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| C+ C+ C+ | |
| Review by Xibo | Date seen: July 30, 1999 |
| Viewing Location: East Village, NYC | Grade: C+ |
| Summary: Disappointing. | |
| Tim Robbins gives a very fine performance as the bad guy in this suspense thriller about a terrorist who moves next door to a professor who teaches a course in terrorism (played ineptly by Jeff Bridges). The direction is deplorable, with most of the exciting scenes looking like they were made to go into a trailer, not an actual film. | |
| C+ C+ C+ | |
| Review by hughjtoad | Date seen: January 27, 2000 |
| Viewing Location: Sunnyvale, CA | Grade: C+ |
| Summary: I hated this up until the end | |
| I mocked this movie from the beginning until the end, at which point I said 'hunh'. The ending gives a full letter grade boost to what was otherwise pretty mediocre fare. I didn't particularly like either stars' performance. | |
| B B B | |
| Review by sesame | Date seen: January 27, 2000 |
| Viewing Location: sunnyvale | Grade: B |
| Summary: lock your doors at all times | |
| despite the mocking, i was somewhat engaged in this film. i think paranoia is one of the defining qualities of america at this point in time: burglar alarms, handguns for protection, never talking to strangers, fearing the police (since they're all corrupt), fearing the immigrants or the poor... yet, at the same time, the ideals of political correctness, sympathy for others, not being judgmental, etc, are at war with our paranoia. is he or isn't he evil? or is he just misunderstood? the ending did redeem much of the overly obvious plot points. | |
| D+ D+ D+ | |
| Review by Parallel | Date seen: May 13, 2001 |
| Viewing Location: Home on DVD | Grade: D+ |
| Summary: | |
| The protagonist is basically a good guy--intelligent and charismatic college professor--but has already had enough tradgedy in his life for any two people. Maybe that's supposed to explain why he acts on his paranoid instincts, enough to break laws, just to find out about someone he's helped. But at the same time, he's still not over the death of his wife--caused by an attempt at law enforcement that went horribly, terribly wrong. His paranoid actions are the proximate cause of everything that follows, and then we're supposed to be sympathetic to him? And finally, the ending doesn't help at all. The best guess I have is that the people making this movie wanted to emphasize the futility of everything. Maybe that's your cup of tea, but like _Brazil_ I just don't need it. | |
| A+ A+ A+ | |
| Review by Teen Wolf | Date seen: July 13, 2001 |
| Viewing Location: Pasadena, MD | Grade: A+ |
| Summary: Brilliant | |
| What is wrong with you people?! Do you not see what I see?! ARLINGTON ROAD was a brilliantly acted, written, and directed film. If you hated it, you probably did not pay very much attention to it, or were just too stupid to understand (even though it was pretty simple). Bridges gave an extraordinary performance, and the ending is one of the best I have ever seen in any film. My hypothesis is, for all of these negative reviewers, that they saw too much of the trailer, rented it but did not really pay attention to the story or understand Bridges' role, were sceptical of the plot, and gave it a bad review. I personally loved this movie, and most everything about it. | |
"I should put quotes here."