The Children of Huang Shi Reviews
Critic & User Reviews
Critic Reviews
It's a polished, beautifully shot story, and it acknowledges the messiness of real life. But like real life, it's often baffling and frustrating.
Read the full reviewTells an engrossing story of a remarkable man, but nevertheless it's underwhelming. Dramatic and romantic tension never coil very tightly, as the film settles into a contented pace.
Read the full reviewWhat ought to be the pinnacle of the story - the orphans' odds-defying 500-mile march over snow-covered mountains toward the relative safety of the Mongolian desert - is shunted toward the end of the film and compressed to a near-footnote.
Read the full reviewRoger Spottiswoode directs with old-fashioned style, avoiding the saccharine with realistic depictions of a war-ravaged China (where he filmed) and a cast well versed in stiff-upper-lip.
Read the full reviewFull of incident but nearly devoid of dramatic tension, The Children of Huang Shi is a based-on-fact saga that has lost much of its power on the long road to the screen.
Read the full reviewSometimes the most compelling real-life stories make better documentaries than dramas. Such would seem to be the case with The Children of Huang Shi.
Read the full reviewYou can be 100 percent in favor of rescuing adorable orphans from war-torn zones and still find The Children of Huang Shi a tough haul.
Read the full reviewThe best thing about "Children" is the cinematography by Zhao Xiaoding ("Hero," "House of Flying Daggers"), which is so distracting because it so out-classes the rest of the movie.
Read the full reviewIf you can get past the Eurocentric focus, there are worse ways to pass the time than to see The Children of Huang Shi, if only because the glimpse into the time and place are captivating and the images are gorgeous.
Read the full reviewGiving Jonathan Rhys Meyers the kind of manly yet paternal role Spencer Tracy once mastered, this carefully wrought international production relates the basic story of reporter George Hogg without any vibrancy, emotion or style.
Read the full reviewIt's like "Schindler's List" crossed with "The Sound of Music," and Roger Spottiswoode directs it in a stiff, lifeless, utterly dated style of international squareness.
Read the full reviewReview excerpts provided by Metacritic.com.
The Metascore® designation for this movie is 49
User Reviews
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