Churchill
Lionsgate | Release Date: June 2, 2017 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
44
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 25 Critic Reviews
Positive:
3
Mixed:
16
Negative:
6
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
Los Angeles TimesGary GoldsteinJun 1, 2017
Cox masterfully captures Churchill’s contradictory nature, obsessive dutifulness to queen and country, and a volatility born out of fear, desperation and impending loss. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversJun 1, 2017
You can certainly argue just how speculative this film version of Churchill is as history. But Cox's performance cannot be faulted. It's a master class in acting. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerJun 2, 2017
Too often Churchill feels more like an exposé than a deep-dish psychological exploration Read full review
60
EmpireJonathan PileJun 19, 2017
A fascinating but flawed portrait of a fascinating but flawed man. However, with Cox so good, it’s a surprise Churchill isn’t being held back until awards season. Read full review
60
Time Out LondonTom HuddlestonJun 12, 2017
Cox is rudely magnificent, capturing not just the wilfulness of the man but the nagging self-doubt at his inner core. But the film is just too bloodless to be fully convincing. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJun 1, 2017
If the story is somewhat lacking, Cox is terrific. Read full review
60
VarietyOwen GleibermanMay 29, 2017
Churchill is a small, watchable, rather prosaic backroom docudrama. Read full review
58
The Film StageJared MobarakMay 29, 2017
As directed by Jonathan Teplitzky, the film carries with it a theatrical style heavy on dialogue with everything portrayed in close-up besides some very attractive wide shots setting each scene. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreJun 7, 2017
Churchill seems a hasty addition to this Summer of War, with a valid point of view and portrayal, but without the budget or scope to be anything more than a lot of shouted arguments — a stage play with very pretty historical backdrops. Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJun 1, 2017
On the stage, it could be a powerful and moving work. As a movie, it’s a sometimes effective but more often tedious history lesson. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineChuck BowenJun 1, 2017
The film simplifies Winston Churchill's legacy for the dubious purposes of narrative momentum and emotional lift. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMay 31, 2017
Cox does a better than average job — almost everybody bombs when playing Churchill — capturing the leader’s seriousness of purpose and the weight of his responsibility. He gives us Churchill’s irascibility, but he doesn’t convey Churchill’s twinkle, his charm or his wit. Read full review
50
Village VoiceChuck WilsonMay 31, 2017
Cox’s delivery of Churchill’s “We will fight on the beaches” D-Day speech surely ranks among the best, but it’s a problem when a narrative feature’s most powerful scenes are drawn from historical text. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterStephen DaltonMay 29, 2017
Australian director Jonathan Teplitzky has fashioned a small-scale chamber drama from huge historical events, with a functional script and modest budget that fails to match the grand sweep of its story. Read full review
50
Screen DailyWendy IdeMay 29, 2017
Although driven by a robust, screen-filling performance by Brian Cox, who not only captures the voice and mannerisms of Churchill but also the distinctive silhouette, the film is too ponderously paced and conventional to make much of an impact. Read full review
42
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyMay 31, 2017
The result is monotonous, its only memorable image being the salacious wink of Cox’s open fly, mid-frame during a shot of Churchill getting out a car. (Presumably this was the best take.) Read full review
40
The New York TimesGlenn KennyJun 1, 2017
The movie’s ambition is the good news. The bad news is that it is a hash, choosing to jumble the historical record and frame a Churchill bout with depression against the D-Day invasion of France by Allied forces. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternJun 1, 2017
Audacity can’t carry a drama that’s unequal to its subject in almost every respect. ( Brian Cox does what he can, sometimes admirably, to breathe life into the title role.) Read full review
40
TheWrapRobert AbeleMay 29, 2017
There’s a glimmer of a better movie in Richardson’s and Cox’s scenes, which suggest a thorny marriage that barely survived its low points, but it’s inevitably undercut by Teplitsky’s fondness for slo-mo memorializing, music overuse, and a simplistic pace that wants to brush away all the negativity with a well-timed come-to-Jesus moment, and a rousing radio speech. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeTy BurrMay 31, 2017
Unfortunately, Churchill the movie is simply dreadful, a stiff, melodramatic “Great Man” travesty that gets both the larger history and the details wrong while encouraging its star’s most overwrought excesses. What Cox serves in this movie is ham, poorly sliced. Read full review
37
Washington PostAlan ZilbermanJun 1, 2017
Biography, at its most useful, disabuses us from myth, but Churchill has no such ambitions. As both history and entertainment, it’s a drag. Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenJun 7, 2017
Fortunately, Brian Cox delivers a bravura performance that keeps things watchable, if not always dramatically truthful. Read full review
25
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Kate TaylorJun 8, 2017
The script, written by neophyte Alex von Tunzelmann, is appalling, its plot simplistic and its dialogue alternating between misplaced bits of contemporary psycho-babble and improbable grandiloquence. Read full review
20
Paste MagazineDaniel SchindelJun 1, 2017
It’s difficult to think of a biopic that so thoroughly embarrasses its subject in the process of attempting to honor them the way Churchill does. Read full review
12
RogerEbert.comGodfrey CheshireJun 2, 2017
In the annals of historical biopics, Jonathan Teplitzsky’s Churchill stands out as a uniquely awful and tedious caricature of a fascinating subject. Read full review
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