The worst is saved for last: just when you think the movie has shown the courage of its 'gritty' convictions, it hits you with schmaltz that would shame a Hallmark card.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Nov 11, 2006

From its non-committal title downwards -- we're a bit worse than ankle deep, but not quite neck deep -- the film includes a final shot that is almost surreal in its implausibility. Waist Deep? More like Deep Waste.

| Nov 2, 2006

The efforts of Waist Deep to make some meaningful social commentary about street gangs and the vicious circle in which African-American men often find themselves seem like an afterthought, rather than anything remotely sincere.

| Original Score: 1.5/5 | Jul 8, 2006

Curtis Hall keeps slipping in surprising social and emotional flavorings rarely found in [this] genre.

| Original Score: B | Jul 5, 2006

The Game attempts to exude menace through hardcore forehead-wrinkling and gangsta nose-crinkling, but his efforts are more comic than sinister.

| Original Score: D | Jun 29, 2006

For its ever shifting attitudes toward men, women, and murder, Waist Deep is one of the sloppiest movies ever to reach the screen.

Full Review | Jun 27, 2006

Nothing in this story is remotely realistic, and the target audience for urban dramas -- teenage boys -- won't know what to make of its mushy romantic center.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Jun 23, 2006

Sometimes excessiveness and implausibility are virtues in disguise. Movies this enjoyable don't come about by accident.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 23, 2006

The film is noteworthy for its tiny if incomplete effort to pour old wine in a new bottle.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Jun 23, 2006

[Hall] undermines the early style and intelligence of his all-black action movie, taking audiences for the wrong kind of ride in the end.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Jun 23, 2006

If you're looking for gunning gangsta action on a hot summer night, Waist Deep is an effective-enough story of urban outlaws in love and on the run. It's sweet, sweaty stuff, for a while at least.

| Original Score: C+ | Jun 23, 2006

[Director Hall] has proved he is as good with actors as he is at staging action sequences and creating tension.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 23, 2006

By teasing us with potential meaning only to embrace wanton gunplay, Waist Deep betrays thinking members in the audience.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Jun 23, 2006

Everyone connected with this gangsta opus was probably trying to make a crowd-pleaser. However, you wind up wondering what kind of crowds they were trying to please.

| Original Score: D+ | Jun 23, 2006

Vondie Curtis Hall helmed Gridlock'd, a low-budget buddy thriller starring Tupac Shakur and Tim Roth, with nary a rote moment. This is not the case with Waist Deep, a big-budget thriller with nary an original moment.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Jun 23, 2006

A cynical excuse for the writer and director (and talented actor) Vondie Curtis-Hall to sock some money away for the kids' college tuition.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Jun 23, 2006

All of the familiar urban stereotypes and clichés are out in force.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Jun 22, 2006

It plays like an urban western: a strong, quiet loner takes on a corrupt man who runs the town with the help of a girl gone wrong with a heart of gold.

Full Review | Original Score: B- | Jun 22, 2006

A solidly crafted piece of genre filmmaking.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 22, 2006

Instead of tightening up its storyline, Waist Deep gets more outlandish with its plot complications.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jun 22, 2006