High-Rise
Magnolia Pictures | Release Date: May 13, 2016 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
65
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
21
Mixed:
14
Negative:
1
Watch Now
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Buy on
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Stream On
Expand

Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
CineVueBen NicholsonSep 16, 2015
The politics serves as footnote to the aesthetic for Wheatley and High-Rise is certainly style over substance. For fans of the British director, that may well be more than enough. Read full review
60
Time OutJoshua RothkopfSep 16, 2015
The movie ultimately feels both too glib and too hermetically sealed to resonate beyond its chaotic interiors. Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyMay 12, 2016
There are certain movies that you really want to like based on their ambition, or their weirdness, or their ambitious weirdness, and ultimately you just can’t. Ben Wheatley’s High-Rise is one of those movies. Read full review
50
The Seattle TimesMichael UpchurchMay 19, 2016
Unfortunately as festivities in the building turn violent and/or orgiastic, Wheatley keeps resorting to high-speed montages rather than slyly crafted scenes. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaMay 13, 2016
High-Rise feels like a throwback to a time when this kind of social commentary, in literature and film, seemed shocking and true. Not sure whether it's progress to say that in 2016, High-Rise doesn't shock at all. Read full review
50
The New York TimesA.O. ScottMay 12, 2016
The retro-futurist production design is gorgeously awful, the cast is awfully gorgeous, and the dystopian setting is explored with an appropriately Ballardian blend of suavity and aggression. But onscreen, High-Rise is curiously inert. The themes don’t resonate, and the story lags and lumbers. Read full review
50
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanMay 12, 2016
The overly schematic nature of High-Rise does not entirely diminish its pleasures as a story, which include, in addition to Wheatley’s richly lurid visual sensibility, an effective metaphorical tool in Laing. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleMay 12, 2016
This is the best disappointing movie you will see all year. Read full review
50
Village VoiceMelissa AndersonMay 10, 2016
Ben Wheatley's muddled adaptation of the dystopian 1975 novel High-Rise — one of many Ballard books that examine the pathologizing effects of modern technology and convenience — suffers from being both too literal and too obtuse in its alterations. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineChuck BowenApr 25, 2016
The film's notion of a caste system is crudely reductive in the manner of a routine future-shock thriller. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterStephen DaltonSep 16, 2015
Rarely have so many classy ingredients added up to such a muted, muddled, multi-story mess. Of course, it is still better to make an ambitious failure than a boring success. A true disaster movie, in all senses, High-Rise is ultimately an ambitious, brilliant failure. Read full review
50
The PlaylistKevin JagernauthSep 16, 2015
screenwriter Amy Jump and director Ben Wheatley are less concerned with the message than with the madness, and their resulting picture is heavier on style than substance. Read full review
50
VarietyPeter DebrugeSep 16, 2015
What began as a self-contained allegory on open class warfare becomes a showcase for stylistic anarchy, wherein the ensuing orgy of sex and violence serves to justify a near-total breakdown of cinematic form. Read full review
40
The GuardianHenry BarnesSep 16, 2015
Wheatley has made High Rise his story, instead of Ballard’s. That’s fine – but, unfortunately, it’s a less interesting take. Read full review
More From This Movie

65 Critic Reviews

5.2 User Reviews

Details & Credits|Trailers

Current Movie Releases
By MetascoreBy User Score
1 77 Project Hail Mary
2 75 Send Help
3 73 Hoppers
4 71 The Sheep Detectives
5 68 Crime 101
SEE ALL
Essential Links
New on Amazon Prime Video
New on Netflix
Coming Soon to DVD/Blu-ray
SEE ALL