| Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 18, 2011

| Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 17, 2011

... a visually sumptuous, dramatically inert fable ...

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Jul 26, 2007

Familiar situations and trite dialogue give this movie the feel of something freeze-dried and reconstituted.

| Jul 15, 2007

An ultimately dull nonaffair.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Jul 13, 2007

Luc Besson returns to his roots in this delightful, funny and stylish fantasy. Shot in gloriously crisp black and white, it's also a bit of a throwback to the French New Wave for its technique and dazzling location vignettes across Paris.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jun 22, 2007

You desperately want the story, and the characters, to make some kind of emotional sense. This, however, does not happen.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 21, 2007

Counterfeit art-house chic writ large -- a French film that fails to produce the ineffable charms of the yesteryear movies it brazenly imitates.

| Jun 21, 2007

[The] plot is warmed-over Capra, and it's no wonderful-life yarn.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jun 15, 2007

Still, I'm willing to give the multitalented filmmaker a break and give his latest concoction an ever so slight recommendation.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 14, 2007

It seems Besson can be sentimental about Paris but he's still not ready to get too romantic with people.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 8, 2007

Feels like a mash-up of It's a Wonderful Life and Xanadu, without the wholesome sweetness of the first and the campy excesses of the second.

| Original Score: 1/4 | Jun 8, 2007

The movie doesn't aspire to be anything but a lightweight pastiche that rehashes your memories of other, better movies.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jun 8, 2007

Angel-A is all icky fantasy.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Jun 8, 2007

For many people, including me, the visual virtuosity behind Angel-A will be more than enough to get them over the storytelling bumps and the character inconsistencies.

Full Review | Jun 8, 2007

[Besson's] attractive black-and-white 'Scope compositions, strong Paris locations, and effective handling of the actors makes this captivating throughout, and wholly undeserving of the drubbing it's received from many critics.

| Jun 7, 2007

We all have our own view of paradise, but as long as Besson has Arbogast, his camera and those surreal bare Parisian streets, his schlocky heaven enchants the eye, if not the mind.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 7, 2007

The overall experience of the movie is of something fresh. And while it inhabits a pretty rough world, of Parisian gangsters and loan sharks, the film has a warm spirit.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 2, 2007

Even though it looks like art, it plays like schlock.

| Original Score: D | May 26, 2007

Visually arresting but flawed. Its strongest asset is the stunningly poetic cinematography by Thierry Arbogast.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | May 25, 2007