Bobby Deerfield

A big, slick melodrama that knows exactly what it wants to accomplish and does so with great craft.

Don't be fooled by the action-packed DVD cover: Pacino spends roughly five minutes of Deerfield racing, and two hours learning, from a woman facing death, how to embrace life.

Even though Alvin Sargent's script lacks both grace and plausibility and director Sydney Pollack has succumbed to pretentions of European artiness, star chemistry might have made this love story catch fire. [03 Oct 1977, p. 71]

This gorgeously shot film is a trifle long at just over two hours; much of the racing footage could have been dispensed with, along with the sudsiest of the emotions.

An uncoordinated tear jerker certain to double up cynics and touch only those fans who prefer their favorites lost in a narcissistic fog. [26 Oct 1977, p.B1]

Big, expensive, ultimately ridiculous movie that appears to have been constructed to be a Love Story on wheels.

A rich-meets-rich picture, and worse than one imagines. Al Pacino gives a torpid performance as a spiritually depleted Grand Prix racing-car driver who falls in love with a well-heeled free spirit (Marthe Keller), a metaphysical kook.