What might otherwise be an exercise in ordinary adolescent stories turns powerfully intimate through the wonderful performances that Salky coaxes out from the cast.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 10, 2022

I didn't expect much from Dare going in but was pleasantly surprised by its willingness to take chances and push its characters and its audience out of their comfort zones.

| Original Score: B+ | Aug 4, 2021

What elevates Dare above the usual high school fare is the quality of the writing by David Brind, crisp direction by Adam Salky and a uniformly attractive and compelling cast led by the delightful Emmy Rossum.

| Nov 10, 2015

It is so fresh and fun.

| Nov 10, 2015

I've rarely seen a more rabidly inconsistent film -- astute one moment, stupid the next.

Full Review | Original Score: C+ | Nov 10, 2015

Dare portrays teenagers with actual depth, breaking away from the conventional stories we see so often in films involving high schoolers these days. It'll stick with you long after the movie's over.

| Nov 10, 2015

Dare is ostensibly about high-school identity and and social anxiety, but if feels more like three interrelated episodes of Extreme Makeover: Personality Edition strung together to make an all too obvious point.

| Jul 6, 2010

Though minor arcs play out in each piece, Dare lacks an overarching narrative to propel the entire film, so overall pacing feels uneven and long at just 90 minutes.

| Jul 6, 2010

The movie has already made two fatal mistakes from which it has not recovered.

| Jul 6, 2010

Unlike so many films that paint a rosy picture of adolescence for adults with fuzzy memories, Dare has the courage of its convictions.

| Feb 12, 2010

Brind's screenplay is pregnant with fascinating questions of identity and social anxiety. And Salky knows how to create a mood.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Dec 3, 2009

The film lacks the comedic charm of American Pie, but with its dark, hyper-sexualization of teens, it offers an engrossing if not soap opera-esque tale of self-discovery.

| Nov 13, 2009

Dare feels a bit unfinished, at once overreaching and underrealized. But there is a lot of intelligence, and considerable daring, in the basic conceit.

| Nov 13, 2009

Quite good in brief stretches but not distinguishable enough overall, freshman director Adam Salky's picture evinces the coming of age confusion he's chronicling.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Nov 13, 2009

Dare is a high school coming-of-age film that dares to push the envelope. It doesn't always succeed, but that's not for lack of trying.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Nov 13, 2009

Director Adam Salky nails down the notion that when your fantasies come true, sometimes they are awkward and unsatisfying. There's a reason they didn't seem realistic.

| Nov 12, 2009

Dare is substandard fare by all accounts, plucking its characters from past (and better) teen-angst films.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Nov 11, 2009

The actors, all great camera subjects, help give director Adam Salky's overly pat movie a trace of confessional conviction.

| Original Score: C+ | Nov 11, 2009

Adam Salky's high-school soap offers a virtual Spumoni of caricatured adolescent hand-wringing. When subtlety equals a drama-class performance of A Streetcar Named Desire's rape scene, expect a bumpy ride.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 11, 2009

Zach Gilford's game performance is still no match for the film's catalog of easy ironies, awkward framings, and advice on how to play Blanche DuBois cribbed from season 4, episode 2 of The Simpsons.

| Nov 10, 2009