BITIFUL (Spain, Mexico) dir. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
Competition
The story of Uxbal. Devoted father. Tormented lover. Mystified son. Underground businessman. Friend of the disposed. Ghost seeker. Spiritual sensitive. A survivor at the invisible margins in today’s Barcelona. Uxbal, sensing the danger of death, tries to reconcile with love and save his children, as he tries to save himself. Uxbal’s story is simple: just one of the complex realities that we all live in today.


Jeffrey Wells (Hollywood Elsewhere) writes, "sad and deeply touching hard-knocks, lower-depths drama in the tradition (or along the lines, even) of Roberto Rosselini's Open City or Vittorio DeSica's The Bicycle Thief. How's that for high praise out of the gate"

Kirk Honeycutt (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "it's a gorgeous, melancholy tone poem about love, fatherhood and guilt. Some scenes are absolutely wrenching to behold. Others hit home with a punch to the solar plexus. Spain -- and Barcelona to be specific -- has beckoned forth the wistful poet in the Mexican-born filmmaker. His response to this summons is a film that, while about death, is teeming with life in all its tangled messiness."

Sukhdev Sandhu (Telegraph UK) thinks differently, giving it 2 stars, describing it as "another laborious stretch of designer depression, a remorseless headache that begins with a mysterious chap telling a ponytailed Javier Bardem: “When owls die they spit hairballs out of their beaks.” Does that sound profound? Or does it reek of cod-spiritual phooey?"

OUTRAGE (Japan) dir. Takeshi Kitano
Competition
In a ruthless battle for power, several yakuza clans vie for the favor of their head family in the Japanese underworld. The rival bosses seek to rise through the ranks by scheming and making allegiances sworn over saké. Long-time yakuza Otomo has seen his kind go from elaborate body tattoos and severed fingertips to becoming important players on the stock market. Theirs is a never-ending struggle to end up on top, or at least survive, in a corrupt world where there are no heroes but constant betrayal and vengeance...

Maggie Lee (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "As violent, amoral and misanthropic as a Jacobean play, "Outrage" is Takeshi Kitano's first yakuza flick since "Brother" (2000), and arguably his best film in a decade."

Brad Brevet (Ropes of Silicon) gives it a C+, "Outrage exists in an effort to explore the various amounts of violence that can be dispensed in the midst of a yakuza turf war in the Japanese underworld. With an overwhelming measure of inventive kills, Outrage invites its audience to the slaughter with a story in which cooler heads prevail, but it isn't really much more than that. I laughed with and enjoyed this film, but it didn't strike me as any kind of overwhelming achievement."

FILM SOCIALISME (France) dir. Jean-Luc Godard
En Certain Regard
A symphony in three movements.. Things such as A Mediterranean cruise. Numerous conversations, in numerous languages, between the passengers, almost all of whom are on holiday... Our Europe. At night, a sister and her younger brother have summoned their parents to appear before the court of their childhood. The children demand serious explanations of the themes of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. Our humanities. Visits to six sites of true or false myths: Egypt, Palestine, Odessa, Hellas, Naples and Barcelona.

Peter Howell (Toronto Star) writes, "The film exhibits many of Godard's signature tropes: the indifference to narrative, shock cuts between images and the liberal use of text on the screen ... Asking what it all means is like asking Lady Gaga to explain her latest costume. Godard delights in obscurantism, and he considers it a success if you leave his movies with a headache. But he retains his dry wit, through such visual puns as a girl standing at a gas station pump, reading a paperback of Balzac's Illusions perdues while a llama looks over her shoulder."

THE PRINCESS OF MONTPENSIER (France) dir. Bernard Tavernier
Competition
France, 1562. The wars of religion between Catholics and Protestants rage against a backdrop of intrigue and shifting alliances.

Kirk Honeycutt (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "With this film, Tavernier pokes a real hole in costumed romance. Everything feels all too real here. There is little room for grand gestures or noble sentiments. Combat is nasty and obscene. A wife cheating on her husband is sordid. And when a man truly loves and respects a young woman, that love is not returned. Despite this -- or perhaps because of it -- "The Princess of Montpensier" is one of the finest costume dramas in a long while."

