Jailhouse Rock

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) | Release Date: November 8, 1957

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

68	METASCORE Generally favorable reviews based on 12 Critic Reviews

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

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Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

Steve Simels

If you’re looking for cool, here’s Elvis Presley at his absolutely arctic. Read full review

Marjorie Baumgarten

Elvis' third movie is surely his best. He plays a guy vaguely like himself, who hits it big after learning to play music while in prison. Not only does this film have some of the best tunes in an Elvis movie, the choreography is great too. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

Luckily, the attitude, the aggression, and the sex were let out in a burst of fire and they got it all on film. Read full review

TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)

All shook up and enjoyably bad, JAILHOUSE ROCK captures early Elvis in all his leg-quivering, nostril-flaring, lip-snarling teen idol glory. Read full review

Michael Wilmington

The all-time great Stoller-Lieber title number, performed by The King in jailbird regalia, is just one highlight of this '50s rock-the-house classic. [04 Sep 1998, p.H]

Michael H. Kleinschrodt

Presley, though not the strongest actor in the world, deserves credit for taking a risk in playing an edgy character who is unsympathetic for much of the film. [03 Aug 2007, p.13]

Staff (Not Credited)

The production carries a contrived plot but under Richard Thorpe's deft direction unfolds smoothly. Director has been wise enough to allow Elvis Presley (in his third starrer) his own style, and build around him. Read full review

Dave Kehr

Elvis made a few better films (including Peter Tewksbury’s The Trouble With Girls and Don Siegel’s Flaming Star), but none that drew so well on the bad-boy side of his personality. Read full review

The IndependentStaff (Not Credited)

Elvis's best film, in which he quite convincingly plays an unsavoury character sent to jail for killing a man in a bar brawl, but is reformed after he's introduced to the music business by his country-singing cellmate and becomes a big star. [18 Oct 2008, p.48]

Howard Thompson

Presley fans may not like the idea of his being a churlish, egotistical wonder boy of television and the screen for a good half of the picture. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

The story, about a rock star with a prison background, was tougher than some of the other Presley pictures, but the musical numbers especially were shot in the MGM tradition, which was totally wrong for rock. Read full review

Pauline Kael

Richard Thorpe directed this package, shrewdly designed to give satisfaction to the new raunchy rock generation. The story ends happily, and the movie made millions, though Presley never begins to suggest the vitality that he showed in documentary footage.