‘Source Code:’ What the Critics Think

The Hollywood Reporter’s Kirk Honeycutt calls the sci-fi flick, which opens Friday, “a dead-ringer for Groundhog Day, only without the laughs.”

 

It centers on Colter Stevens (Gyllenhaal), a soldier who wakes up in the body of an unknown man and discovers he’s part of a mission to find the bomber of a Chicago commuter train.

 

Confused?

 

“Good,” says Bill Goodykoontz of Arizona Republic. “Director Duncan Jones has you right where you wants you … What’s really cool about the film … is how Jones makes sure that we don’t know any more than Stevens does, right up till the end.”

 

Moira Macdonald of The Seattle Times says “the movie works a little better if you don’t ask yourself too many questions about it.”

 

Gyllenhaal makes the “swiftly moving thriller” more enjoyable as well, she says.

 

The actor “is effective as a mystified fellow who eventually engages himself — and us — in putting the pieces of the puzzle together,” she writes.

 

The New York Times‘ Manohla Dargis agrees.

 

She says Gyllenhaal “hits the dark and light notes right, bringing subtle differences to his performance.” 

 

He also has plenty of heat with costar Michelle Monaghan.

 

Notes New York magazine‘s David Edelstein: “Those who inexplicably convinced themselves that Matt Damon and Emily Blunt had romantic chemistry in The Adjustment Bureau should check out true heat, courtesy of Gyllenhaal’s unblinking baby blues and Michelle Monaghan’s irrepressible glow.”