Rating: 
Summary: Sean Penn and Nicholson make a great team
Review: Penn is amazing what what he put to script here
Nicholson or Jack Nicholson is brilliant as his role
the movie touches you , scares you, shocks you, keeps you guessing a little about what will happen at the end. but overall a truly moving movie. have it on dvd and it never let me down. it never has and never will. the crossing guard is truly a gem like Chinatown with Nicholson in it. I could watch this movie again and again and again. Nicholson really shines in this role for a movie. and the cast is innovative and picked out quite well :)
Rating: 
Summary: ACTOR'S MOVIE
Review: Sean Penn, recently winning his first Oscar for MYSTIC RIVER, directed this film, and as an actor he is vastly aware of the importance of good performances. While the movie itself is a flawed film, one can hardly fault the performances. The movie is about going on with one's life, even when that seems the furthest thing in mind. Jack Nicholson in a very strong performance plays Freddy, a man who lost his seven year old daughter to a drunk driver. After this loss, his marriage to Mary (Anjelica Huston) has fallen apart, and she has remarried a stable and nice enough man (played with restraint by Robbie Robertson). Freddy has been living for one thing: revenge. Now that the driver, John Booth (David Morse) has been released from prison, Freddy wants to kill him. Booth, however, is a changed, desolate man as well, bearing the guilt of ruining not only Nicholson's life, but hurting his loving parents (Piper Laurie and Richard Bradford) as well. How these two face their demons is the crux of the plot. What makes it so good are the performances. Huston is magnificent; a scene between her and Nicholson in a restaurant late at night is devastating in how it switches from what starts out as sentimental and caring, but then turns despicably ugly. Although not on screen much, Ms. Huston asserts her power as an actress. Robin Wright Penn as the girlfriend of Booth has some powerful moments, although her "dancing" sequence is both absurd and unmeaningful. David Morse is brilliant as John Booth, an obviously gentle man who made that horrible mistake of drinking too much and driving. His guilt weighs heavy on his shoulders, and in the convoluted ending, he and Nicholson still make it potent.
Not a happy film by any means, but a good exercise in cinematic performance.
Rating:
Summary: Better Than Citizen Kane - in our opinion! (Sorry Roger E.)
Review: The best $10 ever spent on a movie. We highly recommend it. Character-driven certainly is the best description. The three main characters are portrayed with true depth of emotion, giving the viewer real insight into how the tragic DUI-death of the young girl affected each one. The story itself isn't especially unique; how the story is told is most certainly unique. The ending surprised and moved us. Having previously watched The Pledge (another Sean Penn/Jack Nicholson collaboration), which is a definite downer, we put off watching The Crossing Guard for a couple of weeks. We're sorry we waited. We are sure to watch this movie again, even though the end won't be a surprise.
Rating:
Summary: Reaches It's Goal - It Makes us Watch, and Entertains
Review: The Crossing Guard is a pyschological drama and study. I don't think it set out to be the most meaningful or important movie of the year. And it doesn't need to be. It explains itself neatly and on time - it doesn't drag along. We are well introduced to all the characters and their points of view - and as audience members are treated to some outstanding performances. I dare say even better than Jack Nicholson is David Morse, easily the best role of his career. The story concerns the pending release of John Booth (played by Morse) who was convicted of the hit and run drunk driving death of Nicholson's little girl. Since the tradgedy Nicholson and his wife (played by Angelica Huston) have split. Nicoholson now tries to kill time, and his memories, in a local strip joint - somtimes trying to get through to his fellow patrons, other times exploding in rages and all the while carefully marking the days off on a calender until John Booth is a free man so he can turn him into a dead one. Two other brief, but well turned roles are the almost totally inexperienced actor Robbie Robertson as Huston's new husband and Richard Brandford, who has made a career of playing 'heavies' as the convict's sympathetic father. I don't think Crossing Guard set out to be a masterpiece, and it need not be, it keeps us well within it's grip throughout, making us think, observe and wonder. This would make a nice double bill with 'The Pledge', in which we see a much more intense Nicholson performance. The Crossing Guard would make a nice warm up. Enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: CROSSING GUARD-Excellent
