Born in Flames
First Run Features | Release Date: November 9, 1983 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
75
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 10 Critic Reviews
Positive:
8
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
Beautifully made, courageously edited, and swift-moving, this challenging, provocative film is a work that is both humanist and revolutionary. Read full review
90
Village VoiceMelissa Anderson
Like her namesake, the filmmaker Lizzie Borden took an ax...to cinema conventions and tidy political resolutions in her 1983 landmark Born in Flames. Read full review
83
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
Borden artfully combines social and political commentary with story elements, character development, and enough ideological savvy to poke intelligent fun at dogmas of every stripe. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter Bradshaw
The anarchic spirit of agitprop pulses from this scrappy, smart, subversive film. Read full review
80
The New YorkerRichard Brody
Borden’s exhilarating, freely assembled story stages news reports, documentary sequences, and surveillance footage alongside tough action scenes and musical numbers; her violent vision is ideologically complex and chilling. Read full review
80
Time OutStaff (Not Credited)
Borden charts the explosive coming together of the women as they forge their own liberation, handling her story with audacity and making even the driest argument crackle with humour, while the more poignant moments burn with a fierce white heat. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineClayton Dillard
It fuses documentary and dramatic sequences into a free-form narrative that exists somewhere between essay film, political manifesto, and exploitation. Read full review
75
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
Made piecemeal over a number of years and first released in 1983, this 90-minute comic fantasy has lost little of its radical edge—in contrast to Borden’s subsequent Working Girls, which accommodated itself to a wider audience. Read full review
50
The New York TimesJanet Maslin
Born in Flames, while inventive, is also much too diffuse and overcrowded. Only those who already share Miss Borden's ideas are apt to find her film persuasive. Read full review
50
VarietyStaff (Not Credited)
It is impertinent, audacious, abounding in fresh ideas, considerably untraditional ideas. On the other hand, it is disjointed, with no real characters, preachy, the script unsufficiently developed and the acting often amateurish. Read full review
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