Critic Reviews
47
Metascore
Mixed or Average
positive
10(32%)
mixed
18(58%)
negative
3(10%)
Showing 31 Critic Reviews
91
In a time when even the best of big Hollywood movies all seem to be mired in a certain nagging, unimaginative visual sameness, this one dares to take us to a place we haven't been before.
90
Hallström has leavened the story's bleakness with great warmth, fashioning one of the finest films of the year.
78
It's a consistently entertaining story.
75
Beside its major virtues, it contains a vice: that one flat lead performance. Who would have thought Kevin Spacey would ever go dull on us?
75
It's hardly possible to overstate what a welcome change of pace The Shipping News is for admirers of Kevin Spacey.
75
Stays engaging, chiefly, through the textured, ambiguous performances of Spacey, Moore and Dench.
70
It's worth seeing at the very least because it is so different from standard Hollywood fare.
63
Despite its haunting artistry and its winning eccentricities, The Shipping News is a vehicle that's still very much at sea.
63
The Shipping News is good news, but not as good as it could have been.
63
The choice made by Kevin Spacey in taking on the role of Quoyle in the film adaptation of E. Annie Proulx's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Shipping News nearly sinks it. But not quite.
