84
Metascore
34 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100The Hollywood ReporterThe Hollywood ReporterIt's a superb cinematic work and an appropriately serious one, given its subject matter and its intentions.
- 100TimeRichard CorlissTimeRichard CorlissA kind of mashup of "Our Town" and "Village of the Damned," the film is both draining and enthralling.
- 100Village VoiceJ. HobermanVillage VoiceJ. HobermanDetailed yet oblique, leisurely but compelling, perfectly cast and irreproachably acted, the movie has a seductively novelistic texture complete with a less-than-omniscient narrator.
- 90VarietyTodd McCarthyVarietyTodd McCarthyImmaculately crafted in beautiful black-and-white and entirely absorbing through its longish running time, Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon nonetheless proves a difficult film to entirely embrace.
- 88Rolling StonePeter TraversRolling StonePeter TraversThis haunting film never pushes itself on you. It trusts you to suss out the horror that lies beneath the veneer of innocence. You'll be knocked for a loop.
- 88New York PostKyle SmithNew York PostKyle SmithThe White Ribbon is one of the finest films that ever repelled me, a holiday in the abyss.
- 80EmpireDamon WiseEmpireDamon WiseA hard film to love, but a hypnotic meditation on all the elements -- gossip, religion, bullying -- that can turn a parish and country bad.
- 80Time OutJoshua RothkopfTime OutJoshua RothkopfThe White Ribbon comes dangerously--wonderfully?--close to playing like an evil-kid flick.
- 60New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierNew York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierHaneke's superb cast provide beautifully measured hints at the disconnect between the ribbon's symbolism and the entire town's unspoken atrocities.
- 30New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinNew York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinChill to the core, Haneke presents human cruelty not to make us empathize with the victims or understand the oppressors but to rub our noses in the crimes of our species. He thinks he’s held on to the subversive ideals of punk, but all I smell is skunk.