A Couple
Zipporah Films | Release Date: November 11, 2022 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 13 Critic Reviews
Positive:
10
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
91
IndieWireSophie Monks KaufmanSep 4, 2022
Wiseman has made a vocation out of filming what is right in front of him, and he applies that schematic to a dead woman whose words are all that remain. Her husband did not see her, but we will. Read full review
90
TheWrapDave WhiteNov 11, 2022
Boutefou’s performance in this delicate but wild environment is coiled and tense, but one that balances interior pain with a graceful delivery. She embodies rage, bitter amusement, longing and an emotional knowledge that comes only from decades spent with one very difficult person. Read full review
90
Paste MagazineAndrew CrumpNov 10, 2022
Though A Couple is [Wiseman's] first narrative feature in 20 years, the narrative structure documents history by fashioning Sophia’s diaries and letters as a performance. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comMatt Zoller SeitzNov 11, 2022
There’s only one character here, but the institution is still illuminated by verbal storytelling, as well as our observations about how the speaker comports herself as she describes her situation. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangNov 23, 2022
A dazzling suite of emotions plays out within the confines of Boutefeu’s subdued, sensitive, gradually mesmerizing performance. At times she stares with laserlike focus into the camera, as if she had located the object of her scorn seated just behind the lens. Mostly she stares pensively into the middle distance, lost in the phantasms of memory. Read full review
80
The New York TimesBen KenigsbergNov 10, 2022
Even at 63 minutes, A Couple is not an easy sit. It took me three viewings before I was able to become absorbed in it — to settle into the rhythms of Boutefeu’s performance, to find the monologues less monotonous, to admire the beauty of the garden that Wiseman uses so calmingly to counterpoint the anger of Sophia’s words. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinSep 4, 2022
The result is an expressive and moving portrait of a tempestuous marriage, one told with elan that feels rich in feeling even if its entire budget probably wouldn’t have covered the cost of croissants on an average film shoot in France. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawSep 4, 2022
It is a thoroughly intelligent production, a film festival event that could not exist in the rough-and-tumble of regular movie distribution but will I hope find a home on streaming services. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineKeith WatsonSep 28, 2022
A Couple ultimately constitutes not so much a footnote to Frederick Wiseman’s storied career as a beguiling little doodle in its margins. Read full review
70
VarietyGuy LodgeSep 4, 2022
The final film is elegant and empathetic, but never quite emotionally involving: For all its rich, heightened articulation of a woman’s distress and unrest, the sense of a life being academically magnified under glass never quite leaves the endeavor. Read full review
58
The PlaylistMarshall ShafferSep 4, 2022
While it’s great to see an example of a filmmaker refusing to rest on his laurels or stay inside the nearly defined box of his cultural reputation, a film must be a film – not just a concept. Un Couple never quite manages to transcend its origins as a precious pandemic project. Read full review
58
The Film StageRory O'ConnorSep 4, 2022
I couldn’t bear another minute of A Couple, but I’m perfectly happy it exists. Read full review
40
Screen DailyWendy IdeSep 4, 2022
Performance aside, the key issue is that endless griping about a shitty marriage – even the marriage of arguably the pre-eminent figure of 19th century literature – is a drag. Read full review
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