Everybody Wants Some!!
Paramount Pictures | Release Date: March 30, 2016 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
85
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 50 Critic Reviews
Positive:
46
Mixed:
3
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
The TelegraphRobbie CollinMay 12, 2016
The characters often come across as immature dolts, but the film’s humane enough to recognise that’s all part of being 18. Read full review
100
HitfixDrew McWeenyApr 6, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! offers a mature and crystal-clear voice, a filmmaker of enormous muscle who makes it all look ridiculously easy. Read full review
100
The Seattle TimesSoren AndersenApr 6, 2016
Linklater gets it right in every significant regard. Read full review
100
Time OutJoshua RothkopfApr 1, 2016
A hilarious, deeply relaxed comedy about male bonding, Richard Linklater’s baseball-minded latest ranks right up there with his masterpieces. Read full review
100
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternMar 31, 2016
Toward the end of this loose-jointed and endearing new film, a freshman says to her boyfriend, “It’s kind of beautiful that we get to feel passion in this world—about anything.” She and he, and everyone around them, have passion to burn, and we get to feel great about them. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperMar 31, 2016
Linklater introduces us to an abundance of characters, but it’s a tribute to his writing (and the performances) that each of the baseball players has a distinct personality and story thread. Read full review
100
TimeStephanie ZacharekMar 31, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! is a seemingly straightforward picture that’s surprisingly stealthy in capturing the joy and exaltation of being an almost-adult but still feeling young, of messing around and messing up, of waiting and hoping for the chance to meet a guy or girl you really like. Read full review
100
SlateDan KoisMar 31, 2016
Like Clueless or Breakfast at Tiffany’s, it’s a great American comedy, and like Boyhood and Dazed and Confused, another easygoing masterpiece from our reigning auteur of hidden depths. Read full review
100
Village VoiceBilge EbiriMar 29, 2016
The experience of watching this film is one of reflective exuberance. It's a movie about people who arrive sure of themselves and depart in the quiet confidence that all they know is that they know nothing. Read full review
100
Screen DailyDavid D'ArcyMar 11, 2016
Linklater does connect you with the fun that he must have had in those days. If you can take the testosterone, you’ll have a good time. Read full review
100
VarietyJustin ChangMar 11, 2016
Linklater indulges his characters’ antics with such wild, free-flowing affection that you might miss the thoughtful undertow of this delightful movie: Few filmmakers have so fully embraced the bittersweet joy of living in the moment — one that’s all the more glorious because it fades so soon. Read full review
100
The Hollywood ReporterJohn DeForeMar 11, 2016
It's as honest and clear-eyed about the past as its predecessor, another in a filmography of unpredictable gems. It may be most like Dazed in that the public could take a while to appreciate it for what it is. Read full review
91
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallApr 7, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! is as playfully raunchy as any sex comedy doubling down on exclamation points can be. Read full review
91
IndieWireEric KohnMar 11, 2016
Endlessly charming and sneakily wise, Everybody Wants Some!! epitomizes Linklater's unique ability to magnify human behavior with levity. Read full review
90
The New York TimesA.O. ScottMar 30, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! is more than just nostalgic. It’s downright utopian, a hormonal pastoral endowed with the innocent charm of a children’s book. There are plenty of movies about lust-addled youth, but it’s unusual to find one that feels truly wholesome. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovMar 30, 2016
While there’s hardly a plot to speak of, that’s never hobbled Linklater before and is indeed the director’s keenest, cleverest trick: the ability to make something sweet, honest, and true out of the ephemeral marginalia of youth minus the rose-tinted bullshit. Read full review
88
St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin WilsonApr 7, 2016
The tale of Jake and his pals is something of a time capsule — and the kind of film from which sociologists decades from now might glean extremely useful information about American culture. Read full review
88
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezApr 7, 2016
This is a smart, wise and compassionate movie about young people in the act of finding out who they are and not always behaving properly but never crossing the line into cruelty or crassness. If you happen to have been around during 1980, the soundtrack is just a bonus. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeTy BurrMar 31, 2016
A nice long soak in the Proustian detritus of its era. Read full review
88
RogerEbert.comSheila O'MalleyMar 31, 2016
When Linklater's style works (and it works in Everybody Wants Some!!), there is nobody quite like him. Read full review
88
Slant MagazineCarson LundMar 30, 2016
Richard Linklater's film luxuriates in a world that's the platonic ideal of youthful indulgence. Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter TraversMar 30, 2016
It'll slap on a smile on your face that won't quit. Read full review
88
USA TodayBrian TruittMar 30, 2016
Though Linklater isn’t subtle when it comes to his lesson plan — the theme of the movie is, in fact, written on a chalkboard — he gives you a squad of guys whose good times and fun personalities will leave you wanting some more. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyMar 30, 2016
There’s Glen Powell as Finn, the endearing loquacious smoothie; there’s Juston Street as Jay, the psycho loose-cannon fireballer; and Wyatt (son of Kurt) Russell as Willoughby, the older, sage-like stoner who quotes Carl Sagan after ripping bong hits. Read full review
83
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Mar 29, 2016
In its funky, aimless, winningly juvenile way, Everybody Wants Some is about as inclusively celebratory as any college comedy in memory: Per its title, it really does want everybody to get some. Read full review
83
The PlaylistCharlie SchmidlinMar 12, 2016
The strength of Linklater’s films have always been their ability to capture the textures of lived experience, and Everyone Wants Some!! is no different in that regard: it is a confident, hugely enjoyable return to a universe that treats the connection to “Dazed and Confused” not as an obligation or cash grab, but as inspiration to match that film’s level of energy and cast chemistry. Read full review
