58
Metascore
13 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 75New York PostLou LumenickNew York PostLou LumenickBe warned that Wolf Totem, featuring one of the final scores by the late great James Horner, is probably too brutal for younger children and more sensitive animal lovers.
- 75Philadelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniPhiladelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniWolf Totem has some of the most exciting, mind-blowing scenes of nature I've ever seen.
- 63Washington PostMark JenkinsWashington PostMark JenkinsAnnaud and his crew, including wolf trainer Andrew Simpson, nicely illustrate the animals’ cunning and coordination.... The human drama is more perfunctory.
- 63Slant MagazineOleg IvanovSlant MagazineOleg IvanovIt becomes difficult to separate the natives from their communist masters in terms of their treatment of their natural surroundings.
- Annaud’s film can’t help itself galloping off in allegorical bursts barely under his control, and intriguingly off-course from the kind of bold messages of national conciliation officially sanctioned Chinese films tend to convey.
- 60Arizona RepublicBarbara VanDenburghArizona RepublicBarbara VanDenburghWolf Totem doesn’t feel so much like fully formed narrative film as it does a trumped up National Geographic special on Inner Mongolia eager to make use of shiny new IMAX cameras.
- 58The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyThe A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyIt sets out to take the viewer on a journey, but ends up giving them little more than a pleasantly diverting sight-seeing tour. There are worse ways to spend two hours. Better ones, too.
- 50The Hollywood ReporterBoyd van HoeijThe Hollywood ReporterBoyd van HoeijTellingly, all of the film’s emotional highlights come from scenes involving the animal rather than the human protagonists and there are only very few scenes in which the two interact in a manner that feels entirely synergetic.
- 50VarietyMaggie LeeVarietyMaggie LeeDespite its magnificent natural vistas and some pulse-pounding action in stunning 3D, Wolf Totem boils down to a familiar environmentalist allegory that doesn’t move or provoke too deeply.
- 50Village VoiceVillage VoiceWolf Totem itself becomes a pitched battle for supremacy between the breathtaking glories of nature and the grinding banality of man. Here, as ever, nature loses.