Kill the Jockey
Music Box Films | Release Date: July 2, 2025 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
65
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 13 Critic Reviews
Positive:
8
Mixed:
5
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
RogerEbert.comCarlos AguilarJul 2, 2025
If the director’s spell has taken hold as presumably intended, by the time the most outlandish touches appear, one has already surrendered to its visceral, chaotic allure. Read full review
80
Screen DailyWendy IdeAug 29, 2024
Like its magnetic central character, the entertaining latest from Luis Ortega is fascinating: a playful, shape-shifting, questioning journey that refuses to be neatly pinned down. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineWilliam RepassJun 29, 2025
Kill the Jockey’s originality consists not just in taking the clichéd metaphor of rebirth literally, but in casually ratcheting that literalness to ever more fantastical degrees. Read full review
70
The Film VerdictStephen DaltonSep 5, 2024
This ebullient equestrian comedy thriller is effortlessly enjoyable as camp spectacle, with shades of Almodovar in the mix, even if its twist-heady screwball plot ultimately delivers more style than substance. Read full review
70
Screen RantAlex HarrisonAug 30, 2024
The cast deserves real credit for that, Biscayart especially. His physical expressiveness is truly extraordinary, and without his performance to transition us to the final act, Kill the Jockey doesn't succeed. Read full review
70
VarietyGuy LodgeAug 29, 2024
Awash with kooky gags and bolstered by the strange, soulful presence of leading man Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, it’s fun but flighty, liable to throw some viewers from the saddle. Read full review
67
IndieWireSophie Monks KaufmanAug 29, 2024
Kill the Jockey is an elusive and sometimes frustrating watch. It elides interpretation in ways both intentional and undercooked, flirts with a greatness that isn’t fully earned, yet it has some glorious moments and never unseats the viewer. Read full review
63
Movie NationRoger MooreAug 4, 2025
It’s not wholly coherent. But anyone in the mood for a quirky, absurdist farce with full frontal nudity, gunplay and a lost hero trying to fulfill his pregnant girlfriend’s deal-breaker request should check out Kill the Jockey (simply “El Jockey” in Argentina). Because surreal and screwy film fare like this is rare, with or without subtitles. Read full review
60
ColliderElisa GuimarãesJul 7, 2025
It works for about half an hour, but its excess of panache eventually gets tiring, and the story's seams are just too frail to hold it together. Still, those dance sequences are really something. Read full review
60
The GuardianXan BrooksAug 29, 2024
It’s too skimpy and self-conscious, more a series of gestures than an organic whole. But Ortega frames his action with a delicious high style, interspersing tense standoffs with formal dance sequences. He gives the impression that all his characters are locked in a bizarre hothouse romance, even when they are chasing or attempting to kill one another. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinAug 29, 2024
In the end, it all feels a bit like a fashion film or some other branded exercise in style — except that the brand is Ortega’s peculiar and unique vision. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerJul 10, 2025
It’s rare to say about a contemporary film, but maybe it could gain from a little didacticism, a little lecturing, a little clarity to ensure that its muddied purpose becomes clearer. Instead, its idiosyncrasies obscure its insights. Read full review
50
The New York TimesNatalia WinkelmanJul 2, 2025
The director, Luis Ortega, doesn’t give much reason to care about Remo’s conflict — the protagonist’s catatonia inspires the same in the viewer — and instead exhausts his efforts on a mannered blankness of style and mood. Read full review
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