Synopsis
When college senior Anastasia Steele steps in for her sick roommate to interview prominent businessman Christian Grey for their campus paper, little does she realize the path her life will take. Christian, as enigmatic as he is rich and powerful, finds himself strangely drawn to Ana, and she to him. Though sexually inexperienced, Ana plunges headlong into an affair -- and learns that Christian's true sexual proclivities push the boundaries of pain and pleasure.
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Cast
- Dakota JohnsonAnastasia Steele
- Jamie DornanChristian Grey
- Jennifer EhleCarla
- Eloise MumfordKate
- Victor RasukJosé
- Luke GrimesElliot Grey
- Marcia Gay HardenDr. Grey
- Rita OraMia Grey
- Max MartiniTaylor
- Callum Keith RennieRay
Recommendations
- 75
New York Post
The film never pretends to be other than what it really is: soft-core porn for the ladies, diluted with an “R” rating. - 70
The Hollywood Reporter
With a loose-limbed naturalness, she conveys naiveté, intellectual curiosity and romantic yearning, and shows the unassuming Ana’s newfound thrill at being seen, however complicated the man holding her in his admiring gaze. She’s open and vulnerable but no fool. Best of all, Johnson and her director embrace Ana’s paradox: She snickers at Christian’s predilections, but they also turn her on. - 67
Entertainment Weekly
I spoil nothing by reporting what readers already know, that when Fifty Shades is not a dirty story, it is, as the trilogy unfolds, a study in cartoonishly weird family dynamics. - 65
TheWrap
Starring a vivacious Dakota Johnson and a game Jamie Dornan, Taylor-Johnson’s erotic romance is a skillful distillation of James’ first book that captures the heady exhilaration of being someone’s fixation. - 60
New York Daily News
Credit goes to director Sam Taylor-Johnson and her screenwriter, Kelly Marcel, who've stripped the first book of its biggest flaws, while still honoring its essence. And lead Dakota Johnson makes for an ideal heroine, though — as doubters feared — her chemistry with costar Jamie Dornan doesn't always sizzle. - 60
Time Out
Fifty Shades of Grey is a sex-positive but hopelessly soft-core erotic drama that fails to be even a fraction as titillating as the E.L. James books that inspired it. And yet, that’s exactly why it works. - 60
Variety
Glossy, well cast, and a consistent hoot until it becomes a serious drag, this neo-“9½ Weeks” is above all a slick exercise in carefully brand-managed titillation — edgier than most grown-up studio fare, but otherwise a fairly mild provocation in this porn-saturated day and age. - 60
The Guardian
Johnson’s Ana squeezes believability out of one of the more silly romantic entanglements in recent popular culture. It’s all there in her face, which Taylor-Johnson frames in close-up. She’s fully aware this scenario is ridiculous, but can’t seem to turn away from its lunacy.
