Machine Gun Preacher
Relativity Media | Release Date: September 23, 2011 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
43
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 32 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
20
Negative:
7
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
Boxoffice MagazinePete HammondSep 17, 2011
The exploitation title may not do it any favors, but this biopic based on the incredible life journey of Sam Childers is gripping, inspirational and well told. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubTasha RobinsonSep 21, 2011
Machine Gun Preacher is stirring when it presents Childers as a hero, but it does its most impressive work when it addresses him as a flawed, struggling, but still determined man. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterKirk HoneycuttSep 17, 2011
One can't escape the nagging feeling that the film doesn't dig deeply enough into its real-life hero. The film doesn't explore all those "whys" and "whats." Read full review
63
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsOct 7, 2011
If you'd pay to see a film called "Hotel Rwanda: Maniac Manager," you might be receptive to this mixed-message movie, but skeptics should keep one eye on the exit. Read full review
63
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliSep 30, 2011
The action sequences are energetic and suspenseful but they don't always mesh well with the dramatic material. Read full review
60
EmpireDavid HughesOct 31, 2011
It's gratifying to see Butler giving a proper acting role the old college try. Despite his best efforts, Forster's film, while pulling no punches, still somehow manages to miss the mark. Read full review
60
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzSep 29, 2011
Director Marc Forster moves from one thing to the next so quickly the movie plays like a two-hour-plus trailer. Something feels like it's missing here, even at that length. Read full review
60
Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeySep 22, 2011
If anything, watching the film is like attending an old-style Southern tent revival - you want to believe in the fight against all that fire and brimstone. Heck, you want to join the righteous brigade. But when the lights go up and the fever dies down, it feels more like you've witnessed a show than a real showdown with the devil. Read full review
50
Orlando SentinelRoger MooreOct 12, 2011
The movie never convinces us that Forster is convinced himself. The director lines up this bad good man in his sights, but he never quite has the nerve quite to pull the trigger. Read full review
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick GroenSep 29, 2011
At the end of these "based on a true story" flicks, it's customary to flash photos of the real people over the end credits. There, Sam Childers looks older and less handsome and awfully imposing, a scary sort of cat with raw but authentic tales to tell. I'd like to hear them. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleSep 29, 2011
Is he a hero or a lunatic? He's possibly neither, or possibly a little of both, but this is the problem with making a movie about a real person. Read full review
50
Boston GlobeTy BurrSep 29, 2011
Machine Gun Preacher is crude and ham-handed from its ridiculous title on down, but it still gets to some interesting places. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaSep 29, 2011
By the end of Machine Gun Preacher, its title character has become a cartoon. Read full review
50
Chicago ReaderJ.R. JonesSep 29, 2011
He's a fascinating character (even in the person of Gerard Butler), but his conversion from drug-crazed bruiser to psalm-singing family man is so swift and unconvincing that the movie is hobbled from the start. It becomes more engrossing once Childers finds his mission in Africa. Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertSep 28, 2011
He seems fueled more by anger and ego than spirituality and essentially abandons his family to play with his guns. It's intriguing, however, how well Butler enlists our sympathy for the character. Read full review
50
Christian Science MonitorPeter RainerSep 23, 2011
Director Marc Forster and screenwriter Jason Keller take the easy way out by turning Childers into a Bible-thumping Rambo. Just because the Childers of this movie is not, to put it mildly, introspective, is no reason why the filmmakers had to be equally dense. Read full review
50
The New York TimesA.O. ScottSep 22, 2011
In movie terms, Mr. Childers's story is too true to be good. Machine Gun Preacher, directed by Marc Forster and starring Gerard Butler, illustrates some of the ways that a terrific story can turn into a bad film despite the best intentions of everyone involved. Read full review
50
IndieWireEric KohnSep 22, 2011
The action scenes in Machine Gun Preacher work fine on their own, but they cheapen a work that attempts to command great importance. Read full review
50
MovielineAlison WillmoreSep 22, 2011
Gerard Butler, who's honed his screen persona as a brutish, charismatic jerk, isn't a bad fit for the role of Sam, even if he's more believable spraying bullets and stabbing hitchhikers than he is delivering a sermon. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineEd GonzalezSep 21, 2011
Marc Forster regards the real-life Childers's evolution from heroin-addicted, wife-beating (implied), gun-toting oblivion to born-again do-gooderism with motorized aloofness. Read full review
50
Village VoiceMelissa AndersonSep 20, 2011
Machine Gun Preacher is the umpteenth onscreen iteration of a white savior aiding the most desperate in Africa. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovOct 5, 2011
With its combustible mix of high-octane action and Christian faith, and an overall vibe that falls somewhere between bloodthirsty nihilism and an unshakable belief in the twinned powers of religious redemption and obsession, Machine Gun Preacher is certainly the strangest examination of grace under AK-47 fire to merit a mainstream release in ages. Read full review
40
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierSep 23, 2011
The result is far too high-and-mighty to truly be moving. Read full review
40
Time OutDavid FearSep 20, 2011
Childers's varied, charitable life story warrants a movie, but whether that means it's okay to simply mash up sappy Christian piety and action-movie chaos is highly debatable. Read full review
40
VarietyJustin ChangSep 17, 2011
While the result is yet another story of African suffering told from a white do-gooder's perspective, this particular do-gooder is intrinsically fascinating enough to warrant attention, albeit more nuanced attention than he receives here. Read full review
38
Chicago TribuneMichael PhillipsSep 29, 2011
The events of the movie may be a little bit true, or a lot, but hardly any of it plays that way. Read full review
38
USA TodayClaudia PuigSep 23, 2011
Machine Gun Preacher has a lot more wrong with it than a bullet-riddled premise. It is yet another iteration of the big, strong white man who comes to save legions of poor anonymous black Africans. Read full review
38
New York PostKyle SmithSep 23, 2011
In Machine Gun Preacher, Gerard Butler says, "I've done a lot of things I'm not proud of that hurt a lot of people." But enough about "The Bounty Hunter," "The Ugly Truth" and "P.S. I Love You." Read full review
30
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternSep 22, 2011
The failure lies not with the film's director, Marc Forster, nor with its impressive star, Gerard Butler, but with Jason Keller's dreadfully earnest script, which charts the hero's spiritual journey, and his Rambo-esque exploits, without offering a scintilla of mature perspective on his state of mind. Read full review
25
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallOct 5, 2011
Machine Gun Preacher comes alive only when Sam is pulling a trigger, which is most of the second hour. You can find the same thrill from watching a grindhouse descendant like "The Expendables" on cable TV. Read full review
25
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanSep 29, 2011
It gets the bullet points of Sam Childers's life, but misses the target. Read full review
25
Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanSep 21, 2011
The title, Machine Gun Preacher, makes it sound like a piece of grindhouse kitsch - and by the time it's over, you'll be thinking, ''If only!'' Read full review
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