Leslie Felperin (Variety) writes, "Like its heroine, helmer Bertrand Tavernier's visitation to 16th-century France has both beauty and brains, and offers a portrait of renaissance life -- complete with ethics now utterly alien to a contempo mindset -- leagues more accurate than the most historical epics. In commercial terms, that will probably be pic's fatal flaw: It's simply too intellectual to cross over to the masses beyond Gaul, where the name cast and helmer's rep should ensure considerable royalties.

A SCREAMING MAN (France, Belgium, Chad) dir. Mahamat-Saleh Haroun
Competition
Present-day Chad. Adam, sixty something, a former swimming champion, is pool attendant at a smart N’Djamena hotel. When the hotel gets taken over by new Chinese owners, he is forced to give up his job to his son Abdel. Terribly resentful, he feels socially humiliated. The country is in the throes of a civil war. Rebel forces are attacking the government. The authorities demand that the population contribute to the "war effort", giving money or volunteers old enough to fight off the assailants. The District Chief constantly harasses Adam for his contribution. But Adam is penniless; he only has his son....

Peter Brunette (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "The heartfelt yet very modest film "A Screaming Man" (Un Homme qui crie), set in perennially war-torn Chad, probably doesn't really belong in the Cannes competition, but it's good to see it there anyway"

Lee Marshall (Screen Daily) writes, "A disappointment after Dry Season, Mahamat-Saleh Haroun’s latest reflection on the troubled history of his Chadian homeland unfolds a poorly developed story about a senior pool attendant’s rivalry with his son and co-worker against the background of the country’s ongoing civil war."

ADRIAN PAL (Hungary, Netherlands, Austria, France) dir. Anges Kocsis
En Certain Regard
Piroska is an overweight, alienated nurse who can’t resist cream-filled pastries. She works in the terminal ward of a hospital; her life is surrounded by death. One day she sets off to find her long-lost childhood friend. While tracing her recollections, she embarks on a paradox-filled voyage within her own memory and the memory of those she encounters.

Howard Feinstein (Screen Daily) writes, "The concept of childhood, according to the late French historian Philippe Aries in his seminal study, Centuries of Childhood, did not exist prior to the Middle Ages, and once in did, it was strictly for the upper classes until the 1900s. Until then, kids were merely little adults"

Boyd Van Hoeij (Variety) writes, "In Agnes Kocsis' sophomore feature "Adrienn Pal," an obese nurse's search for a long-lost friend from primary school is, well, long and, if not exactly lost, at least pretty vague about where it wants to go. The dreary retro-chic visuals and offbeat humor of the Magyar helmer's debut film, "Fresh Air," are again present here, though because of a weak screenplay, the film struggles to sustain interest for its supersized two-hour-plus running time. "Adrienn" will pal around with some fests that showcased "Air," though the item will remain fresh for a much shorter time than its predecessor."

R U THERE (Netherlands, France, Taiwan) dir. David Verbeek
En Certain Regard
Jitze, a young Dutch professional gamer, travels the world to compete in video game tournaments. During a stay in Taipei his arm starts to hurt and he?s forced to take a few days rest. A night in his hotel, Jitze meets a girl and starts realizing what it means to be human in the age of the virtual worlds.

Natasha Senjanovic (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "David Verbeek's "R U There" feel like a great short stretched into a feature that cannot sustain the tension for which it so earnestly strives. The best target audience for this film about a young gaming champ should be the enormous gaming/"Second Life" community. Yet gamers, for one, inhabit virtual worlds that are far faster and far more action-filled than the slow-paced, moody "R U There." Ominous music throughout sets up a thriller, but it's actually a "boy meets girl but does better with her avatar" story."

Charles Ealy (Austin 360) saw it, and says, "Verbeek handles this tale of becoming human again with compassion and nuances"



I WISH I KNEW (China) Jia Zhangke
En Certain Regard
Shanghai, a fast-changing metropolis, a port city where people come and go. Shanghai has hosted all kinds of people – revolutionaries, capitalists, politicians, soldiers, artists, and gangsters. Shanghai has also hosted revolutions, assassinations, love stories. After the Chinese Communists' victory in 1949, thousands of Shanghaiers left for Hong Kong and Taiwan. To leave meant being separated from home for thirty years; to stay meant suffering through the Cultural Revolution and China's other political disasters.

