Blue Bayou
Focus Features | Release Date: September 17, 2021 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
58
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 28 Critic Reviews
Positive:
14
Mixed:
12
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
IGNTara BennettSep 17, 2021
Blue Bayou works as both an emotionally insightful character piece about a man looking for where he belongs, and as a brutal exposé of the lesser-known broken parts of our immigration system. Read full review
80
Screen DailyLee MarshallJul 16, 2021
It is both a passionate exposé of a serious injustice and a big emotional ride that is also prepared to take some interesting risks in its journey towards a old-school tear-jerker finale. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreSep 22, 2021
A winning and quite moving look at the immigrant experience, and how fragile and fraught this past decade’s politics have revealed it to be. Read full review
75
Film ThreatAlan NgSep 20, 2021
Good movies make you feel, even if that feeling is not good. Chon ensures you’ll have feelings at the end of Blue Bayou, just not the happy ones. Read full review
75
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottSep 15, 2021
Even though Blue Bayou could have been set anywhere, Chon is smart enough of a storyteller to leverage the personality and textures of New Orleans — just as he did with southern Los Angeles in his 2017 film Gook — to lend his film a very specific and very authentic sense of place. Read full review
75
The Seattle TimesKatie WalshSep 15, 2021
As Chon calibrates a wide variety of emotions, allowing space for all the agonies, ecstasies, repressions and excesses, he crafts a tale of intergenerational traumas and personal redemptions that is an emotionally complicated yet ultimately cathartic viewing experience. Read full review
75
The PlaylistIana MurrayJul 16, 2021
What Blue Bayou does wonderfully in these quiet moments is illustrate that being Asian is not a one-size-fits-all identity but a vast tapestry of different cultures. Read full review
70
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisSep 16, 2021
Beautifully relaxed family scenes help us forgive the ponderous direction. Read full review
70
SlashfilmHoai-Tran BuiSep 15, 2021
Chon aims for the pulse at the end, but he may not have realized that he didn't have to try so hard — he had already effortlessly plucked at the heartstrings. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangJul 19, 2021
Artfulness and restraint can be admirable qualities in a filmmaker, but rage and despair, when channeled with this much force and purpose, can be undeniably effective substitutes. Read full review
67
The Film StageGabrielle MarceauSep 17, 2021
Chon is a magnetic and sympathetic performer, and Vikander lends warmth and vulnerability to an undercooked role. But there are many false notes. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Cliff LeeSep 17, 2021
The film lays emotions on thick, with strong performances and dreamy cinematography. The high points are devastating and show off Chon’s empathetic storytelling. But at its ebb, the film tries to do too much at once, spilling every which way. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comSheila O'MalleySep 17, 2021
Blue Bayou is sunk, on occasion, by its own symbolism, and how it wields said symbols. It's not enough to use a symbol visually, and let the audience put two and two together. A character needs to have a long monologue where they explain the symbol and pontificate on how the symbol is relevant to the circumstances. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliSep 15, 2021
Blue Bayou channels plenty of anger and passion and the narrative lynchpin is sufficiently compelling (despite a tendency toward melodramatic manipulation) but Chon’s capabilities as a writer don’t match those as a director and an actor. Read full review
60
EmpirePamela HutchinsonDec 3, 2021
Multi-hyphenate Justin Chon has crafted an impressive melodrama, rich in Louisiana atmosphere and with a timely message, but Blue Bayou is marred by its reliance on symbolism and sentiment. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawDec 1, 2021
Subtlety and nuance are not exactly this film’s strong points. Read full review
60
VarietyGuy LodgeJul 16, 2021
Blue Bayou holds little back as it rails against the cruelties and hypocrisies of American immigration law to stirring effect — though this emotional pile-driver of a film could stand to trust more in the undeniable power of its core story. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneyJul 16, 2021
There’s enormous heart behind Justin Chon’s drama, and wrenching performances full of feeling from the writer-director and his co-star Alicia Vikander. But those strengths don’t obscure the problems of an overdetermined screenplay, with too many plot points competing for focus and too many moments of strained melodrama. Read full review
58
TheWrapSteve PondJul 16, 2021
The melodrama can be effective at times, and there’s an admirable urgency with which it tackles significant issues in U.S. immigration policy. Read full review
58
IndieWireDavid EhrlichJul 16, 2021
Justin Chon’s overcranked but achingly heartfelt “Blue Bayou” is a case-study in how issue-driven melodramas are a double-edged sword. Read full review
50
Original-CinLiam LaceySep 16, 2021
The praise for the film — a one-man show by a Korean-American filmmaker at a time of heightened anti-Asian racism and a focus on unjust immigration policies — is understandable. But the film itself is a disappointment, a message film that relies far too much on artless, melodramatic contrivances for its emotional impact. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleJenny NulfSep 16, 2021
Chon’s ambitions are astonishing, but his bloated script needed an edit or two. It’s a film written with big moments for big performances in mind, which is too painfully obvious as the film treads on. Read full review
50
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanSep 15, 2021
Blue Bayou strikes a nerve, of that there is no doubt. But then it keeps poking at it, pointlessly. Read full review
45
Vanity FairCassie da CostaSep 17, 2021
We get a smattering of piercing thoughts about family separation as sanctioned by the U.S. government and a roster of deeply felt performances, but not the vision to see it through. Read full review
40
Little White LiesHannah StrongDec 3, 2021
[Chon's] execution is heavy-handed, with the ending steering into a mawkish spectacle which undercuts the seriousness of the topic at hand. Read full review
40
The Irish TimesDonald ClarkeDec 3, 2021
The main thread of the script is efficient enough, but the loosely connected subplot concerning a terminally ill acquaintance strains the boundaries of good taste past breaking point. Read full review
38
Slant MagazinePat BrownJul 16, 2021
The film’s evocative imagery doesn’t compensate for the story being told with such a heavy hand that it dulls, rather than sharpens, Justin Chon’s urgent political message. Read full review
33
The A.V. ClubVikram MurthiSep 15, 2021
Blue Bayou is designed to jerk tears out of a plainly tragic scenario, but all it does is expose the strings behind the puppets and the set. In the film’s failures, we can see the limits of good intentions: It doesn’t matter if a heart is in the right place if the mind isn’t too. Read full review
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