81
Metascore
26 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaPhiladelphia InquirerSteven ReaWhile White Material is very much the story of this one woman, it is also a story of postcolonial Africa, a place where Europeans staked their claim, and where disorder and destruction upended everything. A mournful, frightening, powerful film.
- 88Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertThis is a beautiful, puzzling film. The enigmatic quality of Huppert's performance draws us in.
- 85NPRElla TaylorNPRElla TaylorYet in the end it's less the climactic madness and mayhem in White Material that sear the memory than it is the silent, balletic creep of child soldiers, grabbed out of school and sent with machetes and rifles through a forest to exact revenge for decades of repression.
- 80Chicago ReaderJ.R. JonesChicago ReaderJ.R. JonesThis haunting drama by Claire Denis burns with a mute fear and rage at the ongoing atrocities in central Africa.
- 75San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleSan Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleDenis' viewpoint and sympathies are sophisticated, complex and humane.
- 75Washington PostMichael O'SullivanWashington PostMichael O'SullivanA lean and hungry thing. With the sparest of storytelling, the French filmmaker ("35 Shots of Rum") devours her audience, swallowing us up in a yarn that is as enigmatic as it is engrossing.
- 75Boston GlobeTy BurrBoston GlobeTy BurrWhat sustains the film is its tone of almost hallucinatory foreboding. White Material isn't about the calm before the storm but the seconds before the deluge.
- 75Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsChicago TribuneMichael PhillipsIts dramatic vexations are at war with Denis' prodigious visual skill. And the fight, ultimately, rewards the viewer.
- 60Boxoffice MagazineRichard MoweBoxoffice MagazineRichard MoweThis is one of Denis's most provocative films and also one of her most compelling.
- 60EmpirePatrick PetersEmpirePatrick PetersClaire Denis' drama is an overly fastidious but insight-filled look at post-colonial Africa.