The defence The Sentimental Softie
“Sincerity is not manipulation.”
The film risks embarrassment to make emotion communal, and that openness is harder than fashionable detachment.
Back to trending 
The Sheltering Sky
Drama · Adventure · 1990
An American couple drift toward emptiness in postwar North Africa.
Movie details
The Sheltering Sky
“A woman's dangerous and erotic journey...”
1990 Drama · Adventure 2h 18m
Critical arithmetic
One number, for now.
Scores change. Arguments endure.
TMDB
6.5 / 10
Community rating
An American couple drift toward emptiness in postwar North Africa.
CriticWise case file
What this film says about your taste.
Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.
The archetype split
Who fights over The Sheltering Sky?
For the defence
The Sentimental Softie
“You came to feel something, and you will.”
Read their case For the prosecution
The Cool Ironist
“Feeling things is a little embarrassing.”
Read their objectionThe split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.
Taste neighbourhood
Nearby on the taste map.
TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.
Black Gold
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On the Arabian Peninsula in the 1930s, two warring leaders come face to face. The victorious Nesib, Emir of Hobeika, lays down his peace terms to rival Amar, Sultan of Salmaah. The two men agree that neither can lay claim to the area of no man’s land between them called The Yellow Belt. In return, Nesib adopts Amar’s two boys Saleeh and Auda as a guarantee against invasion. Twelve years later, Saleeh and Auda have grown into young men. Saleeh, the warrior, itches to escape his gilded cage and return to his father’s land. Auda cares only for books and the pursuit of knowledge. One day, their adopted father Nesib is visited by an American from Texas. He tells the Emir that his land is blessed with oil and promises him riches beyond his wildest imagination. Nesib imagines a realm of infinite possibility, a kingdom with roads, schools and hospitals all paid for by the black gold beneath the barren sand. There is only one problem. The precious oil is located in the Yellow Belt.
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The Ledge
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Horns
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Beast
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Blood Diamond
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An ex-mercenary turned smuggler. A Mende fisherman. Amid the explosive civil war overtaking 1999 Sierra Leone, these men join for two desperate missions: recovering a rare pink diamond of immense value and rescuing the fisherman's son, conscripted as a child soldier into the brutal rebel forces ripping a swath of torture and bloodshed countrywide.
Brothers
Drama · 2009
When his helicopter goes down during his fourth tour of duty in Afghanistan, Marine Sam Cahill is presumed dead. Back home, brother Tommy steps in to look over Sam’s wife, Grace, and two children. Sam’s surprise homecoming triggers domestic mayhem.
Max
War · 2002
In 1918, a young, disillusioned Adolf Hitler strikes up a friendship with a Jewish art dealer while weighing a life of passion for art vs. talent at politics
The Only Living Boy in New York
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When a young man learns that his overbearing father is having an affair, he tries to stop it, only to be seduced by the older woman as well.
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Names above the title
The people responsible.
Cast & crew
Directed by
Bernardo Bertolucci
Written by
Mark Peploe · Bernardo Bertolucci
Debra Winger
Kit
John Malkovich
Port
Campbell Scott
Tunner
Jill Bennett
Mrs. Lyle
Timothy Spall
Eric Lyle
Eric Vu-An
Belqassim
Amina Annabi
Mahrnia
Court is in session
Put The Sheltering Sky on trial.
Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.
The prosecution The Cool Ironist
“The strings are showing.”
Every cue tells you exactly what to feel and when, leaving sentiment to do the work character should have done.