Janet Planet
A24 | Release Date: June 21, 2024 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
83
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
30
Mixed:
6
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Washington PostAmy NicholsonJun 27, 2024
Baker’s delicate spellbinders more often leave their themes unspoken. Her characters grapple with longings and a need to prove their worth, but they rarely share their struggles out loud. Read full review
100
Rolling StoneDavid FearJun 25, 2024
It’s the kind of minimalist, yet emotionally rich memory piece that’s so quietly attuned to people, place and the passing of time that, ironically, it makes you want to shout hosannahs from a mountaintop until you’re hoarse. Read full review
100
Los Angeles TimesCharles McNultyJun 25, 2024
Janet Planet is a brilliant debut for Baker, who doesn’t so much translate her artistry to the screen as discover a whole new frontier for her singular sensibility. Read full review
100
RogerEbert.comJourdain SearlesJun 24, 2024
The world Baker creates for her characters is so rich, warm, and beautiful. Read full review
100
The New YorkerJustin ChangJun 21, 2024
If there’s a reason Janet Planet never succumbs to the rosy, banalizing glow of nineties nostalgia, it’s Baker’s ability to juxtapose multiple perspectives in the same static frame—a gift that feels closely rooted in her theatre work. Read full review
100
Wall Street JournalZachary BarnesJun 20, 2024
One of the virtues of Ms. Baker’s spare style is the profundity that lurks in every line, which here comes out at its most clearly and movingly distilled. Read full review
100
The New York TimesAlissa WilkinsonJun 20, 2024
Janet Planet is a tiny masterpiece, and it’s so carefully constructed, so loaded with details and emotions and gentle comedy, that it’s impossible to shake once it gets under your skin. Read full review
100
The TelegraphTim RobeyFeb 19, 2024
Baker’s tingling delicacy of touch makes it a subtly distinctive experience: it’s a film I already looked forward to revisiting while tiptoeing through it the first time. Read full review
100
Screen DailyTim GriersonSep 10, 2023
Janet Planet is alive with possibility, not just for the youngster but also for the remarkable writer-director who announces her big-screen ambitions with stunning force. Read full review
100
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneySep 10, 2023
The movie contains no non-diegetic music and even limits major camera movement to a relatively small handful of scenes. Nothing distracts from the tender wisdom of its unimpeachably unsentimental gaze and the vividness of its very specific New England milieu. Read full review
100
IndieWireEsther ZuckermanSep 10, 2023
There is nothing artificial here, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t mystery. It’s the mystery of people and their unusual behaviors and the way they can flit in and out of our lives and our consciousness. Read full review
95
The AtlanticDavid SimsJun 21, 2024
What impressed me most about Janet Planet is what a work of cinema it is, visually alive and inventive even with a small budget and fairly languid plotting pace. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubNatalia KeoganJun 20, 2024
Few artists can so seamlessly transcend artistic labels, but Annie Baker has proven that she possesses the natural knack for quiet storytelling across mediums. Read full review
91
The PlaylistGregory EllwoodSep 10, 2023
When was the last time someone who has so mastered the stage – Baker is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, mind you – crafted a directorial feature debut of such artistic confidence? A film that feels a million miles from the confines of a sterile theatrical setting. A movie that is creatively propelled more by a filmmaker’s eye than the words composed by a screenwriter. Read full review
90
IGNSiddhant AdlakhaJul 2, 2024
Visually lush and emotionally affecting, Janet Planet marks playwright Annie Baker’s bold transition to the big screen. Read full review
90
New York Magazine (Vulture)Alison WillmoreJun 24, 2024
When I came back to the film months later, the intricacy of its emotional undercurrents bowled me over, as though I just needed to know what was coming to fully appreciate what Baker was up to. Read full review
90
Vanity FairRichard LawsonJun 21, 2024
As is true of Baker’s plays, Janet Planet envelops its audience with a lulling mood before delivering a closing punch of meaning, a kind of summation of theme and intent that casts a clarifying light on all that you’ve just watched. Read full review
