42 Reviews
We Got This Covered
42 is pleasant experience at times, but is a disappointment on the whole, even with great performances from Chadwick Boseman and Harrison Ford.
Full Review
| Original Score: 5/10
Hollywood.com
42 proves an important theory on biopics: a historical figure can be too significant for the Hollywood treatment.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
Top CriticA likable hagiography as nuanced as a plaque at the Cooperstown Hall of Fame.
ComingSoon.net
42 is enjoyable as hagiography goes, but for a genuinely important subject it has all the density of a soufflé.
Full Review
| Original Score: 6/10
Las Vegas Weekly
More a string of rousing speeches than a narrative.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/5
"42" settles for too little, for being an attractive primer, an introduction to the legend of Robinson and the faith that saw him through.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
Mr. Helgeland's ponderously reverential biopic is a string of unearned runs.
COEDMagazine.com
Robinson did more for dudes with female names' rights than any politician or activist. It's no wonder that every Major League team retired his jersey number, which was... Huh. Can't seem to recall.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
HitFix
If you want to see a completely by-the-numbers Hollywood biopic that indulges a sort of surface-level myth-making, "42" is that film, and I suspect that's exactly the film they set out to make.
Full Review
| Original Score: C+
The Movie Minute
What Jackie Robinson achieved, on and off the baseball field, is the stuff of legend. It deserves to be. This decent, formulaic salute does the job of recounting it, yet never shows half the ambition of the people it depicts.
Slant Magazine
The film elevates the story of Jackie Robinson to that of cornball legend rather than just honoring his legitimately uplifting, heroic saga by telling it straight.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
Screen International
The film feels subdued and a little stiff, as if afraid to add too much drama or cinematic style to the historical facts.
Film Racket
There is more to Jackie Robinson's story than what up on the screen. Sadly, no mere movie could do his legacy justice.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
Rather than letting its hero's accomplishments and behavior speak for themselves, Helgeland hammers home every achievement and then puts a halo around it, as if anyone won't get it otherwise.
Blu-ray.com
It's an earnest endeavor, but for 2013, it's about time the true grit of Jackie Robinson is celebrated, not just the thick outline of his bravery.
Full Review
| Original Score: C
There's not enough of Robinson's back story to convey the full drama of his place in history.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
Ozus' World Movie Reviews
Competent but superficial historical tribute to baseball legend Jackie Robinson.
Full Review
| Original Score: C+
At the top of a new baseball season, it's hard not to root for a movie that's in it for the love of the game.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
This big-budget period piece is more concerned with burnishing a legend than dramatizing a life.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
Old School Reviews
a script that touches the well known base paths of Robinson lore without penetrating the man's heart
Full Review
| Original Score: C