Wesley Morris (Boston Globe) writes, "Jia Zhangke is a master at taking his non-narrative time. "I Wish I Knew" continues, more or less, where last year's "24 City" left off, contemplating the personal side effects of modern China. The new film considers Cultural Revolution-era Shanghai and its survivors and devastated diaspora. The movie is lush and, at times, moving, catching up with filmmakers (hey, its Hou Hsiao-hsien!) and offspring of assassinated officials, collapsing fiction and documentary, although with less mesmerizing flair than in "24 City."

David Cox (Film 4) writes, "Stories, characters, reminiscences and powerful images accumulate gracefully, with Jia's eye ensuring that each interview is something distinct and special to behold in its own right. Although inexplicably not in the Competition (it's actually in Un Certain Regard, which so far is shaping up as the stronger section), I Wish I Knew is by some distance the film of the festival so far and further confirmation that Jia Zhang-ke, who's rise to prominence over the last ten years, is now one of the greatest filmmakers working today.

ANOTHER YEAR (UK) dir. Mike Leigh
Competition
Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter. Family and friendship.
Love and warmth. Joy and sadness. Hope and despair.
Companionship. Loneliness. A birth. A death. Time passes.....

Anthony Kaufman (IFC) finds it an "intimate, funny and finely crafted multi-character portrait... While Staunton's memorably irritable and intensely troubled woman is not part of the central story, Leigh foretells the terrain he wants to tackle in this opening scene: about those who are fulfilled, and those who are not, and the fickle ways of life that keep some people from happiness."

Charles Gant (Telegraph UK) writes, "Audiences not endeared by the singsong cadences and nervous giggles of the strange creatures that always seem to inhabit Leigh World will find further opportunities for irritation, and Manville's high-energy performance initially throws up the odd red flag. But, like Sally Hawkins in the director's last picture Happy-Go-Lucky, it's a real grower, powered by wonderful comic moments, jealous glances, neurotic sparks and, finally, quiet reflection. Broadbent is more restrained - much more - and his masterclass in economy unwittingly steals the film."

Ray Bennett (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "Mike Leigh studies loneliness at a well-crafted but funereal pace...The veteran British director draws typically skillful performances from his cast of mostly regulars, and there are fine contributions from cinematographer Dick Pope and composer Gary Yershon. It's a sedate film without drama that festival juries could well fall in love with, but moviegoers might decide that their own brand of misery is quite sufficient, thanks."


THE CITY BELOW (Germany) dir. Christophe Hochhausler
En Certain Regard
A man and a woman at an art exhibition share a fleeting moment of attraction, which neither can act upon. Days later, a chance second meeting leads to an innocent coffee and the two strangers – both married - toy with their unexplainable fascination for each other. Svenja is curious and finds herself in a hotel room with Roland, but she does not consummate an affair. A powerful executive at the large bank where Svenja's husband works, Roland is used to getting what he wants. He manipulates the transfer of her husband to Indonesia to replace a recently murdered bank manager. Unaware of Roland’s actions, Svenja now ceases to resist...

Natasha Senjanovic (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "Christoph Hochhausler makes his second appearance in Un Certain Regard with the dispassionate "The City Below," an artsy cross between "Wall Street" and "Fatal Attraction." The filmmaker takes advantage of the current crisis to the use the banking world as shorthand for emotional nefariousness, but his auteur approach renders it almost absurdly simplistic."

Boyd Van Hoeij (Variety) writes, "Private and professional spheres clash violently in Christoph Hochhausler's otherwise solemn Teuton drama "The City Below." Impressively assembled and acted, helmer's third outing after "This Very Moment" and "Low Profile" offers a clinical but always interesting observation of an illicit affair against the backdrop of the Frankfurt banking world. Serious-minded arthouse item, which could have used a bit more of the dark humor that only occasionally surfaces, goes out in Deutschland in October and should love up to other fests after its Cannes preem."


HEARTBEATS(Canada) dir. Xavier Dolan
En Certain Regard
Francis (Xavier Dolan) and Mary (Monia Chokri) are good friends. One night, they meet Nick (Niels Schneider), a young man from the country who has just settled in Montreal. From encounter to encounter, from moment to moment, troubled by innumerable signs - some real, some imagined - Francis and Mary fall deeper and deeper into their fantastical obsession. Soon, they find themselves on the precipice of a love duel that threathens the friendship they once thought indestructible.