90
ColliderChase HutchinsonMar 4, 2024
Just as credit must be given to Baker for how she so completely captures a moment in time and place, it is Nicholson who inhabits this world so naturally that you feel like you’re just peeking in on Janet’s life. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsJun 27, 2024
The film is a mite thin, and occasionally glib. But Baker knows where the bittersweet human comedy lies in this mother, and this daughter. Read full review
80
The Irish TimesDonald ClarkeAug 1, 2024
Janet Planet plays a little like a memory piece from an unknown future – the assembled past life of an adult who, as a child, grasped only a bare majority of the tensions unfolding about her. A lovely, flawed idyll. Read full review
80
The IndependentClarisse LoughreyJul 19, 2024
The emotions in Janet Planet creep up on you. Read full review
80
Time OutAndrzej LukowskiJun 20, 2024
It could all come across as terribly zany, or sentimental. But Baker’s writing and direction has a near-hallucinatory sparseness to it. Read full review
80
VarietyPeter DebrugeSep 10, 2023
It’s striking proof of an original sensibility. Read full review
77
Paste MagazineJesse HassengerOct 10, 2023
The many great scenes in Janet Planet underscore the frustrations of its few bad ones: Even an emotionally tumultuous childhood can be a lot more absorbing than the indulgences of the adult world. Read full review
75
LarsenOnFilmJosh LarsenJun 25, 2024
This is a sad film, if beautifully observed, about a young girl learning that she won’t always be able to have her mom to herself—that, in fact, she never really had her in the first place. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineKenji FujishimaOct 9, 2023
Annie Baker’s spare dialogue style remains intact, with each line revealing of character and mood. Read full review
70
The New YorkerRichard BrodyJun 26, 2024
As admirable as some of the onscreen talk is, it’s mainly just delivered, along with the intentions and meanings that it contains; its precision leaves little overflow, little room for observation, little scope for imagination beyond the intimate purview of the story. Read full review
70
TimeStephanie ZacharekJun 21, 2024
This is a child’s-eye view of a parent rendered without a sheen of nostalgia—it feels less like a story being told by a thoughtful adult looking back than one springing directly from the fierce, untamed mind of a child. Read full review
70
Screen RantGraeme GuttmannJun 21, 2024
Baker's familiarity with the area gives Janet Planet a distinct sense of place and Baker an assured way with the camera, but there's also a universality to it and to the film's central pair that helps it transcend to something even more affecting. Read full review
65
TheWrapSep 10, 2023
It keeps the viewer at arm’s length from both the joys and aches of tweenhood, when all you crave is to get just a step closer. Read full review
60
EmpireNicola AustinJul 22, 2024
This gentle and intimate coming-of-age drama from beloved playwright Annie Baker is an assured but frustratingly slow-paced directorial debut which evokes the bittersweet nostalgia of ‘90s pre-teen girlhood. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawJul 16, 2024
The film has sympathy and charm, although I can’t exactly share all the praise that’s been lavished on it. It unfolds in an indulgent, dreamy summer haze, halfway between rapture and torpor; a murmuring indie-stonewash of good taste. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliJul 1, 2024
Although not without its merits, it’s far from a standout even when one considers how lackluster the current indie/art house landscape has become. Read full review
45
The Daily BeastNick SchagerOct 8, 2023
Operates in a single, precious sub-Kelly Reichardt register, its every second marked by studied images, sounds and performances. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerJun 27, 2024
If you grew up in the 1990s post-hippie Massachusetts performance arts scene (as Baker did), Janet Planet may tug on your nostalgia, but you may not feel otherwise drawn to its ethereal qualities. Read full review
40
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzJun 25, 2024
Ultimately, the movie is really boring. Any charm or spark it might have had is quashed by a lack of strong direction and writing. Read full review
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