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So-so
Avg. Critic Score: 45 out of 100 Mixed or average reviews Metascore® based on all critic reviews
Information for Parents:
13 Iffy for 13+
Read Common Sense Media review

Critic scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating more favorable reviews.

  • 75
    Chicago Sun-Times | Roger Ebert

    An ingenious attempt to update an old plot with new technology, and it is made with competence, skillful acting, and the ability to make us feel cleverer about digital stuff than we really are. Read full review

  • 60
    The Hollywood Reporter | Kirk Honeycutt

    The amount of enjoyment one gets out of the Harrison Ford crime-action thriller Firewall depends on one's tolerance for watching thugs terrify an innocent family for most of the movie. Read full review

  • 60
    Variety | Brian Lowry

    Firewall begins slowly, exhibits hints of promise in the middle and then descends into silliness. Read full review

  • 50
    San Francisco Chronicle | Mick LaSalle

    I like it for the thing it is, a reasonably solid B movie, and I like it as one in the continuum of bizarre Ford vehicles that combine high-stakes action with household horror. Read full review

  • 50
    Rolling Stone | Peter Travers

    As a thriller, Firewall is flabby and familiar. Read full review

  • 50
    The New York Times | Manohla Dargis

    Manages to entertain mildly only because it traffics in all the familiar action-movie clichs, giving moviegoers ample opportunity to test their action-movie I.Q. Read full review

  • 50
    USA Today | Claudia Puig

    Firewall might be worth renting on an inclement weekend when the pickings are slim. It does have some tense moments - even if some of the technical plot points don't quite scan. But, overall, it just feels like a rehash. Read full review

  • 50
    Los Angeles Times | Kenneth Turan

    For though it is a reasonable facsimile of a successful thriller, this film (named after a barrier that protects computers from hackers) never manages to be more than mildly effective. Read full review

  • 40
    Washington Post | Desson Thomson

    Flagging energy isn't the only issue here; Ford has become enslaved in his own cliches. Read full review

  • 16
    Entertainment Weekly | Lisa Schwarzbaum

    Firewall is a witless entertainment, and a derivative one, too; it's everything listless about Hollywood in February, everything discardable about the genre in general. Read full review

View more reviews for Firewall on Metacritic

Information for Parents
Common Sense Media says Iffy for 13+ Harrison Ford as action hero again. Teens and up.
What Parents Need to Know Parents need to know that this film considers fears of surveillance, with characters showing both anxiety and ingenuity trying to avoid it. It includes multiple tense scenes, as well as violent scenes, both abrupt (as when the villains burst into the family's home and again when the chief villain whomps Jack across the face) and sustained (a prolonged, bruising, bloody fight scene at the end). References are made to online gambling and identity theft. The family's escape attempt appears in fast cuts and jarring images; a child who is allergic to nuts suffers an alarming, nearly fatal reaction. Villains brandish guns, and three men are shot on screen, upsetting other characters who observe. Characters use mild language and a villain's dumping of the family dog leads to the mom's and kids' tears.
  • Families can talk about the insecurity of online exchanges, of information, money, and identities. What does Jack's change from compliant victim to agitated hero suggest about the consequences of pushing "nice guys" to the edge? How must Jack give up some of his authority (at least until the film's climax), to prevail over his more predictable enemies?
The good stuff
  • message true0 Positive messages: Villains are greedy and aggressive; hero must use deadly violence to save his family.
What to watch for
  • violence false3 Violence: Guns wielded, sudden shootings, bloody fisticuffs, smashed cars, bodies thrown through windows; a child suffers a severe allgeric reaction.
  • sex false0 Sex: Villains threaten family, including wife and 14-year-old girl, forcing wife to pretend to have an affair with her husband's friend.
  • language false3 Language: Mild language, including "screw you," the s-word, "hell."
  • consumerism false0 Consumerism: Equifax (online service), Flintstones on television.
  • drugsalcoholtobacco false0 Drinking, drugs and smoking: Not an issue
An independent nonprofit dedicated to providing families the information they need to help kids thrive in a world of media and technology. © Common Sense Media Inc. 2010. All rights reserved.

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