38
Metascore
13 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 60Time OutEric HynesTime OutEric HynesFarmiga persuades as a kooky monster of a matriarch, while Javier is an ideal vessel for Duchovny's laconic line readings (he's grown into an even more deadpan Bill Murray). Goats may cover an all-too-familiar terrain, but at least it grazes it well.
- 58The PlaylistTodd GilchristThe PlaylistTodd GilchristOverall, it's not that Neil's directorial debut is boring or even disappointing, it's that it's just unexceptional – almost exactly the sort of dime-a-dozen growing-up story that's become a Sundance/ independent film world cliché.
- 58Entertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumEntertainment WeeklyLisa SchwarzbaumEllis (The Good Wife's Graham Phillips), an alienated teen, smokes weed and hangs out with a goat-obsessed, pot-cultivating surrogate father (David Duchovny, hidden by hair). New Age details aside, though, Ellis is easily identifiable as a distant cousin-by-genre to J.D. Salinger's Holden Caulfield.
- 50ObserverRex ReedObserverRex ReedMs. Farmiga is the only one who seems to be having any fun, as an aging flower child stuck in an earlier decade and addicted to healing vortex workshops and primal screams. Mellow, but very much a work in progress, Goats has a bland but overcrowded menu that could benefit from a little feta.
- It's a strange stunt of a role for Duchovny, who even when playing characters indulging in sex, drugs, or conspiracy theories, has the air of a savvy urbanite, a quality he can't submerge while trying to act as a perpetually high mystic.
- 50Slant MagazineSlant MagazineChristopher Neil's film is more location-scouted and photographed than directed and acted.
- A coming-of-age story without any clear epiphany, Goats meanders rather aimlessly through 92 minutes of running time.
- 40VarietyRob NelsonVarietyRob NelsonThis monotonously deadpan coming-of-age comedy has little to recommend it beyond some beautiful widescreen cinematography and the momentary kick of seeing David Duchovny looking like a stoned Jesus as Goat Man.
- 20Village VoiceNick SchagerVillage VoiceNick SchagerIncapable of energizing Mark Poirier's leaden script (based on his own novel), Christopher Neil directs with a mechanical blandness made more tedious still by a score of gentle guitar strumming so aggravatingly benign it might inspire you to partake in one of Wendy's climactic, cathartic primal screams.
- 0New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierNew York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierGoats is just b-a-a-a-aad.