Nutcracker in 3D (2010)

Critic Reviews

• Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter

  Delivering the cinematic equivalent of a lump of coal in a Christmas stocking, The Nutcracker in 3D is an apparent Scrooge-like attempt by Russian filmmaker Andrei Konchalovsky to forever ruin children's associations with the classic Yuletide ballet.

• Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail

  One of the most misguided children's films ever made.

• Dana Stevens, Slate

  This non-balletic adaptation by the Russian director Andrei Konchalovsky is something gnarled and stunted and wrong, something that should never have been allowed to see the light of day. How's that for a holiday-ad pullquote?

• David Edelstein, New York Magazine

  [It] has so many terrible ideas that the terrible execution is almost irrelevant: Even if the film were well done, it would still be a travesty.

• Mike Hale, New York Times

  The Viennese scenes, shot on Budapest soundstages, give a new, dreary meaning to "workmanlike."

• Lou Lumenick, New York Post

  Spectacularly misconceived, bloated and incredibly ugly...

• James Luxford, The National

  A frankly bewildering attempt at serious cinema

• Brian Orndorf, BrianOrndorf.com

  I have my theories on the true inspiration motivating the madness here. Something tells me if I bit into the negative, it might taste like whisky, insomnia, and repressed childhood trauma.

• William Goss, Cinematical

  The whole thing is just so astoundingly wrongheaded.

• Susan Granger, SSG Syndicate

  One of the most wretched, misguided extravaganzas ever mounted on the big screen...a stale schnitzel.

• Jim Slotek, Jam! Movies

  A Holocaust motif? In a children's movie? 'Based' on The Nutcracker? No, we're not making this up.

• Michelle Orange, Movieline

  An inchoate hash of classical children's themes and twentieth century flashpoints.

• Maitland McDonagh, Film Journal International

  The best part of this variation on the classic ETA Hoffmann story "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King" is Elle Fanning, but it's unreasonable to expect a child to support the weight of a resolutely un-magical fantasy film.

• MaryAnn Johanson, Flick Filosopher

  [S]o gloriously horrible that Santa Claus Conquers the Martians is going to have to shuffle over and make some room on the throne of Bad Holiday Movies...

• Cole Smithey, ColeSmithey.com

  Andrey Konchalovskiy botches history.

• S. Jhoanna Robledo, Common Sense Media

  Big-screen remake of ballet is too dark for little kids.

• Annlee Ellingson, Moving Pictures Magazine

  Russian director Andrei Konchalovsky claims to have dreamed of making this film for 20 years. Well, his dream is a nightmare.

• Peter Canavese, Groucho Reviews

  Vienna. The 1920s. Albert Einstein sings...a world of proto-Nazi space-ranger rats led by a nasty, singing Andy Warhol rodent. But I don't have to tell you the beloved story of The Nutcracker...

• Robert Levin, amNewYork

  A lot happens in The Nutcracker in 3D, little of it of much consequence.

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