Mike Goodridge (Screen Daily) writes, "The second film from the precociously talented 21 year-old Canadian Xavier Dolan is alternately infuriating and delicious. While Dolan’s visual tricksiness and mannerisms wear on the patience, he does achieve occasional moments of visual poetry and, appropriately bearing in mind his age, captures the despair and longing of young heartache. This time he also laces the angst with a dose of caustic humour missing from last year’s I Killed My Mother."

Eric Kohn (Indiewire) seems to concur, "A hyperstylized “Jules and Jim” update, Canadian actor-turned-filmmaker prodigy Xavier Dolan’s French language romance “Heartbeats” (“Les Amour Imaginaires”) is as hip as he intends it. At the same time, this chic look at a bisexual love triangle occasionally feels too entangled in its own cool maneuvers. Moving beyond the subtly believable relationships of his 2009 directorial debut, “I Killed My Mother,” Dolan has apparently cultivated an obsession with cinematic overstatement—albeit an effective one."

Alex Billington (FirstShowing.net) loves it, "I'm not even sure how to explain the style of the film, since I could categorize it as hyper-stylized, but it was one of the most beautifully shot films at Cannes this year and one film that I will definitely not be forgetting anytime soon. Its a uniquely modern bit of cinema that I'm absolutely in love with and I can't even begin to think about it without listening to Dalida's "Bang, Bang" which is used almost as a theme song in the film."

THE HOUSEMAID (South Korea) dir. Im Sangoo
Competition
Lee Euny is hired as a housemaid in an upper class family. Soon enough, master of the house Hoon will become her lover. The family’s world will begin to fall apart.

Maggie Lee (The Hollywood Reporter) writes, "An operatic, sensuous social satire that dares to be different from the original classic. Im Sang-soo's version, far from being a masterpiece, is not even subtle. Yet, he deserves credit for his gutsy departure from the original, rather than doing a carbon copy "remake" a la Gus Van Sant's "Psycho." The outcome is a flamingly sexy soap opera whose satire on high society is sometimes as savage as Claude Chabrol's "La ceremonie.""

Lee Marshall (Screen Daily) writes, "Tasty, full of black humour, but finally upended by the mannerist games it plays so ably, erotic thriller The Housemaid is a smart but shallow remake of Kim Ki-young’s cult 1960 Korean movie of the same name."

Brad Brevet (Ropes of Silicon) says it's "an erotic revenge thriller that doesn't entirely work, but is twisted enough to keep you engaged the entire way. This is partly due to Sang-soo's direction, but even more so the talent in front of the camera as each actor carries their weight every step of the way, allowing me to dote on this film a little more than I otherwise would have had it been in less capable hands. Additionally, a series of themes and happenings keep you guessing as to their meaning throughout the picture and their overall impact on the story is impressive."



AURORA (Romania) dir. Cristi Puiu
En Certain Regard
An apartment kitchen: a man and a woman discuss Little Red Riding Hood, their voices hushed, mindful of waking the little girl sleeping in the next room. A wasteland on the city’s outskirts: behind a line of abandoned trailers, the man silently watches what seems to be a family. The same city, the same man: driving through traffic with two hand-made firing pins for a hunting rifle. The man is 42 years old, his name - Viorel. Troubled by obscure thoughts, he drives across the city to a destination known only to him.

Eric Kohn (Indie Wire) writes, "A slow burn thriller taken to the extreme, Cristi Puiu’s “Aurora” continues the Romanian writer-director’s obsession with time as his main narrative device. Whereas Puiu previously applied a patient, naturalistic approach to the final day of a dying man in 2005’s “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu,” his new three-hour opus studies a dead man walking...not much happens, and that’s the point. Puiu constructs Viorel’s gradual downfall as a purposefully overextended black comedy."

Geoff Andrew (TimeOut) writes, "Aurora’ will not be to everyone’s taste, but it is undoubtedly the work of an audacious, intelligent writer-director (and, at least for now, actor) who’s both ready and very able to deal with areas of human experience of which many other filmmakers seem barely to be aware. It was the inescapable fact of mortality in ‘Mr Lazarescu’; here it is the pain and confusion of just being alive. And Puiu’s special approach to the realist aesthetic ensures that ‘Aurora’ rings unusually true. Superb stuff."



