Capitalism: A Love Story
Overture Films | Release Date: September 23, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
61
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
24
Mixed:
9
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike Scott
After watching the bailouts, the bank foreclosures and the Bernie Madoffs of the world dominate headlines, Michael Moore is mad as hell, and he's going to try to make you mad as hell, too. Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter Travers
Moore's fireball of a movie could change your life. It had me laughing with tears in my eyes. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The film's title is never explained. What does Moore mean? Maybe it's that capitalism means never having to say you're sorry. Read full review
80
Film ThreatElias Savada
He's preaching a story we must all hear. This is no fairy tale. Read full review
75
PremiereMark Salisbury
With the global economic meltdown affecting just about everybody, the film is pertinent, hugely entertaining, and, above all, timely. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
At its best, Capitalism: A Love Story is a searing outcry against the excesses of a cutthroat time. At its worst, it's dorm-room Marxism. Read full review
75
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Impassioned, informative and entertaining, if sometimes repetitive. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Vintage Moore, which means that it will enthrall many and enrage an equal number of viewers. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
This lively, infuriating and occasionally moving film certainly leaves you thinking, and there isn't a dead spot in it. That's the mark of a real filmmaker, not just a muckraker. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
With mixed results, Moore singles out those who profit from the misery of American workers. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
Capitalism lacks the surprising wit of “Roger & Me” and the sobering comparative journalism of “Sicko,” and it isn’t nearly as heartfelt as “Columbine,” which poignantly and repeatedly circled back to Moore’s beloved home state of Michigan. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleAmy Biancolli
No matter where you stand, there's no denying "Capitalism" is flat-out polemic wizardry. Read full review
75
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
The real love story here is between Moore and his bullhorn. Read full review
75
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
The symmetry doesn't work. Capitalism is an economic system; democracy, a political system. Perhaps Moore should have come out and said what he really wants to see us adopt: a democratic socialism. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterDeborah Young
This is a typical Moore oeuvre: funny, often over the top and of dubious documentation, but with strongly made points that leave viewers much to ponder and debate after they walk out of the theater. Read full review
70
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
Too bad its wide net ultimately results in diminishing returns. Read full review
70
The New York TimesManohla Dargis
Like most of his movies, Capitalism is a tragedy disguised as a comedy; it’s also an entertainment. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
Moore's scattershot is a lot more interesting than some filmmakers' focus, and many of those individual parts are classic. Read full review
70
SlateDana Stevens
There's something touching, even a little bit noble, about Moore's eternal willingness to serve as our nation's shame-free populist gadfly. Read full review
70
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
A freewheeling denunciation of the capitalist system that is often mordantly funny and, by lurching turns, scornful, rambling, repetitive, impassioned, mock-lofty, pseudo-lowbrow, faux-naïve, persuasive, tabloid-shameless and agit-prop-powerful. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
On one level: groan. On another: No one else seems about to make those arrests. The only thing that would scare Wall Street straight is the image of Michael Moore as the new sheriff in town. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
Moore's voice is weak and fuzzy, directed at a choir that should already know the words by heart. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
Redundant for a filmmaker whose work has always dealt with the dismaying consequences of this country’s profit motive. Isn’t every Michael Moore film ultimately about capitalism? This one just has a more facetious title. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
At its best, this uneven work represents Moore at the peak of his argumentative skills. Read full review
60
VarietyLeslie Felperin
Whether Capitalism matches "Fahrenheit 9/11" or underperforms like "Sicko" will depend on how much workers of the world are ready to unite behind the message. Read full review
60
Time OutDavid Fear
Delivers Moore’s usual grab bag of ironic kitsch, gotcha clips and infotainment-journalism. Read full review
60
EmpireDamon Wise
A barbed study of the American economy puts capitalism in the dock but somehow fails to convict. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubNoel Murray
The tone is so smart-ass that it’s bound to put a lot of viewers into a default defensive posture. Read full review
50
Village VoiceElla Taylor
Scattershot, lazy slice of agitprop, which recycles Moore's usual slice-and-dice job on corporations, while bobbing a curtsey to the current crisis. Read full review
50
The New YorkerDavid Denby
It’s a sad movie--funny, yet wounded and bewildered. Read full review
50
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
Exhibits the weaknesses and the strengths of what has become a nearly foolproof formula for keeping viewers engaged. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
As a statement on capitalism or anything else, Capitalism: A Love Story is often embarrassingly simplistic, self-contradictory. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleMarjorie Baumgarten
This time the acclaimed filmmaker tackles an entire “ism” and, much like its ambiguous title, Capitalism: A Love Story, Moore’s film is an unmethodical survey of a gargantuan topic, one that has only grown more so in the year since he began work on the project. Read full review
30
SalonStephanie Zacharek
This is a love story, all right, but it has less to do with the flaws of capitalism than it does with Moore's unwavering fondness for the sound of his own voice, and for what he perceives as his own vast cleverness. Read full review
30
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
By the end, when Moore presents himself as a lone crusader for justice and wraps yellow crime-scene tape around the AIG building, his reasoning is so muddled that he can’t distinguish an economic system (corporate capitalism) from a political one (representative democracy). Read full review
25
New York PostKyle Smith
Shouldn’t Moore run his yellow crime-scene tape around the White House instead of Wall Street? Anyway, President Obama said this month that in cases where the government has fully sold its TARP bank holdings, it has gotten back its money plus 17 percent. Damn those capitalist barons, breaking into our treasury and filling it with their filthy money. Read full review
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