Dreamer: Inspired by a True Story Reviews
May 12, 2006
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
November 21, 2005
Sure, it's as goopy as Kris Kristofferson is grizzled, but families might find a genuinely warm experience in the simple story of a child following her heart %u2014 especially in the rare moments when we're not told how to feel.
Original Score: 2.5/4
November 15, 2005
This is a slow track of wish-fullfillment fantasy and all who come through the turnstiles will wear a happy face.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
November 9, 2005
Painfully earnest and aggressively sappy, it requires an outrageous suspension of disbelief, and becomes even more far-fetched as it goes along.
October 29, 2005
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/4
October 25, 2005
A nice film for a father to take his daughter to. Others may find it so by-the-numbers that even high-powered actors (+ a horse) have a hard time breathing life into it.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
October 25, 2005
Its problems aren't its claims to truth so much as its letdowns to genre.
October 25, 2005
Mildly pleasant, but never once does it surprise us.
Original Score: 2/4
October 25, 2005
Despite thoroughbred work from Dakota Fanning, by the time the movie hits the final furlong it's only good for the glue factory.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/5
October 22, 2005
The bond between Cale and Sonya changes everyone's lives, including the film's oddest convert, wealthy Prince Sadir (underused Oded Fehr).
October 22, 2005
Triumphant coming-of-age drama (complete with horses!) [aimed] at little girls and their captive-audience fathers.
Original Score: 2.5/4
October 22, 2005
Seabiscuit-Lite (half the emotional impact and half as satisfying as the regular inspiration film).
Full Review
| Original Score: 2.5/5
October 21, 2005
As a sports drama -- a genre that's gotten entirely too much play lately -- Dreamer is singularly unexciting.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
October 21, 2005
Too obvious, too trite and too sentimental to ever be more than Seabiscuit for tweens.
Full Review
| Original Score: 3/5
October 21, 2005
There's nothing particularly inspired about the film.
Original Score: 2/4
October 21, 2005
The plot, 'inspired by a true story,' is all but impossible.
Original Score: 1.5/4
October 21, 2005
A textbook study in cinematic recycling -- everything in it seems to have been borrowed from other movies.
Full Review
| Original Score: 2/4
October 21, 2005
Gatins is so worshipful of a child's starry-eyed aspirations that he forgets to ground them in narrative honesty.
Original Score: 2.5/4
October 21, 2005
Treads a well-worn path that will likely feel familiar even to the newest crop of horse-crazy girls.
Original Score: 2/4
October 21, 2005
From the first twinkly notes of Americana on the soundtrack to the last freeze-frame voice-over, the movie offers exactly the gooey, homogenized confection it promises -- or almost exactly.
Original Score: 2/4