Critic Rating
(read reviews)User Rating
Director
Jim Abrahams
Cast
Winona Ryder,
Jeff Daniels,
Stephen Tobolowsky,
Dinah Manoff,
Laila Robins,
Thomas Wilson Brown
Genre
Comedy,
Drama
Movie star Roxy Carmichael is abandoning the bright lights of Hollywood, Calif. and returning to her small Ohio hometown -- at least long enough to dedicate a city building. And now the whole town of Clyde is bracing for Carmichael's return, most of all her now-married old flame Denton Webb and troubled teen Dinky Bossetti. An orphan with few friends, Dinky is convinced that Carmichael is her birth mother, and that the actress will reclaim her when she returns.
The New York Times by Caryn James
Though ''Roxy Carmichael'' is never as fresh or powerful as it might have been, it is a sweetly engaging film in the Barry Levinson school: just when you think it might fall into a bottomless pit of sentimentality, it stops short.
Entertainment Weekly by Nicholas Fonseca
An offbeat pic pointlessly oversaturated with grating characters who look like they got lost on their way to a John Waters fan club convention.
Variety
Fans of Winona Ryder will definitely want to catch her in an offbeat role as the town rebel in this teen-oriented smalltown saga; unfortunately, the rest of the production doesn't quite match up.
Washington Post by Hal Hinson
Where the movie sabotages her, though, is by insisting that all she really wants is to be like everyone else.
Time Out
There are a few piquant ironies at work, but the selling point is Ryder, again doing her coming-of-age turn for the camera, with a performance that wavers between gangling fragility and a tough-girl Matt Dillonism. Otherwise, the movie falls flat, because of its leaden pacing, and because deep down it believes in the moral imperative of having perfect hair and teeth.
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
The movie sinks into contrived plot manipulation.
TV Guide Magazine
WELCOME HOME ROXY CARMICHAEL is less a movie than it is an example of what the studios refer to as "product," the kind of toothless comedy that features big stars in frenetic and forgettable farces.
Empire
Borderline dreadful waste of potential.
The Associated Press
The wrong version of Welcome Home, Roxy Carmichael must have been released, because this sloppy-looking film never should have been allowed into theaters. [11 Oct 1990]
Chicago Tribune by Dave Kehr
As the movie slowly slogs along to its dreary, moralistic conclusion, Ryder`s sharp presence seems to recede into a candy-colored fog of sentimentality.
Loading recommendations...
Loading recommendations...