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10/16/07
Civic Duty (2007)
56 %
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted: 52
Fresh: 29
Rotten:23
Average Rating: 5.8/10
Consensus: At times a tense and provocative thriller, Civic Duty struggles to move beyond its one-note premise.
Synopsis: A nervy, claustrophobic look at post-9/11 anti-terrorism hysteria, CIVIC DUTY asks the difficult question: What would you do if you thought you next-door neighbor might be a terrorist? Our proxy in... [More]
Starring: Peter Krause, Khaled Abol Naga, Richard Schiff, Kari Matchett
Director: Jeff Renfroe
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Reviews for Civic Duty
If we can ignore the plot's too-often dips into cliché, we just might walk away with a lot on our minds.
10/08/07
Eventually it all boils down to cliché, with home invasions by Terry, physical confrontations between Terry and Gabe, a hostage situation, a main character getting gunned down, and all the other standard thriller tropes that might excite the kind of audie
06/22/07
Terrorism can make you crazy. Or more accurately, U.S. media hype about terrorism can drive you to believe.
05/30/07
A flawed but worthwhile examination of paranoia and clashing cultures in the 21st century.
05/21/07
Top Critic Andrew Joiner's clever and layered screenplay just may be one of the best of the year, particularly as it requires thought and may even spark debate.
05/07/07
Krause and his character are the entire movie. Watching him fall apart is fascinating and the ending has a particularly nice, if expected, twist.
05/07/07
"Rear Window" updated to post 9-11 corporate downsizing has too many mixed messages to convey the simple fear of a classic thriller.
05/06/07
There's the faint air of a solid cable movie about Civic Duty...but the questions it raises are provocative enough to make it worth seeing.
05/05/07
Until it becomes simply a hostage dilemma, the film maintains an uneasy air of mystery and suspicion.
05/05/07
An intense and startling movie for our times. It hits you right between the eyes.
05/05/07
A claustrophobic setting and the paranoid concerns of a modern world make Jeff Renfroe's "Civic Duty" an effective psychological thriller.
05/05/07
The film’s pace lags toward the end, but its grasp of manufactured fear’s dreary pervasiveness never falters.
05/05/07
It does build up considerable suspense and tension; Renfroe has learned well from Hitchcock.
05/05/07
Top Critic All that flash serves to prop up what's in essence a one-act play, constructed around a political message that's telegraphed from the start.
05/05/07
The vivid sense of time and place is the best thing about the initially promising, ultimately irritating psychological thriller Civic Duty.
05/04/07
Top Critic As thoughtful as it means to be -- its agenda is outlined by on-the-nose dialogue from its characters -- Civic Duty does little to go beyond this premise.
05/04/07
Top Critic The movie becomes a game of sorts, and to get to the 'truth' of the story we're left simply keeping score rather than examining our own perceptions and reaching any greater understanding of the very real issues at hand.
05/04/07
A sharp 9/11 twist on Rear Window paranoia, Civic Duty is all the more effective for its chilling plausibility.
05/04/07
Top CriticLatest News for Civic Duty
May 03, 2007:
"Civic Duty's" Peter Krause Talks TV, Terrorism, And Paranoia
On HBO's "Six Feet Under," Peter Krause played Nate Fisher as an outwardly cool guy haunted by internal demons; in his new film, "Civic Duty," he plays a man... More...
April 27, 2007:
Trailer & Poster review 
More...
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