Winter's Tale 2014

Wesley Morris, Grantland: We never come to understand the magic that keeps Farrell looking like a member of My Chemical Romance for 10 decades. We never know why consumption makes women sexy. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: Oblique, unstructured and demented, Winter's Tale aims to cast a dreamlike spell, but it's more like a nightmare. Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: A surrealist love story with countless admirers has been reduced by Akiva Goldsman's screen version to a potboiler brimming with treacly preachments. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: It's a pretty film full of magic and miracles - a flying horse, a child saved, a man made immortal by love, a mortal character who by my count is at least 104 years old but still working as a newspaper editor - but, alas, it just doesn't gel. Read more

Justin Chang, Variety: Akiva Goldsman's feature-directing debut is a cloying, sledgehammer-subtle adaptation of Mark Helprin's vastly richer novel. Read more

Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, AV Club: A moony kitsch fantasy of the "everything is connected and everyone is special" variety, Winter's Tale is as romantic as a Facebook-posted engagement photo, as opulent as a rehearsal dinner, and as profound as a greeting card. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: Earnest in its ambition but dopey in its execution, "Winter's Tale" never takes flight. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: How do you adapt "Winter's Tale," Mark Helprin's epic 1983 magical-realist novel, into a movie? If you're writer-director Akiva Goldsman, you take a meat tenderizer and hammer away until all that's left is romantic-fantasy mush. Read more

Jocelyn Noveck, Associated Press: It might all make more sense to fans of the book. But you shouldn't have to have read the book to be able to see and enjoy the movie. Read more

Ben Sachs, Chicago Reader: This live-action fairy tale aims to recapture the romantic splendor MGM's golden era; the dialogue and metaphysical conceits are often risible, but even they convey an emotionalism rare in 21st-century Hollywood. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: Goldsman has stripped the source material for parts and for its through-line, eliminating various characters, as is the case with any adaptation. What's left is sincere ridiculousness. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: If only there was less mush and more meat in this stew. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: You have to stretch your imagination just a teensy bit - OK, a whale of a lot - to buy into it. Read more

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly: You may find yourself either stifling a sniffle by the film's end credits or rolling your eyes and groaning. There isn't much middle ground. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Hollywood Reporter: An ineffectual account of an eternal love. Read more

Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times: Because it is fearlessly sincere and not totally successful, "Winter's Tale" is easy to mock. But it is also hard not to admire its willingness to go all out in its quest for the grandest of romantic gestures. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: Mark Helprin's original novel had its well-earned fans, but writer-director Akiva Goldsman replaces Helprin's creative metaphysical musings with cheap sentimentality. Read more

A.O. Scott, New York Times: Clumsy and inert, a lumbering white elephant rather than the flying white horse that is the novel's magical mascot. Read more

Michael Sragow, Orange County Register: It's so filled with high-flown blather about love, destiny and miracles that there's no room for enchantment. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Winter's Tale is the kind of really bad movie that may still be quite easy to like, or even love, if you abandon all senses ye who enter here. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: On a purely narrative level, Winter's Tale missteps early and often. Its earnestness is its downfall, resulting in opportunities for unintentional humor. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Winter's Tale is preposterous twaddle. Use it as a date movie only if you don't love the one you're with. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: "Winter's Tale" has a magic white horse, and these days you just can't see enough of those. Read more

Kristin Tillotson, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Like the frozen expanses of its most dramatic settings, "Winter's Tale" is mostly hard, glittering surface. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: Enduring this soppy muddle of twinkling stars, fluttering wings, refracted points of light and destiny-led swooners is like being forced to listen at length to a crazy person at a street corner read out old Hallmark greeting cards. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: The film grinds its gears when it tries to make its fantasy elements run alongside real-world logic. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Not only is the story of magic, angels, demons and predetermined destiny preposterous, but the characters are also unconvincing and the dialogue sanctimonious. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Village Voice: Winter's Tale switches from a lavish mystical fantasy into a ponderous fable about destiny and miracles and stuff. Read more

Stephanie Merry, Washington Post: "Winter's Tale" is ambitious with its otherworldly ingredients and temporal leaps. It's not always a success, but the movie has one thing going for it: spot-on casting. Read more