Little Children (2006) - Oscar® Nominee!

New York Times
"[A] superb film adaptation of the novel by Tom Perrotta....A rigorous study of adult behavior....[The film] balances tenderness with satire." 09/29/2006 p.E1-E8

Entertainment Weekly
"[A] jolting, artfully made drama set in and around a suburban playground somewhere between AMERICAN BEAUTY and IN THE BEDROOM on America's psychic highway." 10/13/2006 p.109

Rolling Stone
"A never-better Kate Winslet goes so deep into her character you can almost feel her nerve endings....Most movies fade from the memory. This one sticks." 10/19/2006 p.138

Total Film
4 stars out of 5 -- "Todd Field's second feature prickles with sterile threat and looming suburban doom....Field gathers everything into a climax that trains a brutal light on the big idea: living is easy, growing up is hard." 12/01/2006 p.46

Box Office
"All may seem neat and tidy, but simmering beneath is a hotbead of anxiety, frustration and infidelity." 12/01/2006 p.79

Uncut
"[A] superbly realised and wryly comic melodrama of suburban angst, anomie and adultery." 01/01/2007 p.69-70

Premiere
3.5 stars out of 4 -- "[O]ne of the best American films in recent memory. It is by turns disturbing and uplifting, both horrible and horribly funny, which is to say, more than a bit like real life." 04/01/2007 p.86

Ultimate DVD
4 stars out of 5 -- "[I]t's impossible not to be drawn into Field's intriguing and beautifully crafted drama." 03/01/2007 p.113

ReelViews 9 of 10
It's not necessary to look at the color of the leaves to determine the season of the year when movies of this power come along. Little Children, the second feature from director Todd Field (In the Bedroom), is the rarest of movies - a literary multi-character drama. From the erudition of the voiceover narrative to the three dimensionality of the characters, Field's film is the closest it's possible to get to a book without reading one. The story is presented in an unhurried fashion with all the characters and situations being allowed to develop and expand in a natural fashion...The main story deals with Sarah and Brad, but the other characters are given existences of their own, which is rare in motion pictures, and Little Children is richer for it. - James Berardinelli
 
Reel.com 9 of 10
A nearly pitch-perfect adaptation of Tom Perrotta's lauded satirical novel, Little Children is a film that just misses greatness. Returning to the suburban milieu of his Oscar-nominated directorial debut In the Bedroom (2001), writer/director Todd Field has achieved that rarity in cinema: a film that not only honors the source material, but, at least in one respect, improves upon it. For whereas Perrotta's 2004 bestseller peters out in frustrating ambiguity, the film version of Little Children ties up the many narrative strands with intelligence and greater emotional weight. Expertly juggling the film's quicksilver shifts in tone from pitch-black comedy to domestic drama to emotionally acute character study, Field directs with an assurance that belies his relative inexperience behind the camera. - Tim Knight