A masterful accomplishment...teems with its own sense of life, crackles with daring, walks the tightrope between satire and pathos with a rare assuredness.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
Philadelphia Inquirer by Carrie Rickey
Few movies are as eloquent in their performances and their art direction.
San Francisco Chronicle by Edward Guthmann
Self-satisfied -- an undisciplined brat of a film.
New York Daily News by Jami Bernard
Beneath the noisy, farcical surface of John Turturro's Illuminata is a thoughtful and unusually mature meditation on love.
Its pretensions eventually undo it.
Los Angeles Times by Kevin Thomas
Everything falls into place and seems exactly right: the brisk tempo, the crisp, witty performances, the slightly sooty touch.
Chicago Reader by Lisa Alspector
Insights about romance are enhanced by the novel production design, which includes puppetry, but the story's reflexivity is smug and cloying.
Chicago Tribune by Michael Wilmington
A gloriously giddy movie about theater, love and artifice, an unabashed art film.
Susan Sarandon has never looked better in her 29-year screen career than she does here.
Portland Oregonian by Shawn Levy
It isn't, finally, satisfying: It's too uneven, indulgent, fey.