Metacritic Movie Ratings
Footnote Reviews

A sample of reviews from critics across the country.

• 100

  out of 100

  Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert

  It's one of the smartest and most merciless comedies to come along in a while. It centers on an area of fairly narrow interest, but in its study of human nature, it is deep and takes no prisoners.

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• 100

  out of 100

  Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum

  Footnote is itself a perfect little piece of Talmud, full of text, commentary, and colorful argument.

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• 90

  out of 100

  The New York TimesA.O. Scott

  It is a truism that academic arguments are so passionate because the stakes are so small. Footnote, a wonderful new film from the American-born Israeli director Joseph Cedar, at once affirms this conventional wisdom and calls it into question.

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• 90

  out of 100

  Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan

  Intensely specific in story yet wide-ranging in themes, with a tone that turns on a dime from comic absurdity to close to tragedy, this is brainy, bravura filmmaking of the highest level, a motion picture that is as difficult to pigeonhole as it is a pleasure to enjoy.

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• 90

  out of 100

  Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern

  Footnote does function as a character study, an exceptionally rich one.

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• 88

  out of 100

  Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips

  The main thing with Cedar's film, I think, is to approach it not as a farce, not as a drama, not as a mystery, not as any genre in particular. It's a comic nightmare, in the vein of the Coen brothers' "A Serious Man," and Cedar proves masterly at playing the stakes for real.

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• 70

  out of 100

  Village Voice

  Something between a comedy of everyday absurdity and a family tragedy pushed into the realm of the hyper-real, Footnote uses its characters' differing relationships to authenticity as the basis for an enigmatic riff on representation.

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• 60

  out of 100

  Variety

  Footnote is a decidedly male-centric film. Structurally, the picture is divided into named chapters that make for cute markers but give it the not-entirely satisfying feel of a jaunty satire.

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• 60

  out of 100

  The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthy

  Jewish and academically inclined audiences worldwide will respond to numerous aspects of this unusual drama, although it is paradoxically both too broad and too esoteric for the general art house public.

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See all Footnote movie reviews at Metacritic.com