Synopsis
Wisecracking, gum-chewing 12-year-old Gilly is well known in the foster system. Totally unmanageable, she has stayed with more families than she can remember and has outwitted them all. After all, how can she settle down when her real mother, the beautiful and glamourous Courtney, might be out there waiting for her? When Gilly is sent to live with the Trotters, the weirdest family yet, she isn’t planning to stick around. But cheerful, affectionate Maime Trotter isn’t giving up on Gilly just yet...
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Cast
- Sophie NélisseGilly Hopkins
- Kathy BatesMaime Trotter
- Glenn CloseNonnie Hopkins
- Bill CobbsMr Randolph
- Octavia SpencerMiss Harris
- Julia StilesCourtney Rutherford Hopkins
- Clare FoleyAgnes
- Billy MagnussenEllis
- Zachary HernandezW.E.
- Sammy PignalosaRajeem
Recommendations
- 70
Village Voice
[A] hokey but effective adaptation. - 70
Variety
While uneven in places, The Great Gilly Hopkins works because it boasts an actress tough enough for the title role. - 63
RogerEbert.com
A spectacularly foursquare “family is what you make it” redemption story. The kind of thing that film critics like to dismiss as “looking like a made-for-TV movie,” as if that comparison/analogy even holds as a dismissal anymore. - 60
The New York Times
The title character is a child, but two adult actors, Kathy Bates and Glenn Close, really give The Great Gilly Hopkins its considerable heart. This movie, though uneven, is affecting because of these two reliable stars. - 60
The Hollywood Reporter
The Great Gilly Hopkins has its enjoyable moments — Bates' entertaining, scenery-chewing turn providing many of them — and its themes are refreshingly complex for a film targeted to kids. - 50
Observer
Sweet but inconsequential, The Great Gilly Hopkins will satisfy family audiences and pre-teens with minimal demands for their money. - 42
The A.V. Club
The whole movie falls between stylization, which it mostly lacks, and realism, which it can’t quite claim with its non-teenage teenager spouting non-swearing swears. - 40
Los Angeles Times
Characters and situations are painted in such simple, broad strokes, we’re asked to take much at face value.
