Chappaquiddick
Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures | Release Date: April 6, 2018 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
67
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 33 Critic Reviews
Positive:
24
Mixed:
9
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
91
IndieWireKate ErblandMar 2, 2018
Jason Clarke opts for a more low-key approach to Teddy Kennedy, eschewing a big accent or showy mannerisms, and fully disappears into the role. It’s his finest work yet, and proof of his ability to excel given the right material. Read full review
90
VarietyOwen GleibermanMar 2, 2018
The movie is avidly told and often suspenseful, but it’s really a fascinating study of how corruption in America works. It sears you with its relevance. Read full review
88
ObserverRex ReedApr 10, 2018
Several aspects of this sad, grim story remain a mystery, but I am pleased to report that for the most part, Chappaquiddick catalogues the facts and eschews the sensationalism. The result is a film of integrity and disclosure, a controversial chapter in American history that substitutes clinical accuracy for Hollywood embellishment, with an impressive attention to detail and an admirable respect for suspenseful narrative. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperApr 5, 2018
Chappaquiddick does a remarkably economical job of encapsulating the madness of that week without overwhelming us with historical detail. The story moves from moment to moment, day to day, with clarity and great dramatic effect — and (rightfully) condemns Kennedy’s actions without turning him into a monster. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyLeah GreenblattApr 4, 2018
What the movie doesn’t do, until it’s nearly over, is make any real case for why so much of America continued to put their faith in Kennedy long after the facts of the case were revealed. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzApr 5, 2018
Chappaquiddick is a study of arrogance, of power and influence wielded corruptly to cast facts into doubt. Read full review
80
The New York TimesA.O. ScottApr 4, 2018
Whether or not events actually unfolded this way, the story the film tells is an interesting and complicated character study, with something to say about the corrosive effects of power and privilege on both the innocent and the guilty. Read full review
80
The GuardianJordan HoffmanMar 2, 2018
Jason Clarke is strong as the weak senator, and he wisely goes easy on replicating the unmistakable Massachusetts accent. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleDanielle WhiteApr 9, 2018
Chappaquiddick portrays the “incident” with the delicate meticulousness of an autopsy – which is ironic because the body of Mary Jo Kopechne never got one. Read full review
75
New York PostJohnny OleksinskiApr 5, 2018
Chappaquiddick is far from a love letter to the famous family. It paints them as a hollow dynasty of pretty faces hiding behind a powerful name, while real men of intellect and influence puppeteer their every move. Camelot, it’s not. And, as this terrific movie suggests, the American people fall for their polished BS every time. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Brad WheelerApr 5, 2018
Jason Clarke is excellent as the complicated Kennedy, an unsure, insecure and not entirely decent man daunted by his brothers’ shadows and eager to earn a father’s respect that is not forthcoming. The supporting cast is top-notch, particularly Kate Mara, who portrays the doomed Kennedy loyalist Kopechne with a warm humanity. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversApr 5, 2018
The film is corrosive in its take on the injustice that allowed Ted to live and prosper in a protective bubble of privilege. Clarke makes it clear that the man himself most likely felt the same way. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleApr 5, 2018
This much is certain: The cover-up was grotesque. Read full review
75
Philadelphia Daily NewsGary ThompsonApr 4, 2018
The ability of political power to impose narratives, says Chappaquiddick, has always been conditional on our willingness to believe them. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineMark MatousekApr 4, 2018
John Curran creates room for his characters to think and feel and an environment that encourages us to do the same. Read full review
75
Washington PostAlan ZilbermanMar 30, 2018
The Kennedy dynasty has its share of admirers and critics alike, and — to the film’s credit — director John Curran and his screenwriters do not appease either camp. The result is a challenging character study, punctuated by moments of uneasy suspense and dark humor. Read full review
70
