93% Zero Dark Thirty

All Critics (175) | Top Critics (42) | Fresh (161) | Rotten (13)

Chastain makes Maya as vivid as a bloodshot eye. Her porcelain skin, delicate features and feminine attire belie the steel within.

No doubt Zero Dark Thirty serves a function by airing America's dirty laundry about detainee and torture programs, but in its wake, there's a crying need for a compassionate Coming Home to counter its brutal Deer Hunter.

While "Zero Dark Thirty" may offer political and moral arguing points aplenty, as well as vicarious thrills,as a film it's simply too much of a passable thing.

From the very first scenes of Zero Dark Thirty, director Kathryn Bigelow demonstrates why she is such a formidable filmmaker, as adept with human emotion as with visceral, pulse-quickening action.

A timely and important reminder of the agonizing human price of zealotry.

Not only is Zero Dark Thirty one of the year's best movies, it's an inspiring one to share with your daughters. That is, if they're old enough to deal with explicit torture scenes.

Zero Dark Thirty is a gripping, authentic-feeling account of the dark side of the war on terror.

Chastain's Maya is a red-tressed Pre-Raphaelite madonna with the cleft chin and chiseled features of an action hero.

After the lengthy torture scenes, procedural repetition takes over until the murkily-filmed Seal Team 6 raid. But Jessica Chastain is quite convincing as a CIA operative dedicated to her job.

A well-acted, well-intentioned, disjointed mess.

A well-produced and well-acted procedural/thriller film that stays focused on the frustrating nuts and bolts CIA led search for the elusive Al Qaeda leader.

A gripping, almost necessary, piece of filmmaking.

The picture acknowledges the very real presence of torture on the post-9/11 landscape -- had the filmmakers ignored the subject, the movie would be little more than vile, jingoistic nonsense.

(Jessica) Chastain's powerful performance, for which she deserves a best actress Academy Award, drives the film. She has no private life, no friends. Her obsession drives her.

"We always get our man, eventually."

Bigelow has hamstrung herself by not committing to a viewpoint. This is a by the numbers, cold, emotionally inert, just the "facts" procedural drama that is just barely a step above an episode of Law & Order.

Bigelow has crafted a film which will keep audiences enrapt for ages to come.

In a strong field of Best Picture nominees, "Zero Dark Thirty" has a decent chance to emerge the winner.

Powerful and gripping, the movie is not only a fine document of the hunt for Public Enemy #1, but also a testament to the dedication of those in every corner of the military, government, and intelligence community who refused to give up the search.

"Zero Dark Thirty" is film making at it's best.

An important film for our nation's soul. It gives context to the manhunt, and it lets us experience it for catharsis and closure.

The film has recently been slammed, perhaps as backlash to its early critical raves, but on close examination, it's not a work to readily dismiss.

Though it surely takes some dramatic license, "Zero Dark Thirty" is a worthy document of that moment and the people who made it possible.

This isn't a bad movie, it's just too easy. This is a movie for people who want to eat their fish without having to gut it first.

Kathryn Bigelow turned 10 years of looking for bin Laden into a magnificently well-crafted film.

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/zero_dark_thirty/

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