Mogul Mowgli
Strand Releasing | Release Date: September 3, 2021 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
71
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 27 Critic Reviews
Positive:
21
Mixed:
5
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Wall Street JournalJohn AndersonSep 3, 2021
Acting may be a collaborative art form, but Mr. Ahmed also flies solo with considerable grace. Read full review
90
Film ThreatAli ArkaniJul 20, 2021
Mogul Mowgli elegantly deals with essential issues while remaining entertaining. Read full review
88
ObserverEmily ZemlerSep 2, 2021
This is an intimate story, sometimes uncomfortably so, but it’s also an expansive one, about whether our societies allow people to live outside prescribed boxes and whether it accepts them when they do. Read full review
83
IndieWireSiddhant AdlakhaSep 5, 2021
Ahmed exudes a never-before-seen vulnerability, both physically and emotionally. Read full review
83
The PlaylistRobert DanielsSep 5, 2021
Tariq’s Mogul Mowgli is enrapturing, revelatory, and at all times, a nightmarish accounting of the bonds that make us, but can easily break us as well. Read full review
83
Original-CinKaren GordonAug 31, 2021
The movie jumps between reality and fantasy, and its device, Zed’s autoimmune disease, where the body is literally rejecting itself, is perhaps a bit of an obvious metaphor for Zed rejecting his cultural roots. But strong, heartfelt and sincere performances, especially by Ahmed and Kahn draw us in. Read full review
80
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Aparita BhandariSep 5, 2021
Using Toba Tek Singh as a recurring narrative device is sublime, for those who understand the reference and the burden it carries. Read full review
80
SlashfilmHoai-Tran BuiSep 5, 2021
Mogul Mowgli is an imperfect exploration of cultural identity and generational trauma, but in its messiness and chaos, it feels all the more genuine. Read full review
80
The New York TimesA.O. ScottSep 2, 2021
With the director of photography (Annika Summerson) and the sound designer (Paul Davies), Tariq stitches domestic drama, satire and magical realism into a tissue of moods and meanings, held together by the shattering credibility of Ahmed’s performance. Read full review
80
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeAug 25, 2021
This is abrasive, confrontational film-making, with a machine-gun assault of ideas and influences. Read full review
80
Time OutStephen A. RussellAug 25, 2021
Ahmed is at his best in Zed’s darkest hour, as he struggles to hold it together in a hospital cubicle. It’s blistering stuff. Read full review
80
EmpireHanna FlintOct 26, 2020
Culturally rich and emotionally raw, Mogul Mowgli is a brilliant showcase for Riz Ahmed’s bevy of talents, and speaks visceral truth to the British-South Asian experience so rarely explored on screen. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comRoxana HadadiSep 3, 2021
A simultaneously deeply personal and sometimes-opaque cinematic experience that often feels like walking through memories—messy, malleable—in search of an intrinsic inner truth. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChroniclePam GradyAug 31, 2021
Tariq began his career as a documentary filmmaker, and now he has made a drama that rings with truth, about a musician’s ambition, a son’s relationship with his father and how the immigrant experience shapes following generations. Read full review
75
Paste MagazineJacob OllerAug 31, 2021
Ahmed’s intimate performance and Tariq’s intense framing lend Mogul Mowgli a raw power that’s heady, heavy and a little heavy-handed. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineWes GreeneAug 30, 2021
The film’s poignancy derives from its profound understanding of its main character’s identity crisis. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesCarlos AguilarSep 3, 2021
Though not all its gyrating parts and magical realist flourishes congeal, this feverish visual parlance rouses. Read full review
70
Screen DailyWendy IdeFeb 28, 2020
While the picture doesn’t quite maintain its vigorous energy through to the very end, it is still a satisfyingly knotty exploration of the bi-cultural experience. Read full review
70
VarietyGuy LodgeFeb 28, 2020
Outside of Ahmed’s seething, spitting, can’t-look-away performance, Mogul Mowgli is a sparsely scripted but scratchily atmospheric culture-clash drama that runs on some quite traditional father-son melodramatics. But considering the film outside the performance would be a mistake. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleRichard WhittakerSep 9, 2021
The audience is thrown into Zed’s world (or rather, worlds), and it’s Ahmed’s astounding performance that provides the through line. It’s OK to be lost, because Zed is. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubVikram MurthiSep 2, 2021
Ahmed can’t sand over all of the flaws through sheer charisma. But with him at center, the movie is always watchable, even in its imperfections. Read full review
60
CineVueMatthew AndersonAug 25, 2021
A film that is chock full of insight, piercing ideas and visual metaphors that unfortunately are never fully realised. Read full review
60
The TelegraphTim RobeyAug 25, 2021
For all its occasional fumbling, Mogul Mowgli fully justifies its existence in every bristling detail of Ahmed’s performance, which never plays as self-pitying so much as impatient and hotly aggrieved. Read full review
60
The GuardianPeter BradshawFeb 28, 2020
It is a deeply personal drama about culture, family, community and what it means to represent – though it can also be self-indulgent and even a bit self-involved, though this is arguably a function of the story. Read full review
60
The Hollywood ReporterStephen DaltonFeb 28, 2020
Handsome and intense, Ahmed is a reliably magnetic screen presence, while his punchy real-life chops as a rapper and lyricist also serve him well here. But his screenwriting skills are less assured, and Mogul Mowgli is strangely low on dramatic or emotional bite given its high-stakes storyline. Baggy editing, underexplained context and flat dialogue add to this muted effect. Read full review
58
The Film StageEthan VestbySep 2, 2021
For something that deals with assimilation, disability, and art in one fell swoop, it’s disappointing that the experience of watching Mogul Mowgli seems no deeper than reading a plot synopsis. Read full review
30
TheWrapSimon AbramsSep 2, 2021
The canned British character study Mogul Mowgli disappoints on a few levels, especially given its admirable focus on authenticity and cultural identity in a kitchen-sink drama about Zed (Riz Ahmed), an aspiring British Pakistani rapper. Read full review
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