48
Metascore
25 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80VarietyTodd McCarthyVarietyTodd McCarthyJennifer Eight is an unusually intelligent and unexploitative late-season thriller, which probably won't help its chances at the box office. Involving without being exciting, pic is notable for avoiding most of the standard suspense film contrivances, as well as for Conrad Hall's utterly smashing cinematography. Interesting cast and sober approach will mean more to critics and sophisticated viewers than to general audiences, resulting in OK results during brief release window before Christmas heavy hitters put this out to video pasture, where it might fare better.
- Despite a gimmicky, underdeveloped plot, JENNIFER EIGHT is a moody, atmospheric thriller, featuring several fine performances and marking a promising major studio debut by writer-director Bruce Robinson.
- 67Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovAustin ChronicleMarc SavlovRobinson keeps Jennifer 8 moving right along, alternately dropping clues right in our laps and tossing in a red herring or two, but it's the dark town running like a black thread throughout the whole film that keeps your nerves jangling.
- 60Los Angeles TimesMichael WilmingtonLos Angeles TimesMichael WilmingtonJennifer 8 is smarter than most of the swanky scare machines, but it’s also too hemmed-in by convention and programmed scares. The game is too rigid: the player’s skills are being wasted. The movie, perhaps, should have been built entirely around those Garcia-Malkovich scenes--because it’s in the exchange of glances between those two, the scraped wariness of Garcia, the quiet, almost lazy sadism of Malkovich, that it really chills the blood.
- 60The New York TimesJanet MaslinThe New York TimesJanet MaslinOne of the most surprising things about Jennifer 8, a strikingly atmospheric film even when not an entirely convincing one, is a running time that is in excess of two hours. Losing 20 minutes would almost certainly have heightened the film's sense of purpose, which is sometimes in danger of drifting away.
- 50Time OutTime OutThe opening scene on a rain-drenched rubbish tip hints at great things, but despite strong writing and an exceptional cast, the plotting is suspect and the murderer's identity is obvious from very early on.
- 40IGNIGNCurse you and your vile coma-inducing powers, Jennifer 8!
- 38Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertJennifer 8 promises a plot of excruciating complexity, but the storyline turns relentlessly dumb. By the end the characters might as well be wearing name tags: "Hi! I'm the serial killer!" This is the kind of movie where everybody makes avoidable errors in order for the plot to wend its torturous way to an unsatisfactory conclusion.
- 38Baltimore SunStephen HunterBaltimore SunStephen HunterAll in all, Jennifer 8 is about four bricks shy a load and two hours too long.