The Guillotines(血滴子)

The A.V. Club by Ignatiy Vishnevetsky

The Guillotines expends most of its energy in its first 30 minutes, leaving the audience with roughly 90 minutes of soapy Qing Dynasty fan fiction.

Time Out by Joshua Rothkopf

All the solemnity is deadly: Not one of these superhuman gang members registers in memory, and you feel stiffed on gory giggles. Talk about having your chain yanked.

The New York Times by Manohla Dargis

The incrementally served up pieces never satisfactorily cohere. The blades fly as do the heads, but the movie remains disappointingly aground.

Village Voice by Nick Schager

A corny saga of social and generational conflict, it's ultimately yet another Chinese period epic that functions as a thinly veiled treatise on the nobility of socialist equality.

Slant Magazine by Rob Humanick

Despite the multitude of cinematic tricks the prolific Andrew Lau has up his sleeve, the film is a disappointingly rote entry in the wuxia pantheon.

Los Angeles Times by Robert Abele

An action fan could be forgiven for the medicinal taste that this slick but dissipating exercise leaves behind.

New York Post by V.A. Musetto

It’s doubtful that Scorsese will redo this new Lau thriller, which is OK because the Chinese original is all fans need.