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Plot Summary
Vowing to go straight, a recidivist convenience store bandit H.I. (Nicolas Cage) proposes marriage to police department photographer Ed (Holly Hunter), whom he's come to know quite well after so many trips to jail. All is wedded bliss for the unlikely couple until they discover she's unable to get pregnant. Turned down by every adoption agency in town thanks to H.I.'s rowdy past, it does not take long before they realize the only solution--kidnap one of the town's celebrated "Arizona Quintuplets" and hit the road! But the road is never smooth, and soon H.I.'s convict friends, his greedy boss and a ruthless motorcycle-riding bounty hunter become involved in the scheme to possess the famous baby.
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Rotten Tomatoes Movie Reviews
TOMATOMETER
90%- Reviews Counted: 50
- Fresh: 45
- Rotten: 5
- Average Rating: 7.6/10
Top Critics' Reviews
Fresh: To their old fascination with Sunbelt pathology, to their side-winding Steadicam and pristine command of screen space, the Coens have added a robust humor, a plot that keeps outwitting expectations and a...dollop of sympathy for their forlorn kidnapers.
Fresh: Raising Arizona is no big deal, but it has a rambunctious charm.
Fresh: A wacky, happy, daring, darkly comic tale of parenting outside the law.
Fresh: The cartoon vision of southwestern tackiness doesn't cut very deep, but the mise-en-scene is packed with clever clutter.
Customer Reviews
great script, talented actors & an athletic cameraman
this is an amazing movie. the cinematography, the story, the characters & the acting are priceless. most movie previews show you all the best parts of a film so when you finally do go & see it there's nothing left to enjoy. this movie's preview is an accurate barameter of what the entire movie has in store. movie studios these days seem to view a script as that thing that loosely ties all the special effects together. this movie's script is one that even other writers point to as inspiration. too bad the studio executives are overlooking the value of good writers. it is truly amazing what a great script, very talented actors & an athletic cameraman can accomplish.
Mind His Little Fontanel
This was Nick in his prime. Way before he sold out and started doing movies like The Rock,Con Air and Oh ya, Face Off. What a piece of ... I liked him better when he was an actor, not a movie star. I guess he needed more money than he could spend.
Intellectually brilliant, poetic and impossibly funny
One of the best Coen brothers best, this movie is brilliant on many levels. Narrated by in 3rd person by the main character H.I. (Nick Cage) it follows his bumbling attempts at trying to go down a straight road of and have a normal life with his police-officer wife Edwina (Holly Hunter), aka Ed, only to have his past catch up to him and turn it upside down. Ed's strong desire to have a baby coupled with H.I.'s lament that "her insides were a rocky place where my seed could find no purchase", lead them to kidnap one of the five quintuplets given birth my the wife of cheap-furniture magnate, Nathan Arizona (Trey Wilson). With a bothered conscience, and a little help from some of H.I.'s former cellmates (John Goodman and William Forsythe), a wife-swapping boss (Sam McMurray), and a "Lone Biker of the Apocalypse" (Randall "Tex" Cobb), the couple - with Junior in tow - try their best to keep it together and "do what's right". The setting and costumes make the whole thing seem surreal, yet believeable. You won't think of Arizona the same way again.
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