Everyone's Hero 2006

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune: A likable, good-natured family show -- one that takes a typical boyhood fantasy of improbable sports heroics and inflates it into a cracked cartoon odyssey. Read more

Joshua Katzman, Chicago Reader: This computer-animated baseball adventure espouses a shopworn moral about persevering against long odds, but there's still plenty to recommend it, including memorable characters, solid storytelling, and accurate period detail. Read more

Tom Keogh, Seattle Times: It's all good fun, but the film really only works if one buys its more awkward elements. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: A sweet but very forgettable animated adventure. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: The movie means well and, like tee ball, it's probably best suited for the littlest kids only. Read more

Bob Townsend, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Everyone's Hero is a labor of love. And that clearly comes through in this feel-good animated feature about a 10-year-old boy, Yankee Irving, who becomes an unlikely World Series hero for the 1932 New York Yankees. Read more

Tasha Robinson, AV Club: It's a shallow, treacly movie for children too little to question its many pointless puerilities. Read more

Bill Muller, Arizona Republic: I can't say Everyone's Hero strikes out -- it might distract little kids for a while -- but the directors needn't bother practicing their home run trots. Read more

Janice Page, Boston Globe: If it's not in the same league of talking-inanimate-object cartoons as Cars, at least we can say it has heart. And that's always more important than stars. Read more

Gregory Kirschling, Entertainment Weekly: Everyone's Hero re-creates Depression-era America with surprisingly agreeable anachronistic panache. Read more

John Monaghan, Detroit Free Press: A likable, lumbering, computer-animated children's movie set during the Depression that is more entertaining than it has any right to be. Read more

Mark Medley, Globe and Mail: Everyone's Hero is an after-school special stretched to feature-film length. Read more

Nancy Churnin, Dallas Morning News: This handsomely animated, well-directed and -voiced G-rated film, set in the hope-starved era of the Depression, takes on special poignancy as the last directing project of Christopher Reeve. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: No one but the youngest in the family will care much about it ... Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: [A] simple, pleasant film ... Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: ... amiable ... Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: The script is anachronistic and trite ... Read more

Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: ... just another forgettable entry at the end of a summer that offered an unprecedented amount of mediocre animated films. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Bill Zwecker, Chicago Sun-Times: It's a shame that Christopher Reeve's final directorial effort could not have been a more fitting, and lasting, tribute. Read more

Susan Walker, Toronto Star: ... feels more like a 1950s cartoon. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Everyone's Hero is a sweet, inspirational movie that doesn't offer any surprises, but entertains youthful audiences in a gentle, almost old-fashioned way. Read more

Joe Leydon, Variety: ... a modestly engaging mix of broad comedy and nostalgic fable, spiked with a few unwelcome sprinklings of gross-out gags. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: The movie is a feast of miscalculations. Read more