41
Metascore
32 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- Stand Up Guys never wobbles into maudlin or cheap-n-easy sentimentality. It is an entertaining yet sobering portrayal of not-so-wise guys who do not go gently into a no-good night.
- 63Slant MagazineSlant MagazineFails to plumb the dramatic depths of its setups, but every now and then the actors pick up the slack, filling in the blanks with three decades's worth of mythic resonance.
- 60The New York TimesStephen HoldenThe New York TimesStephen HoldenMost of the modest pleasures are in the ways the men expertly play off one another and invest their shallow characters with more depth than any filmmaker could reasonably expect.
- 60Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyLos Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyWhile the action is brisk, the film never feels in a hurry. Walken and Pacino amble through their paces. Arkin ups the adrenaline any time he's around, and he is not around quite enough.
- 40New York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanNew York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanThe script is undernourished, the supporting characters - including a horribly miscast Lucy Punch - ill-conceived, and Val increasingly hard to take. But when the movie ended, I wanted to watch Walken all over again.
- 33The PlaylistGabe ToroThe PlaylistGabe ToroIt's like stocking a team with proven performers and hoping that everything else will work itself out at the end, including a rickety script, indifferent direction, and a plot that pretends its final act is anything other than a cliché-hugging inevitability.
- 30Village VoiceVillage VoiceBut by the end, the feeling the movie inspires isn't suspense but relief: Thank God that the producers behind "Grumpy Old Men" and "The Sunshine Boys" didn't yet have Viagra to joke about.
- 25New York PostKyle SmithNew York PostKyle SmithPainful, misshapen and a little gross. It's an enlarged prostate of a movie.
- 20Time OutKeith UhlichTime OutKeith UhlichThis moronically unfunny gangster comedy fluctuates wildly between the lowest-of-low humor and pity-the-aged-man pathos, and offers further evidence that the best days are behind its iconic cast members.