Stanley's family is cursed with bad luck. Unfairly sentenced to months of detention at Camp Green Lake, he and his campmates are forced by the warden to dig holes in order to build character. What they don't know is that they are digging holes in order to search for a lost treasure hidden somewhere in the camp.
One can't help but feel thankful that the movie doesn't always go the expected route, that the characters have a little more depth to them than average, and that the complexity, which is the movie's basic weakness, is also its fundamental virtue.
– Philip Kennicott,
Washington Post,
18 Apr 2003
fresh:
A wonderfully dark fairy tale.
– Desson Thomson,
Washington Post,
18 Apr 2003
fresh:
It's smart, strange, unpredictable, and defies the formulas that typically define this sort of motion picture.
– James Berardinelli,
ReelViews,
20 Apr 2003
rotten:
[T]here's too much going on, and none of it is executed well enough to recommend.
– Richard Roeper,
Ebert & Roeper,
21 Apr 2003
fresh:
Brims with storytelling flourishes and gently deployed life lessons that even accompanying adults may dig.