73
Metascore
41 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100NewsweekDavid AnsenNewsweekDavid AnsenAs he did in “The English Patient,” Minghella artfully weds movie-movie romanticism with a dark historical vision. The man knows how to cast a spell.
- 100Film ThreatK.J. DoughtonFilm ThreatK.J. DoughtonAs he did with “The English Patient,” director Minghella performs a miraculous juggling act, balancing his epic, sweeping story with the subtleties of character and detail that make Cold Mountain breathe.
- 100TimeRichard CorlissTimeRichard CorlissA grand and poignant movie epic about what is lost in war and what's worth saving in life. It is also a rare blend of purity and maturity -- the year's most rapturous love story.
- 90The Hollywood ReporterKirk HoneycuttThe Hollywood ReporterKirk HoneycuttA somber, often downbeat depiction of human savagery and treachery as well as of human kindness. Writer-director Anthony Minghella has meticulously crafted an intimate epic.
- 90The New YorkerDavid DenbyThe New YorkerDavid DenbyA much better movie about the South during the Civil War than “Gone with the Wind”--visionary, erotic, and tragic where the older movie is flossy, merely ambitious and self-important. [22 & 29 December 2003, p. 166]
- 80VarietyTodd McCarthyVarietyTodd McCarthyA grim picaresque odyssey across a beautiful scarred landscape laced together by private romantic longing. Handsomely made and vividly acted.
- 75ReelViewsJames BerardinelliReelViewsJames BerardinelliIt's certainly a successful adaptation, features numerous memorable performances (mostly by the supporting players), and is worth a post-holiday expenditure of time and money.
- 70New York Magazine (Vulture)Peter RainerNew York Magazine (Vulture)Peter RainerCold Mountain has some marvelous, intimate moments and a real feeling, at times, for the loss that war engenders, but it also has more than its share of hokum--which would be more entertaining if the hokum were juicier.
- 70L.A. WeeklyElla TaylorL.A. WeeklyElla TaylorZellweger looks like a big movie star roughing it à la Paris Hilton, and as if this weren't distracting enough, the hills are alive with big acting names from both sides of the Atlantic who pop up as help or hindrance to Inman's pilgrim's progress while straining, with variable success, for credible Southern twangs.
- 67Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanEntertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanMinghella's adaptation of the 1997 Charles Frazier novel is emotionally detached and almost too studiously carpentered: a willed exercise in mythmaking.