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Philip Kennicott

Philip Kennicott's reviews only count toward the Tomatometer® when published at Tomatometer-approved publication(s).
Publications:

Reviews

Movies TV Shows
Peter Hujar's Day (2025) 92% 4/4 EDIT “The film honors Hujar not by impersonating him, but by doing exactly what he did in a different medium: demanding we look long and hard at the world.” – Washington Post Nov 14, 2025 Full Review Architecton (2024) 95% 3.5/4 EDIT “A raw, beautiful and demanding essay on the fate of our collective home.” – Washington Post Aug 1, 2025 Full Review Casino Jack and the United States of Money (2010) 81% 2/4 EDIT “Ultimately, it becomes a Rorschach test of the viewer's cynicism: Does it shock you? You must not live in Washington, read the newspaper or follow politics. Are you horrified? Congratulations, and now wise up.” – Washington Post May 7, 2010 Full Review New York, I Love You (2009) 37% EDIT “The characters are all more or less useless, inhabiting the frivolous tippy-top of Maslow's pyramid of needs, with little sense that there's anyone essential at the bottom. It's fun, but decadent.” – Washington Post Oct 16, 2009 Full Review The Cove (2009) 95% EDIT “It is filmmaking not just in the service of the environment, but in the service of a victim, and while that victim may have flippers and fins, it is straight from central casting.” – Washington Post Aug 7, 2009 Full Review Shrink (2009) 27% EDIT “Shrink is no worse than the average Hollywood comedy. But it shows, more obviously than most, the bankruptcy of standard-issue American pop narrative, circa 2009.” – Washington Post Jul 31, 2009 Full Review In the Loop (2009) 94% EDIT “Film should do more than television. In the Loop is tremendous fun at times, especially in its vicious power plays and betrayals.” – Washington Post Jul 23, 2009 Full Review Tokyo Sonata (2008) 94% EDIT “Kurosawa is the rare director who simply lets his film dissolve into music, allowing the plot to take the film naturally to a musical conclusion.” – Washington Post Jul 17, 2009 Full Review Herb and Dorothy (2008) 96% EDIT “You can't hate the film anymore than you can hate Herb and Dorothy. But this is lazy work.” – Washington Post Jul 2, 2009 Full Review Departures (2008) 80% EDIT “It is as polished as it is heavy-handed, and it leaves one under a spell.” – Washington Post Jun 19, 2009 Full Review The Taking of Pelham 123 (2009) 51% EDIT “Like most of Scott's recent films, this one ends in self-indulgent silliness. You end up asking yourself, how do the few fun bits of the film manage to survive in the midst of so much lousy filmmaking?” – Washington Post Jun 12, 2009 Full Review The Garden (2008) 79% EDIT “A good documentary leaves the viewer wanting more. A problematic one leaves the viewer needing more.” – Washington Post May 15, 2009 Full Review Is Anybody There? (2008) 65% EDIT “Caine is magnificent, and the film is worth a look for his contribution alone.” – Washington Post Apr 30, 2009 Full Review Lemon Tree (2008) 91% EDIT “Riklis has made a powerful film, but can a powerful film change anything about the fatalistic culture of powerlessness that is felt throughout Palestine and Israel?” – Washington Post Apr 30, 2009 Full Review Tokyo! (2008) 76% EDIT “All three films deal with things hidden, or disappearing, or suppressed. But Tokyo, if anything, becomes more of a mystery after Tokyo! than it was before.” – Washington Post Apr 9, 2009 Full Review Amarcord (1973) 88% EDIT “Orthodox Fellini lovers will give primacy to La Strada or La Dolce Vita, but Amarcord has its fans, and it's easy to see why.” – Washington Post Mar 13, 2009 Full Review Watchmen (2009) 64% EDIT “Sad to say, the much-anticipated adaptation of the world's most celebrated graphic novel is long, dull and sinks under the weight of its reverence for the original.” – Washington Post Mar 5, 2009 Full Review Donkey Punch (2008) 54% EDIT “Donkey Punch is almost humorless, and there's no wink and nudge behind the mayhem to absolve us of taking its ugly, class-obsessed subtext seriously.” – Washington Post Feb 12, 2009 Full Review Marley & Me (2008) 63% EDIT “Not every book has a movie lurking in it.” – Washington Post Dec 29, 2008 Full Review Valkyrie (2008) 62% EDIT “Valkyrie is a brutally efficient bit of storytelling, and it makes no unforced errors.” – Washington Post Dec 29, 2008 Full Review Frost/Nixon (2008) 93% EDIT “It isn't Shakespeare, but it is drama at a level one doesn't often get in movies.” – Washington Post Dec 12, 2008 Full Review Nobel Son (2007) 25% EDIT “It's all wildly implausible and occasionally fun, but it could be so much better if director Randall Miller had thrown in a little more character development and excised a half-dozen crazy plot twists.” – Washington Post Dec 5, 2008 Full Review Synecdoche, New York (2008) 69% EDIT “The acting is magnificent, especially Hoffman's anguished, distracted, solipsistic portrayal of Cotard.” – Washington Post Nov 7, 2008 Full Review The Women (2008) 13% EDIT “In the end, English just wants to make a nice chick flick with some sassy lines. Genuine nastiness has been eliminated, while not-very-funny banter is retained.” – Washington Post Sep 12, 2008 Full Review A Jihad for Love (2007) 78% EDIT “[Director Sharma's] focus on religion and this particular religion's all but certain hostility to same-sex love means there can be no answers to the spiritual searching of many of his characters.” – Washington Post Sep 4, 2008 Full Review
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