May (2002)

All Critics (68) | Top Critics (18) | Fresh (44) | Rotten (20) | DVD (16)

Too much of a hodgepodge of borrowed ideas and uneven tone.

July 11, 2003 Full Review

Gary Dowell

Dallas Morning News

Top Critic

Part Carrie, part Frankenstein and still shlockier bits and pieces, May isn't seamless. But boy is it hard to avert one's eyes from this creature ready-made for the midnight-movie circuit.

June 27, 2003 Full Review

Lisa Kennedy

Denver Post

Top Critic

A bizarre (and sometimes repulsive) exercise that's a little too willing to swoon in its own weird embrace.

June 27, 2003

Robert Denerstein

Denver Rocky Mountain News

Top Critic

Unfolds with the creepy elegance and carefully calibrated precision of a Dario Argento horror film.

June 19, 2003 Full Review

Kevin Thomas

Los Angeles Times

Top Critic

[Bettis] has a smoldering, humorless intensity that's unnerving.

June 13, 2003

Mary Brennan

Seattle Times

Top Critic

Lowdown genre fun, a film that nearly makes up in slacker wit and high-spirited gore what it lacks in budget and elegance.

June 13, 2003 Full Review

Ty Burr

Boston Globe

Top Critic

A marvelous cinematic debut from director Lucky McKee...

October 21, 2012 Full Review

Felix Vasquez Jr.

Cinema Crazed

"May" takes a cracked view of 1 Corinthians' idea of leaving childish things behind - blending the brooding of "Frankenstein" with the bleak, acrid tone of Alkaline Trio lyrics and the most frightening sing-song horror-film score since "Suspiria."

September 19, 2010 Full Review

Nick Rogers

Suite101.com

Proves that fresh new work can be done in the horror genre if the director follows his or her own shadowy muse.

September 27, 2007 Full Review

Rob Gonsalves

eFilmCritic.com

Benefits from bursts of gory black humor as well as Bettis' riveting performance.

January 9, 2006 Full Review

Nick Schager

Lessons of Darkness

MAY is a very nasty and disturbing little horror film that the viewer will probably either love or hate. It is very unpleasant see and at the same time mesmerizing.

March 30, 2005 Full Review

Mark R. Leeper

rec.arts.movies.reviews

O terror originado pela loucura da protagonista foge do apelativo e investe no dramático, levando o espectador não apenas a temer May, mas a sentir compaixão pela garota.

October 30, 2004

Pablo Villaca

Cinema em Cena

Lucky Mckee's film works better as a misfit character study than it does a purebred slasher flick.

January 27, 2004 Full Review

David N. Butterworth

Movie Boeuf

McKee's directing and screenwriting are unusually low-key for a psychological horror thriller, and Bettis is excellent as the disturbed antiheroine.

January 15, 2004 Full Review

David Sterritt

Christian Science Monitor

Standard, low-budget slasher film, elevated by a breakthrough performance by Angela Bettis.

January 13, 2004 Full Review

Robert Roten

Laramie Movie Scope

A flawed little prize that somehow manages to mesmerize with its sound, intrigue with its visuals, and numb with its ending.

January 8, 2004 Full Review

Frank Wilkins

ReelTalk Movie Reviews

'May is nothing short of brilliant. It is likely the most original horror story I have seen in years.'

September 4, 2003 Full Review

Jovanka Vuckovic

Rue Morgue Magazine

Director Lucky McKee has a knack for discomfiting material involving contact lenses and animal hospitals, but such moments are increasingly rare as he stretches his material.

August 25, 2003

Bryant Frazer

Bryant Frazer's Deep Focus

• 1. May Canady: Where's Polly?
  2. Ambrosia: In the head. Polly, hurry up in there! I've been drinking vodka all night and I have to piss like a racehorse!
  3. May Canady: [giggles] hm-hm
  4. Ambrosia: (gets annoyed and mimics May's giggle) - UM-HM!
  5. May Canady: You have really beautiful legs.
  6. Ambrosia: I thought they were gams?
  7. May Canady: Gams, stems, wheels, whatever. Give us a little spin, doll.
  8. Ambrosia: Huh?
  9. May Canady: Turn around for me.
  10. Ambrosia: You are so fu*king weird. I don't know what Polly sees in you.
  11. May Canady: Polly doesn't see anything. Turn around, Miss Grable.
  12. Ambrosia: Okay, doll (she does a sexy spin) How was that?
  13. May Canady: Beautiful [May stabs Ambrosia in the temple with a scalpel, killing her]
  – Submitted by Creep F (23 months ago)
• 1. Polly: You're funny. You want to watch me file?
  – Submitted by Creep F (23 months ago)
• 1. Adam: So what do you do, May?
  2. May Canady: I work at the animal hospital. And I sew.
  3. Adam: Okay. Animal hospital.
  4. May Canady: Some people think it's kind of gross.
  5. Adam: I love gross.
  6. May Canady: Really?
  7. Adam: Mm-hmm. Disgust me, please.
  8. May Canady: Okay. A couple of weeks ago, and old man comes in, and says his dog is dying. And he begs us to save it. A 90-pound black lad named Seymour. We take him in and run some tests, and find that he has a twisted bowel, and needs to be operated on immediately. So we shave Seymour's tummy, we cut him open, and take out a piece of intestine about - about the size of a hot dog. Everything went smooth, but when we went to sew Seymour back up, we realized we were out of the heavy sutures your supposed to use for large dogs. So the doctor decided that if we tripled up on cat sutures, that should do the trick. Well, a few days go by, and the old man calls up hysterical. The sutures had burst while he was at work, and by the time he got home, Seymour was sprawled out on the back porch with his guts spread all over the concrete, and the fence was soaked in blood all around the yard. It was a mess [Adam stares in disgust] I had to sew that one back up.
  – Submitted by Creep F (23 months ago)
• 1. Polly: Do you feel weird doing this?
  2. May Canady: I am weird.
  3. Polly: I love weird.
  – Submitted by Creep F (23 months ago)
• 1. Adam: There's an Argenta playing at the Beverly in 15 minutes. I took the afternoon off. They're showing 'Trauma.'
  2. May Canady: Is that a movie?
  3. Adam: You've never seen 'Trauma'?!
  – Submitted by Creep F (23 months ago)
• 1. Mama: I've always said, 'If you can't find a friend, make one.'
  – Submitted by Creep F (23 months ago)

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