Joe
Lionsgate | Release Date: April 11, 2014 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 36 Critic Reviews
Positive:
30
Mixed:
5
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
RogerEbert.comPeter SobczynskiApr 11, 2014
If your moviegoing needs are driven less by a need to "feel good" afterwards and more by a desire to see something that will grab and touch you in ways that you will not be shaking anytime soon, this is the movie for you. Read full review
100
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanApr 10, 2014
Nicolas Cage delivers what may his best, most nuanced performance yet in the gritty, hypnotic and deeply moving Joe. Read full review
88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Geoff PevereMay 2, 2014
None of this would work with anywhere near the power it does without Nicolas Cage, whom Green has smartly cast in this sometimes maddeningly erratic and ill-disciplined actor’s most perfectly suited role since "Leaving Las Vegas" and "Adaptation." Read full review
88
McClatchy-Tribune News ServiceRoger MooreApr 8, 2014
Joe is the movie that will make you remember how good Nicolas Cage once was and can be again. Read full review
83
IndieWireEric KohnSep 16, 2013
If Joe marks a new beginning for some of its characters, the same description applies to its director and star. Read full review
83
The PlaylistOliver LytteltonSep 16, 2013
It’s not exactly doing anything new, but it’s a muscular and textured piece of work that shifts assuredly through tones and genre, features a rich and rewarding performance from Cage, and another excellent turn from his young co-star Tye Sheridan. Read full review
80
EmpireDavid HughesJul 21, 2014
An understated Nicolas Cage — there’s a phrase you don’t get to write too often these days — anchors a superbly realised film, which, like its eponymous hero, has a brittle outer shell concealing a surprisingly warm heart. Read full review
80
New Orleans Times-PicayuneMike ScottMay 16, 2014
The result is intense and powerful, a full-color portrait of the importance of never surrendering. Read full review
80
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzApr 17, 2014
Cage is getting down and dirty again in Joe, and it's pretty remarkable — the performance more so than the film, and the film's good. Read full review
80
The New YorkerAnthony LaneApr 12, 2014
Yet Joe, directed by David Gordon Green, succeeds. Although Green's resume has been as up and down as that of his leading man, his eye for decay has rarely blurred; and now, you sense, he has come to the right place. [14 April 2014, p.87]
80
The New York TimesStephen HoldenApr 10, 2014
Mr. Cage gives his most committed performance in years as this divided soul, but it still looks like acting when compared with Mr. Poulter’s embodiment of pure evil. Read full review
80
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternApr 10, 2014
A beautiful film, shot by Tim Orr, that is elevated by Mr. Cage's stirring portrait of a violence-prone man who can't restrain himself from doing good. Read full review
80
Village VoiceAmy NicholsonApr 8, 2014
Joe is Cage's periodic reminder that he's one of his generation's great talents. Read full review
80
The DissolveNathan RabinApr 8, 2014
Joe’s brilliance doesn’t lie in its destination, but in the gripping, intense, surprisingly joyous and funny journey it takes to get there. Read full review
80
Film.comJordan HoffmanSep 16, 2013
Cage, not one known for subtlety of late, is truly great in this sad, funny and tender role. Read full review
80
The GuardianXan BrooksSep 16, 2013
Joe also stands as a reminder of what a terrific actor Cage can be when he is able to harness and channel his wilder impulses. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleMarjorie BaumgartenApr 9, 2014
As for the Austin-based Green, the director’s characteristically understated style is well-suited to this material. Joe recalls, in many ways, the filmmaker’s earliest features – "George Washington," "All the Real Girls," and "Undertow" – not to mention his heavily wooded last feature, "Prince Avalanche," films that capture a poetic sense of bewildered young people in the rural South. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaApr 11, 2014
This world feels studied in its "authenticity": the rusted GMC pickup, the tumbledown shack, the boozy brothel, and angry Joe Ransom guttin' deer and tending to his own gunshot wounds with a grimace and a bottle of alcohol. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter TraversApr 11, 2014
Sheridan, so good in "Mud" with Matthew McConaughey, excels here as a vulnerable sapling. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesBill StametsApr 10, 2014
Gripping and at times agonizing. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleApr 10, 2014
As Wade, Gary Poulter is the most authentic-looking old drunk you'll ever see onscreen - something I thought before I knew the story of his casting: Poulter was a homeless man who was recruited by a casting director. He'd never acted before, and yet he's remarkable in this. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezApr 10, 2014
Green’s movies rarely play out in conventional ways, and Joe, too, surprises in the end. Read full review
75
Portland OregonianMarc MohanApr 10, 2014
Joe works better as a study of character and environment than as the thriller it tries to become in its final act. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Apr 9, 2014
For two hours or so, he becomes a magnetic actor again, the same vibrant presence who wowed audiences with his work in "Leaving Las Vegas" and "Adaptation." He is, in these rare instances, just plain good. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyChris NashawatyApr 9, 2014
Both Cage and Sheridan (who shined opposite Matthew McConaughey in Mud) give true and at times tender performances. It's a shame the film lacks the same subtlety and force. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineDavid Lee DallasApr 6, 2014
Director David Gordon Green finds a balance between symbolism and realism in his storytelling that allows the film to be many things at once. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)David EdelsteinApr 11, 2014
You can be of two minds about the movie’s climax without shame. It’s galvanizing and, after all the accumulated tension, longed-for. And it’s too easy. And it’s rousingly well done. And it’s cheap. And that’s what makes the vigilante myth so vexing. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyApr 10, 2014
Though Joe occasionally slips and falters, the filmmakers and actors get all the hard-luck details right. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterDavid RooneySep 16, 2013
Where it really works is in Cage's bone-deep characterization of a man at war with himself. Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsApr 10, 2014
While Green is force-feeding us this hard-boiled hokum, he doesn’t distract us with many memorable images, as he did in his earliest films. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierApr 10, 2014
Joe and director David Gordon Green find a middle ground between the old, vulnerable Cage and the one that seemed to eat that other guy. Good to have him back. Read full review
60
Time OutKeith UhlichApr 8, 2014
Yet Green, as is his wont, too often strains for poetic effect through flowery voiceover and tone-deaf interactions — like those between Joe and his latest short-term girlfriend — that undercut the genuineness. Read full review
60
VarietyJustin ChangSep 16, 2013
A patiently observed, often unsettlingly violent drama that can’t help but feel overly familiar in some of its particulars, rich in rural texture but low on narrative momentum or surprise. Read full review
60
The TelegraphRobbie CollinSep 16, 2013
Joe represents a return to the independent-spirited storytelling that characterised Green’s early career. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle SmithApr 9, 2014
David Gordon Green’s Joe largely succeeds in immersing us in a rural world of cruelty, ugliness, decay, neglect and aggression, but if there is a point to it all, I couldn’t find it. Read full review
38
Boston GlobePeter KeoughApr 10, 2014
Joe is one more in the line of Southern Gothic miserabilism that includes “Winter’s Bone” and “Beasts of the Southern Wild,” films that many have praised but some find condescending. Read full review
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