67
Metascore
9 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 80TheWrapJames RocchiTheWrapJames RocchiThe Circle has a sincerity and an honesty that shames far more expensive but over-polished dramas. Plenty of movies have happy endings; The Circle shows you both the happy ending and the incredibly hard work it took to get there.
- 80Los Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinLos Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinA richly absorbing historical docudrama.
- 75Slant MagazineDiego SemereneSlant MagazineDiego SemereneThe film refuses to tease us with suspense, overwhelm us with sentimentality, or defy us with nuance.
- 75RogerEbert.comGlenn KennyRogerEbert.comGlenn KennyHaupt’s film moves along agreeably enough for a while, and the intercutting between the film’s real-life subjects, now at an advanced age, and their dramatized adventures almost 60 years ago, convincingly creates a rooting interest.
- 67The A.V. ClubVadim RizovThe A.V. ClubVadim RizovIts fascinations compromised by its clunkiness, the film is a necessary niche history that serves well enough as a primer, placing it just a cut above coasting on good intentions.
- 60Village VoiceAbby GarnettVillage VoiceAbby GarnettThis is a fascinating and often tumultuous story, which Haupt chronicles through a mixture of interviews with the real Ostertag and Rapp (now married, they appear as a pair) alongside dramatized vignettes that, as the film wears on, feel like annoying interruptions.
- 60The New York TimesNicolas RapoldThe New York TimesNicolas RapoldThe sense of an invisible world being revealed is more potent than the film’s fairly standard portrayal of closeted life.
- 60EmpireEmpireA solid telling that spans several fascinating periods of 20th century life.
- 60CineVueCineVueThe Circle is an undiscovered gem that constantly delights with its unshowy transference of an inherited blood debt that we finally are 'beginning' to honour.