Jimmy's Hall
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: July 3, 2015 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
63
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 24 Critic Reviews
Positive:
14
Mixed:
10
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaJul 17, 2015
There's humanity here, on all sides, and a gentle wisdom beneath the raging rhetoric. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriJul 6, 2015
Don’t let the politics scare you off, though, for Jimmy’s Hall is a joyous movie. I wasn’t being glib with that earlier mention of "Footloose": Loach’s film isn’t technically a musical, but it has that same spirit, that same let’s-put-on-a-show vitality. Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsGraham FullerJul 3, 2015
This companion piece to Loach’s 2006 drama “The Wind That Shakes the Barley” tenderly conveys the generosity of working people. It’s the last biographical fiction movie the 79-year-old Loach has said he’ll direct. Read full review
80
Time Out LondonDave CalhounMay 30, 2014
Politics and entertainment are never an easy mix, and Jimmy’s Hall is a familiar, slightly unsurprising coming together of the two from Loach and his writer Paul Laverty. Sometimes you can see the joins, but there’s also great warmth, charm and humour among the ideas, and the sense of time and place is especially strong. Read full review
80
VarietyScott FoundasMay 25, 2014
A minor-key but eminently enjoyable work by a master craftsman. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianJeff BakerAug 7, 2015
Laverty gives the scenes between Jimmy and Father Sheridan a sharp edge, and Ward and Norton do the rest. Ryan shot on 35mm and makes the whole movie glow. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreJul 28, 2015
An eye-opening period piece that takes us back to the dark days of the Irish Police State. Read full review
75
Washington PostAnn HornadayJul 9, 2015
In many ways, Jimmy’s Hall shows what the pursuit of happiness can look like, and why it’s worth a revolution to protect it. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comGlenn KennyJul 3, 2015
It’s just another solid Loach film, an affectionate realist portrait of individuals fighting against state and religious oppression. In this case the setting, as it was for his 2006 Cannes Film Festival Palme d’Or winner “The Wind That Shakes The Barley,” is Ireland. Read full review
75
IndieWireEric KohnMay 25, 2014
A minor work by Loach's standards, the movie nevertheless marks his most enjoyable effort in years. Read full review
70
Village VoiceMarsha McCreadieJul 2, 2015
[Loach] and his longtime scriptwriter Paul Laverty combed Irish history to find a figure you might see as Loach's intellectual double; maybe this accounts for some of the speechifying dialogue as various political positions are explained, jarring at times in a film of action shots and escaping out windows. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleKimberley JonesJul 29, 2015
If you ever thought "Footloose" might’ve been improved with an Irish brogue and a short pour of agitprop, then by all means look to this latest from Ken Loach, Britain’s elder statesman of cinema and its evergreen champion of the working class. Read full review
63
New York PostFarran Smith NehmeJun 30, 2015
As lovely as Jimmy’s Hall is, Paul Laverty’s script is not so much talky as speech-y. Some conversations play like bullet points about Irish politics and the iron grip of the Catholic Church. Read full review
63
Slant MagazineChuck BowenJun 28, 2015
Ken Loach's staging is so calm and sober that it turns his story into an expertly photographed yet weirdly remote rebellion tale. Read full review
60
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottSep 3, 2015
It's a comfortable and tidily assembled story of human perseverance in the face of adversity. Which is yet another thing about which the Irish know a thing or two. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesSheri LindenJul 2, 2015
A story that might have been alive with messy complexity is instead genial and polite. Read full review
60
The New York TimesStephen HoldenJul 2, 2015
The screenplay is vague not only about politics but also about the history of Jimmy’s unconsummated relationship with his former sweetheart, Oonagh (Simone Kirby), now married, whose wide Susan Sarandon eyes express a wistful sadness. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubMike D'AngeloJul 3, 2015
Jimmy’s Hall is one of [Loach's] clunkers: Footloose set in 1930s Ireland, basically, with jazz in lieu of Kenny Loggins. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeTom RussoJul 16, 2015
The film is slow going with its mix of stilted political discourse and restless village folk just looking to celebrate life and dance. At times, it’s like “Footloose” gone didactic. Read full review
50
The DissolveVadim RizovJul 2, 2015
If this is, as he claims, indeed his last film (or at least last big narrative feature), he’s retiring with the courage of his convictions intact. If only he was expressing them more vigorously. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterNeil YoungMay 25, 2014
For the first time his ongoing collaboration with scriptwriter Paul Laverty, Loach's studiously safe-hands approach -- typified by regular collaborator George Fenton's near-incessant score -- can't counterbalance fundamental screenplay flaws. Read full review
50
The PlaylistJessica KiangMay 25, 2014
It’s a twee and tweedy period “Footloose,” into which Loach’s trademark left wing sympathies are not so much woven as photocopied and stapled onto alternate pages of the script. Read full review
40
The TelegraphRobbie CollinMay 25, 2014
This is exasperatingly thin stuff from Loach and Laverty, who have in the past built far more textured narratives, peopled by far richer characters, even while maintaining the fierce, politicised charge they aim for here. Read full review
40
CineVueJohn BleasdaleMay 25, 2014
The characters of Jimmy's Hall aren't really characters as much as archetypes: the saintly mother, the sweetheart, the hero, the villain. This is the kind of film where people don't argue - they debate - speaking in lines from manifestos and creating an incongruity. Read full review
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