CHATROOM (Japan) dir. Hideo Nakata
En Certain Regard
When five teenagers meet online, innocent friendships are forged. But soon one dysfunctional member of the group, increasingly drawn to the darker side of the online world, singles out the most vulnerable in the group and seizes the chance to erase his own past. A chance to manipulate, to make a statement: a chance to lead someone down the path of no return. Set in both online and offline worlds, this smart psychological thriller has a poignant relevancy, exposing the chilling reality of what happens when the lines between reality and cyberspace become blurred...

Dave Calhoun (TimeOut) writes, "what makes this creepy and often very inventive film distinctive is that it’s mostly set on the internet – in chat rooms where five teens, including Aaron Johnson, play out their neuroses and aspirations. It gets a little hysterical, and Nakata is much better with the digital world than the real one, but it’s a good stab at encapsulating the chaos of the net and the fragility of many of the young personalities inhabiting it."

Chongqing Blues (China) dir Wang Xiaoshuai
Competition
Lin, a sea captain, returns from a 6 month journey when he is told that his 25-year-old son Lin Bo has been gunned down by the police. In his quest to understand what happened, he realizes he knew very little about his own son. He starts a journey back to Chongqin, a city he once lived. He will understand the impact of his paternal repeated absence on the life of his child.

Lee Marshall (ScreenDaily) writes, "A strong performance by Wang Xueqi as the father provides emotional ballast but fails to make up for the glacial pacing of the drama; and although there are some effective emotional tugs and an evocative use of the film’s dirty industrial city setting, the audience’s investment in the slowbuild structure is never paid back in full....As a film about fathers and sons, Chongqing Blues has some resonance. The film is also chock-full of images of passage and change...But the slight, mushy story, and the overly pretty actors cast in the three main youth roles, are not really up to the task of carrying what would otherwise be a stimulating symbolic load. "

Maggie Lee (Hollywood Reporter) seems to concur: "It may be solidly directed with Bressonian detachment and anchored by an absorbing performance by lead actor Wang Xueqi, but it is neither outstanding nor revelatory enough to play outside of a cluster of European art house cinemas."

Sukhdev Sandhu (Telegraph UK) gives it four stars, "Like many Chinese films being made today, Chongqing Blues desperately needs to find international audiences; its focus on dislocation — both physical and mental — and its melancholic textures aren’t in demand back home. With barely a false note, and a quietly absorbing lead performance from Wang, this is a slow-burning gem."



Tournee (France) dir. Mathieu Amalric
Competition
Joachim, a former Parisian television producer had left everything behind - his children, friends, enemies, lovers and regrets to start a new life in America. But he returns with a team of New Burlesque strip-tease performers whom he has filled with romantic dreams of a tour of France, of Paris!

Brad Brevet (Ropes of Silicon) seems on the fence, "the film didn't bowl me over there is an undeniable playful and inviting quality to it — primarily to its characters..., the abrupt introduction and where the film ends up never makes it feel like a complete picture. The comparison to a Fellini piece ('8 1/2') is appropriate, but the film doesn't create enough sustainable layers to justify a nearly two hour runtime while Federico (Fellini) could go on for hours before I ever begin to look at my watch."

Sukhdev Sandhu (Telegraph UK) likes this as well, "Tournée is funny, intelligent, sad-eyed — just like Amalric himself..."

Dave Colhoun (TimeOut) writes, "Overall it’s far too scrappy and freewheeling to come across as the credible portrait of a man on the edge that it wants to be. Amalric is a frenetic, conflicted presence, but the writing and his acting don’t go anywhere near far enough to make you believe his predicament"



The Strange Case of Angelica (Portugal, France, Spain, Brazil) dir. Manoel De Oliveira
En Certain Regard
Isaac is a young photographer living in a boarding house in Régua. In the middle of the night, he receives an urgent call from a wealthy family to come and take the last photograph of their daughter, Angelica, who died just a few days after her wedding. Arriving at the house of mourning, Isaac gets his first glimpse of Angelica and is overwhelmed by her beauty. As soon as he looks at her through the lens of his camera, the young woman appears to come back to life just for him. Isaac instantly falls in love with her. From that moment on, Angélica will haunt him night and day, until exhaustion.

