“Jennifer Aniston should not see this movie, under any circumstances. You don't need photographers hiding in bushes to figure out whether Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have the hots for each other...The screen smokes with sexual heat. But what's really erotic is how much fun the actors seem to be having. They're enjoying each other's company, and they're exaggerating their already awesome sex appeal for the sake of the comedy. The audience shares their good time, and it's a turn-on...The Smiths go at each other in a molten cascade of comic violence that just gets them more aroused...Pitt and Jolie can deny it all they want, but ‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith’ makes a good case that what you see is what they got.” --Jami Bernard, The New York Daily News

“The stars in this tabloid-juiced project are so pleased with themselves that audience approval seems almost superfluous. Angelina Jolie looks hot, but she flirts with the camera like an amateur, turning her head to the side and slowly lowering her eyelids. What she does here is less acting than voguing--she’s invulnerable and smug, as if she dropped into the movie from a couture runway. After a few genial moments, Brad Pitt goes remote, and his voice is so inexpressive and toneless that people in the theatre were complaining that they couldn’t understand what he was saying.The movie is a technological and publicity triumph, and a calamity in every other way.” --David Denby, The New Yorker

“Pitt and Jolie play secret agents who don't know each other's line of work when they get married, then become rivals and eventually partners in the licensed-to-kill game. The movie is a mish-mash of action-adventure clichés, book-ended with lame attempts at psychological interest. Written, directed, and acted with ham-fisted heaviness.” --David Sterritt, The Christian Science Monitor

“Pitt and Jolie flirt with expert timing, and they're never sexier than when they're biting each other's heads off. It helps, of course, that the two are ideally matched physical specimens, with a his-and-hers set of bee-stung lips — his, if anything, are even poutier — and a shared attitude of come-hither carnality. Pitt's heavy-lidded gaze makes it look as if he were stoned on the happy knowledge of what a sun-god pinup he is, and Jolie, with her naughty yet playful hellcat snarl, is perhaps his first female costar to come on like she could eat him for breakfast...but for all the nimbleness of its first half and the chemical zing of Pitt and Jolie, the film devolves into a fractious and explosive mess, hitting the same note of ‘ironic’ violence over and over.” --Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly

“An action comedy for suburban women that's as toothless as a newborn, and nearly as stupid. It tries so hard to be cute that it practically drools on your shoulder...The film has only one idea, and that is a stolen one. Suburban superspy goes to work at the assassination bureau each day, without the spouse suspecting? I saw ‘True Lies’ too...There is never the sense that either lead is ever in the slightest danger, an attitude that renders the action campy rather than exciting. During the big final blowout, set in one of those nesting superstores, you'll be looking at the kitchenware instead of the shooting.” --Kyle Smith, The New York Post

“A genre hybrid that combines comedy and action to awkward effect... Ms. Jolie's singular beauty and preternatural intensity have failed to give her many worthy roles, but whenever she is onscreen you can't take your eyes off her. Her beauty makes her as pleasurable viewing as Mr. Pitt, but her intensity also means that she upends this film's delicate balance of hard action and soft romance...All it takes is five minutes with Ms. Jolie to realize that Mrs. Smith could wipe the floor with Mr. Smith and probably burns for nothing more.” --Manohla Dargis, The New York Times

“Hollywood teems with swollen-lipped actresses, but Angelina Jolie is the only one with the spirit to match her humongous tire-treads. She's so large a presence that she doesn't need to pull out the stops...she meshes surprisingly well with Brad Pitt...They're both unbelievably fit and pretty, and Pitt is canny enough not to get into an acting contest with her. She's disarmingly direct; he's an adorable ditherer. She should be able to incinerate him with a stare, but he doesn't mind falling back on his looks and letting her telepathic torpedos bounce harmlessly off his impenetrable shell of narcissism.” --David Edelstein, Slate

