Ruby Sparks Reviews
Top CriticSometimes it's worth surrendering to cinematic enchantments, and Ruby Sparks makes a pretty good case for its own magic.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
Sure it's been done before -- man brings ideal woman to life -- but not quite like Ruby Sparks. And that sets this film up to be a smart and romantic low-key comedy that goes beyond expectations.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
If the result feels like a Pinocchio story that spends too much time with Geppetto, or a takedown of narcissism that never breaks free of what it's critiquing, Dano nonetheless makes Calvin compelling company.
Kazan winds up indulging in the very wish-fulfillment she initially sets out to deconstruct.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
Ruby Sparks flirts with preciousness and has less fun with its premise than it could have, but that's because it's actually a gently touching metaphorical drama about the real essence of love.
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| Original Score: B+
Ruby Sparks might have been more fun if Cal were written to be expansive instead of a worrywart in the middle-aged Matthew Broderick mode.
Kazan's script is observant about how we try to control relationships - making this a smart, modern movie. And how often can you say that about a romcom?
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
Sneaks up on you with deep questions, discomfiting insights and more emotional punch than you may expect.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
Ruby Sparks opts for a seemingly darker but ultimately easier resolution, one that involves magic and fantasy and the sort of neat, happily-ever-after finales that only exist in movies.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
"Ruby Sparks" is a curveball delight, the work of serious-minded jokers.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/4
Kazan carries the film with a disarmingly sweet performance.
The meta-fiction concept of characters interacting with their creator is hardly original, but it's neatly packaged here by Kazan herself, who wrote the script for this clever little charmer.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
"Ruby Sparks" is a film about the wonder of, and the limits of, magic. Believe and enjoy.
Full Review
| Original Score: A-
There are moments in this movie that are mind-bendingly funny, and that fill the viewer with the thrill of discovering great new talent.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/4
What starts off as a sunny daydream, a shot of whimsy and mild-mannered magical realism, turns into something more serious, and seriously reflective. Satisfyingly so.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/4
Kazan isn't beautiful. She's not even pretty, at least not in any conventional way. But she's enormously attractive, and the camera can't get enough of that heart-shaped face and those bouncing bangs.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
So much more satisfying than the cut-rate romantic comedy that it could have been.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
Envision (500) Days of Summer as retold by Charlie Kaufman and you won't be far off.
Maybe it'll give you something to think about as you Facebook stalk that cute girl you just met for coffee.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
A twee, mildly amusing rom-com from the directors of "Little Miss Sunshine.''
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
"Ruby Sparks" is a closed system that gradually turns in on itself. There isn't enough of someone else.
Don't look for sweet and embraceable. This movie is not afraid to show its claws. Like the spirited teamwork of Kazan and Dano, Ruby Sparks is honest, deep and true.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
You find yourself wanting to go through Kazan's script with a red pen and indicate all the places where she could have let herself get darker, weirder, and braver.
It's refreshing to see a premise such as this one treated to a nonsmarmy telling. But the picture, intelligent but mild, has more of a 10-volt hum than a true spark.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
Ruby Sparks tries its damnedest to make a picture that seduces moviegoers into accepting it as their best imaginary friend forever. But the sweat shows more than the sparkle.
It's not the sunniest romantic comedy you'll see. But it is one of the smartest. And, perhaps, the likeliest to get you thinking about what romance and relationships are really all about.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
I imagine most people seeing "Ruby Sparks" will consider it to be about a writer and his fictional creation. There may be another way to approach it.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
The movie is sweet, but it's a lollipop of whimsy. Lick it and it's gone.
Full Review
| Original Score: 1/4
An engagingly off-kilter love story of a writer, the girl of his dreams and the power of his pen.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/5
It's mediocre and half-baked, with flashes of a potential good movie showing through here and there.
A movie about the power of the imagination really becomes a movie about a certain element of surrender - about the release of power - that is practically a requirement for loving somebody.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/4
Who hasn't entertained a fantasy of romantic omnipotence in which a dream partner complies with your every wish?
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
You'd have to be under 30 to see any of this as strikingly original insight, but it bears repeating in an eternal-child culture that favors reflexive cursing and knowing yuks over the honest longing to make a connection stick.
Not only does the movie play with a lot of intriguing quasi-philosophical issues but it is uncompromising in its trajectory.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3.5/4
Begs interpretation as a frustrated actress's commentary on the way that even ostensibly serious writers write women-that is, for maximum convenience.
Assaults the audience with such an unending charm offensive that what initially seems cute becomes cutesy, and what feels quirky descends into twee.
...a rare gem of a romantic comedy, sharp and smart with a warm glow.
Full Review
| Original Score: 4/5
You get to acknowledge how one-dimensional the male fantasies of hot nerd-messiah chicks are while basking in exactly the same thing.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
A beguiling romantic fantasy about the creative process and its potential to quite literally take on a life of its own, Ruby Sparks performs an imaginative high-wire act with finesse and charm.