80
CineVueAdam LowesMay 17, 2016
Richard Linklater once again casts his outwardly laid-back yet deceptively astute gaze on those loitering around the edge of adulthood with Everybody Wants Some!! - a joyous and often uproarious portrayal of college-age adolescence and the alluring freedom that brings. Read full review
80
Total FilmJamie GrahamMay 9, 2016
Everybody in Everybody smashes it out the park, playing dreamers who exhibit a voracious lust for life as they quest for identity. Well, these actors might have found theirs – the next generation of leading men. Read full review
80
EmpireJonathan PileApr 18, 2016
A perfectly pitched blast of nostalgia, which will transport you to that time in life when the future stretched before you and anything seemed possible. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinApr 8, 2016
If you’ve seen Linklater’s other films, you know that time for him isn’t just a factor, it’s a character, a player. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzApr 7, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! is a terrifically entertaining movie that proves Linklater once again a master of perfectly capturing moments in time without judgment or apology. Read full review
80
The New YorkerAnthony LaneApr 4, 2016
Linklater barely puts a foot wrong, and he shows that a movie about happiness can be cogent and robust, rather than sappy or wispy; and yet, for all its gambolling mischief, Everybody Wants Some!! leaves us with plenty to rue. Read full review
80
TheWrapSam FragosoMar 30, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! may not achieve the lasting status of some of Linklater’s more acclaimed work, but there is something wonderful in watching a movie remain joyfully plotless, as intentionally lacking in direction as so many college students manage to be before society harangues them about the importance of responsibility. Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesMark OlsenMar 30, 2016
The ostensible college comedy Everybody Wants Some!! is like a stream that looks shallow but once you're in the middle of it reveals an unforeseen depth. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsStephen Whitty Mar 30, 2016
There's never an emotional moment here to compete, or even compare, with his last film, "Boyhood." But there's not supposed to be. Everybody Wants Some!! is as laid-back and low-pressure as a Saturday afternoon at someone's dorm room. Read full review
80
The GuardianNigel M SmithMar 12, 2016
If the lads were insufferable misogynistic pricks, Everybody Wants Some!! would make for horrible viewing. Thankfully they’re all intensely lovable. Read full review
80
ScreenCrushMatt SingerMar 11, 2016
The film’s structure — off-putting in the early going, irresistible by the end — is ingenious. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliApr 8, 2016
Emotionally, Linklater’s recreation of August 1980 is spot-on. Sure, there are a few anachronistic cheats (how many college-goers in 1980 had a VCR in their room?) but the tone is just about perfect. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaApr 7, 2016
Linklater, drawing from his own experiences as a baseball player at Sam Houston State University, looks back with affection, a knowing wink, and maybe the beginnings of an apologetic shrug at the jerk behavior, the locker-room pranks. These guys smell freedom in the air - and maybe some pot smoke, too. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)John SemleyMar 31, 2016
It’s hard to imagine another filmmaker who could invest the lives of straight, middle-class, norm-y, aggressively bro-y, immaculately groomed college sports jocks with a sense of vital anarchy and resounding humanity. Read full review
75
Washington PostAnn HornadayMar 31, 2016
As small and specific as it is, Everybody Wants Some!! feels improbably expansive, even universal. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMar 31, 2016
It’s a good, not great, movie, but it has some of the elements that make Linklater’s work special. Few filmmakers are quite as keyed into the passing of time, as the source of all sweetness and heartache in the human experience. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsMar 31, 2016
The film doesn't so much build as glide, in a pleasing, half-stumbling way, to the first day of school, which links Everybody Wants Some!! to Linklater's previous film, the gentle masterwork "Boyhood." Read full review
75
The Film StageMichael SnydelMar 14, 2016
Linklater finds a joyful freedom in these men who refuse to discriminate. They’re happy to play dress-up daily, moving from discotheques to honky tonk bars to hardcore shows without worrying that they’re compromising some form of authenticity. Read full review
65
The VergeBryan BishopMar 23, 2016
Linklater is in many ways a kind of movie secret agent, making films that are unconventional in form and function, but so effortlessly entertaining that the audience may not ever realize that’s what they’re seeing. Everybody Wants Some!! still pulls that trick off, but despite its laughs and moments of fun it can’t help but feel like a step back. Read full review
63
New York PostKyle SmithMar 31, 2016
A fulsomely, aggressively modest no-star picture, it’s a plotless, pointless two-hour hangout. Read full review
58
ConsequenceMichael RoffmanMar 12, 2016
A lot of it’s funny — especially any scenes involving Powell’s admittedly charming Finnegan or Hoechlin’s testy McReynolds– but hanging out with these guys eventually becomes a chore. Read full review
50
Movie NationRoger MooreApr 14, 2016
Everybody Wants Some!! is just Linklater showing he can still summon up the immaturity to do a film like the ones he did when he had no name, no polish and was just starting out...This is the sort of movie he’d have made had he never grown as a filmmaker, if he’d only been a one-trick indie cinema pony, like Kevin Smith. And the world has already decided one Kevin Smith is more than enough. Read full review
50
ObserverRex ReedMar 31, 2016
Despite the title, which relates to a song by Van Halen, it is never clear what everybody wants some of, but the film does feature a cast of obviously talented, charismatic unknowns. Read full review
38
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanApr 21, 2016
If this project is some kind of huge in-joke, I’m willing to admit I didn’t get it. But if I did get it (and I’m afraid I did), it’s a huge disappointment. Read full review
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