L'Auberge Espagnole
Fox Searchlight Pictures | Release Date: May 16, 2003 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
65
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 31 Critic Reviews
Positive:
22
Mixed:
6
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
40
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
A dodgy, hit-or-miss affair that never quiet seems to gel: too many lumpy bits, and not enough crème. Read full review
88
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
L’Auberge Espagnole (The Spanish Hotel) is unexpectedly entertaining because it captures the point in young adulthood when life is unseriously serious, or maybe seriously unserious. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy Burr
The movie also rather sweetly suggests that the apartment being shared is Europe itself. There's a reason this warm, stylish human comedy was a big hit all across the Continent: It conveys a new generation's conviction that borders no longer matter. Read full review
38
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
Movies can certainly be worse than bad sitcoms, and this is one of them. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJennifer Vanasco
The film is a pleasant ramble through an eventful year. Klapisch's special effects--cameras speeding down hallways, superimposed images--are both amusing and annoying. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The movie is as light and frothy as a French comedy, which is what it is, a reminder that Cedric Klapisch also directed "When the Cat's Away" (1996). Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneAllison Benedikt
Klapisch frequently uses voiceovers to express Xavier’s thoughts, and Duris expresses those thoughts beautifully, with a quirky open face, tuned perfectly to whatever his character is thinking. Read full review
80
Dallas ObserverGregory Weinkauf
Writer-director-actor Cedric Klapisch simultaneously shows great moviemaking flair and reveals a very peculiar worldview. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
The atmosphere of gentle communal chaos is authentic enough to become the movie's dramatic center. Read full review
70
L.A. WeeklyElla Taylor
The characters are well-observed and mercifully unrepresentative of their home countries. (Kevin Bishop is laugh-out-loud funny as a clueless British visitor who shows up to offend more than one national sensibility.) Read full review
80
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
Exhilarating comedy...Its warm, embracing spirit is refreshing in these divisive times. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Best of all, L'Auberge Espagnol uses Barcelona as a veritable character, a picturesque, vivacious place where, as one character puts it, ''No one eats before 10 p.m." Read full review
50
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
Beware of movies whose creators boast of the little effort involved. Little reward is what you're likely to get. Read full review
50
New York PostLou Lumenick
At times, writer-director Cedric Klapsich seems to be trying to copy the frestyle of "Amelie," but L'Auberge achieves only a fraction of its charm. Read full review
88
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
A love song to the new Europe (Klapisch's original title: Euro Pudding) and a snapshot of a polyglot gang on the cusp of kind-of-reckless youth and responsibility-burdened adulthood. Read full review
58
Portland OregonianKim Morgan
While breezy and fun, the film is also flimsy and sloppy in style and content. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
A lighthearted, good-natured motion picture that contains enough humor to leaven the tone and keep the drama from becoming too serious. Read full review
30
SalonCharles Taylor
Klapisch wants his characters shiny bright, and winds up making them excruciatingly dull in the process. Watching L'Auberge Espagnole is like seeing the young Maoist revolutionaries of Jean-Luc Godard's 1967 "La Chinoise" body-snatched by the international touring company of "Up With People." Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalle
Does a beautiful job of capturing that mood -- the exuberance and wistfulness of one man's last year of youthful irresponsibility before joining the rat race. Read full review
83
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
This community finds its balance with an easy effortlessness. Read full review
80
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
Not since Lukas Moodysson's "Together" has communal living been depicted with such warmth and feeling for the entire ensemble. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
A film whose limitations are the same as its appeal: It's a bauble. Running at barely more than 80 minutes, the film is both a travelogue and a commercial for swinging polyglot Europe. Read full review
60
The New RepublicStanley Kauffmann
The pace is fairly hectic, which it needs to be. (Mustn't linger on bubbles.) The performances are warm, especially the tender Judith Godrèche as the doctor's wife. Read full review
70
The New York TimesDana Stevens
Presents an appealing and persuasive picture of European integration, in which national differences, which once sparked military and political conflict, are preserved because they make life sexier and more interesting. Read full review
80
The New YorkerDavid Denby
Vignettish and offhand, but it’s extremely pleasant, and it suggests what can be done with lightweight equipment and a loose-limbed approach to the right subject. [19 May 2003, p. 94]
60
TV Guide MagazineKen Fox
The real stars of the film are Francois Emmanuelli's vibrant production design, Klapisch's flair with inventive optical effects and above all Barcelona itself, captured here in all its baroque brilliance. Read full review
75
USA TodayClaudia Puig
It energetically captures the frenzied pace of contemporary existence, the complexities of life in a multicultural world, the rootless joys of living in a foreign city and the heady world of possibilities one envisions while in college. Read full review
30
Village VoiceJessica Winter
Cédric Klapisch has been compared to Truffaut, but the new-waver's weakness for glib sentimentalism seems to have left the biggest impression on L'Auberge Espagnole. Read full review
90
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
Blissfully funny, terrifically intelligent and tender when you least expect it to be.
90
Washington PostMichael O'Sullivan
In almost every way that I can think of, L'Auberge Espagnole is a perfect movie... It is a film that feels alive. Read full review
90
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
It's an exhilarating, funny, very sweet movie. Read full review
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