आलोचक समीक्षाएं

Of course, there's still the Williams schmaltz factor.

But the best thing about Jakob the Liar is that it's not "Patch Adams at Auschwitz."

More altruistic would be if Williams stopped torturing us with weepy endearments so he could look for that complex clown who used to mug just for laughs.

I prefer "Life Is Beautiful," which is clearly a fantasy, to Jakob the Liar, which is just as contrived and manipulative but pretends it is not.

Flat and forced, Jakob the Liar aspires to be a poignant parable about the power of hope but instead uses one of humanity's greatest tragedies for trite melodrama.

Feels sterile and chilly; the humor -- Yiddish and otherwise -- falls flat, and sadly so does the film.

An awkwardly executed, tedious and -- a near impossibility for a Holocaust movie -- emotionally uninvolving bore.

A particularly gross exploitation of the Holocaust for financial gain.

The latest in what feels like an endless string of movies ... in which the actor's parts have ruinously overdosed on sentimentality and schmaltz at the expense of humor and even sanity.

Just avoid this ghastly, insulting farrago at all costs.