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Showtime

2002

Tom Dey

Robert De Niro, Eddie Murphy, René Russo, Frankie Faison ...

4.6

11,196

Action. Comedy SHOWTIME deftly combines clever satire and explosive action, taking the buddy cop movie in a new direction. Robert De Niro stars as Mitch Preston, a no-nonsense detective who makes headlines when he shoots the television camera right out of the hands of a meddlesome photographer during a bust. The department is sued for millions, but a slick producer (Rene Russo) drops the suit to force Mitch to star on the network’s new reality series. ... [+]

	Media	Author	Review
		A. O. Scott The New York Times	"[Satire] is not a vaccine against stupidity. More and more these days, as movies try to camouflage their lack of imagination with knowing cleverness, it's just another form of stupidity."
		Roger Ebert rogerebert.com	"The movie's funny in the opening scenes and then forgets why it came to play (…) Rating: ★★ (out of 4)"
		Paul Tatara CNN	"It's getting harder and harder to ignore the fact that Hollywood isn't laughing with us, folks. It's laughing at us."
		Kevin Thomas Los Angeles Times	"From frame one Showtime displays an ingenuity, cleverness and briskness that never flags"
		Todd McCarthy Variety	"A shrill, strained and shallow riff on a tired idea (...) Pic has a notably ugly look for a major studio production."
		Chris Kaltenbach Baltimore Sun	"Humorous but much too predictable send-up of reality TV and the sheer banality of it all."
		William Thomas Empire	"Decidedly average, actually (...) Odd belly laugh apart, this should have been so much more (…) Rating: ★★ (out of 5)"
		Jonathan Foreman New York Post	"It's a wretchedly dumb, lazy and incoherent movie that's magically rendered watchable by Eddie Murphy's charm and Robert De Niro's presence"
		Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times	"The movie's funny in the opening scenes and then forgets why it came to play."
		Mick LaSalle San Francisco Chronicle	"A disgrace to the talents of Robert De Niro and Eddie Murphy, but it's not enough just to say that. It's also a disgrace to the talents of Rene Russo and whoever drove the coffee truck to the set every day"
		Jonathan Rosenbaum Chicago Reader	"There's so little urgency to the plot that one eventually feels not even the actors and filmmakers believe for a second in what's going on"

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