Club Dread 2004

Critics score:
29 / 100

Reviews provided by RottenTomatoes

John Monaghan, Detroit Free Press: If Project Greenlight ever awarded a movie-making contract to a group of drunken frat boys, it might look something like Broken Lizard's Club Dread. Read more

Mark Caro, Chicago Tribune: Outrageous comedy isn't meant to be this safe. Read more

Ted Fry, Seattle Times: A shabby attempt at mixing elements of a teen slasher flick with the lowbrow laughs of a teen sex romp. Neither one adds up to the sum of its whole. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: In these sensitive, politically correct times, I thought it was refreshing to see a comedy troupe that's perfectly willing to fill the screen with exposed flesh and buckets of blood, in the name of cheap but legitimate laughs. Read more

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: A bumptious splatter farce that manages to improve from awful to moderately engaging as its cast is winnowed down to the five guys themselves. Read more

Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times: If the group strikes gold at the box office with its new picture, Broken Lizard's Club Dread, it will be more for the seemingly surefire combination of extreme violence and extreme raunch rather than for anything resembling comic inspiration. Read more

Houston Chronicle: Read more

Scott Brown, Entertainment Weekly: A few gags are brilliantly staged, but most have a smug, collegiate take-it-or- leave-it quality that makes full-on belly laughter feel optional. Read more

Gary Dowell, Dallas Morning News: The jokes don't always work, and some of the scares are weak. But Club Dread is a comedy that tries to be scary, and much of the time succeeds at both. Read more

Scott Foundas, L.A. Weekly: Director Jay Chandrasekhar is a master forger of images and situations from horror movies past, but unlike Wes Craven did in Scream, he doesn't build on them in any way, and the result is the opposite of what's intended; the movie is stultifying. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: Hackneyed premise, recycled jokes. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: Most of the movie is just blood and bodies, some of the dead, some of them topless, and none of them interesting. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: Pure dumb fun. Read more

Dave Kehr, New York Times: A disappointingly routine horror movie spoof that follows the well-worn path of the Scream and Scary Movie franchises. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: This is the first movie in years to challenge Ed Wood's Plan Nine From Outer Space for the title 'worst movie ever.' Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: There will be better movies playing in the same theater, even if it is a duplex, but on the other hand there is something to be said for goofiness without apology by broken lizards who just wanna have fun. Read more

Ruthe Stein, San Francisco Chronicle: Doesn't quite capture the devil-may-care feel of a sex comedy. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: A splatter of scenes that relocate the funny-bone in the lower anatomical regions -- sometimes hitting the mark, occasionally a glancing blow, often missing completely. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: Club Dread is just stupid, period. Read more

Time Out: Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: We realize it's a spoof of bad movies. But does a satire of bad movies need to be bad, too? Read more

Joe Leydon, Variety: Stunningly unfunny. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, Village Voice: As relaxed and fun-loving as its characters. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: About as funny as malaria. Read more