Name : Richard Brody / Alias : New Yorker
A wallpaper-thin but sentimentally effective hagiography.

Name : Soren Anderson / Alias : Seattle Times
Directed by Stephen Hopkins from a screenplay by Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse, "Race" is a well-made biopic about Owens at the Berlin Games and the events leading up to his extraordinary accomplishment.

Name : Alan Zilberman / Alias : Washington Post
The script and direction of "Race" are both workmanlike and serve the film well, helping us to see Owens and Snyder as ordinary people with extraordinary gifts.

Name : Calvin Wilson / Alias : St. Louis Post-Dispatch
James makes for a charismatic hero, and former "Saturday Night Live" star Sudeikis is a revelation as the steadfast Snyder.

Name : Stephen Whitty / Alias : New York Daily News
As a Hollywood biography of the great Jesse Owens, it's meant to be epic. But its characters feel flat and unreal. Apart from a few big moments, it's as cheap and false as a 1970s TV flick.

Name : Tony Hicks / Alias : San Jose Mercury News
"Race" is the story of Owens in his finest moments, and it succeeds in telling it. Just don't expect more than that.

Name : Rene Rodriguez / Alias : Miami Herald
A dull portrait of an extraordinary man.

Name : Jesse Hassenger / Alias : AV Club
Ultimately, it offers history told as a series of passing anecdotes.

Name : Stephen Holden / Alias : New York Times
"Race" reminds us that long before television elevated black sports heroes into gods, there were athletes like Jesse Owens who paved the way.

Name : Richard Roeper / Alias : Chicago Sun-Times
"Race" tells the story of a brave and gifted and determined man who accomplished great feats during a pivotal moment in world history - but it's a by-the-numbers sports biopic with little nuance and a penchant for saccharine-soaked dramatic moments.

Name : Joe Morgenstern / Alias : Wall Street Journal
It's a saga of unquenchable spirit and fast-twitch muscles shot in slow-twitch style.

Name : Mick LaSalle / Alias : San Francisco Chronicle
It's amazing, the power of drama to make audiences worry about an outcome that is part of the historical record, but "Race" accomplishes just that.

Name : Michael Phillips / Alias : Chicago Tribune
"Race" can't help but engage when it gets to the games. But what's the point of telling Jesse Owens' story if you don't get into what made him tick, and drove his success as an athlete?

Name : Inkoo Kang / Alias : TheWrap
A keen exploration of how to make a political statement without saying a word, and how best to stay true to one's self while making necessary compromises and calculations.

Name : Brian Truitt / Alias : USA Today
At a time when the Oscars and movies, in general, struggle with finding racial balance, two guys of different skin colors coming together for some sports-movie magic is a fitting and truly welcoming lapping of the competition.

Name : Linda Barnard / Alias : Toronto Star
Owens's story is certainly one that needs telling, although Race isn't as strong as it could be, even if it does include a larger narrative than one man's rise to greatness.

Name : Peter Travers / Alias : Rolling Stone
Director Stephen Hopkins plods when he needs to sprint, but Jesse Owens is a great movie subject. His triumph at the 1936 Olympics left Hitler to suck it up and watch a black man shatter his cuckoo theories of an Aryan master race.

Name : Kyle Smith / Alias : New York Post
"Race" is disappointing in parts, but Stephan James makes for an appealing star .

Name : Stephanie Zacharek / Alias : TIME Magazine
Where is Owens in all of this? By the end of Race, we don't know much more about him as an individual than we did when the movie began.

Name : Colin Covert / Alias : Minneapolis Star Tribune
Hopkins, a prolific producer/director of B movies, moves things at a steady pace through the film's two-plus hours, getting many facts right, fudging a few and ignoring some. Those it shows with sensitivity are breathtaking.

Name : Christian Holub / Alias : Entertainment Weekly
The title is on-the-nose but rather fitting for the story of Jesse Owens, the black track-and-field athlete who stunned the world by winning four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in Adolf Hitler's Berlin .

Name : Ty Burr / Alias : Boston Globe
"Race" wants so badly to get every last bit of the big picture that it dashes past the little details that actually tell a story. Like an over-trained athlete who pulls a hamstring in the big race, the movie tries to do it all and comes up short.

Name : Scott Tobias / Alias : Village Voice
Race follows the pattern of so many other sports biopics in which it's white patronage that makes black triumphs possible.

Name : Jim Slotek / Alias : Toronto Sun
A glossy, superficial biopic set in a historical context that begs for more, Race can at least claim to be one of the two best movies ever made about Olympic hero/Hitler-embarrasser Jesse Owens.

Name : Adam Graham / Alias : Detroit News
A so-so movie about an extraordinary athlete.

Name : David Sims / Alias : The Atlantic
Race wants to end, unsurprisingly, on a note of uplift-but for a film with so much dark, unexplored potential, it's an unsatisfying finish line to cross.

Name : Andrew Barker / Alias : Variety
Making a few admirable attempts to complicate what could have been a standard-issue inspirational sports narrative, "Race" is better than it has to be, but not by too much .

Name : Kate Taylor / Alias : Globe and Mail
Hopkins films all the races with suitable elan - since Owens was a sprinter, accomplishing his feats in a matter of seconds, they are relatively easy to dramatize - but you don't leave the theatre with much understanding of how he did it.

Name : James Berardinelli / Alias : ReelViews
The bare necessities are there, the performances are competent, and there are some strong moments but Race suffers from a lack of ambition. It's too safe and that quality mutes its impact and limits its ability to be more than a history lesson.

Name : Cary Darling / Alias : Fort Worth Star-Telegram/DFW.com
There are reasons to wish that Race.offered a broader, deeper portrait of the man. Yet, as a celebration and evocation of a stunning moment in time, it's an engrossing and occasionally surprising take on an iconic event in sports history.

Name : Tirdad Derakhshani / Alias : Philadelphia Inquirer
The film delivers what it promises - an education and a thrill.

Name : Ella Taylor / Alias : NPR
A handsomely mounted drama about a pivotal moment in the life of track star Jesse Owens .

Name : Joshua Rothkopf / Alias : Time Out
Race is the most timid, lackadaisical movie that could have been made out of potentially classic material.

Name : James Rocchi / Alias : TheWrap
A startlingly enjoyable and well-made action film leavened by humor and slicked along by style, made by, for, and about people who've seen far too many Bond films.

Name : Sheri Linden / Alias : Hollywood Reporter
Firth enters new territory with style and grace, anchoring a smart, high-energy movie that eventually runs out of steam.

Name : Peter Debruge / Alias : Variety
Whether it's "Alex Rider," "Agent Cody Banks" or "Spy Kids," plenty have tried to adapt the 007 shtick to younger characters, with demonstrably dopey results. In the end, the reason it works for Vaughn is that he's making the film for adults.