Love
Alchemy | Release Date: October 30, 2015 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
51
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 27 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
20
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
SalonAndrew O'HehirOct 31, 2015
Even with its abundant flaws and its willingness to embarrass itself this strange and extraordinary film never lost me and never let me go; it wrapped me in a dreamlike rapture and then in a sense of profound and nearly universal personal tragedy. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comSimon AbramsOct 30, 2015
Love may not always be enjoyable, but it leaves an abiding mark. Read full review
75
HitfixGregory EllwoodMay 21, 2015
Love may not be as erotic as many expect. The gratuitous sex may eventually start to bore many viewers. Some may even take off their 3D glasses because they simply aren't necessary. Yet, for all its faults, Love is a film that somehow still resonates. Read full review
70
New York Magazine (Vulture)Bilge EbiriNov 2, 2015
This is not a rich, novelistic tapestry of humanity; this is a solipsistic world, enclosed on all sides by the director’s ego. But the entrapment is vivid and poignant. Look past all the beautiful people fucking, and you realize that Love is sad in all the right ways. Read full review
67
The PlaylistJessica KiangMay 21, 2015
While the sexuality is pushed far too far for mainstream audiences, it's also true that Noe's conception of sentiment and romance pulls the film back from being truly transgressive about its gender or sexuality politics. Read full review
60
EmpireDamon WiseNov 16, 2015
The acting is wooden, but fans of the director’s more shocking work might enjoy its gentle self-referential comedy. Read full review
60
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlOct 27, 2015
The couplings have an artful intensity lacking in pornography, which favors athleticism and disconnectedness, and the lighting — well, the best thing in the movie is the look of it all, which in a tony sex-flick counts for a lot. Read full review
60
CineVueJohn BleasdaleMay 22, 2015
Though an entertaining-enough stab at a new kind of orgiastic extravaganza, Noé's Love is so mired in its own hang-ups and conservative gender views that it never gets past the first stroke. Read full review
60
Time Out LondonDave CalhounMay 21, 2015
In the end, Love is more silly than sordid, and even a little soppy in its late – too late – love-filled moments. Many teens will love it; most adults will roll their eyes. Read full review
60
VarietyPeter DebrugeMay 21, 2015
Given the escalating ambition of Noe’s oeuvre and the pornographic promo materials teased in advance of the pic’s Cannes premiere, who would have thought that Love would ultimately prove to be Noe’s tamest film? Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawMay 21, 2015
It’s hardcore, yet much softer-core than Noé’s earlier movies, without the terrifying shock factor of Irréversible and Seul Contre Tous, and without the visual brilliance of Enter the Void, and Love is preposterous and badly acted and talky in a way that porn films haven’t been since they were designed to be shown in cinemas. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinMay 21, 2015
If the metrics by which you want to measure Love are its brute sexiness and technical panache, then the film is indeed rather extraordinary. Thanks to Noe's regular collaborator Benoit Debie (who also shot such recent visually bravura films as Spring Breakers and Lost River), Love contains some of the prettiest shagging scenes in cinematic history. Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyJoe McGovernOct 29, 2015
The big draw should be 3-D, which enhances the visual intimacy, though only in shooting a male orgasm does Noé go gonzo with the format. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyOct 29, 2015
Love, a movie with very little to say about relationships and even less to say about sex, is somehow one of the most interesting attempts any filmmaker has made in recent years at conveying the experience of memory. Read full review
58
IndieWireEric KohnMay 21, 2015
Love plays out like the fragmented outline for a more engaging movie. But the one found here lacks substance both on the level of story and graphic reveals. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleJosh KupeckiNov 11, 2015
Love is a maddeningly myopic film, mainly due to Murphy's squarely white-male heteronormative experience. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleNov 5, 2015
When Love works, Noé achieves a lulling, melancholic frenzy about sex and memory, but the foundation isn't strong enough to make his movie ever seem more than a stereoscopic fermata: one envelope-pushing note held way too long. Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperNov 5, 2015
An artfully shot and occasionally provocative but ultimately underwhelming and self-indulgent film. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleDavid LewisNov 5, 2015
A little more character dimension would have made these between-the-sheet sessions a lot more charged. Read full review
50
New York PostLou LumenickOct 29, 2015
For all of its in-your-face, full-frontal sex scenes and threesomes (one involving a transsexual), this autobiographical story is almost sweet. Read full review
45
TheWrapInkoo KangNov 5, 2015
Love feels deeply, but not complexly. Both Murphy and Noé’s sustained sex scenes understand want and need, but there’s little to invest in emotionally. Read full review
42
Portland OregonianJeff BakerNov 5, 2015
There's plenty of sweat but no blood or tears in Love. Without talented actors or a compelling story, it's not love. It's just sex. Read full review
40
The New York TimesJeannette CatsoulisOct 29, 2015
As if all its artistic energy had been gobbled up by the fornication, Love has nothing left with which to build its characters or set them in motion. Read full review
40
Screen DailyJonathan RomneyMay 21, 2015
Despite early frissons from the very game lead trio, the overall effect is a lugubrious turn-off. In its spacily numb longueurs, Love effectively invents a new, singularly unsatisfying genre: chill-out porn. Read full review
40
The TelegraphRobbie CollinMay 21, 2015
So if the sex is such a ball, what’s wrong with Love? The answer, unfortunately, is absolutely everything else, of which there’s more than you might initially expect. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineEd GonzalezOct 26, 2015
Gaspar Noé's lack of self-investigation merely situates the film as a libidinal advertisement for a tantrum-prone filmmaker's delayed adulthood. Read full review
25
Washington PostStephanie MerryNov 5, 2015
Good camerawork only goes so far. Love drags on and on, alternating between arguments and intimacy, breakups and makeups. The movie never passes the authenticity test; if this is what sex feels like, we’ll all soon be extinct. Read full review
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