35
Metascore
11 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 60Village VoiceSerena DonadoniVillage VoiceSerena DonadoniThe widescreen intimacy of small moments — the flush of a rain-soaked cheek — humanizes Donzelli's grand folly and the couple who challenge the parameters of morality.
- 58HitfixGregory EllwoodHitfixGregory EllwoodDemoustier is charismatic enough to almost help Donzelli pull it off, but Elkaïm is so stiff as Julien you never understand why Marguerite is willing to risk her life in the first place.
- 50The Hollywood ReporterBoyd van HoeijThe Hollywood ReporterBoyd van HoeijAmbitiously mounted but wildly uneven.
- 50The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyThe A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyIt’s somehow both mannered and style-less, fantastical and under-imagined—perversely watchable, in other words.
- 40CineVueJohn BleasdaleCineVueJohn BleasdaleAs fate closes in on the lovers, the silliness of their own behaviour and Marguerite & Julien in general prevents any pathos from entering the scene. The taboo of incest never troubles as one never truly believe that they are brother and sister - or in love - or anything else.
- 38RogerEbert.comSusan WloszczynaRogerEbert.comSusan WloszczynaRather than presenting something akin to the heady youthful cravings of Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes as contemporary versions of Romeo and Juliet, the equally tragic Marguerite & Julien often feels more like a version of Richie and Margot in Wes Anderson’s “The Royal Tenenbaums” crossed with the pre-teen runaways from “Moonrise Kingdom,” but minus the humor and insight.
- 30VarietyJay WeissbergVarietyJay WeissbergThe film is a painfully silly, laughably naive Romance with a capital “R.”
- 25Slant MagazineClayton DillardSlant MagazineClayton DillardIt finds its filmmaker completely lost between impulses to pay homage, play it safe, or offer something—anything—new.
- 20The GuardianPeter BradshawThe GuardianPeter BradshawThis buttock-clenchingly embarrassing movie from director Valérie Donzelli is a pre-Revolutionary period drama from the quality end of the sugary French market – theatrically tricked out with one or two annoying and clumsy Brechtian touches of stylised self-aware modernity.
- 10The New York TimesGlenn KennyThe New York TimesGlenn KennyThe excruciating experience of Marguerite & Julien need only be endured by viewers with an obsessive interest in the least constructive aesthetic currents in contemporary French cinema.