A well-made film with first-rate performances!
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01/01/00
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Jakob the Liar (1999)
30
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:71
Fresh:21
Rotten:50
Average Rating:4.7/10
Consensus: Any real story is buried by awkward performances and contrived situations.
Runtime: 2 hrs
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: In Nazi-occupied Poland at the height of World War II, impoverished cafe owner Jakob (Williams) keeps hope and humor alive in the Jewish ghetto by reporting fictitious news bulletins about the... [More]
Starring: Robin Williams, Liev Schreiber, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Alan Arkin
Director: Peter Kassovitz
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Reviews for Jakob the Liar
The movie's one odious concession to blatant sentimentality, and it never comes close to priming the audience's tear ducts.
01/01/00
Ultimately appreciated more for what it doesn't do than what it does.
01/01/00
Jakob the Liar is too closed off to provide sufficient air for its deprecating humor (jokes, such as they are, fall flat), and the relentless struggle by the hapless people to survive is not adequately transmitted.
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Williams contributes one of his most subtle, relatively restrained performances, moving us with a gentle gesture or a fearful glance.
01/01/00
Williams is seriously miscast, and his presence in the movie damages its credibility and effectiveness.
01/01/00
Top CriticThe film anticipates all laughter and emotion in ways that make it its own worst enemy.
01/01/00
Top CriticJakob the Liar deserves a place alongside Life Is Beautiful and, yes, even Schindler's List.
01/01/00
Top CriticThe film leans from the comedic to the near-mawkish.
01/01/00
Top CriticClumsy and forgettable!
01/01/00
Well-acted and deftly written and directed.
01/01/00
We have the old Robin Williams here -- the Robin Williams of Moscow on the Hudson and The World According to Garp.
01/01/00
Jakob the Liar plays like a Robin Williams concentration-camp comedy that was intended to cash in on the success of Roberto Benigni's Life Is Beautiful.
01/01/00
Written with astonishing crudeness!
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Top CriticPlays dangerously close to Hogan's Heroes goes to Auschwitz.
01/01/00
Awkward!
01/01/00
Jakob the Liar is so forced that only the interest of a star of Williams' magnitude could have gotten it made.
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Top CriticJakob the Liar airbrushes, trivializes and Disney-fies the WWII ghetto experience.
01/01/00
Peter Kassovitz establishes an effectively grim, cramped yet barren setting, making respectful use of locations in Poland and Budapest.
01/01/00
Top CriticLatest News for Jakob the Liar
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