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Stop Loss
Paramount Pictures


6.2

based on 35 reviews
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based on 37 votes
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MPAA RATING: R for graphic violence and pervasive language

Starring Ryan Phillippe, Abbie Cornish, Channing Tatum, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ciarán Hinds, Timothy Olyphant, Victor Rasuk, and Rob Brown

Sgt. Brandon King fought for America. He fought for freedom. He fought for his family. He gave everything, and then he came home to begin his life anew. But now his superiors want more: They want him back. (Paramount Pictures)

GENRE(S):	Drama \| War
WRITTEN BY:	Mark Richard Kimberly Peirce
DIRECTED BY:	Kimberly Peirce
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: July 8, 2008 Theatrical: March 28, 2008
RUNNING TIME:	113 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Stop-Loss is a human story first and foremost, and Peirce and her stellar young cast ensure that the message never gets in the way of the storytelling.

TV Guide Ken Fox

It's a richly textured, psychologically acute film that takes an unblinking look at the tattered life of the returning soldier, and it's boosted by two powerful performances from Phillippe and the increasingly impressive Tatum, a former underwear model who has somehow turned into a fine actor.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Even when the script slips into sentiment, Peirce sticks with her troubled, questing soldiers, and through this raw and riveting movie, they stick with us.

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

Stop-Loss carries the emotional force and propulsive drama of the quintessential soldier's story.

Baltimore Sun Chris Kaltenbach

There's little time for nuance in Stop-Loss, and it doesn't deny any of the film's power to wish Peirce would occasionally slow things down enough to let her audience ponder what they're seeing.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

Clearly, Peirce's motives are pure. She's not using the "stop-loss" issue as a wedge to make the government or the administration look bad. She's using it to dramatize an injustice and to advocate on behalf of the soldiers.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Stop-Loss is a film that does it right.

New York Magazine David Edelstein

It’s ironic that Stop-Loss loses its momentum when the characters go on the road. Yet Rasuk--the star of "Raising Victor Vargas"--gives a stunning performance.

The New Yorker David Denby

Stop-Loss is not a great movie, but it’s forceful, effective, and alive, with the raw, mixed-up emotions produced by an endless war.

Time Richard Schickel

A relentlessly grim film.

Washington Post John Anderson

It's a remarkably entertaining movie, thanks in part to a first-rate cast and a director who knows you can't make a point without calling everyone to attention.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Phillippe does a dark, searing turn with a character that could have easily been little more than Taps-era hubris, and Gordon-Levitt, as one of King's more fragmented former charges, is riveting and convincingly small-town Texas.

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

A painfully polite Iraq war drama pitched at the MTV generation.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

While there are good things about it, Stop-Loss is nothing spectacular.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

What we're left with is outrage in a vacuum. It's impossible to separate out the stop-loss tactic from the misadventures of the war itself, and that's what this film, to its discredit, accomplishes.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

Pierce never pulls these pieces together satisfyingly, and the result is a botched effort to put a human face on a genuinely alarming situation.

Chicago Tribune Jessica Reaves

While Stop-Loss doesn’t pack anything like the emotional wallop of her previous film, the movies do share Peirce’s clear-eyed refusal to answer difficult questions with simplistic answers.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

Someone watching Stop-Loss with younger eyes might feel the heat of the main soldier's dilemma more than I did, but I couldn't help thinking director Kimberly Peirce was presenting us with abstract ideas in the forms of half-realized characters.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Despite several attempts, we're still waiting for the drama that convincingly captures the experienc of soldiers who've fought in Iraq. Stop-Loss" isn't that film, but at the very least its efforts are honorable.

USA Today Claudia Puig

It's an uneven experience, with some evocative moments and others that don't resonate as much as they should.

Village Voice Scott Foundas

In the end, Stop-Loss's evening-news topicality proves both an asset and a liability--an irresolvable structural conundrum. Simply put, the film so effectively reconstitutes those Vietnam-homecoming touchstones that we can anticipate its every move well before it makes them.

The New York Times A.O. Scott

Ms. Peirce’s movie, which she wrote with Mark Richard, is not only an earnest, issue-driven narrative, but also a feverish entertainment, a passionate, at times overwrought melodrama gaudy with violent actions and emotions.

The Hollywood Reporter John DeFore

A young cast and hotheaded melodramatic streak make it broadly accessible, perhaps enough so to help the film scrape past boxoffice challenges faced by other Iraq-centered features.

