Mrs. Miniver

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) | Release Date: June 4, 1942

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

77	METASCORE Generally favorable reviews based on 15 Critic Reviews

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

100

Josh Larsen

Under the direction of Wyler, who is working from a novel by Jan Struther and won a Best Director Oscar for his efforts, this ultimately becomes a portrait of a community. Read full review

100

Bosley Crowther

Certainly it is the finest film yet made about the present war, and a most exalting tribute to the British, who have taken it gallantly. Read full review

100

ColliderJulia Harari

As an example of artistic propaganda, a film that drives home a message while maintaining creative credibility, it remains second to none. Read full review

100

IndieWireCharles Bramesco

An increasingly loud world may have made the quiet truths of "Mrs. Miniver" seem small - tune out the noise and hear what this film is saying. It's a roadmap for how dignity and freedom can survive. Read full review

100

Kate Cameron

As the story unreels, one can feel the warmth of the writers' and director's hearts for their subject and inspired playing of the cast. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

Mrs. Miniver is that almost impossible feat, a great war picture that photographs the inner meaning, instead of the outward realism of World War II. Read full review

James Berardinelli

Despite being filmed far from where it is set, the authenticity of the situations and emotions is unmistakable. Read full review

Michael Wilmington

This is perhaps the quintessential stiff-upper-lip homefront drama, with Minivers Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon at their noblest, Teresa Wright at her most adolescently angelic and assorted English-Hollywood expatriates (Dame May Whitty, Reginald Owen, Peter Lawford) at their hardiest. [11 Oct 1996, p.J]

Herb Golden

Superbly catching the warmth and feeling of Jan Struther’s characters in her best-selling book of sketches, “Mrs. Miniver,” Metro has created out of it a poignant story of the joys and sorrows, the humor and pathos of middle-class family life in wartime England. Read full review

EmpireDavid Parkinson

Winning WW II story of british pluck that manages to side-step the propaganda trap. Read full review

Matthew Gilbert

As a piece of nostalgia, "Mrs. Miniver" will carry you into a world gone by when war movies promoted community and not fragmentation. [16 Oct 1992, p.38]

Susan King

1942's Mrs. Miniver seems dated in today's contemporary world. Nevertheless, it's still an inspiring, well-made, patriotic drama. [05 Jan 1997, p.4]

Tom Milne

Classic soap opera in which good old British understatement has a field day, everybody is frightfully nice, and sentimentality is wrapped up in yards of tasteful gloss. Read full review

Dave Kehr

The film (and Garson’s stiff-backed, Academy Award-winning performance in particular) has dated very badly; it’s difficult now to see the qualities that wartime audiences found so assuring. Read full review

Pauline Kael

M-G-M's wartime salute to gallant England, engineered to make the audience choke up.