73
Metascore
45 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 90IGNIGNPaul Greengrass and Tom Hanks have given us something truly special with their latest collaboration: a film that is engaging and challenging but also just makes you feel good.
- 90The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyThe Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyEssentially a two-hander though enlivened by incisive secondary character turns along the way, it's a drama made with tremendous feeling, an unhurried, contemplative tale peppered with nail-biting set-pieces.
- 88Movie NationRoger MooreMovie NationRoger MooreIn the hands of Tom Hanks and his “Captain Phillips” director, Paul Greengrass, this adaptation of a Paulette Jiles novel becomes a parable for these “troubled times,” a story of race and unrepentant racism, men of violence who won’t give up that violence and the power of a free press to rectify that.
- 83Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattEntertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattThe movie offers few surprises and even less alacrity; and yet there's a cumulative weight to World that feels, if hardly new, still worth sitting through.
- 80TheWrapAlonso DuraldeTheWrapAlonso DuraldeNews of the World nestles comfortably not only in the canon of the Western but also among the films by European artists who make a movie in the United States and find themselves overwhelmed by all that space. To his credit, Greengrass finds an emotionally engaging way to fill it.
- 80Screen DailyFionnuala HalliganScreen DailyFionnuala HalliganGreengrass is definitely aiming for big-screen entertainment here, and Hanks is the actor to deliver it.
- 75IndieWireDavid EhrlichIndieWireDavid EhrlichIf Greengrass’ broadly entertaining (if gallingly relevant) film is a bit too soft and spread thin to hit with the emotional force that it could, so much of its simple power is owed to the grounded nature of the director’s approach, which allows these desperate characters to feel as if they’re trying to escape the very genre that threatens to define them forever.
- 70SlashfilmChris EvangelistaSlashfilmChris EvangelistaThe drifting from town to town gives the whole thing an episodic feel, and as great as Hanks is, even his talents aren’t enough to distract us from the sheer predictability of what’s going on here.
- 70Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangLos Angeles TimesJustin ChangGreengrass can be as shrewd and skillful a storyteller as his hero, even if News of the World finally inspires something less than total belief.
- 65Vanity FairSonia SaraiyaVanity FairSonia SaraiyaIt won't disappoint viewers who want to see Hanks play a nerdy cowboy, or who want to revel in wide shots of American west. But for a film with so many thorny contradictions encased within it, News of the World has surprisingly few hooks.