80
A luminous performance from Cate Blanchett lies at the heart of Joel Schumacher's impressive drama.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
60
The supporting perfs provide the real drama, especially Hinds' excellent turn as the outwardly macho but inwardly broken Traynor, and McSorley's simmering portrayal of the psychotic Gilligan
80
For once, it's no stretch for Jerry Bruckheimer to turn a human life into an action movie. Give or take a pack of screaming clichés in Carol Doyle and Mary Agnes Donoghue's screenplay, Joel Schumacher's propulsive thriller is also a smart character study, with Cate Blanchett as the jewel in its crown.
50
Too bad the movie was assembled by Hollywood types -- Joel Schumacher directed, Jerry Bruckheimer produced -- who like to have things 15 ways at once. Hollywood types don't like journalists, so while they're lionizing Guerin, they go out of their way to make almost every other journalist depicted in the picture despicable.
60
Dallas Observer by Gregory Weinkauf
While the movie is indeed touching and very politically significant, there's something peculiar about never learning exactly what made ace reporter Guerin so intensely obsessive about this topic.
91
Entertainment Weekly by Lisa Schwarzbaum
Her death was shocking; this well-made telling of her life is inspiring.
50
Village Voice by Michael Atkinson
A pre-programmed mediocrity, a slave to its clichés.
50
New York Magazine (Vulture) by Peter Rainer
A character as psychologically complex as Guerin -- whose drive may not have been fully comprehensible even to herself -- needs a lot of room to expand on screen. Schumacher and Bruckheimer box her in.
50
Rolling Stone by Peter Travers
Cate Blanchett is the spark that keeps this well-meaning but by-the-numbers biopic going.
80
Veronica Guerin paid with her life. This film would make her proud, for it is ultimately not depressing but -- we say without a shred of journalistic irony -- inspiring.