Sinéad W
As a child, North didn’t feel absurd to me it felt natural. Watching it now, I see how surreal and exaggerated it is, but back then, it played like a dream I could’ve had. The story of a boy who divorces his parents and travels the world searching for new ones wasn’t strange. It was fantastical, imaginative, and emotionally honest.
North exists in a space between a child’s fantasy and emotional reality. It’s a film that feels like it was made from the mind of a child, not just for children. Each scene unfolds with a kind of dream logic: bold, colorful, strange, and often funny in a way that only makes sense if you’re looking at the world through young eyes. Cultures are caricatured, emotions are big, and the rules of reality bend. Not because the film is sloppy, but because it’s tuned to how children think and feel.
It’s not trying to win over adults. And maybe that’s why so many adults hated it. Critics saw North as aimless and juvenile, but I saw it as a rare film that dared to reflect the inner world of a child. Not just in plot, but in style, tone, and emotion. The absurdity wasn’t absurd to me; it was magical.
North may not be a perfect film, but to the right child, at the right time, it can feel like being seen. It’s a journey through the highs and lows of growing up, filtered through fantasy and dreams.
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
05/10/25
Full Review
Anton H
I think about this movie a lot. What in the world was Rob Reiner thinking? It actually *may* have worked, provided it was a different kind of movie. If the offensive material actually went much further, with emphasis on the fact that a child’s imagination can lead to troublesome assumptions of other cultures, this could have been a clever dark comedy, aimed at adults. As a kid’s movie, though… ugh. Terrible stuff that gives kids a lot of bad ideas. Shameful movie.
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
11/19/24
Full Review
Christopher J
this movie isnt funny at all what a waste of time
Rated 1/5 Stars •
Rated 1 out of 5 stars
09/04/24
Full Review
Red B
Kids deserve better....The acting, editing, cinematography is all horrifcally bad. The jokes are terribly unfunny. There worse than Dad Jokes. It's clear this is mean for families/kids but holy cow I mean so is The Lion King & Home Alone....how in the world this got the green light even with the director behind it is beyond me. When North goes on his journey I am not kidding when I say it truly feels like stuff just happens and there really isn't any meaningful story. He just visits families for gags. It also makes no sense why he finds the perfect family and "Something isn't right" it's such lazy writing. The villian is so stupid and unfunny as well. Bruce Willis feels like he is just here for the paycheck and isn't trying and at the same time is miscast. His narration feels completely unneeded. The African Joke is so cringe as well. This just leads constantly to random stupid stuff scene to scene with no set up or flow. It's all just random humor with a light hearted kid touch to it. The music is the best thing and even that is just average. Stay away from this at all cost. You can't just make unfunny terribly written garbage and hide it under the guise of a "It's for Kids". This is the Poster Child for that.
Rated 1/5 Stars •
Rated 1 out of 5 stars
10/03/23
Full Review
Ola G
Skilled in academics, sports, and drama, and praised for his good work and obedience, North (Elijah Wood) feels unvalued by his own parents. One day, while finding solace in a living room display at a mall, he complains to the Easter Bunny—a man in a pink bunny suit—who recommends that North simply explain his feelings to them, but North says their neglect makes them undeserving. Aided and encouraged by his best friend Winchell, who works on the school paper, North plots to "divorce" his parents, hiring ambulance-chasing lawyer Arthur Belt to file the papers. The announcement greatly shocks his parents, leaving them unresponsive when Judge Buckle grants his petition, giving him one summer to find new parents or go to an orphanage...
North has been called one of the worst films ever made. Rotten Tomatoes consensus reads, "Laden with schmaltz and largely bereft of evident narrative purpose, North represents an early major disappointment from previously sure-handed director Rob Reiner." Kenneth Turan stated in his review "The problem overall is not so much that the humor, especially in the parent-tryout situations, is forced, but that it simply is not there at all. So little is going on in this mildest of fantasies that it is hard to even guess what kinds of emotional effects were aimed at in the first place." Turan also asked "How could director Rob Reiner, whose touch for what pleases a mass audience is usually unfailing, have strayed this far?" Leonard Klady of Variety described the film as a "noble misfire" and "that unique breed of misconceived entertainment that only a filmmaker of talent is capable of making." Joe Brown of The Washington Post called the film "a gentle, harmless and rather pedestrian fantasy." Janet Maslin of The New York Times was somewhat more positive, writing that the film "doesn't always work, but much of it is clever in amusingly unpredictable ways." Roger Ebert's review of North was this: "I hated this movie. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. Hated it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it." (Via Wikipedia)
"North" is based on the 1984 novel "North: The Tale of a 9-Year-Old Boy Who Becomes a Free Agent and Travels the World in Search of the Perfect Parents" by Alan Zweibel, who wrote the screenplay and has a minor role in the film. Along the lines of Roger Ebert, I say that "North" is awful, awful, awful and just awful. What a piece of jibberish that makes you queasy within. The plot itself is just beoynd silly with an Elijah Wood looking like a dear in headlights while the stupidity just continues througout the running time. Awful, awful, awful...
Trivia: North was heavily panned by critics, and has been referred to as one of the worst films of all time.
Rated 1/5 Stars •
Rated 1 out of 5 stars
08/10/23
Full Review
Mekhi W
An interesting concept on paper. However, it is butchered with not a single funny joke to be found, shockingly bad stereotypes, terrible writing, and an ending cliche that acts as a straw on the camel's back. Avoid this one at all costs.
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
06/25/24
Full Review
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