Metacritic sampling of Apocalypto reviews

From Metacritic.com: 100 Variety (Todd McCarthy) Mel Gibson is always good for a surprise, and his latest is that Apocalypto is a remarkable film. Set in the waning days of the Mayan civilization, the picture provides a trip to a place one's never been, offering hitherto unseen sights of exceptional vividness and power. [More.] 100 LA Weekly (Scott Foundas) For those of us who prefer to judge Gibson solely in terms of his art, the movie is a virtuosic piece of action cinema -- particularly in its second half...And while there has been no shortage of recent films that decry the horrors of war and man's inhumanity to his fellow man, I know of none other quite this sickeningly powerful. [More.] 91 Seattle Post-Intelligencer (William Arnold) For all its excesses, it's an absorbing, disturbing, savagely beautiful "trip" movie, and an extraordinary -- perhaps even outrageous -- personal vision of the one A-list filmmaker who truly deserves the adjective "maverick." [More.] 90 Washington Post (Stephen Hunter) Gibson may not be much of a deep thinker, but he's a heck of a storyteller. Apocalypto turns out to be not a case of Montezuma's revenge but of Gibson's: It's something entirely unexpected, a sinewy, taut poem of action. [More.] 88 Rolling Stone (Peter Travers) Gibson has made a film of blunt provocation and bruising beauty. [More.] 80 Wall Street Journal (Joe Morgenstern) By the end I felt sure it was the most obsessively, graphically violent film I'd ever seen, but equally sure that Apocalypto is a visionary work with its own wild integrity. And absolutely, positively convinced that seeing it once is enough for one lifetime. [More.] 80 The Hollywood Reporter (Kirk Honeycutt) The guy knows how to make a heart-pounding movie; he just happens to be a cinematic sadist. [More.] 80 Newsweek (David Ansen) The film is mostly successful in transporting the viewer to another age: the costumes, the body markings, the fierce Mayan masks, all feel right. And keeping the dialogue in subtitles was a smart move. Even better are the faces, which never fail to fascinate. But for all the anthropological research that went into the movie, what is Apocalypto trying to say? [More.] Apocalypto currently has the highest average review rating of any major movie premiering this Friday!