Black Bear
Momentum Pictures | Release Date: December 4, 2020 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
79
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 27 Critic Reviews
Positive:
26
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleDec 1, 2020
Ultimately, Black Bear is about the price of art — not only the price the artist pays, but that the people around the artist end up paying, unwittingly. Yet in the actual experience of it, the movie doesn’t feel so lofty. It just feels tense and disquieting, like a thriller. In that sense, it is a thriller, but one of the emotions, and it’s riveting every step of the way. Read full review
91
ConsequenceClint WorthingtonFeb 3, 2020
More than a metatextual look at the struggles of indie filmmakers to gnaw at their own emotional wounds, Black Bear is an astounding showcase for its leads, and way more than it says on the wrapper. Read full review
91
Entertainment WeeklyDavid CanfieldJan 28, 2020
It’s brainy, sure, but the emotional experience is what’s most vivid. The plot beats may confound you, but the feelings behind them are crystal-clear. Read full review
91
IndieWireKate ErblandJan 28, 2020
As Levine unravels clever jabs and jibes at current culture — few recent features have so smartly picked apart both feminism and caveman culture with such insight and humor — tenuous bonds break down. Read full review
91
The PlaylistRobert DanielsJan 28, 2020
Unique and unfazed, hilarious yet philosophical, Black Bear is the comedic form reinvented and re-conformed to mad and intoxicating ends. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleJosh KupeckiDec 4, 2020
It is an exhilarating feat of control, and a scathing deconstruction of the sacrifices made in the name of art. You have to confront those threatening corners of the psyche. You have to embrace the black bear. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comSheila O'MalleyDec 9, 2020
Black Bear is ambitious for itself in its many layers of meta, but the observational moments of behavior is where the film soars. Writer/director Lawrence Michael Levine has created a highly self-conscious work that comments on itself and then comments again. Levine's sense of humor is one of his saving graces, and that's particularly true here. This is a disturbing film, and much of it is unpleasant, but it's also very, very funny. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneKatie WalshDec 4, 2020
It places a modern lens on complicated questions of art, love and perspective in storytelling, in an entertaining and intelligent thriller of intimate proportions. Read full review
83
Original-CinJim SlotekDec 1, 2020
Intriguingly weird, and only loosely tethered to its own reality, Lawrence Michael Levine’s Black Bear is two movies in one - both on the theme of creativity-squeezed-from-pain, and both offering Aubrey Plaza the acting turn of her career. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Jan 28, 2020
Black Bear is the movie that proves, beyond any lingering doubt, that Aubrey Plaza has much more to offer than the best eye-roll in the business. Maybe that was clear already. Read full review
80
The Irish TimesTara BradyApr 23, 2021
Lawrence Michael Levine’s blisteringly original, provocative, often hilarious screenplay lurches between familiar tropes – “I saw the way you were looking at her!” – and jagged edges. It’ll keep you guessing long after the credits roll. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawApr 22, 2021
The meta gets better in Lawrence Michael Levine’s dizzying but gripping comedy Black Bear, which is a recurring nightmare – or rather, an entertainment in two acts about the messy business of making a personal film based on actual events. Read full review
80
CineVueMatthew AndersonMar 2, 2021
Led by a tour de force performance as savage, unpredictable and frightening as the film’s titular ursine, Black Bear stars Aubrey Plaza in stellar form as a writer-director seeking inspiration, in this bamboozling psychological character study. Read full review
80
Film ThreatSabina Dana PlasseJan 30, 2020
Throughout clever turns and twists of the plot, Levine presents a meditation and deconstruction on life imitating art and vice versa with a dash of Robert Altman and a nod to David Mamet as players fill in the story. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliDec 23, 2020
The way Levine has structured Black Bear turns the possible interconnections between the stories into a puzzle for which there is no ironclad solution. That’s part of the fun – speculating what it all means. For those who prefer a more passive experience, Black Bear offers a dollop of frustration but, for those willing to brush aside the web-like strands entwining the first story with the second, it’s an engaging double-feature. Read full review
75
The Associated PressLindsey BahrDec 4, 2020
The film itself might not wrap up in any sort of tidy or satisfying way, but nothing leading up to the conclusion would lead you to expect something so basic. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperDec 3, 2020
Suffice to say Levine has fashioned a twist-filled gem that leaves us a bit drained but also a little bit exhilarated by all its peaks and valleys and sharp curves. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreNov 30, 2020
It’s not the neatest film-dissecting-filmmakers story, with rough edges, lurches in tone and trite tropes and dialogue. But the characters make us wince in recognition and the situations, even the ones we know are coming, are real enough to cringe over. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineChuck BowenNov 29, 2020
Shot through with darkly existentialist humor, the film finds Aubrey Plaza throwing a gauntlet to filmmakers who have typecast her in the past. Read full review
75
The Film StageJared MobarakOct 14, 2020
We read into what’s been provided in ways that resonate with us personally whether or not the resulting thoughts were consciously presented. We make films ours. Read full review
70
TimeStephanie ZacharekDec 10, 2020
Your enjoyment of Black Bear will depend on your tolerance for cerebral game-playing for art’s sake. But if the movie is sometimes a little too hung up on its somewhat tortured premise, it still offers some subtle, dusky pleasures. Chief among them is Plaza’s performance. Read full review
70
The New York TimesTeo BugbeeDec 3, 2020
The movie plays like a well-crafted game, one with stable rules and safeties, perfectly enjoyable but limited. The director and the performers circle ideas about how intimacy can be manipulated to satisfy artistic ambitions, but the experiment feels easy to leave behind. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyJan 28, 2020
A slippery psychological drama that starts out talky and perhaps intentionally distancing but becomes retroactively gripping once its big switch is revealed, this is a darkly playful deconstruction of the indie filmmaking process that digs into the artist-muse dynamic and the power structures in relationships, constantly teasing the viewer as to what's real and what's part of the writer character's imagination. Read full review
70
VarietyDennis HarveyJan 28, 2020
This adventurous seriocomedy has enough surprising elements and off-kilter humor to keep one intrigued, even if the payoff is debatable. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy BurrDec 4, 2020
With Black Bear, Plaza pushes her talent into raw new places. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzDec 1, 2020
Lawrence Michael Levine’s film, though, is only sporadically clever enough to pull off its central trick. Mostly, we’re stuck with a group of rather unpleasant people doing rather unpleasant things. To what desired end, it is never quite clear. Read full review
60
The Observer (UK)Simran HansApr 26, 2021
Levine’s playful deconstruction of tortured genius is a witty and provocative send-up of tyrannical directors, diva-ish actors and over-invested voyeurs alike. Read full review
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