Peter Brunette (The Hollwood Reporter) sums it up as a "Rarefied homage to the imagination and the otherworldly is pretty but uninvolving". It's from a 101 year old director, and Brunette references his age, "There seems to be general agreement that longevity equals virtue, but this is true, in and of itself, neither in life nor in filmmaking. "Angelica" is vintage De Oliveira, and some will love it on those grounds alone, but it's a vintage that may have passed its prime."



Tuesday, After Christmas (Romania) dir. de Radu Muntean
En Certain Regard
Paul Hanganu married Adriana ten years ago. They have an eight year old daughter, Mara. For the past six months he has been involved in an extra-marital affair with Raluca, a twentyseven-year-old dentist. Paul, who is struggling to find time for Raluca, for gift shopping and for his family, decides to take his daughter to the dentist one last time before Christmas. An unexpected change in Adriana's schedule brings the two women in the same room for the first time. The meeting forces Paul to face a difficult decision.

Steven Zeitchik (LA Times) loves this one, "Romanians can't make a bad film. It's, like, illegal in their country. Or at least not in their DNA...This year the streak continues -- and perhaps gets even stronger...Muntean's movie is a remarkable, pitch-perfect work, as convincing and affecting a portrayal of the subtleties of modern life and marriage as you'll find on the screen. Cinematic genius is taking a story we think we've seen before and telling it an entirely fresh way, Muntean is ready for Mensa."

Natasha Senjanovic (The Hollywood Reporter) disagrees, "More than slice-of-life, Romanian director Radu Muntean's "Tuesday, After Christmas" is dice-of-life -- but the dissected minutiae of this adultery drama unfortunately doesn't add up to a very original or moving whole. Lovers of neo-neo-realism will extol the film's painstaking honesty so "Tuesday" can count on extensive festival exposure and auteur venues -- Muntean's forte. It will not have much television or DVD play across borders though."

Jay Weissberg (Variety) seems in between, "Impressively held takes and a superbly spare use of widescreen are the most notable elements ...Once again, Muntean and his script collaborators offer exceptionally naturalistic dialogue -- though there's an awful lot of it in this story of a guy shuttling between wife and mistress before finally making a decision. Perhaps more problematical (and perhaps partly due to Mimi Branescu's strong thesping), the male protag is far less interesting than his distaff partners. Nevertheless, excellent craftsmanship will win over fest programmers."

Cannes is officially under way and like last year, I'll be compiling reviews of the films screened each day. So in lieu of being there you can get the buzz of the what's hot and what's not as it happens.

As always Day One, is for the Opening Night Selection, Ridley Scott's 'Robin Hood'. So here you go, some first reactions from the Croisette:


ROBIN HOOD (US) dir. Ridley Scott
*Out of Competition
Robin Hood chronicles the life of an expert archer, previously interested only in self-preservation, from his service in King Richard I’s army against the French.

Todd McCarthy (IndieWire - Deep Focus) says it's "neither as good as the director’s personal best period epic, “Gladiator,” nor a match for Hollywood’s most memorable previous accounts of the beneficent bandit of Sherwood Forest (it is, however, superior to the Kevin Costner entry two decades back". McCarthy cites a disconnection between Scott's very serious style with the romping nature of the Robin Hood story, "the dramatic sobreity and historical consciousness with which the director approaches this new take is knee-capped by the sort of broadstroke villainy and motivational simplicity more suitable for a straightforward audience pleaser of yore."

Xan Brooks (Guardian UK) finds it "a lengthy, bombastic origins tale in which Robin (Crowe) spends more time battling the Frenchies on the beach than robbing the rich in the forest – a film, perhaps, for the Cameron era?"..." For all its flash and thunder, the film winds up signifying very little."

Tim Robey (Telegraph UK) is a tad more lenient, "Nothing here is as entertaining as the swordfight up the steps in Michael Curtiz’s famous 1938 film, or Alan Rickman’s withering Sheriff of Nottingham – certainly not Matthew Macfadyen’s token take on the same character. What saves the movie, which is quite flawed but still Scott’s best in nearly a decade, is its majestic feel for the English landscape."

Jimmy O from JoBlo.com, writes, "(Ridley Scott) has created something of a misstep that sometimes borders on terrific yet mostly meanders in and out of just okay in Sherwood Forest...As uneven and sometimes frustrating as I found this, there are certainly moments of power. Most of the bloody battles at least look good, even if you feel like you’ve seen it before."