70
Metascore
12 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 88Chicago TribuneMichael WilmingtonChicago TribuneMichael WilmingtonMankiewicz's classic Hollywood backstage tale of a tragic sex goddess/superstar (Ava Gardner), her gloomy, intellectual director (Humphrey Bogart) and the retinue of glamorous and/or exploitive movie types around them. [05 Nov 2004, p.C6]
- 80CineVueChristopher MachellCineVueChristopher MachellJoseph L. Mankiewicz’s The Barefoot Contessa is at once a deeply satirical depiction of Hollywood and a sumptuous saga of the rise and fall of a star.
- 80The New YorkerRichard BrodyThe New YorkerRichard BrodyIn The Barefoot Contessa, [Mankiewicz] shows the sordidness of the money-driven, ego-fuelled, ruthless machinations that are both central to the business of Hollywood and constantly threaten to derail it.
- 80Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranLos Angeles TimesKenneth TuranAva Gardner in the role of her career (Humphrey Bogart isn't bad either) and writer-director Joseph L. Mankiewicz at the top of his form. [03 Dec 2006, p.18]
- 75Chicago ReaderDave KehrChicago ReaderDave KehrIt’s overlong, talky, and sometimes stolid, but these are all familiar Mankiewicz failings. He shines in his deft verbal wit and novelistic propensity for detail, backlit by a highly personal blend of romance and cynicism. An imperfect film, but its excesses are as suggestive as its subtleties.
- THE BAREFOOT CONTESSA is marked by Mankiewicz's sharp wit--sometimes too much wit. When there is one character cracking wise, fine. When you have two, okay. But when almost all the characters sound as though they were sitting around the writer's table at the MGM commissary, suddenly credibility goes out the window.
- 60The New YorkerPauline KaelThe New YorkerPauline KaelThe movie is so ornate and so garrulous about telling the dirty truth that it's a camp classic: a Cinderella story in which the prince turns out to be impotent.
- 60The Observer (UK)The Observer (UK)Pretentious, highly entertaining melodrama about the international movie business, giving Ava Gardner an iconic role as a wayward actress who takes a dangerous step too far when she marries an impotent Italian aristocrat (Rossano Brazzi). [01 Oct 2006, p.14]
- 40The New York TimesBosley CrowtherThe New York TimesBosley CrowtherThe story that's told against this background is a curiously empty tabloid tale, and the title performer, Ava Gardner, fails to give it plausibility or appeal.