71
Metascore
18 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertOne of the best qualities of Map of the Human Heart was that I never quite knew where it was going. It is a love story, a war story, a lifetime story, but it manages to traverse all of that familiar terrain without doing the anticipated.
- 100Washington PostHal HinsonWashington PostHal HinsonA marvelous breakthrough, a film of incantatory intensity and moment by a prodigiously gifted young filmmaker.
- 90Los Angeles TimesMichael WilmingtonLos Angeles TimesMichael WilmingtonWard's "Map" is a wildly ambitious film and, often, a wildly beautiful one--and if it isn't quite a masterpiece, if we sense that Ward's resources aren't enough for the World War II London scenes, in the end, any flaws or lapses simply may not matter. Movies, especially ones with a broad epic canvas and international logistics, don't often get this intimate. They don't give you such a sense of nerves stripped raw, joy or misery nakedly expressed.
- 89Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovAustin ChronicleMarc SavlovSpanning three decades, Map of the Human Heart is one of those rare films that illuminates a single human story, and does it so well that you're hardly aware you're watching a movie.
- 80Time OutTime OutFate intervenes at an indecent rate, serving up plenty of misunderstandings, but the mise-en-scène is stunning. Go with the floe.
- 70The New York TimesJanet MaslinThe New York TimesJanet MaslinFar more memorable for the spectacular wildness of its Arctic and Dresden scenes (as photographed by Eduardo Serra) than for its uneven efforts to bind such images together.
- 63Chicago TribuneChicago TribuneWard's ambitions for this project far outstripped the intentions and capacities of its screenplay.
- 60EmpireEmpireScott Lee gives a surprisingly strong performance as the Inuit who falls in unrequited love with Albertine. If you can overcome the almost-too-coincidental fact that they are assigned to the same Air base several years later allowing them to be together again then this pleasing romantic drama could just be for you.
- 50TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineCult New Zealand director Vincent Ward (THE NAVIGATOR) pushes perhaps a little too hard for popularity with this oddly truncated, though engrossing, epic.