After being discharged from the Army, Brian Flanagan moves back to Queens and takes a job in a bar run by Doug Coughlin, who teaches Brian the fine art of bar-tending. Brian quickly becomes a patron favorite with his flashy drink-mixing style, and Brian adopts his mentor's cynical philosophy on life and goes for the money.
Cocktail is a bottle of rotgut in a Dom Perignon box.
– Richard Corliss,
TIME Magazine,
21 May 2013
rotten:
The pairing of old-hand Brown and young-hand Cruise may have been meant to remind us of Cruise and Paul Newman; if so, think of this as The Color of Counterfeit Money.
– Sheila Benson,
Los Angeles Times,
21 May 2013
rotten:
It may not be a megaton bomb, but Cocktail is definitely of the Molotov type.
– Carrie Rickey,
Philadelphia Inquirer,
21 May 2013
rotten:
Very, very stupid.
– Jonathan Rosenbaum,
Chicago Reader,
21 May 2013
rotten:
Cruise is beguiling with his smile and his swagger, but the script doesn't take us anywhere fresh when it leaves the barroom.