Empire Helen O'Hara

Strong performances from the young cast make a compelling case that the US govt is failing its soldiers, but the film’s a little too much of a blunt instrument.

Film Threat Pete Vonder Haar

Stop-Loss is a bit uneven. Mixed messages abound.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

After a strong start, Stop-Loss becomes driven by a series of contrivances before falling prey to bad melodrama and even a little cheesiness.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

Heavy metal, alt-pop, southern rock, orchestral swells, wailing Middle Eastern tunes all vie for our attention, but none of this noise drowns out the sound of good intentions twisting themselves into an impotent knot.

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Though its intentions are noble, it's hampered by a stock romantic subplot (Phillipe falls for his friend's squeeze, Abbie Cornish), a familiar structure (since The Best Years of Our Lives soldiers invariably come home in threes), and a lack of symmetry (some of Gordon-Levitt's story seems to have wound up on the cutting-room floor).

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

An earnest and well-meaning but disappointing failure.

Variety Joe Leydon

A wildly uneven drama, by turns sincere and synthetic.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

With the release of Stop-Loss, a precedent of sorts has definitely been set. If we've yet to see a brilliant Iraq movie, the wait is over for a bad one – this is it.

Wall Street Journal Joanne Kaufman

Swamped by clichés, continuity problems, stock characters and very good intentions.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

A filmmaker's personal connection to the material doesn't necessarily mean that the resulting picture will be any good, and Stop-Loss is so dramatically tedious that it feels remote instead of resonant.

Premiere Aaron Hillis

What little anti-war critique Peirce presents -- and she has it in her, which makes it all the more dubious -- gets trampled over by jingoistic Rambo porn.

New York Post Kyle Smith

As phony as a re-enactment with finger pup pets.

The average user rating for this movie is 6.2 (out of 10) based on 37 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Ken D. gave it a0:
The public has spoken! They avoided this one sided movie in overwhelming numbers. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but not all the people all the time. From start to finish it is one of the worst made movies of the year, if not a decade. Only redeaming moments in the movie was the end credits, and that was only because it was over...

Rob s gave it a0:
yet another anti-american movie that will make no money and isn't even entertaining.

Billy S. gave it a5:
Who cares about the acting and accents and square dancing, when a movie about the War in Iraq within the first 10 minutes has the lead character saying "F**K the President" you're on to something! Unfortunatly, by the end, it all turns right back around to another We Are Americans and We Will Not Back Down, Bush worthy Rhetoric!!!

Marc D. gave it a5:
Chad, I was intrigued by your review, and you don't often lead me astray, but this one didn't live up to your tempered praise. I liked Phillippe in "Breach" last year, but he is really poor in this one. That accent was simply horrible. Pierce didn't do a bad directing job - the tone of the film is good, and she coaxed a solid performance out of Channing Tatum (and Abbie Cornish is excellent). The film just doesn't bring much to the table to be considered among the best modern war flicks such as "Three Kings." As a fan of "The Wire", I'm eagerly anticipating David Simon's "Generation Kill" which should come out later this year on HBO, I believe. I guarantee you it'll be worth seeing and will likely be the Iraqi experience which breaks this jinx on gulf war flix.

Chris W. gave it a3:
Stop Loss is a mess of a human drama, devoid of any sembelance of realistic interaction. The basic premise is good. Unfortunately Stop Loss needs more than just a bit of tweaking to pass for anything close to good. It needs to re-think itself entirely. The main problem that I found with the movie was that it seemed more concerned with informing the public about stop loss than telling a story. Much, if not most of the script was unbelievable, and the execution worse. Furthermore the conclusion was... well nonexistant really, leaving the audience unsettled, though not in the way the director undoubtedly intended. The three points I gave were simply for the attempt at a movie on so relevant a topic.

Marc L. gave it a9:
This movie IS NOT FOR DATE NIght!! It is hard to watch in a few places but it forces a deeper look at war, relationships, choices and everything in between. I was taken (Treated) to the movie by 4 active duty Marines, 2 of whom had just returned from Iraq. They showed their tears, will you?

Ken D. gave it a0:
Should get 7 Razzie Nominations minimum! I'm sure the Hollywood blow hards all love this anti-war slam! Any thing that is anti-American is how they express their hatred for the USA. If they had their will we would have Castro as the father of this country, and Chávez as president. Wake up Hollywood. No one wants to see your crap!!!!!

Stop Loss Paramount Pictures

Stop Loss
Paramount Pictures