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The generally good buzz that preceded the arrival of Universal's Meet Joe Black is effectively silenced by a deadly din of negative reviews today (Friday). Janet Maslin in the New York Times calls the movie, oxymoronically, a "somnolent, emotion-free weepie." Co-star Brad Pitt takes the brunt of much of the criticism. For example, Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times: "Meryl Streep once said that an experienced actor knows that the words 'I love you' are really a question. Pitt plays them as a compliment to himself. There is no chemistry between Joe Black and Susan [the two lead characters] because both parties are focused on him." Then there's Rod Dreher in the New York Post: "As the Grim Reaper walking among mortals in the guise of a spiritually aware studpot, pretty-boy Pitt is so vacant, mechanical and pretentious it occurs to you that this is what the Dalai Lama would be like reincarnated as an underwear model." Susan Wloszczyna of USA Today puts it more succinctly: "There hasn't been such a cockamamie performance in a movie all year." Most reviewers remark that the film is overlong and tedious, watering down its efforts to present an uplifting message. "The real way Meet Joe Black makes you appreciate life is by boring you to death," comments Steve Murray in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "At three hours, it's a slow death," chimes in Jay Carr in the Boston Globe. Steven Rea in the Philadelphia Inquirer writes that the film amounts to "a daunting endurance test: big-star, big-budget banality that'll suck the life out of you." And Joe Morgenstern in the Wall Street Journal observes that, while the film pretends to be about the preciousness of life, "The biggest thing, though, is that it's about three hours long, and a folly of epic proportions. I've never encountered such dramatic flatulence." "The movie is a perfect mirror of its star," concludes Bo Goldman in the Toronto Globe & Mail, "looks great, seems empty." |
