54
Metascore
23 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80Village VoiceVillage VoiceThough Natasha Lyonne as bratty daughter and Philip Baker Hall as the disposable spouse impress, it's Busch's heartfelt Joan Crawford homage that enthralls. Busch can transcend even the smog, making hazy camp seem fresh.
- 80Los Angeles TimesKevin ThomasLos Angeles TimesKevin ThomasWith his hilarious spoof Die Mommie Die! Charles Busch takes the melodramatic woman's picture of the '40s and '50s to delirious extremes.
- 80The New York TimesStephen HoldenThe New York TimesStephen HoldenMakes a jolly absurdist stew out of its sources.
- 70VarietyDennis HarveyVarietyDennis HarveyDoing for the cheesier Ross Hunter-style bigscreen soaps of the early/mid-'60s what "Far From Heaven" did for the plush Douglas Sirk melodramas of a decade earlier -- albeit with tongue planted much further in cheek -- writer/star Charles Busch's Die Mommie Die! is an enjoyable genre homage-cum-parody.
- 67Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanEntertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanBusch, looking like a depressed Stockard Channing, throws his tantrums with breathy ''aristocratic'' hauteur. Yet the movie winds up walking a line between put-on pastiche and kitsch passion, and Jason Priestley is perfect as a brooding lunkhead of Tab Hunter gigolo-osity.
- 63New York Daily NewsJami BernardNew York Daily NewsJami BernardA brilliantly pitch-perfect sendup of a particular type of cheesy movie.
- 50Dallas ObserverRobert WilonskyDallas ObserverRobert WilonskyBusch, responsible for the similarly hit-and-miss-that's-a-mister "Psycho Beach Party," has a good idea; two in one movie would make him absolutely fabulous.
- 50L.A. WeeklyChuck WilsonL.A. WeeklyChuck WilsonPredictably, the jokes are raunchy, yet they're few in number, as if the writer's sleaze well is running dry. First-time director Mark Rucker has a nice feel for period detailing but fails to build on his star's rare flashes of high energy.
- 38Chicago TribuneChicago TribuneIt's a screen adaptation of Busch's stage play of the same name, which never really went anywhere after its 1999 Los Angeles debut -- and doesn't go anywhere here.
- 20The A.V. ClubNathan RabinThe A.V. ClubNathan RabinMean-spirited and stagy where "Psycho Beach Party" was cinematic and charming, Die, Mommie, Die recycles gags from Busch's screenwriting debut--from transparently phony rear projection to a character's crippling constipation--and the law of diminishing returns kicks in pretty hard.