Chang, Variety: [A] strained and soapy empowerment comedy ... Read more

Mike D'Angelo, AV Club: Early in The Hot Flashes, Brooke Shields is seen reading Menopause For Dummies, and it doesn't take long to realize that's precisely what you're watching. Read more

Robert Abele, Los Angeles Times: A post-"Bridesmaids" case of raunch lite, a change-of-life comedy that could have used a change of scripts. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: A Lifetime movie, minus the commercials, but with every predictable twist and turn and treacly message intact. She shoots. It bores. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: Susan Seidelman has been making these blandly safe movies for years now; what happened to the edgy exuberance of her early films, like "Smithereens" or "Desperately Seeking Susan"? Read more

Farran Smith Nehme, New York Post: Lifetime movies have their pleasures, and so does this film. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: Better for what it is than for how it's done...provides a welcome opportunity for five actresses of a certain age to share the screen together and yet it's pretty much a bland outing because virtually every scene plays out in a programmatic way. Read more

Inkoo Kang, Village Voice: [Brooke Shields'] plodding performance brings the film down as ineluctably as gravity on the female body. Read more

Ann Hornaday, Washington Post: Even though it earns an R rating for profanity and some risque material, it's too meek and mild-mannered to qualify as brave, or even slyly subversive. Read more