Popular reviews

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  Review by Ian West ★★★ 14

  Solid ‘real-time’ 90’s shithouse thriller with a perpetually sweaty Depp falling into the wrong place wrong time hitchcockian role and a sinister Walken having being an evil prick. Fun, dumb, and entertaining but this would’ve been a better Hitchcock movie in 1956 with Edith Head costumes and a bewildered Jimmy Stewart.

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  Review by matt lynch ★★½

  Add this to the long list of thrillers with completely inept criminal conspiracies. Also I'm absolutely furious that Depp's character isn't named Nick. Discussed on Episode 29 of The Suspense is Killing Us.

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  Review by Speeg ★★★ 9

  I’m getting to the point where a low stakes 90s thriller I had marked in my notes as watched, something I probably caught on cable a year after it was released and haven’t thought about since then, isn’t familiar at all on a rewatch. So I’m not sure if that speaks to the quality of the movie or to my memory or a combination of both. 
  Fast paced and over-plotted, taking place in what appears to be a sort of simulated real time, the film barely gives you a chance to breathe once the premise is set up, which itself only takes about five minutes. Shot and edited to look like a nightmare and you see what a man might…

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  Review by Mads Ej ★★★★

  This was a great and simple action thriller starring Johnny Depp as the main character and Christopher Walken as the villain and they were both great.
  The story follows a man, whose daughter gets kidnapped and he is given one hour to kill a politician to save her life. 
  The story was simple but exciting. The kidnapping felt a bit too easy and it was a bit unrealistic how much the villain was able to follow his every move. The ending also felt a bit weird and not really that satisfying. 
  All the stuff in between was very good though and I especially liked that the events happened in real time, since it made it more inclusive for me as…

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  Review by ᴬⁿᵗʰᵒⁿʸ ★★★

  Total missed opportunity by not having Depp’s character named “Nick.” But Walken’s far fetched timing steals the show. ⏱ 

  #99

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  Review by Travis Lytle ★★★

  Unfolding in real time, with its story taking place over same 90-minutes of its running time, John Badham's "Nick of Time" is a milquetoast thriller with a compelling gimmick. Though that gimmick does not power the film to tense, riveting highs, the film's cast and taut storytelling push the experience to rate as something, at least, above average.

  Starring Johnny Depp as a man thrust into an assassination plot, the film follows as Depp's character is forced to carry out a violent agenda in order to keep his daughter safe. As he tries to separate friend from foe, the clock ticks down toward his most unfathomable nightmare.

  The core narrative is a mostly bland political potboiler, but Badham's ability to…

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  Review by Rob Hill ★★★ 2

  On one hand, this isn't very smart. It takes some really huge logic leaps, and asks that you not think too hard about the plot.

  On the other, this is really fun. The pacing is relentless, and the movie wastes nary a second in its brisk 90 minute runtime.

  This is fun! Especially if you love mid-budget 90s thrillers half as much as I do.

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  Review by lamia ★★½

  young johnny depp with glasses 🥺🤏

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  Review by Matt LaFemina ★★½

  Aggressively 90s and mostly frustrating, you will spend most of its short run time wondering how Christopher Walken has the greatest timing ever and had everything figured out, but yet comes up with the stupidest assassination plan imaginable. The plan: kidnap Johnny Depp’s daughter and force him to kill the Governor. There are so many ways for this type of plan to easily go south, even in a pre-cell phone world, but yet there is Walken, just in “the nick of time”. With such a quick pace, I didn’t actively dislike the movie and it’s entirely watchable, but it will induce more “oh come on”s than “go Johnny go”s.

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  Review by williamfaeleith ★★½ 1

  Formulaic, fairly predictable but serviceable political conspiracy thriller. The premise is absurd, but the actors try their best and generally succeed in keeping the suspense going. That being how is Johnny Depp going to avoid doing what he's being forced to do and still save his daughter.
  Johnny's average guy accountant look suits him, but really, as another reviewer said, his character should have been called Nick.

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  Review by Jim Caddick ★★★★ 1

  I’ve never heard of this film. I’ve never seen it in a shop. I’ve never even seen anyone mention it. By all accounts, this should equate to Nick of Time being a total disaster that wasn’t even good enough for a UK DVD release - better left forgotten - an embarrassing stain on Johnny Depp’s career. Amazingly, though? This is a great watch. Fine; the dramatic editing can be a little cheesy and it’s nothing that will change your life perspective - it’s a humble little movie - but regardless, Nick of Time delivers when it comes to a fast-paced thriller about a regular guy blackmailed by seemingly unstoppable forces into killing a governor in exchange for his daughter’s life.

  
  Not…

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  Review by Justin LaLiberty ★★★ 1

  Badham isn’t Hitchcock (or De Palma) and this is largely ludicrous, even (or especially) the real time conceit, but as a lean genre exercise it’s inoffensive and *moves* which is more than I can say for anything similar being made twenty five years later; doesn’t hurt that Walken is suitably hysterical here, to the point that you really think he could shoot a child in the face and shrug it off