In the end, the surprise plot twists make perfect sense, and it becomes clear that the mystery that's supposed to be driving the suspense was obvious from the beginning.
Comment
06/05/02
Rate this Movie 
8MM (1998)
22
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:78
Fresh:17
Rotten:61
Average Rating:4.1/10
Consensus: Its sadistic violence is unappealing and is lacking in suspense and mystery.
Runtime: 2 hrs 8 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Nicholas Cage plays Tom Welles, a straight-laced surveillance specialist. His innocent, naive world begins to unravel when he is hired by the widow of an industrialist to investigate what she has... [More]
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Joaquin Phoenix, James Gandolfini, Catherine Keener
Director: Joel Schumacher
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Reviews for 8MM
Click to read the article
03/24/02
The third reel is vicious sensationalism pure and simple, designed to please the crowd who may feel that that the makers of the snuff film need to suffer a horrible death.
02/27/01
Given that Schumacher and his cohorts have reasons of their own for wanting to make this film, they may be the only people who end up liking it.
02/14/01
Top CriticFine entertainment if you've got a strong stomach.
01/01/00
My advice is get drunk, cook dinner, watch infomercials or do your taxes -- anything to keep those two hours for yourself.
01/01/00
Top CriticClick to read the article
01/01/00
Overlong, slow, violent, nasty and unredeeming.
01/01/00
Has none of the mystery or suspense that helped Seven rise above the filth in which it sought to wallow.
01/01/00
Top CriticThe idea of snuff films is presented as so obnoxious that it disgusts even the slimiest porn peddlers.
01/01/00
Top CriticThe premise is interesting, although disturbing, but the film strikes out on three pitches.
01/01/00
Walker and Schumacher have made a rather ordinary picture with an ironically self-righteous mean streak.
01/01/00
This is one for which we needn't pray for a sequel.
01/01/00
This is not a movie for the squeamish, by any means. But for those who like their thrillers dark and their heroes a bit more complicated and flawed than the average shoot-without-a-blink type so prevalent in today's movies, 8MM fills the bill.
01/01/00
Cage is the film's greatest asset!
01/01/00
Watching Eight Millimeter is like seeing the basement torture scene in Pulp Fiction expanded to film length, but with the kinky overlay of wit removed, and only the vile sadism left.
01/01/00
Intense but very engaging.
01/01/00
8MM doesn't condemn or condone its subject matter, it just exploits it.
01/01/00
Just when we thought Mel Gibson had plumbed the lowest depths of big-studio nastiness in Payback, along comes Nicolas Cage to do him one better.
01/01/00
A plodding, doggedly tawdry thriller.
01/01/00
Top CriticLatest News for 8MM
February 04, 2007:
Joel Schumacher Lost in "Lost Boys" Sequel
Fans of '80s movies, cool vampire horror or The Coreys Haim and Feldman have all awaited the possibility of a "Lost Boys 2." But the idea that Warner Brothers might... More...
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