50
Washington Post by Ann Hornaday
If Quitting isn't worthy of affection exactly, it's worthy of respect.
We hate to say it, but we can't find anywhere to view this film.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
50
Alternately grueling and soporific, Quitting is a movie about addiction that demands the viewer also give something up.
50
Unfortunately Jia --a rather limited actor, judging from the movies excerpted here -- has trouble either articulating or projecting the existential crisis that ultimately landed him in a mental institution, which leaves the emotional center of the film inert.
50
Whether Quitting will prove absorbing to American audiences is debatable: After all, it's not like we don't have enough rehab stories of our own, and Jia often comes across as a sullen, unreachable brat.
60
The entire cast is extraordinarily good -- many of them are, after all, actors by trade -- but throughout, Zhang is keen to remind his audience that this is only a dramatization.
88
Chicago Tribune by Patrick Z. McGavin
Daring and beautifully made, Zhang Yang's Quitting plays like a Chinese "Rebel Without a Cause."
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) by Rick Groen
Quitting begins to seem intriguing in concept. Now comes the best news: It's just as compelling in execution.
63
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
It is a brave experiment, based on life and using actors who play themselves, but it buys into the whole false notion that artists are somehow too brilliant to be sober.
70
Particularly wrenching in its depiction of the father-son relationship.
75
If only "reality" TV was as realistic as Quitting.