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Poster for Bombay Beach

Bombay Beach

2011 · 1h 20m · Not Rated Documentary, Drama
Directed by Alma Har'el

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Overview

Bombay Beach is one of the poorest communities in southern California located on the shores of the Salton Sea, a man-made sea stranded in the middle of the Colorado desert that was once a beautiful vacation destination for the privileged and is now a pool of dead fish. Film director Alma Har'el tells the story of three protagonists. Together these portraits form a triptych of manhood in its various ages and guises...

Director and cast

Critics on Rotten Tomatoes

Top critics, in their words

All reviews
77%
Tomatometer
Fresh

"Bombay Beach" is an oasis of creativity in the documentary landscape.

Joe Williams, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Fresh

Har'el's film is at times bizarrely uplifting, at others crushingly sad...

Tom Huddleston, Time Out
Fresh

That it documents rural poverty in the American West without exploiting or sanctifying its subjects would be cause enough for praise. But this doesn't begin to approach what Alma Har'el pulls off with her hybrid doc knockout Bombay Beach.

Eric Hynes, Village Voice
Fresh

More lyrical tone poem than straightforward documentary.

Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times
Fresh

You either like this kind of ambitious, brave, borderless experiment or you don't, and I think it's absolutely magical and tragic.

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com

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