Legendary: Critic Reviews

67%

MovieWeb: 1 reviews

17%

RottenTomatoes: 42 reviews

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Adam Markovitz Entertainment Weekly (Top Critic)

34

A well-meaning dud that'll put you out faster than a sleeper hold.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Stephen Holden New York Times (Top Critic)

50

Follows a straight narrative line to its cliched ending without a deviation from formula.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Scott Bowles USA Today (Top Critic)

50

For a movie with a star wrestler at the center of it, Legendary doesn't pack much of a punch.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Stephanie Merry Washington Post (Top Critic)

50

Exactly what you might expect, right down to the montage of blindfolded tussling, jogging and high-fives to the tune of unrelenting inspirational music.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Ty Burr Boston Globe (Top Critic)

38

1985's Vision Quest is still the best movie on the subject, and that isn't saying much.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Melissa Anderson Village Voice (Top Critic)

[A] slow drip of high-fructose corn syrup.
Full Review » 2 years ago
David Roark Dallas Morning News (Top Critic)

50

Legendary relies heavily on veteran actors Patricia Clarkson and Danny Glover. However good they are, they're incapable of making it any better than a made-for-TV movie.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times (Top Critic)

50

It's a feel-good Kleenex(TM) dispenser of a movie, and there's nothing necessarily wrong with that, but it's routine Hallmark Hall of Afterschool Special material.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Michael Phillips Chicago Tribune (Top Critic)

50

Legendary is so intent on paying heartfelt tribute to dogged young athletes that it neglects basic story needs.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Rex Reed New York Observer (Top Critic)

Talk about movies that cannot possibly live up to their titles.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Ronnie Scheib Variety (Top Critic)

Better thesped and helmed than its schmaltzy premise probably warrants.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Lou Lumenick New York Post (Top Critic)

75

It may not live up to that grandiose title, but this rousingly sweet little flick is certainly nothing to go out of your way to avoid.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Roger Moore Orlando Sentinel (Top Critic)

38

The script, by actor turned writer John Posey, has structural problems and motivational issues in between the cliches. And Cena, a few movies into his career, is still all presence and no acting.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Sheri Linden Hollywood Reporter (Top Critic)

Patricia Clarkson's charismatic warmth elevates an awkward inspirational sports drama.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Robert Abele Los Angeles Times (Top Critic)

30

A school wrestling drama so mired in family-film cliches it can never shake loose the suspicion that -- not unlike certain high-gloss mat bouts -- the emotional fix is in from the get-go.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Sean Means Salt Lake Tribune

38

Cena?s a game actor, but imagining him in the same gene pool as the petite Clarkson or the scrawny Graye is too much of a stretch.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Mike Scott Times-Picayune

50

Not nearly cinematic enough or well-written enough to take that doozy of a step that so often separates "inspirational" and "hokey."
Full Review » 2 years ago
Philip Martin Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

82

As schmaltzy after-school special/Hallmark Hall of Fame family fare goes, Legendary isn't so bad.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Gary Thompson Philadelphia Daily News

42

There is something comical about the way the movie tries to integrate Cena's massively muscled torso into its chosen atmosphere of casual realism. He looks like something out of Transformers.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Marshall Fine Hollywood & Fine

This isn't paint by numbers - it's color by numbers, with dull crayons. The only reason to see it is if you happen to want to be a Patricia Clarkson completist.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Frank Lovece Film Journal International

Stix Dig Hick Pix? A firmly Middle American high-school drama, set in small-town Oklahoma, about classical wrestling, starring a sports-entertainment wrestler and produced by World Wrestling Entertainment.
Full Review » 2 years ago
Connie Ogle Miami Herald

38

A by-the-numbers sports drama with a death grip on cliches and acting every bit as flat as the mat...
Full Review » 2 years ago
Joe Williams St. Louis Post-Dispatch

50

Every emotional moment is punctuated by plinking piano, and every wrestling match is underscored by hard rock.
Full Review » 2 years ago
S. Jhoanna Robledo Common Sense Media

40

Predictable but moving sports drama goes beyond wrestling.
Full Review » 2 years ago
John Beifuss Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)

38

Even in our current culture of devalued vocabulary, it takes a lot of chutzpah to make a movie about a high school kid who wins a few wrestling matches and title it 'Legendary.'
Full Review » 2 years ago