Mojave
A24 | Release Date: January 22, 2016 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
41
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 23 Critic Reviews
Positive:
6
Mixed:
8
Negative:
9
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRichard RoeperJan 21, 2016
This movie soars on the strength of the screenplay. Monahan gives Hedlund and in particular Isaac dozens upon dozens of rich, intricate lines, and they’re both up to the task and then some. Isaac is an actor who is not afraid to go big or go home, but in Mojave, his finest moments are relatively quiet and sublime. Every inch of his performance is pure excellence. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreJan 12, 2016
The players and their flinty, smart dialogue make this lean movie the screen equivalent of bleached bones in the desert sand — bones with just enough meat on them to lure us in. Read full review
70
TimeStephanie ZacharekJan 23, 2016
Mojave’s real reason for existing is the wiry, woolly dialogue that Monahan has spun out for his actors. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleJan 21, 2016
Prickly, suspenseful, even coolly humorous, Mojave finds noirish fun in the existential woes of a successful artist and old-fashioned movie pleasure in the parry and thrust of sharp dialogue. Read full review
67
IndieWireCasey CiprianiApr 23, 2015
The overarching problem with Mojave is that the two tones don't mesh well together, to the point where it seems Monaghan can't decide if he wants to make an ominous neo-western or a dark satire. Fortunately, the filmmaker's committed lead actors make some of the storytelling issues bearable. Read full review
63
RogerEbert.comGlenn KennyJan 22, 2016
To his credit, the writer-director maintains a pretty decent balance between his disgust with this Business We Call Show and the movie’s thriller mechanics, which are not entirely well-engineered but do chug along to a not-unsatisfying climax. Read full review
60
The New York TimesManohla DargisJan 21, 2016
Does it add up? Not really, but it passes the time nicely, working best when Mr. Monahan keeps it vague and off-kilter as his characters roam among the Hollywood ghosts. Read full review
58
The PlaylistRodrigo PerezApr 22, 2015
A weird, uneven mixed bag, there’s much about Mojave that’s paradoxically maddening and doesn’t really add up. As the movie plot becomes less interesting and more straight-forward — like a slasher movie with the evil antagonist character slowly closing in on the hero — it becomes funnier and more purely enjoyable. Read full review
50
St. Louis Post-DispatchCalvin WilsonJan 21, 2016
In a small role as a self-absorbed film producer, Mark Wahlberg is touchingly effective. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle SmithJan 20, 2016
Mojave is a movie-length standoff between two detestable villains. One is a serial killer. The other is a filmmaker. Read full review
50
Screen DailyDavid D'ArcyApr 22, 2015
Humor does provide some welcome relief from the heaviness of Mohave’s script. Read full review
42
The A.V. ClubIgnatiy VishnevetskyJan 20, 2016
By turns inert and logorrheic, William Monahan’s pseudo-intellectual nut-scratcher Mojave is a movie of barely furnished mansions and lens flare-speckled landscapes. Read full review
40
Time Out LondonKate LloydMar 21, 2016
It might have made a good episode of ‘Entourage’, but as a full-length feature it misses the mark. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckApr 22, 2015
In a simpler form, Mojave might have been a gripping if minor genre film. Instead, it's undone by the sort of pretentious overwriting that might have seemed impressive in the '70s but now comes across as merely forced. Read full review
38
Philadelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniJan 23, 2016
It would better to call it Two Actors in Search of a Story. Read full review
38
The Seattle TimesMoira MacdonaldJan 23, 2016
In the cast, only Isaac makes a vivid impression, in a swaggery, relaxed turn that seems to imply that he’s in on the joke, or at least having a good time. Read full review
30
Wall Street JournalJoe MorgensternJan 21, 2016
Like the high desert that provides its main setting, William Monahan’s Mojave is dry, often windy and full of hot air. Read full review
30
Village VoiceAlan ScherstuhlJan 21, 2016
Is Mojave's twisty purposelessness showing how producers ruin the work of screenwriters, or is it evidence that screenwriters often need another set of eyes? Read full review
30
VarietyScott TobiasJan 20, 2016
Monahan isn’t required to satisfy bloodlust or to pay off conventional plot points, even if his screenplay for “The Departed” displayed an abundant talent for doing so. But he assumes too much in believing that the audience will connect in any way with a sour, prickly narcissist who’s trapped in the gilded cage of wealth and fame. Read full review
25
Boston GlobePeter KeoughJan 28, 2016
In his second directorial effort, Mojave, Monahan has no such map to follow, and he wanders in a land of sophomoric pretentiousness and banal profundities. Read full review
25
Slant MagazineChuck BowenJan 18, 2016
With the film, director William Monahan offers audiences a bundle of fetishes dressed up as an existentialist thriller about the class system. Read full review
0
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzFeb 14, 2016
Isaac pulls a full Tom Hardy by adopting a weirdo voice, awkward mannerisms and unknown motivations in a bid to give life to a villain who is, in his own words, pure “motiveless malignancy.” It doesn’t work, nor does anything else in this so-bad-it’s-good-no-wait-still-bad mess from William Monahan. Read full review
0
ObserverRex ReedJan 20, 2016
Mojave is 93 minutes of gibberish with guns and phony literary pretentiousness about two thugs in a duel of weapons and words that goes nowhere fast. Read full review
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