Austin Chronicle by Russell Smith

For my money the most gloriously, enchantingly trivial play in the Shakespearean canon, A Midsummer Night's Dream may also be the most screwup-proof of the bard's works.

ReelViews by James Berardinelli

A thoroughly enjoyable piece of cinema that does credit to its director and cast.

Dallas Observer

One of the best of the many delights of director Michael Hoffman's new film -- is that he manages to have it both ways -- the gauzy fantasy and the bacchanal.

The A.V. Club by Keith Phipps

Hoffman (Soapdish, One Fine Day) leads a first-rate cast in an intelligent, fully realized adaptation of Shakespeare's most popular comedy that's at once highly cinematic and true to its source.

Dallas Observer by M. V. Moorhead

One of the best of the many delights of director Michael Hoffman's new film -- is that he manages to have it both ways -- the gauzy fantasy and the bacchanal.

Washington Post by Jane Horwitz

Only the title is clunky in this felicitous marriage of cinematic trickery, theatrical whimsy and the Bard's fabulous tale.

Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington

Most of the original play's magical speeches are preserved here, and however far this film may seem to stray from the original text, the delights remain. [14 May 1999, Friday, p.A]

San Francisco Examiner by Wesley Morris

A gorgeous sliver of grown-up ambrosia.

San Francisco Chronicle by Peter Stack

A playful, sexy piece of work -- just what the Bard might have conjured up for a movie adaptation of his beloved spring-fever comedy.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) by Rick Groen

The well chosen cast helps -- no one strikes a false note.

Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert

It is an enchanted folly suggesting that romance is a matter of chance, since love is blind; at the right moment we are likely to fall in love with the first person our eyes light upon.

Slate by David Edelstein

Hoffman has wedged the play into a weirdly inapposite setting, has stupidly cut and even more stupidly embellished it, and has miscast it almost to a player. And yet the damn thing works: Shakespeare staggers through, mutilated but triumphant.

USA Today by Susan Wloszczyna

The major flaw, the clash of acting styles, is at least fascinating to observe. [14 May 1999, Life, p.8E]

Variety by Emanuel Levy

Whimsical, intermittently enjoyable but decidedly unmagical.

Entertainment Weekly

Kline turns in a bravura performance -- he's one of the few in this star-packed cast who actually knows what to do with Shakespeare's poetry.

The New York Times by Janet Maslin

A parade of incongruities, with performances ranging from the sublime to the you-know-what.

The New York Times by Elvis Mitchell

A parade of incongruities, with performances ranging from the sublime to the you-know-what.

L.A. Weekly by Ella Taylor

The set design is gung-ho Hallmark (Tinkerbell lights, that sort of thing) with a strong whiff of Fellini (the fairy glade looks like a pre-Raphaelite red-light district).

Seattle Post-Intelligencer by Paula Nechak

Shakespeare's comical, all-too-human tale of lust, foreplay and wordplay is buried beneath bad taste.