Pay It Forward Critic Reviews
Metascore®:
Based upon 12 Critic ReviewsHighest Rated
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The kind of film you've got to admire simply for the way it squares its shoulders and plunges into a message of unfashionable idealism.Read the full review
The combination of restrained writing and direction and top-of-the-line acting is enough to make even confirmed agnostics want to believe in this unashamed fairy tale.Read the full review
An unusual film that intelligently avoids numerous potential pitfalls even if its central earnestness is ultimately inescapable.Read the full review
With a cleaner story line, the basic idea could have been free to deliver. As it is, we get a better movie than we might have, because the performances are so good.Read the full review
Either you will weep uncontrollably during the final 10 minutes or so of this bittersweet fable...or the urge to gag will be overwhelming.Read the full review
Has all the elements of a satisfying movie except knowing when to stop.Read the full review
It's too bad about the ending because, until then, Pay It Forward... is Hollywood feel-goodism at its best.Read the full review
It's so enamored of its own upbeat view of human nature that it expects you to overlook its stick-figure characters, its creaky plot machinery and its remorseless assault on your tear ducts.Read the full review
Baldly manipulative, emotionally counterfeit melodrama.Read the full review
Had enough grit to scratch its way through my cynical defenses, at least until its grotesque ending. But that capper isn't an aberration -- it's the logical extension of the movie's grandiose ambitions.Read the full review
