Reviews
Channel 4 Film
Terry Mulcahy
“The double-standards are so painfully entrenched into the gender politics of This Means War that it almost derails the film in a pivotal scene towards the end, but it's probably best to accept the terms of the playing field and just go with it.”
02/03/2012
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Empire Magazine
Helen O'Hara
“While the final result of all this is as slick and shiny as Hollywood can make it, the chemistry between all three leads makes this a likable and frothy confection that’s closer in tone to director McG’s TV successes — Chuck especially — than his recent cinema outings. And that is a very good thing no matter what your sex.”
27/02/2012
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The Los Angeles Times
Betsy Sharkey
“If you are in the mood for action, there is a whole lot of it here. If you're in the mood for love, of the swooning, weak-in-the knees sort, there's not so much. But this is war after all, a bromance, not a romance, muscle, not mush. The relationship that truly sizzles — from the sentiment to the satire — is the one between FDR and Tuck, with Pine and Hardy pulling off one of the better bromances in recent memory.”
14/02/2012
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Total Film
Emma Dibdin
“Given co-scripter Simon Kinberg’s previous scribing gig on Sherlock Holmes, it’s not surprising how much pleasure lies in the central co-dependent friendship – although as with Holmes, it’s not so much the writing as the easy comedic chemistry between the leads that sells it. Pine and Hardy both seem to be having so much fun in their loose, improv-inflected scenes that it’s impossible not to have some yourself.”
30/01/2012
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The Evening Standard
The Evening Standard
“What we get is some smartish dialogue, stunts which at least attempt parodies of the spy genre and an ironic view of the eternal battle between men and women. What we don’t get is the feeling that the film progresses from its passable start towards a decent finish.
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02/03/2012
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The New York Times
Manohla Dargis
“For whatever reason, industry sages keep putting Ms. Witherspoon in romances, which is like putting a shark in a tank with a bobbing basket of kittens. She can be a fine actress and a brilliant comic, but she’s too calculating and self-contained a presence for most romances, particularly those comedies that try to squeeze laughs from female submission or humiliation. Ms. Witherspoon doesn’t register as the yielding type. ”
18/02/2012
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The Scotsman
Alistair Harkness
“As chop-shopped premises go, it’s the sort of thing that might have had some mileage had it been bold enough to make the blatant homoerotic subtext of Tuck and FDR’s relationship literal. Hardy’s and Pine’s overly groomed smoothness would certainly have lent themselves to pushing things a bit further in this respect, particularly since neither of them generate much chemistry with Witherspoon. ”
01/03/2012
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Time Out
Tom Huddleston
“Charm: we know it when we see it, but it’s impossible to manufacture. Buddy-action-romcom ‘This Means War’ tries so hard to be charming that it’s initially unsettling, then sort of sweet, and finally just pathetic. Which, considering the combined charisma of its cast, is something of an achievement in itself.”
28/02/2012
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Screen
Brent Simon
“The action “sizzle” arrives via occasional cheery blasts of brainless, bloodless, consequence-free shootouts, designed so as not to challenge or offend. In encouraging its audience to think so little, however, This Means War also diminishes to the point of negligible existence any care or investment about what unfolds on screen.
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10/02/2012
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The New Yorker
Anthony Lane
“Actually, this means nothing.
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02/03/2012
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Time Magazine
Mary Pols
“Technically, movies don’t give off a scent, but This Means War is so smarmy that it seems to reek of cheap cologne ... Directed by McG, [it] is lit like an advertisement for a cruise line, all harsh candy colors in daylight, various shades of neon at night and garish 24/7.
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16/02/2012
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The Sunday Times
Edward Porter
“A mixture of mediocre comedy, cut-price action and rigidly formulaic romantic scenes — all delivered, in this case, with crude flair, but also with a countervailing nastiness of spirit.”
04/03/2012
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The Observer
Philip French
“Can his films get worse? Take my word for it, or expose yourself to this comedy thriller.”
04/03/2012
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The Independent on Sunday
Nicholas Barber
“The film could have been a comment on 21st-century romance, with all its opportunities for paranoid cyber-snooping, but instead it just churns out repetitive scenes of Pine and Hardy sabotaging each other's dates, interspersed by repetitive scenes of Witherspoon whinging about how conflicted she is.”
04/03/2012
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The Daily Telegraph
Robbie Collin
“A film during which very bad things happen very often, and none of them are noticeably funnier than genital trauma brought on by an air rifle.”
02/03/2012
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The Daily Mail
Chris Tookey
“The film is offensively uncaring that the lads invade the heroine’s privacy, and misuse taxpayer-financed gadgetry and valuable CIA manpower to do so. These scenes are as tasteful and timely an idea as a romcom about a couple of intrusive Sun journalists falling in love with Charlotte Church”
01/03/2012
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The Guardian
Peter Bradshaw
“A three-way masterclass in Not Funny and Not Sexy, a zero-chemistry triangle from McG, the director who gave us the screen version of Charlie's Angels 10 years ago and to which this must now be added on the charge sheet.”
01/03/2012
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The Independent
Anthony Quinn
“The one really unpleasant surprise of the movie is Reese Witherspoon. Back in 1999 she starred in Election as Tracey Flick, one of the funniest, smartest and scariest anti-heroines in all cinema. Thirteen years later she's playing the perky stooge to a couple of jerks who can barely read their own tattoos. "What's the worst thing that can happen?" asks Lauren's girlfriend of her dating two guys at once. In career terms, Reese, this is the worst thing that can happen.”
02/03/2012
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