Armand
IFC Films | Release Date: February 7, 2025 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
62
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 23 Critic Reviews
Positive:
12
Mixed:
11
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Screen DailyJonathan RomneyMay 21, 2024
The film starts by promising a bourgeois social drama about secrets and lies, suspicions and rivalries, and the troubled waters of juvenile and adult sexuality. What it ultimately becomes is much harder to define, but the result is resonant and haunting – and should spark plenty of post-screening discussions. Read full review
83
IndieWireRyan LattanzioMay 21, 2024
Even as Ullmann Tøndel’s two-hour movie grows a bit too winding and weird for its short film-scale conceit, Reinsve grounds the film’s more experimental, almost stagelike leanings in a constant state of heightened emotion that will make you love her even more than in “Worst Person” — and, even better, will make you scared of her. Read full review
80
The Irish TimesTara BradyJul 10, 2025
The film, set within the bland, institutional corridors of a Norwegian primary school, chronicles a single afternoon that stretches into a surreal purgatory of suspicion, guilt and (finally) something like the compellingly demented choreography of Climax, Gaspar Noé’s dance horror. Read full review
80
Screen RantRachel LaBonteFeb 7, 2025
The whole Armand cast is stellar, perfectly conveying the characters' shifting allegiances and uncertain moral stances. Read full review
80
ColliderAidan KelleyJan 9, 2025
The easy winner out of Armand is Renate Reinsve. . . The runner-up is Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel. While his methods for bringing this story to life are a bit overly perplexing and too head-scratching, there is a clear talent for filmmaking on display here that makes his career one to watch with great and serious interest. Read full review
76
Paste MagazineJim VorelFeb 7, 2025
At times, Armand threatens to lose itself entirely in the fever dream it conjures, like the film itself is going to reach its combustion point and ignite, but it gets just enough of its disquieting atmosphere across to lodge in the memory all the same. Read full review
75
The PlaylistGregory EllwoodMay 21, 2024
Considering the entire film takes place in the confines of the school building, it’s a testament to Tøndel’s direction and Reinsve’s enthralling performance that the film avoids feeling claustrophobic. Read full review
75
The Film VerdictMax BorgMay 21, 2024
Ullmann Tøndel deftly uses the claustrophobic setting to gradually unveil the layers of psychological chaos lurking beneath many respectable façades, particularly in the tightly constructed first half of the film, where the verbal and the visual coexist in a riveting harmony. Read full review
70
The Daily BeastNick SchagerFeb 6, 2025
Reinsve reconfirms that she’s one of international cinema’s most electric presences, and her formidable performance is the axis around which this taut drama revolves. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinMay 23, 2024
Norwegian writer-director Halfdan Ullmann Tondel takes some big swings with his first feature Armand, not all of which connect, but the ambition and risk-taking are largely impressive. Read full review
63
Washington PostTy BurrFeb 14, 2025
It’s as a satiric bourgeois psychodrama that “Armand” works best and reveals its genetic heritage to the works of Bergman and Ullmann (the latter no slouch as a director herself). Read full review
63
The Associated PressLindsey BahrFeb 5, 2025
It’s a promising debut from Tøndel, nonetheless — a film that will keep you engaged if not entirely satisfied. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKatie WalshFeb 7, 2025
The unpredictable nature of this thought-provoking tale and its unusual execution is laudable for its originality, but the ending of “Armand” troubles its strong start, with the sense that Tøndel’s assured direction at the outset has slipped as he makes his way to a strange climax and a questionable conclusion. Read full review
60
Rolling StoneDavid FearFeb 5, 2025
It’s decent if often frustrating debut, buoyed by a star that’s shouldering a lot of the needlessly complicated narrative burden. We can’t wait to see what Tøndel’s fourth film looks like. Read full review
60
Film ThreatAlex SavelievJan 7, 2025
At 90 minutes or so, with the needless pseudo-artistic embellishments and tautology tossed out, Armand would have been an intense and cerebral little psychological nail-biter. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubNatalia KeoganFeb 5, 2025
The film is replete with striking visual flourishes, yet its storyline suffers from the inclusion of an unnecessary air of surrealism. Read full review
58
The Film StageSavina PetkovaMay 21, 2024
The film may not leave any deep marks or make you consider parenthood in a new light, but it still constitutes an auspicious debut. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreFeb 19, 2025
A tale told under a cloud with unreliable witnesses, it’s a slow and soft spoken drama that too breaks the chilling spell Tøndel is trying to cast. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoFeb 7, 2025
The always-engaging Renate Reinsve delivers yet again (as does talented co-star Ellen Dorrit Petersen). However, “Armand” is a frustrating, over-long movie that starts with an intriguing premise and then starts fighting it almost immediately. Read full review
50
The New York TimesAlissa WilkinsonFeb 6, 2025
By the end, a kind of narrative lethargy has set in. “Armand” feels mostly like an interesting formal exercise: an attempt to meld realism and surrealism in the most nondescript of places, but in a way that evokes an ancient terror. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineSteven ScaifeFeb 3, 2025
By the time we’re watching whole conversations be drowned out by noise of pounding rain, the abstract tendencies of Armand begin to feel like an act of unintentional self-sabotage Read full review
50
VarietyOwen GleibermanMay 22, 2024
The movie, while elegantly photographed, is mostly a shambles. It keeps throwing things at you in an oblique and random way, and it’s constructed like a puzzle with no solution. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalZachary BarnesFeb 7, 2025
The new movie has all the oft-mocked pretension of classic art film and none of the poetry. It’s a work of almost ostentatious mediocrity. Read full review
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