Natalia Winkelman

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Film Threat, IndieWire, The New York Times
For 253 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 32% higher than the average critic
  • 9% same as the average critic
  • 59% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 6.3 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Natalia Winkelman's Scores

  • Movies
  • TV
Average review score: 59
Highest review score: 100 The Sky Is Everywhere
Lowest review score: 20 Distancing Socially
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 104 out of 253
  2. Mixed: 125 out of 253
  3. Negative: 24 out of 253
253 movie reviews
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    • 52 Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    Wolf
    Wolf may lead with an open curiosity, but in tackling big ideas about identity, openness is not always enough.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 80 Natalia Winkelman
    A Boy Called Christmas
    Magic abounds in A Boy Called Christmas, Netflix’s first prestige holiday movie of the season, but pulsing through this winning adventure tale is something even stronger: the immersive power of storytelling.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Aulcie
    There is a contagious thrill to the movie’s portrait of its subject’s achievements, especially his whirlwind romance with the Israeli supermodel Tami Ben Ami. But when it comes to Perry’s moments of struggle, Aulcie trips up.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Clifford the Big Red Dog
    Genuine sweetness can be found in Emily’s fidelity to her rowdy new best friend. Still, naturalism is hard to fake, and it’s difficult to divorce Clifford from the lines of code that animate him.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 30 Natalia Winkelman
    A Mouthful of Air
    Directed by Amy Koppelman and based on her novel of the same name, A Mouthful of Air aspires to show how depression can sully even the loveliest of scenes. The scenes the movie chooses, however, play like a parody of white privilege.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Natalia Winkelman
    Luzzu
    Malta’s views are arresting, but the images Camilleri chooses would never be found in a travel brochure. In his subtle, vérité approach, he captures something special — not one man’s crisis, but a community’s culture.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 20 Natalia Winkelman
    Distancing Socially
    It’s fine that nothing major happens in this charmless quaran-com; it is concerning, however, that neither the audience nor the actors, sitting stiffly behind their screens, are given reason to care.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Nightbooks
    Its devotion to frights makes it memorable.
    • 41 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Cinderella
    Among the countless iterations the story has weathered through the ages, this Cinderella (streaming on Amazon), starring Camila Cabello as the orphaned maiden, is forgettable. It is oddly transfixing, though, as a study in the semiotics of the modernized fairy tale.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    The Smartest Kids in the World
    The Smartest Kids in the World aspires to offer a study of teaching methods worldwide, but the documentary (on Discovery+) contains little rigor. It’s a dippy lecture in motion.
    • 36 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    The Kissing Booth 3
    Like a scoop of vanilla ice cream atop scoops of chocolate and strawberry, The Kissing Booth 3 rounds out the sugary teen trilogy with a fitting, if bland, finale.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    Playing with Sharks
    Playing With Sharks would like to position Valerie as both intrepid diver and valiant activist, but with its focus on thrills and gills, the film goes light on the context needed to reconcile these two identities.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Last Summer
    For all the beauty of its dazzling vacation setting, Last Summer coasts, but not toward any satisfying destination.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Jagame Thandhiram
    Some moments feel fresh, but the movie’s patterns are familiar: scheme, slaughter, repeat.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Wish Dragon
    Wish Dragon is a transporting experience, but it’s far from a whole new world.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Changing the Game
    Changing the Game could have gone further, analyzing how fairness in sports is a myth to begin with. But the movie isn’t interested in rewriting the rules; it would rather introduce us to the brave young people who are.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Apocalypse '45
    Apocalypse ’45 knows that war is hell for everyone. But it’s difficult to escape the sense that, in this film’s view of history, America is top of mind.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Broken Harts
    With a bolder and broader framework, Broken Harts might have been more than fast food for true-crime obsessives.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    In Our Mothers' Gardens
    As a director, Lewis is admirably present. She seems to have gained the trust of her interview subjects, and has taken care to create a space for openness.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Natalia Winkelman
    Red Moon Tide
    Though thin on story, the film (streaming on Mubi) is a majestic vision. But most captivating are the settings.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Ride or Die
    The movie gracefully captures the rhythms of intimacy, how it deepens quicker in stolen time. But even as they develop a kinship, the women themselves remain ciphers.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Future People: The Family of Donor 5114
    Although Future People struggles to break through to the kids, an engaging family portrait emerges nonetheless — of a group clustered by biology, but bonded by a singular shared experience.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Seaspiracy
    Even the film’s notable points seem to emerge only briefly before sinking beneath the surface, lost in a sea of murky conspiratorial thinking.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Groomed
    Van de Pas calls on experts, psychologists and a convicted sex offender for interviews, but the most illuminating examples come from her own story.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Yes Day
    Though Yes Day does not lack for energy, the jokes are too broad and the mishaps too safe for the movie to emerge as an honest or imaginative journey through family conflict and compromise.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    The Walrus and the Whistleblower
    Frustratingly, the documentary declines to probe Demers’s evolving relationship to his activism and newfound fame.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Little Big Women
    A gentle panning camera and a bland score milk every scene for emotion, and at more than two hours, the women’s journeys drag. By the time it is over, Little Big Women has lost any sense of restorative power — all that registers is tedium.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    There Is No I in Threesome
    As our central couple’s connection falters, the documentary evolves into an astute examination of perspective.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 30 Natalia Winkelman
    Palmer
    That Palmer eventually embraces Sam as an ally in misfitdom is inevitable. So is the annoyance inspired by this prosaic masculine melodrama.
