It is enough to say that [Altman's] cards add up to a royal flush.

| Nov 2, 2021

The conclusion falls a little bit flat, but getting there is much more than half the fun. The parts add up to much more than the whole, and it's enjoyable.

| May 19, 2021

An often hilarious reassurance to Altman's many admirers that the gift of wry and perceptive humor has not deserted him.

| May 19, 2021

"California Split" is a work of art and Robert Altman's best movie.

| May 19, 2021

What you get... is a sacrifice of feeling and a lack of coherence.

| May 19, 2021

Altman is always at his best in capturing the reality of a given situation. His film is gritty and tough and has so much of the feeling of the inside of a gambling den one can almost smell the cigaret smoke and taste the flat beer.

| Original Score: 3/4 | May 19, 2021

California Split has never been heralded as one of the key Altmans. But the few things it does - friendship and disappointment and the drab and desperate thrill of the gambler's life - it does superbly.

| Dec 9, 2014

Sold as a comedy, the film scans more like American-century Dostoyevsky, with comp cocktails.

Full Review | Mar 25, 2008

Robert Altman's masterful 1974 study of the psychology of the compulsive gambler.

| Mar 25, 2008

The film is technically and physically handsome, all the more so for being mostly location work, but lacks a cohesive and reinforced sense of story direction.

| Mar 25, 2008

Adding emphasis on the homo-ness of their lucrative bond are the repeated instances where the interference of women breaks both their concentration and their hot streaks.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Oct 8, 2006

Altman feels rather than thinks his way into a subject, with a special interest in how people relate to one another in moments of crisis.

Full Review | Feb 9, 2006

A fascinating, vivid movie, not quite comparable to any other movie that I can immediately think of. Nor is it easily categorized.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | May 9, 2005

What Altman comes up with is sometimes almost a documentary feel; at the end of California Split we know something about organized gambling in this country we didn't know before.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Nov 13, 2004