Critical Vincent Canby of
The New York Times called it "the sort of movie in which the actors serve the function of scenery. They are nice to look at but it's not really possible to identify with a tree or even a lilac bush. Mr. Schulman's dialogue doesn't help, nor does the direction by Anthony Harvey (
The Lion in Winter), who never discovers a source of narrative energy to compensate for the emptiness of the characters."
Dale Pollock of
Variety wrote, "Another love story in disguise, this time backgrounded against the tennis world,
Players is disqualified by exec producer Arnold Schulman's wobbly script, a simpering performance by Ali MacGraw, and a preponderance of tennis footage."
Gene Siskel of the
Chicago Tribune gave the film 2.5 stars out of four, and wrote: "The problem with the script is that both characters are totally unlikable. These are the sort of selfish, me-centered characters we suspect populate Beverly Hills and environs, people interested only in cars, clothes, sex, and money."
Charles Champlin of the
Los Angeles Times wrote: "Unfortunately, it is much better on court than on courtship ... After one amusing scene when they meet, there is scarcely a line that does not sound as if it were something being read aloud, rather than thought or felt and said."
Brendan Gill of
The New Yorker wrote: "Verisimilitude is achieved during the tennis sequences by furnishing them with people borrowed from real life; those sequences aside, there is little real life to be found in
Players, thanks in part to an ill-written script by Arnold Schulman and in part to the incompetence of its star, Ali MacGraw, who is very good-looking and is unable to recite even the simplest lines with conviction." Gary Arnold of
The Washington Post wrote: "As certain to be laughed off the screen and written off financially as
Hurricane, another Paramount loser,
Players should clinch MacGraw's reputation as the most ridiculous leading lady of the '70s. But the folly is not hers alone. What prompted producer Robert Evans, director Anthony Harvey and screenwriter Arnold Schulman to foist on anyone a love story as unformed and uninteresting as
Players (definitely not to be confused with the
Don De Lillo novel of the same title)?" Schulman ran a full-page ad in the trade papers denying responsibility with the film. "Everybody laughed, and I didn't work for three years", he says.
Quentin Tarantino later wrote that the "film was ridiculed by critics and dismissed by audiences when it came out back in 1979. But as a Hollywood tennis sports movie it's pretty good" claiming Martin's "tennis is terrific, and while I didn’t necessarily need to see him star in anything else, as a tennis pro he's pretty... convincing." ==References==