“When millions of filmgoers queue up to watch ‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith’ this weekend, it won't be for clever repartee, big explosions or steamy sex (which reportedly has been edited out anyway); it will be to ascertain, firsthand, whether this is a romance of Bogie-and-Bacall proportions or just another Cruise-and-Holmes stunt. What this critic can report is that Pitt and Jolie create genuine sparks in ‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith’ when the movie gives them the time and space to resemble sentient human beings. And that's a narrow window, indeed...Pitt and Jolie throw off unmistakable heat, but little warmth; indeed at times the entire exercise seems creepily cold and calculated.” --Ann Hornaday, The Washington Post

“Plot contrivance and major league implausibility are the bread and butter of a film whose motto might be ‘look all you want but don't think too hard.’ Fortunately, when your stars are Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, looking — and listening — will keep you well satisfied...It's hard to think of a more compellingly attractive on-screen couple. But Brad and Angelina are not just eye candy. Under Doug Liman's tutelage, they are having it both ways: enjoying themselves and each other while simultaneously sending up their public image.” --Kenneth Turan, The Los Angeles Times

“There’s such piquant chemistry between these two, I watched in a happily muddled state, mixing up everything I think I know about the actors’ private lives with the wittily exciting action-lives they’re leading onscreen...The movie has the clever nerve to play into our tabloid knowledge of the supposed Pitt-Jolie hookup by presenting it as a dangerous liaison...‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith’ is the rare movie that both captures its pop-culture moment and transcends it.” --Ken Tucker, New York Magazine

“Pitt and Jolie make sexy sparring partners, but they can't lift this leaden material. To compensate, Liman piles on the stunts, which grow boring and repetitive...Only Vince Vaughn registers hilariously as John's boss. Asked about business, he replies, "Same old, same old. People need killing." People also need more in a movie than proof that looks aren't everything.” --Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

“Off-screen chemistry does not necessarily translate onto the screen. Kidman and Cruise? Ben and J. Lo? Enough said. As for Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in ‘Mr. and Mrs. Smith,’ that's an entirely different story... Jolie and Pitt's spontaneous, playfully lusty rapport has an improvisational feel that gives their most outlandish stunts a veneer of verisimilitude...With the notable exception of Vince Vaughn—frazzled and funny in a supporting role as Pitt's mother-dominated boss—Brad and Angelina are the whole show here...They complete each other.” --David Ansen, Newsweek

“Brad Pitt is seriously buff. Angelina Jolie is seriously trashy. And ‘Mr. and Mrs. Smith,’ the movie famous for the way it broke up his marriage to Jennifer Aniston and launched the Pitt-Jolie team on one of the dopiest and most gimmicky P.R.-fueled love affairs since Kermit met Miss Piggy, is seriously preposterous...Brad Pitt’s wry trademark sarcasm is familiar stuff, and Angelina Jolie’s artificially swollen bee-stung lips and tweaked nipples do not make up for her stunning uncertainty about how to play an intimate scene convincingly...Too much phony allure and contrived sexual chemistry wears thin fast.” --Rex Reed, The New York Observer

“What makes the movie work is that Pitt and Jolie have fun together on the screen, and they're able to find a rhythm that allows them to be understated and amused even during the most alarming developments. There are many ways that John and Jane Smith could have been played awkwardly, or out of synch, but the actors understand the material and hold themselves at just the right distance from it; we understand this is not really an action picture, but a movie star romance in which the action picture serves as a location.” --Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

“Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie play cool without ever being cool. The director, Doug Liman, and the writer, Simon Kinberg, give them hollow, pseudo-clever lines that only accent her self-satisfaction and his brittleness....Pitt and Jolie have never been the personality kids at the party, but Liman and Kinberg make them downright boring. As far as the comedy goes, the movie continually proves that two half-wits don't make a whole. ...It's hard to know what these stars are ready for after this fiasco. Maybe a fitness video.” --Michael Sragow, Baltimore