Hitchcock
Fox Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: November 23, 2012 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
55
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 40 Critic Reviews
Positive:
20
Mixed:
16
Negative:
4
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
ObserverRex ReedNov 20, 2012
This is one of the best movies of 2012. With rich performances, a riveting and articulate screenplay, meticulous direction and enough grounded emotional intensity to keep your pulse pounding, Hitchcock grabs you by the lapels like a suspense classic by Hitch himself - a knockout from start to finish. Read full review
83
Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanNov 20, 2012
It's a perfect summation of why he was the ultimate filmmaker. Read full review
80
Boxoffice MagazinePete HammondNov 18, 2012
A "Good Evening" indeed at the movies. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterTodd McCarthyNov 12, 2012
This narrative directing debut by Sacha Gervasi remains absorbing and aptly droll despite a few dramatic ups and downs and, led by large performances by Anthony Hopkins and Helen Mirren. Read full review
75
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanDec 6, 2012
Mirren simply is, and she takes Hitchcock up a notch with every look and line. Read full review
75
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallDec 5, 2012
A movie as fun as it is flawed. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaNov 29, 2012
Jessica Biel is Vera Miles, the star who had the nerve to get pregnant when Hitchcock wanted her for "Vertigo." He feels betrayed, and she feels relieved, consigned to a supporting role in Psycho as Marion's sister. And Toni Collette, in glasses and a dark wig, is Hitchcock's long-suffering secretary, Peggy. Both Biel and Collette are very good, engaging. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleNov 23, 2012
Hitchcock isn't ambitious or complicated. It's simple, does what it sets out to do, and gets out before anyone even thinks about checking the time. More movies should be made in its image. Read full review
75
New York PostKyle SmithNov 21, 2012
When Hopkins' Hitch directs the audience by waving his hands like a symphony conductor - it's a nice callback to a Hannibal Lecter highlight - it's one of the best scenes of the year: a delightfully personal way to show how the story of "Psycho" concluded. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertNov 20, 2012
Hitchcock tells the story not so much as the making of the film, but as the behind-the-scenes relationship of Alma and Hitch. This is a disappointment, since I imagine most movie fans will expect more info about the film's production history. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversNov 20, 2012
Hopkins and Mirren are acting pros in stellar form. There's no way you want to miss the pleasure of their company in a movie that offers a sparkling and unexpectedly poignant look at how to sustain a career and a marriage. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliNov 20, 2012
Anthony Hopkins is probably a shoe-in for an Oscar nomination. Read full review
75
IndieWireEric KohnNov 12, 2012
Hitchcock largely succeeds at pulling back the veil on his off-camera personality. To a larger degree, it reveals the level of influence of his devoted wife and screenwriter Alma (Helen Mirren) on both his personal life and career. Read full review
70
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzNov 23, 2012
Hitchcock is, well, fun. More fun than good, really. It feels weird to call it a disappointment, because it is entertaining. But you can't help feeling a little shortchanged on the deep-thinking front. Read full review
70
TimeMary PolsNov 20, 2012
It's a feel-good frolic, which is fine for anyone who prefers their Hitchcock history tidied up, absent the megalomania, the condescending cruelty and tendency to sexual harassment that caused his post-Psycho blonde discovery Tippi Hedren to declare him "a mean, mean man." Read full review
67
Portland OregonianMarc MohanDec 6, 2012
There's fun to be had in the re-creation of indelible screen moments, including several with Scarlett Johansson as Janet Leigh and James D'Arcy as Anthony Perkins. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsNov 30, 2012
Hitchcock is an amusing lark, but the clumsy way it dissects the director is for the birds. Read full review
63
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsNov 26, 2012
I prefer [HBO's Hitchcock biopic] "The Girl," not because of its salaciousness but because it gets at something underneath the great (truly, great) director's skin. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia PuigNov 23, 2012
Though the film is titled Hitchcock and ostensibly centers on the legendary director, we get a better sense of the women around him than the enigmatic filmmaker. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick GroenNov 23, 2012
Hitchcock unspools at that deliciously silly juncture where biography meets fallacy. Translation: Any director who could crank out Psycho must be a crackpot himself. Read full review
60
EmpireIan NathanFeb 4, 2013
Hitchcock for dummies: brisk, jolly, well-played but oversimplified. Read full review
60
