SOURCE: Turan, Kenneth. “Kafka: A Beautiful, Confusing Letdown.” Los Angeles Times (4 December 1991): F1.

In the following review, Turan offers a negative assessment of Kafka, calling it a disappointing second film.

Imagine Franz Kafka as the Columbo of Prague, scuttling hither and yon, trying to solve what may or may not be a crime. Imagine the poor man getting involved in a pseudo-Kafkaesque plot that evokes great imaginative works of fiction and then serves them up with the sensibility of Mission: Impossible. Imagine anything you like, you will have difficulty imagining how much of a letdown Steven Soderbergh's Kafka finally turns out to be.

Soderbergh is the extremely talented young director whose deservedly lionized sex, lies, and videotape proved a revelation to movie audiences just two years ago because of its carefully nurtured emotional honesty. Apparently fearful of being typecast as the sensitive Woody Allen of his generation, Soderbergh...