Blue Beard
Strand Releasing | Release Date: March 26, 2010 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
73
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 12 Critic Reviews
Positive:
9
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Time OutKeith Uhlich
The most impressive aspect of Breillat’s feature is that it agitates like the best fairy tales, seducing us with otherworldliness before sticking the knife in and permanently inscribing the moral. Read full review
90
The New York TimesManohla Dargis
Ms. Breillat narrates the fairy tale three ways: in the period story, through the little girls and, finally, through the overall film. None are fully satisfying, but together they offer a sharp, knowing gloss on how our stories define who we were and who we become. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubSam Adams
As with Breillat’s 2007 period piece "The Last Mistress," Bluebeard is subdued and unadorned, almost plain. Read full review
80
Boxoffice MagazineRichard Mowe
Breillat directs with her characteristic flair for getting under the skin of her protagonists while taking a particular pleasure examining sisterly bonds and feminist concerns within the context of a fairy tale. Read full review
80
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
Psychologically rich, unobtrusively minimalist, at once admirably straightforward and slyly comic, Catherine Breillat's Bluebeard is a lucid retelling and simultaneous explanation of Charles Perrault's nastiest, most un-Disneyfiable nursery story. Read full review
80
NPRJeannette Catsoulis
Breillat plumbs the power of fairy tales to enchant, disturb, warn and teach. Read full review
75
New York PostV.A. Musetto
Bluebeard revisits themes often found in Breillat's films -- sibling rivalry, pedophilia, gender conflict -- but it remains fresh and new. Read full review
70
VarietyLeslie Felperin
This offbeat but compelling take on the tale, arguably the first serial-killer yarn, emphasizes sisterly bonds but still gets to the original story's heart of mysterious darkness with impressive results. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeMark Feeney
Breillat’s film can seem at times like a far less opaque version of another story set in the 17th century about sex and power: Peter Greenaway’s “The Draughtman’s Contract.’’ Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterPeter Brunette
Stylized, pure cinematic retelling of this ancient tale of misogyny will enchant some and bore others. Read full review
50
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
It's too convoluted by half, and turns what ought to be an idiosyncratic, delightful folktale-film into a baffling personal psychodrama with a nasty sting in its tale. Still, Breillat wouldn't be Breillat if she made movies that were easy to like, or to get your head around. Read full review
50
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
Catherine Breillat, the French director of "Fat Girl", blends victim feminism with the threat of slasher violence in this arid ''deconstruction'' of Bluebeard, the wife killer of legend. Read full review
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