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottDec 7, 2012
Hitchcock purists will certainly take issue with some details, but Gervasi's film shouldn't be taken as an ironclad factual film docudrama. Rather, it is fact-inspired fiction -- a film based on real events but one that isn't shy about taking creative liberties. As long as viewers keep that in mind, Gervasi's stands to be a nice bit of murderous fun. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsElizabeth WeitzmanNov 23, 2012
Despite its definitive title, you won't actually learn much about Alfred Hitchcock from Sacha Gervasi's briskly superficial biopic. But you'll enjoy the experience anyway. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesKenneth TuranNov 23, 2012
Hitchcock puts major league star power at the service of its peek-behind-closed-doors premise. But whatever that relationship was like in real life, this is one cinematic portrait of a marriage we could have lived without. Read full review
60
The New York TimesManohla DargisNov 23, 2012
The movie has its diversions, including Scarlett Johansson's bodacious Janet Leigh and Michael Stuhlbarg's wheedling Lew Wasserman. It's fluff. But while its dim fantasies about Hitchcock and the association of genius with psychosis can be written off as silly, they also smack of spiteful jealousy. Read full review
60
NPRElla TaylorNov 23, 2012
The film never coheres. Trying to carve out a space between black comedy and straight evocation of a difficult but rewarding marriage, the movie never settles on a tone. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenDec 5, 2012
This film is more a love story about the marriage between Hitchcock (Anthony Hopkins) and his wife, Alma Reville (Helen Mirren), rather than a historically accurate backstage look at the making of this important movie in the Hitchcock filmography and the American psyche. Read full review
50
Washington PostAnn HornadayNov 23, 2012
For all his creepy tendencies, Hitchcock is portrayed mostly sympathetically in Hitchcock, in which Sir Anthony Hopkins plays the corpulent British auteur with a combination of hauteur and playfulness. Read full review
50
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerNov 23, 2012
Hopkins has been fitted out prosthetically to resemble Hitchcock and he does a reasonably good job of impersonating him, but it's a foredoomed effort. Read full review
50
The A.V. ClubScott TobiasNov 23, 2012
Making his feature debut, director Sacha Gervasi follows up his fine documentary "Anvil: The Story Of Anvil" with another story about the perils of uncompromising creative endeavor, but his Hitchcock goes only a step beyond caricature. Read full review
50
SlateDana StevensNov 21, 2012
I wouldn't recommend Hitchcock to cinephiles seeking a bold new take on the master's life or work, but if all you want is to while away the afternoon in the company of some excellent actors in plummy period costume, Gervasi's film is not without its pleasures. Read full review
50
The PlaylistCharlie Schmidlin Nov 21, 2012
That feeling of utter disposability pervades throughout the film, underlining the missteps of Gervasi by aiming for breezy entertainment while forgetting to pause and inject some genuine emotion in there as well. Read full review
50
Village VoiceKarina LongworthNov 20, 2012
The change in title from book to film is instructive: Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho is about a filmmaker and the making of a film; Hitchcock is a half-ass attempt to demystify a larger-than-life man who put himself front and center while remaining enigmatic, a master at revealing a little in order to conceal a lot. Read full review
50
VarietyJustin ChangNov 12, 2012
Hitchcock is a diverting but dramatically insipid account of how the Master of Suspense took his biggest gamble and delivered his greatest success with "Psycho." Read full review
40
The GuardianPeter BradshawFeb 9, 2013
A disappointing excursion into movie history. Read full review
40
Time OutKeith UhlichNov 20, 2012
Too-cutesy conceits such as Hitch's imagined conversations with serial killer Ed Gein (Michael Wincott) feebly attempt to ground the story in psychological terra firma, while horribly on-the-nose dialogue flatters those viewers who prefer to keep their sense of cinema history on fan-mag frivolous levels. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeWesley MorrisNov 23, 2012
This is all a long way of saying that the best way to better understand the man who made those and dozens of other movies is simply to see them. There's no case to be made for a mangy shortcut like Hitchcock. It's all surface and formula. Read full review
25
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezDec 6, 2012
Hitchcock spends too much time off the set of Psycho, where the real story was, and focuses instead on incidental matters that feel like outtakes. Mother would not have been pleased. Read full review
12
Slant MagazineAndrew SchenkerNov 16, 2012
If you've ever seen Psycho, or even if you know anything at all about the film, Sacha Gervasi's Hitchcock would like to congratulate you on your savvy. Read full review
10
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternNov 23, 2012
Hitchcock rings false from start to finish. Read full review
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