73
Metascore
9 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzThe Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzThis is a raw, intense movie circling on despair, hopelessness and inevitable dead ends. It is about the dark. But in plumbing the pitch black, Werewolf offers the distinct hope of a brighter future – at least, a brighter future for Canadian cinema.
- 90The New YorkerRichard BrodyThe New YorkerRichard BrodyBy means of ferociously intimate images, tensely controlled performances, and a spare sense of drama, Ashley McKenzie’s first feature, about two young drug addicts in Nova Scotia, conjures a state of heightened consciousness.
- 75Slant MagazineChuck BowenSlant MagazineChuck BowenThe film achieves a strange irony, as its formal abstractions serve to heighten our emotional connection to the characters.
- 75The A.V. ClubMike D'AngeloThe A.V. ClubMike D'AngeloWerewolf unmistakably announces McKenzie as a potentially significant new voice, gifted enough to make well-trod ground seem newly landscaped.
- 70The Hollywood ReporterJordan MintzerThe Hollywood ReporterJordan MintzerMcKenzie deserves credit for revealing such a troubling facet of her homeland, and even if the shallow focus — both literal and figurative — of her movie can be frustrating at times, she bravely never turns away.
- 70The New York TimesGlenn KennyThe New York TimesGlenn KennyThe performers don’t seem like they’re acting at all, which contributes to the film’s unsettling power. The elliptical narrative structure articulates a sad truth of the addict’s life concerning both the challenge and the tedium of making it through to the next fix.
- 70Village VoiceBilge EbiriVillage VoiceBilge EbiriIts story may be thin, its characters not particularly original, but McKenzie’s use of cinematic language is savvy and novel, finding complexity where others might find only emptiness.
- 67The Film StageJared MobarakThe Film StageJared MobarakWerewolf isn’t about addiction’s cruelty. McKenzie has given us a story about an addict’s salvation.
- 50VarietyJoe LeydonVarietyJoe LeydonFor all her attempts at documentary-style verisimilitude, filmmaker Ashley McKenzie doesn’t really cover much new ground with Werewolf.