Five Easy Pieces
Columbia Pictures | Release Date: September 12, 1970 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
85
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
12
Mixed:
3
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
EmpireKim Newman
A key turn-of-the-decade film, with Nicholson railing against waitresses and barking at noisy dogs as Rafelson observes seedily picturesque roadside America. Read full review
100
The GuardianPeter Bradshaw
This superbly composed film comes as close to perfection as it gets. Read full review
100
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
Deceptively simple, Pieces is one of the most complex pictures of the 1970s. Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
A masterpiece of heartbreaking intensity. Read full review
100
Time OutTom Huddleston
It’s a film of stark, superbly judged and beautifully sustained contrasts, the soundtrack hopping confidently from Tammy Wynette to Chopin as Bobby and his waitress girlfriend Rayette (Karen Black) travel from the lusty, sun-baked south to the cerebral, rainswept north to pay final respects to Bobby’s dying father. Read full review
100
Chicago TribuneGene Siskel
What is more striking about the film is that its secondary characters are also real. The acting appears to be non-acting. . . . Karen Black is a letter-perfect Rayette, and Lois Smith, as Robert's sister, gives the most sensitive small performance in the film. (Jack) Nicholson makes it all go. He proves he is more than a character actor with many scenes, especially the confrontation with his father. Read full review
100
The DissolveNoel Murray
Five Easy Pieces is the very definition of a character study, and one of the best American cinema has produced. Read full review
90
Village VoiceNick Pinkerton
It’s a great work of the Discover America Seventies. Read full review
88
Rolling StoneTim Grierson
A marvel of letting an antihero's restless wanderings dictate the terms of the story, Pieces doesn't explain its lead's ennui so much as honors it. Read full review
88
Slant MagazineChuck Bowen
Bob Rafelson directs in an exploratory manner that naturally syncs up with Nicholson’s intuitive performance, his formalism suggesting a fusion of vérité and expressionism. Read full review
80
Village VoiceAndrew Sarris
The plot is sometimes too odd, the style too strained, but the movie holds you just the same. Jack Nicholson plays skillfully and honestly against the sure-fire pathos of the alienated loner, the fallen angel in life’s game of musical chairs. Read full review
80
VarietyStaff (Not Credited)
The film’s nervewracking quality is consistent with its content. Nicholson’s performance is a remarkably varied and daring exploration of a complex character, equally convincing in its manic and sober aspects. Read full review
60
The TelegraphStaff (Not Credited)
It’s the women who steal the film, collectively recalling Grey Gardens (1975) in their distinctive, damaged mannerisms. Read full review
50
Chicago ReaderDave Kehr
The film embraces proletarian chic but still gets its laughs by abusing waitresses. Read full review
50
The New York TimesRoger Greenspun
At first appears to be rich with a quantity of felt life, but on reflection seems both more carefully studied and more coldly casual than profoundly understood. Read full review
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