Vanity FairRichard LawsonApr 25, 2018
Chappaquiddick isn’t a harangue against Kennedy, but it does take a hard look at a man who was a revered stalwart of the Democratic party for decades. The film works best as a character study, a profile of moral crisis, rather than any sort of true-crime exposé. Read full review
70
The AtlanticDavid SimsApr 4, 2018
It’s a film looking to challenge America’s gauzy perception of the country’s most famous political family, loaded with all the bleakness that task requires. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyApr 2, 2018
The stranger and more corrosive subtexts it locates in the Kennedy circle’s actions in the aftermath of the crash are undermined by its classy restraint, which saps the most conceptually outrageous moments. Read full review
67
The Film StageJared MobarakMar 2, 2018
I’m not certain if the truth ever came out about that evening’s events beyond speculation, but I don’t think anyone would question the believably authentic script that Taylor Allen and Andrew Logan wrote for Chappaquiddick. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreApr 11, 2018
Wandering into the unknowns doesn’t serve history or the film well enough to make Chappaquiddick anything more than cinematic escape for folks who don’t like the current history they’d rather avoid thinking about by going to the movies. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comSusan WloszczynaApr 6, 2018
Clarke, who has skillfully brought other complex and compromised males to life in “Zero Dark Thirty” and “Mudbound,” is wholly convincing both physically and vocally as the surviving Kennedy brother. One wishes that the movie itself allowed him more performing room than it does. Read full review
63
Boston GlobeTy BurrApr 4, 2018
An entertainingly brutal portrait of feckless privilege and buried tragedy, hewing reasonably close to those points we know to be true and juicily provocative about what happened in rooms you and I weren’t privy to. Read full review
63
The Associated PressJake CoyleApr 4, 2018
Ambiguous and damning at once, John Curran’s Chappaquiddick plunges us back into the summer of 1969: the season of Woodstock, the moon landing, the Manson murders and the lowest ebb of the Kennedy mythology. Read full review
60
TimeStephanie ZacharekApr 12, 2018
Although Chappaquiddick doesn’t address Kennedy’s subsequent legislative record, it’s the silver-lining storm cloud that hangs over the movie. Read full review
60
TheWrapInkoo KangApr 5, 2018
Chappaquiddick may or may not be what actually happened, but it gets at enough piercing truths. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranApr 5, 2018
While Chappaquiddick sheds some light on the proceedings, the film leaves us feeling, as Kennedy intimate Ted Sorensen (Taylor Nichols) puts it, "history has the final word on these things," not Hollywood. Read full review
60
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternApr 5, 2018
Many of the characters are cut from recycled cardboard, while Kennedy himself, played by Jason Clarke, remains a cipher. (Mary Jo is played by Kate Mara.) The movie makes a point of not judging him, but that only highlights the impossibility, after all these years, of penetrating the mystery of his behavior. Read full review
60
New York Magazine (Vulture)Emily YoshidaApr 4, 2018
Chappaquiddick is somehow both cynical and deeply inquisitive about the morals of every character involved. Read full review
60
CineVueChristopher MachellMar 2, 2018
The film ultimately ends up feeling like a shaggy dog story – a metaphor for Ted Kennedy, perhaps – engaging, charismatic, but ending with a whimper. Read full review
50
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsApr 5, 2018
Chappaquiddick misses that target. But it’s a fairly intriguing mixture of strengths and weaknesses, a case of a sharp cast and a careful director toning up a script best described as “a good try.” Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyMar 2, 2018
First-time screenwriters Taylor Allen and Andrew Logan have done their homework in organizing the material but haven’t brought an argument to the table that might have zapped the film to life; everything is methodical, it covers most of the bases, but passion and vitality are crucially missing from director John Curran’s treatment. Read full review
50
The PlaylistKevin JagernauthMar 2, 2018
Chappaquiddick hardly lands with the power of an exposé, and doesn’t bite hard enough to spur a reconsideration of the Kennedys. The film revives a chapter in Kennedy history, but what it means nearly forty years later is never quite clear. Read full review
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