Io Capitano
01 Distribution | Release Date: February 23, 2024 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
79
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 25 Critic Reviews
Positive:
23
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Los Angeles TimesCarlos AguilarFeb 23, 2024
You can get the facts about these migrants anywhere, but Garrone knows the tool of cinema is more effective. By presenting these adolescents in all their fragility and strength, he comes as close as is possible to getting us to feel how they felt. Io Capitano is as unflinching as it is robust with empathy. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen JohnsonFeb 21, 2024
The late film critic Roger Ebert called movies an “empathy machine,” and “Io Capitano” stands as Garrone’s plea for empathy in a debate that sorely lacks it. Read full review
100
IndieWireLeila LatifSep 9, 2023
Garrone’s film has a three-dimensional and devastatingly realized human soul at its core. The world could do with paying attention to Seydou’s story and the millions of other real ones like it. Read full review
90
The New York TimesManohla DargisFeb 22, 2024
Garrone doesn’t spare you much, but if the movie never turns into an exercise in art-house sadism, it’s because his focus remains unwaveringly fixed on his characters who, from the start, are fully rounded people, not props, symbols or object lessons. Read full review
88
Boston GlobeOdie HendersonFeb 22, 2024
Io Capitano doesn’t try to convince viewers whether Seydou, Moussa, and all the other migrants have a right to seek a better life. What it does do, however, is tell their story in a way that makes them far more human and relatable than most of the news stories we see nowadays. Read full review
88
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanFeb 20, 2024
Io Capitano takes a news story that’s mostly about numbers, and puts a human face on it. Read full review
88
Slant MagazineChris BarsantiFeb 11, 2024
The film builds on a docudrama realism while also reaching toward the mythological. Read full review
85
Paste MagazineSage DunlapFeb 20, 2024
The film highlights the resilience of its subjects and mobilizes us to reflect on persistent racist immigration policies. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeApr 6, 2024
Central to the spirit of the film is Seydou, a gangly string bean with a smile that warms the screen; a teenager who is still enough of a child to believe that manhood means never being afraid. It’s a gorgeous, sensitive performance from Sarr. Read full review
80
The Irish TimesTara BradyApr 5, 2024
Working from a script composed of real-life testimonies and dramatised with youthful verve and extravagant flights of fancy, the director’s follow-up to the exquisite Pinocchio is a true adventure. Read full review
80
Time OutPhil de SemlyenApr 4, 2024
Stark social drama meets boy’s own adventure in this strikingly photographed African-set, Oscar-nominated adventure. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawApr 2, 2024
Seydou and the others are not exactly masters of their fate, or captains of their souls, to quote WE Henley’s Invictus. They are swept along by power and inequality, but Garrone shows that their humanity and compassion are still buoyant. Read full review
80
The TelegraphRobbie CollinMar 12, 2024
Garrone knows exactly where he’s leaving both his heroes and his audience: on the agonising cusp of a happily-ever-after his film makes you want to will into existence. Read full review
80
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerFeb 22, 2024
Understandably wanting to leave audiences with a measure of hope, Garrone in some ways falsifies what is most powerful about his movie. But there is power, too, in dramatizing the endurance of people such as Seydou. Epic stories require epic bravery. Read full review
80
CineVueJohn BleasdaleSep 11, 2023
There are moments when Garrone’s vision strays too close to the fable in its narrative even as its images portray a brutal reality. However, Io Capitano doesn’t lose its humanity. Read full review
80
Screen DailyLee MarshallSep 10, 2023
The gritty realism of Io Capitano’s story is leavened throughout by recognizably ‘Garronian’ touches; pools of magic realism, theatrical set pieces of colourful intensity. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinSep 10, 2023
While the landscapes, especially in the parched Sahara section of the story, are dazzling, Carnera’s camera always keeps the focus on the humans, sometimes specks seen from great distances moving through the sand and sometimes studied in close-ups that fill the widescreen canvas. Read full review
80
VarietyGuy LodgeSep 9, 2023
Me Captain is surprisingly classical in construction and style, wisely guiding our attention away from its sure directorial touch and toward the story at hand — pieced together by a small army of screenwriters and collaborating contributors from first-hand migrant accounts. Read full review
75
The Film StageEd FranklSep 28, 2023
Steered by Sarr in a spellbinding performance, this is a mesmerizing watch for the most part, running the gamut of positive idealism at the film’s opening to clinging on to the vestiges of hope at the finale. Read full review
70
Little White LiesKatherine McLaughlinApr 4, 2024
The superb casting of the two lead co-stars, who were only told the outcome of their characters storylines on the day of shooting, really buoys the film. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleJosh KupeckiMar 13, 2024
Aside from the requisite wide shots of sweeping desert, sea, and cityscapes marking the various stages of the journey, Garrone (the Italian director of Gomorrah and Tale of Tales, among others) keeps the camera close to Seydou, and Sarr’s skill at the subtle transformation of his emotional responses from, say, heartbreak to happiness (and back again) is incredibly compelling to watch. Read full review
63
ObserverOliver JonesFeb 23, 2024
With its stunning John Ford-like vistas of a corpse laden Sahara and a vast Mediterranean Sea empty of aid vessels to help an immigrant ship overburdened with desperate and sick North Africans, Garrone has—on the surface—made a lush and monumentally disturbing feature-length commercial for staying home. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comKatie RifeFeb 23, 2024
The nagging, inconvenient fly in the ointment is this: Who was this really made for — African immigrants in need of advocacy, or bureaucrats in search of Oscar glory? The answer seems to be a little of both. Read full review
50
ColliderLisa LamanFeb 25, 2024
Io Capitano fails its stirring lead performance with generic filmmaking and storytelling impulses. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalZachary BarnesFeb 22, 2024
Mr. Garrone seems so desperate to create a powerful humanist plea that he has neglected to provide his movie with the detail and artistry that would give it force, and he conspicuously concludes his story just before it would have started to become more contentious—and more interesting. Read full review
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