Tom Steele Out Magazine May 25, 2022

The movie is a blistering and important jeremiad about the woeful ways that far too many Americans treat children.

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Steve Erickson Gay City News Jan 29, 2019

A flat plot description would make "The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things" sound like one of the most harrowing films ever made. However, Argento presents it with a lyricism that makes its horrors bearable.

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Rob Gonsalves Rob's Movie Vault Nov 9, 2008 B

Marks [Asia Argento] as a far more adventurous and even risk-addicted filmmaker than her famous father Dario.

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Sky Hirschkron Stylus Magazine Sep 6, 2006 B+

[The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things] has a deceptively desultory structure where no moral system or 'new daddy' seems to hold much water upon introduction, but each accumulates ideas which make an atavistic reappearance at the most inopportune of tim

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Phil Villarreal Arizona Daily Star May 25, 2006 2.5/4

To appreciate or even tolerate the film, you must separate yourself from the characters and the material. What's unfortunate is that the movie is too well made to let you do just that.

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Marc Savlov Austin Chronicle May 6, 2006 3/5

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Ann Hornaday Washington Post Apr 13, 2006

Reeks of a project desperate for edgy credibility.

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Jeff Shannon Seattle Times Apr 7, 2006 2.5/4

Argento's film is arguably exploitative, but its real-life horrors are effectively authentic.

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Sean Axmaker Seattle Post-Intelligencer Apr 6, 2006 C-

... shapeless, excessively lurid and often unpleasant, with Argento shamelessly vamping the white-trash junkie mother and truck-stop hooker.

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Ron Wilkinson Monsters and Critics Apr 3, 2006 7/10

JT LeRoy may be a scam, but Argento's scalding treatment of adults behaving badly is as real as cold French fries in a West Virginia truck stop.

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Jeremy C. Fox Pajiba Mar 28, 2006

We see the horrors of Jeremiah's life, but there's no opportunity to connect with the character; it's just a litany of abuse with no meaning and no redemption.

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Tamara Straus San Francisco Chronicle Mar 24, 2006 1/4

Now the fabricated story of a boyhood that included abandonment, rape and near constant fear and humiliation is a movie. The result is unwatchable.

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Bob Strauss Los Angeles Daily News Mar 24, 2006 1.5/4

I don't know if the movie follows the book closely, but if it does, you kind of have to wonder how Leroy or Albert or whoever it was made such a splash in the first place.

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Ty Burr Boston Globe Mar 24, 2006 0.5/4

Vile beyond redemption.

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MaryAnn Johanson Flick Filosopher Mar 23, 2006

[H]as a sucker-punch power more potent that what most movies specifically designed as 'horror' can muster...

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Jeffrey M. Anderson Combustible Celluloid Mar 23, 2006 3/4

[Argento's] fast-moving, devil-may-care filmmaking keeps The Heart Is Deceitful dangling just above its relentlessly harrowing subject matter.

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Robin Clifford Reeling Reviews Mar 23, 2006 B-

The story conveys so much emotion that I found myself wanting to yell at the screen, "Leave that boy alone!"

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Laura Clifford Reeling Reviews Mar 20, 2006 C+

Argento has made a ferocious film including her own committed performance, but like her character, she loses control in the final goings.

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Jessica Reaves Chicago Tribune Mar 18, 2006 1.5/4

At best, this film raises an all-too-relevant question: Are true-life stories interesting because they're true? Or because they're interesting? At worst, it raises a different question: What if they're neither true nor interesting?

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