Ashton Holmes, Ed Harris, Greg Bryk
Tom Stall is living a happy and quiet life with his lawyer wife and their two children in the small town of Millbrook, Indiana, but one night their idyllic existence is shattered when Tom foils a vici...( read more
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DVD Release Date: March 14, 2006
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Stats: 12,970 reviews
Your Rating
Flixster Reviews (12,970)
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September 23, 2009Am I missing something here? This is one of the most overrated films ever! William Hurt is crap in this!!! Why does everyone praise him so much, why was he nominated for an Oscar? Did I see the same film? This is not the Cronenburg I love! This is a very average film made worse b...( read more)
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June 12, 2009This is, like all Cronenberg's work, a mythic movie. It occupies the world of "monsters" that Tom Stall's daughter dreams about at the start. It's as if we get to see the little girl's nightmare as the film unfolds. It's because of this poetic, super-real quality that criticisms ...( read more)
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March 19, 2009On the surface, it seems like an ordinary thriller. But once you think about it, you realize it's an incredible reflection on violence and the destruction of our humanity.
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March 5, 2009Whoa! This movie is surprising and yet, there was a tinge of "actoring" that it could never fully shake off. I guess maybe it added to the theatricality of it where the brutality added to the meatiness of it.
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February 22, 2009I couldn't believe why I havn't seen this earlier. Its a great piece of film making. I decided to watch this first, and Im still undecided on the Mortensen and Cronenberg pairing, but I think Eastern Promises might lay the doubts to rest, the trailer giving a good preview, that I...( read more)
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October 22, 2009There are movies about character transformation, and then there's A History of Violence....
This Guy Over Here picks this as one of the Best Films of the 2000s -
Critic Reviews
February 7, 2006
Kurt Loder, MTV
October 10, 2005
Nick Schager, Lessons of Darkness
Probes our intrinsic attraction to violence with caustic incisiveness. full review
September 23, 2005
David Edelstein, Slate
An absolutely sensational piece of filmmaking. full review
September 23, 2005
Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times
Despite the blood, the film follows Cronenberg's marvelous Spider in finding its true horror in the dark corners of the mind. full review
September 23, 2005
Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle
Although the movie maintains, and benefits from, the bare bones of a straight-up action story, what emerges onscreen is deeper and more interesting. full review
September 23, 2005
Peter Travers, Rolling Stone
Other films this year will have to sweat bullets to match the explosive power and subversive wit of David Cronenberg's A History of Violence. full review
September 23, 2005
Edward Havens, FilmJerk.com
Eventually does not hold up due to its own ambivalence towards its subject matter. full review
September 22, 2005
Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer
Cronenberg's movie is eerily compelling and darkly humorous. And chilling -- to the bone. full review
September 22, 2005
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
This is not a movie about plot, but about character. It is about how people turn out the way they do, and about whether the world sometimes functions like a fool's paradise. full review
Comments
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August 28, 2009The only thing that I didn't like about this movie was that I thought it wasn't long enough. I thought they could have done a lot more with it. Everything about the movie was great, except that it wasn't long enough!
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January 5, 2007the only good thing about this movie is the con artists who manipulated you into enjoying it.
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November 2, 2006What are you people talking about? This movie is excellent. The ending is perfect.
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August 18, 2006Most films of similar genre are the same story told differently. History Of Violence is really good, delivering its brutal action sequences in brutal detail without warning. Viggo Mortenson is great at portraying a character that is changing from one man to another, putting his family through multiple traumatic experiences. Although the ending was a bit inconclusive.
I would definately reccomend you see this at least once. If you dont like it fine. I dont really care. What am i your babysitter?
Justins Best Bit: A punk mongrel school bully getting utterly pummeled into the ground. -
July 4, 2006I thought this movie was craptacular. It was really long, drawn out and boring. Some of the plot was kind of stupid too.
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June 9, 2006I thought this movie was awesome. Tho the ending was kinda disapointing to me, but I loved this movie.
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