"Given just how much material Kenny Ortega and his editors plowed through to whittle together a two-hour scrapbook and they still could only just barely come up with the presentable material here isn't exactly a vindication." - Eric Henderson

Meh

Essentially a poor quality greatest hits DVD, the only insight we gain from the rehearsals is that Jackson was pushing himself to the limit for these shows, and the strain - while not pronounced - is certainly visible. His moves are still quite smooth but the "saving my voice" line is a lousy excuse for repeatedly singing out of key. Would his final concerts have been a fitting send-off for the fans? Probably. Would he have made it through the entire run? It's doubtful.

Spielberg's failure to engage Jackson on a movie-musical project (Peter Pan or Earth Song or Childhood) deprived the world of a possible Minnelli-level masterpiece.

Fairly weak performances, but weak performances from Jackson is still better than 95% of today's pop acts.

no... no no no

As long as Jackson is singing, this is a great movie (but only for fans of his music).

This was going to be one hell of a tour.

You gotta love the commitment and feeling swimming through every inch of film here. If it wasn't THIS, exactly, I'd throw up, but hey this guy is so impressive. You just let that jaw fall in awe - the energy pulsates through every minute. But it gets a bit too long, eventually. I like the narration though, building it up as the show would've been, and the editing is superb. And the female guitarist is both rock'n'roll and extremely fit. Dips.

Considering much of the footage was most probably not meant for the public domain, "This Is It" has been strung together competently. There is no doubting Jackson's talent, but towards his end he was looking and acting like some sort of Tim Burton caricature. In reality there is nothing more than morbid fascination here. It will hold your attention because of who Jackson was, his talent, & the unusual elements of his personality. Interesting, but not essential.

A sad film about what could have been. With no real interviews outside of the occasional "Michael's the greatest, what an honor it is to work with him, he's a genius" it gets a bit old. It doesn't even count for a good concert film because many times Mike himself says "I'm saving my voice so I'm not gonna sing that". Definitely a film only for the diehard fans.

For years I had wondered if Michael Jackson still had it. He had it...in spades. "This Is It" is the fan service concert that everyone was probably waiting for. It covered nearly all of Michael Jackson's career, spanning all to the way back to his Jackson 5 days. Even though Michael Jackson was about 50 years old, he could still sing and dance with the best of them. This film proved it. Michael Jackson was, and probably always will be, the greatest entertainer who ever lived. This Is It

Blurs reality and fiction in the weirdest way. Like when xfactor started auto-tuning in the auditions.

I think you have to be in the mood for this kind of stuff while you are watching, and I wasn't, but here you can see MJ as a great professional while he is preparing a great show, weeks before his death...

What a shame he died before this show could hit the road, it would have been truely fantastic. All accusations aside this man was a genius and truely the king of pop.

This is curtains, much sooner than Jackson meant when he announced a series of comeback concerts cancelled by his sudden death: "This is the final curtain call." The rehearsal footage for that event, intended for Jackson's "personal library," has here been assembled not with journalistic purpose but rather eulogistic, a best-face scenario, essentially a sequence of planned song-and-dance numbers pieced together from different rehearsals, with different costumes within a single number.

MJ truly was a musical genius and this movie shows the behind the scenes of just that. He was a professional and a perfectionist at what he did and he will be forever as such which appropriately named him as the King of Pop. RIP MJ thank you for inspiring myself and millions others.

The feel good movie of the year

Interesting because Jackson is such a freak. The talent is evident. At a worldwide pop culture phenomenon he is interesting, the execution is a bit long & dull.