Review: The Crossing Guard is one of the most underrated films in years. Sean Penn's use of distant panning shots are nothing short of remarkable and convey a strong sense of emotional drive in the narrrative. Jack Nicholson's performance is unusually raw, almost 'nakedly passionate' and some viewers may feel slightly uncomfortable throughout the duration of this motion picture as a result. David Morse's character is underdeveloped and occassionally his passive acting style becomes frustratingly innapropriate but he still rises to the challenge despite his obvious shortcomings in ability. Recommended
Rating: 
Summary: Good acting - saddled with a ponderous script
Review: The power of film as a medium lies in its ability to connect with the audience on a visceral, emotional level. A good film brings us into the story emotioanlly, and leaves us to ponder the inponderables long after the final credits have scrolled by. If the film-maker insists on dotting all the i's and crossing all the t's on a thinking, intelletucal level, we wind up never being able to suspend our disbelief and much of the power of the medium is lost.Sean Penn is a great actor. But as a writer/director, he does not know how to extract his own personality from his work. The description of a previous reviwer - "self-indulgent" is quite apt in this case. The entire film, from the aviator glasses, the close-ups of the twirling cigarettes, the inexplicable bar-room brawls, to the wordy and wildly implausible dialogue, is smothered with Penn's heavy-handed imprints. It's a story of redemption through forgiveness - one man must learn to forgive himself while another must learn to forgive others - and it's a worthy morality tale. But the emphasis is definitely on the morality at the expense of the tale, and as a result our main characters, all supposedly working class stiffs, are saddled with ponderous lines that constantly threaten to collapse under their own weight. (A typical excerpt - Woman: All this guilt of yours is too much competition for me. Let me know when you want life. A few scenes later the man staggers into the woman's house, collapses on the floor, and asks: "What is guilt? Define guilt." It has to be seen to be believed.) And if that's not enough, the director made sure voice-over commentaries are ever available in the form of song lyrics (sometimes actually sung by characters in the film), even to the point of having a couple of random passengers on a bus, completely unrelated to the story line, carry on a conversation about contentment with material standards of life in the movie's climatic chase scene. Note to Sean: You still have a long career ahead of you. No need to make all your points at once.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful Performances and Nice Effort by Sean Penn!
Review: This disturbing character study features a powerhouse performance by Jack Nicholson. Angelica Huston is equally impressive as Nicholson's wife. The fact that they we're married in real life make their scenes all the more powerful and interesting. David Morse and Robin Wright are also great. Admirable effort by Sean Penn, he wrote and directed this somber and depressing character study. He obviously has problems with the narrative of the film but he is great at directing the actors, he squeezes two powerful performances by Huston and Nicholson, he actually made Jack cry, a rare thing in his movies. Interesting and entertaining but lacking in essence. From a scale of 1-10 I give this film a 6!
Rating:
Summary: A good surprise!
Review: This film, not very talked by the midia, ( at least in my country )is a very good surprise!
I bought it because Jack Nicholson is synonymous of quality.
He and Angelica Houston are a couple that have lost their oldest daughter 5 years ago. When the film starts the man responsible for her death ( David Morse ) is leaving jail and the girl's father ( Nicholson ) intend to kill him. As the film goes on it gets clear that this father is disturbed and muddled. His life is caotic and has no meaning. Than, an unexpected process occurs as we see his hate and the killer's
regret and sensibility and the way they interact with it.
Sean Penn once more has shown his sensibility without silliness.
Rating:
Summary: One of the 90's best films
Review: This is a rare movie. Every situation between all of the characters is handled with great honesty and sensitivity. Anjelcia Houston is great as the mother of the family torn apart by her daughter's death. Nicholson turns in a powerful performance as the father who wants his life back. David Morse steals the show as the repennant killer. Finally, it is Penn's sharp clear direction that put it over the top.
Rating: 
Summary: How low can you sink in the movie industry
Review: This movie is a pure example of something that presumably only was made because someone wanted to earn some bucks. An extremely silly story, the actors spend most of their time unauthentically crying, sobbing, and sniffing. A useless plot. I wonder why such a professional team of actors submits to such a stupid project. On a scale of 1 to 5 the movie deserves a 0.
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