    • 42 Metascore
    • 30 Natalia Winkelman
    Locked Down
    The best that Locked Down has to offer, at least while we remain in the throes of a deadly crisis, is a window into a luxurious space to quarantine.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    The Bee Gees: How Can You Mend a Broken Heart
    Grooving through the decades, this entertaining documentary aspires to prove that the Bee Gees were more than a hitmaker for disco nightclubs. Rather, Barry, Maurice and Robin were master songwriters and chameleons, continually reinventing themselves to harmonize with the times.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Godmothered
    Is the film trapped in Disney orthodoxy? If the shoe fits.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    The Christmas Chronicles 2
    As Kate and Jack’s adventures turn to lessons in love and courage, the movie starts to feel mechanical, like the Village’s churning candy cane mill. But its output is always as sweet.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    Ainu Mosir
    Rather than relying on dialogue, Fukunaga allows emotion to shine through musical performances — a school anthem, folk songs, drunken karaoke. These scenes speak for themselves, and they build upon the story with quiet power.
    • 40 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    Come Away
    Like a magic brew thinned into bouillon, Come Away folds spellbinding storybook tales into a mundane melodrama.
    • 44 Metascore
    • 30 Natalia Winkelman
    Holidate
    Far worse than these characters’ grating personalities are the regressive strains underpinning their flirtation.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Over the Moon
    Over the Moon deserves credit for launching an unflinching lesson about grief. If only it had taken a different flight path.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    Blackpink: Light Up the Sky
    While its salute to the artists flicks at the cynical side of their industry, it is less a probing profile than a backstage pass for fans of the band (a.k.a. Blinks) old and new.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 90 Natalia Winkelman
    David Attenborough: A Life on Our Planet
    The film’s grand achievement is that it positions its subject as a mediator between humans and the natural world. Life cycles on, and if we make the right choices, ruin can become regrowth.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Kiss the Ground
    The film makes a case for the healing power of soil, arguing that its capacity to sequester carbon could be the key to reversing the effects of climate change.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    Unpregnant
    Its driving force may seem topical, but the story’s heart is timeless: the harmony between longtime friends, and Veronica and Bailey throw themselves into even the most fraught situations with giddy enthusiasm.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    Love, Guaranteed
    Love, Guaranteed, simmering at a low boil, is a short and mostly sweet affair. Its successes are due in large part to Cook who, donning a vast array of snug fall coats, is endearing as a willful working woman with a new crush.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Rising Phoenix
    By avoiding complexity, Rising Phoenix preserves its inspiring mood, but offers only a platform for champions who already dominate the arena.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Chemical Hearts
    Despite the movie’s sympathy for the high stakes of Henry’s adolescence, the myopia of his point of view settles over “Chemical Hearts” like a layer of grime.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Natalia Winkelman
    Work It
    Work It is no “Step Up,” but its best sequences involve Jake and Quinn, who share a chemistry in motion that, for a beat or two, conjures the genre’s magic.
    • 39 Metascore
    • 40 Natalia Winkelman
    The Kissing Booth 2
    If The Kissing Booth, stacked with regressive relationship dynamics, is Victorian in its views, The Kissing Booth 2 progresses to the midcentury.
    • tbd Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Feel the Beat
    The harmony among the kids, particularly the older girls Kari (Lidya Jewett) and Sarah (Eva Hauge), is the film’s greatest asset, and the director, Elissa Down, uses their natural charm as a crutch for the run-of-the-mill story.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    I'm No Longer Here
    Frías de la Parra is thoughtful and precise in conveying the cultural identity of these young people, and their spirit pulses through the story.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Natalia Winkelman
    A Secret Love
    It is a compliment that A Secret Love, which runs under an hour and a half, could stand to be longer, with an expanded portrait of Terry and Pat’s early life as a couple.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 83 Natalia Winkelman
    Little Woods
    Affecting, sincere, and most importantly socially astute ... it’s one of the sharpest and most promising first films I’ve seen in some time.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 83 Natalia Winkelman
    Tyrel
    A finely gradated study of race and masculinity in the age of Trump, Tyrel is also an engrossing portrait of the revealing power of language.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 91 Natalia Winkelman
    I Think We're Alone Now
    I Think We’re Alone Now is an exercise in ambiance, and Morano is nothing if not a brilliant conductor of tone. Favoring dreamy over dreary, the movie is a handsome and often mesmerizing addition to Morano’s expanding oeuvre.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Natalia Winkelman
    Never Goin' Back
    You can expect the same defecation and drug humor that crud up comedies of this ilk. Of course, its vacuity is intentional, and maybe we could always use more movies of the women-behaving-badly variety. But there’s also a real danger in perpetuating this type of teenage girl; it propagates the idea that, for women, defiance is power, radicalism is freedom, and being really hot is often all you need to survive.
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