August Rush (2007)

All Critics (128) | Top Critics (32) | Fresh (46) | Rotten (83) | DVD (16)

However predictable, a good ol' fashioned happy ending is always welcome. But bring a box of tissues: A good cry is to be expected as well.

December 1, 2007 Full Review | Comment (1)

Jennifer Preyss

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Top Critic

Even the final few moments, which should have us choking up, seemed hurried and shot from the wrong angles.

November 27, 2007 | Comments (4)

Richard Roeper

Ebert & Roeper

Top Critic

This inspirational drama gets three stars for oddity value alone.

November 22, 2007 Full Review

Wally Hammond

Time Out

Top Critic

August Rush will not be for everyone, but it works if you surrender to its lilting and unabashedly sentimental tale of evocative music and visual poetry.

November 22, 2007 Full Review

Claudia Puig

USA Today

Top Critic

Exuberantly bad and strenuously preposterous.

November 21, 2007 Full Review | Comments (2)

Geoff Pevere

Toronto Star

Top Critic

Intended as a fuzzy family fable, August plays more to the gag reflex than to the heart.

November 21, 2007 Full Review | Comments (4)

Desson Thomson

Washington Post

Top Critic

Essentially an extended music video, and with about as much narrative weight, August Rush is empty, flat, and pointless.

December 28, 2010 Full Review | Comment (1)

Joshua Starnes

ComingSoon.net

A music box trying to pass itself off as an orchestra.

May 5, 2010 Full Review | Comments (4)

Amy Nicholson

Boxoffice Magazine

A heartwarming fairy-tale that is undeniably sweet, even if it occasionally crosses over into sappiness.

July 27, 2009 Full Review | Comments (2)

Mike Scott

Times-Picayune

"The only thing astounding about this movie is how bad it is."

September 8, 2008 Full Review

Heather Huntington

ReelzChannel.com

Someone in Hollywood must have it in for Thanksgiving. How else to explain the cruelly timed release of August Rush, a wretched confection that only the most determined will be able to count among their blessings?

May 8, 2008 Full Review | Comments (4)

Thomas Peyser

Style Weekly (Richmond, VA)

While many films require a suspension of disbelief, August Rush asks viewers to terminate their disbelief without severance and have security escort it from the building.

May 1, 2008 Full Review | Comment (1)

Alonso Duralde

MSNBC

...a lot better than I thought it was going to be and a lot worse than it could have been. (HD DVD and DVD Combo Edition)

April 20, 2008 Full Review

John J. Puccio

Movie Metropolis

Its almost desperate earnestness actually turns out to be its greatest appeal -- August Rush does believe in fairy tales, it does it does it does!

April 17, 2008 Full Review

Jeffrey Chen

Window to the Movies

... the "Oliver Twist" knockoff forgoes the social commentary of Dickens to play up the gooey romantic fantasy of music as the language of love.

March 20, 2008 Full Review

Sean Axmaker

MSN.com

If you approach it with the right attitude, it's impossible not to be moved by this tale of music, loss, and passion.

March 11, 2008 Full Review | Comment (1)

Brian Tallerico

The Deadbolt

August Rush kind of feels like a 2-hour coming attractions preview. Lots of fragmented stuff happens, without ever connecting the dots in between.

March 10, 2008 Full Review | Comments (3)

Mike McGranaghan

Aisle Seat

...warmly affecting at times and almost unbearably saccharine at others.

March 10, 2008 Full Review

John J. Puccio

Movie Metropolis

When a movie is as disappointing and simplistic as this family melodrama, showing deleted scenes in the DVD edition (March 2008) only exposes more the film's shortcomings.

March 8, 2008 Full Review

Emanuel Levy

EmanuelLevy.Com

It doesn't matter if you love music or inspirational stories or Robin Williams (anyone?) -- this is enough to make your teeth ache.

March 6, 2008 Full Review | Comment (1)

Tricia Olszewski

Washington City Paper

• 1. Maxwell "Wizard" Wallace: Music is everywhere.
  – Submitted by Almira A (9 months ago)
• 1. Louis Connelly: How long you been playing?
  2. Evan Taylor: Six months.
  3. Louis Connelly: Six months? How'd you learn to play like that in six months?
  4. Evan Taylor: Julliard.
  – Submitted by Alex S (13 months ago)
• 1. Evan Taylor: Listen. Can you hear it? The music. I can hear it everywhere. In the wind... in the air... in the light. It's all around us. All you have to do is open yourself up. All you have to do... is listen.
  – Submitted by Milly G (16 months ago)
• 1. Maxwell "Wizard" Wallace: I just realized. The harmonica song you hear in the background when the parents first meet is...Yup, the same tune the Wizard plays in the flop house 11 years later... it was him!
  – Submitted by Jeff S (17 months ago)
• 1. Maxwell "Wizard" Wallace: You got to love music more than you love food. More than life. More than yourself.
  – Submitted by Chris P (2 years ago)
• 1. Maxwell "Wizard" Wallace: You know what music is? God's little reminder that there's something else besides us in this universe, a harmonic connection between all living beings, every where, even the stars.
  – Submitted by Chris P (2 years ago)