For the most part, The Professional is a great action picture.
Comment
11/15/07
Léon the Professional (1994)
74
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:38
Fresh:28
Rotten:10
Average Rating:6.7/10
Runtime: 2 hrs 13 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
Synopsis: Leon (Jean Reno) is a precise, calculating hit man--a consummate professional, with no family and no friends. However, he has casually befriended Mathilda (Natalie Portman, in an auspicious debut),... [More]
Starring: Jean Reno, Natalie Portman, Gary Oldman, Danny Aiello
Director: Luc Besson
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Reviews for Léon the Professional
Besson fails to make much of New York's visual potential, and lazily asks that Leon's expertise be taken on trust. The shallowness was to be expected; the slackness is surprising.
02/09/06
Besson's skills of action director are enough to guarantee entertainment.
01/01/00
It is stylish, darkly humorous, and almost artsy in its approach to the genre.
01/01/00
Top CriticIf you’re into stylish action cinema with more than just blood and bullets, this is a film that belongs on your ‘to see’ list.
03/21/01
After a dazzling opening sequence, this one goes downhill fast.
01/01/04
Always at the back of my mind was the troubled thought that there was something wrong about placing a 12-year-old character in the middle of this action.
01/01/00
Top CriticDespite Besson's mastery of technique, Leon's success is due in large part to its elegant performances.
09/25/03
There's conviction in this movie, and intelligence.
09/24/07
It's surprising to find an action movie with so much emotional baggage, but amazingly it works.
03/05/02
Oldman's character is so over the top, so utterly ridiculous that the audience may feel prompted to laugh unintentionally.
01/01/00
One pretty awesome action movie.
01/01/00
Top CriticAn exceptionally well crafted urban drama.
09/10/02
The Professional is much too sentimental to sound shockingly amoral in the least. Even in a finale of extravagant violence, it manages to be maudlin.
08/30/04
Top CriticMy advice to everyone out there is to throw away your copy of The Professional, throw down twenty bucks, and pick up this newly restored (director's cut) cinematic masterpiece.
01/01/00
A naive fairy tale splattered with blood.
09/26/07
Top CriticThe Professional is all over the map, and its pretensions of being about anything more than its most unpleasant elements simply make it all the more unpleasant.
01/01/00
Reno and Portman both deliver terrific performances.
11/07/02
Ultimately seems at once too deranged and too mechanical.
09/26/07
Top CriticOozing style, wit and confidence from every sprocket, and offering a dizzyingly, fresh perspective on the Big Apple that only Besson could bring, this is, in a word, wonderful.
09/26/07
Latest News for Léon the Professional
April 09, 2008:
Total Recall: The 10 Most Corrupt Cops in Movies
In honor of David Ayer's Street Kings we did a little bad-to-worse survey of the boys who soil their blue. Some of them are hot, some of them caustic, but all of them are... More...
November 23, 2007:
Total Recall: Thank Goodness For Hit Men
This week, Timothy Olyphant stars in Hitman, the tale of a skilled contract killer who finds himself in the midst of deadly political intrigue. Here at RT, we thought it would... More...
January 17, 2007:
Olyphant Pursues "Hitman" Contract
Timothy Olyphant has been linked to the movie based on the "Hitman" video game, though he says there is no official contract, pun intended. He's in talks though, and... More...
September 12, 2006:
Director Luc Besson Gives Up Camera for Civic Projects
Director Luc Besson tells the Associated Press that "Arthur et Les Minimoys" (Arthur and the Invisibles), which will open Jan 12, 2007 in the States, is his last movie... More...
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